Chapter 7: Phoebe's POV
I was walking on air as I strode towards the main building of Las Vegas College Prep wearing Caroline's dress. It was long on her, I suppose, but since she was short it only came to my knees. What made me really happy about the dress though, was that it had a cherry print. Even though it was far from what I would usually wear, it was nice, and it reminded me even more of her.
I walked towards my locker and grabbed my books for the day. Since it was Tuesday, I had math and jazz band in the morning, PE, and health in the afternoon. This meant that at some point, I would have to change out of Caroline's dress and into my gym clothes. But that point wasn't now, so I would enjoy the feeling while it lasted.
After I got the books for my morning classes, I headed towards my first class of the day: Math. Usually, I would be able to practice music first, but with my… late start. I didn't have any time. Usually, I would be disappointed, but at this point, I didn't care.
Once I got to math, I noticed that there was a substitute teacher, which meant that Dr. Micheals had just left us some review work. Sure enough, there were two worksheets on everyone's desk, with classical music playing softly through the room. Dr. Micheals always put on music while we worked, because he said it helped us focus, and it certainly helped me.
I sat down at my desk and started on the two worksheets as Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata filled the room. They were on exponential growth and logarithms, which we had gone over last class. It only took me a few minutes to solve them, though, so for the rest of the class, I just read my book on "Profiling" as music hummed through the air. It really was becoming an excellent day.
My peace was interrupted about half an hour later when the bell rang, signaling us to go to our next class.
I walked quickly to the band room because it was on the other side of the school. It was its own building, separated from everything because of the sheer amount of noise emitted. I wasn't technically "in" the band because grandmother didn't think it was important and no amount of piano playing at Bennington would be able to pay the fees necessary. But, Dr. Blake let me in the class to mentor other kids in various instruments, because I was from New Orleans and knew how to play the piano, saxophone, and trumpet.
But to my befuddlement, Mr. Blake wasn't here.
He never missed class, ever. I looked around and noticed how my classmates shared the feeling.
"Do you know what could have happened?" someone asked me, and I looked up. It was Ella Jones, a fellow sophomore who played the trumpet.
"No idea, but it must be something serious," I replied, before setting my bag down on the risers.
"It must be," Ella agreed, before continuing, "I like your dress, by the way. It looks nice on you!"
"Thanks! I, uh, got it at a thrift store" I responded, not knowing whether or not to tell Ella about Caroline. I had never spoken to the girl this much, only a few times while I was tutoring her on the trumpet. She was pretty, with shoulder-length brunette hair, and almond eyes.
"Cool!" she responded brightly, before continuing in a meek tone, "Do you think you could help me with math though? You finished your work so quickly…" she trailed off.
I smiled at her before accepting. I had forgotten that we were in the same math class.
Once I helped Ella with a few problems, she got the hang of them. Once she did one by herself, she looked up at me with pride in her eyes.
"Good job!" I encouraged her, before noticing the shocked look on her face, eyes aimed above my shoulder. Slowly I turned around, only to see a horrifying sight.
Jeremy Jacobs was standing behind me, covered in blood and holding a knife, a predatory smile on his face.
I screamed, which broke Ella out of her shocked trance and she ran behind the risers, along with the rest of the class, and I joined her. But before we could sit down, like the rest of the kids were doing, he spoke.
"Phoebe, come out come out wherever you are," he said in a singsong voice and I felt my blood turn to ice.
"Ella, listen to me. Call Dr. Spencer Reid on my phone, and have someone else call the cops on theirs. I'm going to try and distract him," I whispered, before giving her the phone and standing up. I could only hope she would do it.
I walked to the front of the risers, steeling myself for what was about to happen.
"What do you want Jeremy?" I asked in a shaky voice. But he didn't listen.
"Do you want to know what I did to Mr. Blake?" he asked, before lunging towards me and grabbing my wrist in a viselike grip. He pulled me towards the director's office before pulling the door open and forcing me to look inside.
Inside of his office, sitting on his chair, was Mr. Blake. But he was dead, his body almost white from all the blood that he had lost, blood that was pooled under his chair. His head looked near decapitated.
I screamed. Jeremy had murdered Mr. Blake. Jeremy was covered in Mr. Blake's blood. Jeremy was still holding my arm. He was pressing himself against me. Mr. Blake's blood was on me. I faintly heard him laughing as he pulled me away from the door.
Jeremy Jacobs was absolutely insane.
"What do you want from me?" I pleaded, but that only made him laugh harder. I continued anyway, hoping maybe if I appealed to him he wouldn't hurt me, "I'll do anything!"
"Anything?" he paused, and for a second I thought that it worked.
"Then die," he said, before stabbing my torso and twisting the knife, before pulling it out of the wound. The pain was the worst I had ever felt, and I could feel the life draining out of me as the blood flowed, but I kept conscious.
"I'm going to enjoy watching you die," Jeremy said, before laughing maniacally.
This is how I was going to die. In the band room, wearing my girlfriend's dress, after being stabbed by a maniac who wouldn't stop laughing.
The laughing stopped, and I heard a loud thud.
I looked up and saw Jeremy being held down by Edward, a freshman who was on the wrestling team. Jeremy struggled, but Edward punched him in the face and he was out cold.
Ella came rushing over and gasped when she saw me.
"I'm sorry we didn't stop him sooner," she said, but it was hard to convince them. I called Dr. Reid and Edward called the cops and EMS, help is on the way"
"It's okay, Ella," I said, even though it really wasn't. "Could you keep pressure on the wound, and give me my phone?" I asked weakly. She said yes, though I could see how hard it was for her.
"Thank you," I said after she handed me the phone. I pressed 1, and it automatically dialed Ethan.
"Phoebe? Is that you? Aren't you in school right now? What's up?" he said over the phone, growing more and more frantic. I would have chuckled if it didn't hurt.
"I'm sorry if I'm bothering you-" Ella gave me a look that, in essence, told me it didn't matter if he was bothered because I just got stabbed.
"You're not bothering me, sweetie, what's up?" he asked again, this time calmer.
"I just got stabbed and I wanted to let you know that I love you," I said, almost crying. It was surreal, saying goodbye to the closest thing to a father I had ever had.
"YOU'VE BEEN WHAT?" he yelled, and I had to hold my phone away from my ear.
"Stabbed, dad," I said, blushing at the slip.
He paused.
"I'll be there as soon as I can, Dovey," he said, before hanging up, probably to talk to his manager. If that was how he reacted, I was almost scared to tell Caroline. Grandmother wouldn't care, she never did.
Suddenly, I heard someone burst through the door. Ella looked up and muttered "Oh thank god," before the room descended into chaos.
The FBI were the first over to us, and one of them- a buff black dude- nodded at Ethan in thanks before handcuffing the still unconscious Ethan and carrying him out of the room. Some of them went over to talk to the other kids, get their accounts, I suppose. Dr. Reid, though, stayed next to me, with a horrified expression on his face.
"I'm so sorry this happened," he said. I nodded weakly before EMT's loaded me onto a stretcher.
"By the way, Dr. Reid?" I said, and he looked at me.
"Mr. Blake is dead in his office," I said, and he nodded. Ella looked even more shaken up.
"We're gonna get you help, Phoebe," he said in response, placing a comforting hand on my wrist- the one Jeremy didn't grab.
I slowly descended into sleep on the stretcher, comforted by the feeling that finally, people cared.