"Hello little girl," someone whispers in my ear. My eyes flash open and I sit up. The room is still dark and the other girls are sleeping in their bunks.
"I'm sorry, did I wake you?" the voice asks in a gentle tone.
"Who's there?" I clutch my blankets tight between my fingers.
"You don't recognize me?" The voice grows from a whisper to almost a shout and yet none of the girls in my room wake up. "You should know who I am, daughter."
"No!" I scream. He can't be here. He can't have followed me from Azerath to here.
"Yes." He laughs. His shape appears in the center of the room, larger than life, ripping through the ceiling. Flames burn the room and the other girls finally wake up and start to scream. Smoke fills the air and the screams turn into coughs. I cover my mouth with my blanket, but it doesn't help. The smoke chokes me. I can't breathe.
"Release me!" he roars. I clutch my throat, gasping to get air. He reaches out his big red hand and picks me up. "Release me!" his voice a gust of wind on my face.
Something hits me in the stomach. My eyes open, for real this time and I sit up. Martha and Jessica are standing at the side of my bed.
"You're keeping everyone up!" Martha says wiping her hand on her pajama top. "I'm gonna put duct tape on your mouth if you don't stop screaming every freaking night!"
"Stupid freak," Jessica adds. They walk back to the bed they've been sharing since I arrived, since Martha still refuses to sleep in her own, lest she catch my germs. I sit up and rub my eyes. Maybe it wouldn't be so bad if he came and burned them. Ugh... bad, bad, bad I can't think like that. I lay back down and stare at the bunk above me, there's still probably three or four hours before the alarm will ring for us to get up, but I won't go back to sleep.
The first few nights I was so tired from all the new people, rules and things, that I slept fine. Better than fine. The deepest sleep I've ever had. It was stupid, but I really thought I had escaped him. That he couldn't have followed me here, but I was wrong... On the fourth night it started again. At first the other girls didn't mind that much. They have nightmares sometimes too and I hear them tossing and turning in their sleep, but they don't scream...
Every time my eyes start to fall and the wood planks of the bed above me go dark out of view, I pull a rubber band back on my wrist. The short pop of pain wakes me up again for just a second. When that stops working, I pinch the inside of my elbow. When even that stops working, I pull my hair. Anything to stay awake.
It's been several long and horrible weeks, but somehow, I've managed to survive. I got used to things at the orphanage like the constant bells and alarms throughout the day, reminding us to wake up, eat or go to class. I got used to the presence of the other kids with their extreme range of emotions. I even got used to the faint smell of pee in the bedroom because at least one girl has a problem with wetting her bed. The other kids got used to me too, so they stop staring all the time. By now they all know I won't talk to them, even if they say something mean to me. Even if they call me a freak or ask if I'm sick. It's easier to not talk to them. They have stupid questions about why my hair and eyes are purple. Did I dye it? Is it natural? Do they ask each other why their hair is blond or brown, or in Garfield's case green? Is that just a thing earth kids do? Are people supposed to know why they look the way they do? I could ask them, but I don't want to encourage any type of conversation.
The rules are that the less I talk the better and so far, that seems to be right. Ms. Flores has asked me to talk to her after class several times and the more I talk to her, the more I get the feeling she knows I don't belong here. She asks me about books I'm reading from the bookshelf in the classroom or about the math or science we're doing in class, if I already know it or not, and I always do. Then she gets this look on her face like it's strange even though it's really not. There were younger kids at home who were farther ahead of this class than I am. These kids are either just stupid or maybe lazy. We don't even really have much homework, so maybe it's Ms. Flores' fault for making it too easy. In any case she's not the only one sticking her nose in my business. Miss Vanderbelt has been bothering me to go outside like the other kids do. Most of them go outside at lunch and after classes are over. They runaround on the playground and play games. I watch them sometimes in the window of the library, but I know it's better if I stay indoors. The other kids don't come in the library a lot. Only sometimes to use the computers and then for not too long, because they complain about how they're old and slow. Richard is the only one who comes a lot. He comes almost every evening, but he never bothers me, so he's easy to ignore.
Night is the worst. Night is nightmares and nothing to distract me from forbidden thoughts about wanting to go home. It's when I remember the words she didn't say and the ones he never stops saying, over and over again every night in my dreams. I try to think about nice things before I go to sleep, like a book I really like or if I'm being really bad, I imagine her coming to get me... I imagine rubbing it in Martha's and all the other girl's faces. I'm going home and they'll stay here forever because no one wants mean girls like them for daughters.
"Raven..." someone whispers. No. I must have fallen asleep again. I pinch my arm as hard as I can and it hurts, but not enough to wake me up.
"Raven..." they whisper again. This time it feels closer, like it's right in my ear, but I look to the left and there's nothing there. Something hits the mattress from under the bed again and again, shaking the entire bed frame. I have to wake up! I dig my nails into my arms, ripping at the skin. Wake up, wake up, wake up! I squeeze my eyes shut and keep digging into my skin, because maybe if it hurts enough it'll wake me up, like when Martha hit me. The banging on the mattress stops, so maybe it's working.
"Raven..." I can almost feel his breath on my ear. I turn over and burry my face into my mattress. I don't want to see him again. I don't want to see the room on fire or anything else.
"Ginny!" someone screams. Nope, not going to look. I don't want to see what he did to her.
"She's shaking, look how scared she is. I don't want to get in..." Ginny's voice is interrupted by a scream and then a few more. I open my eyes and turn over. The light is on. Martha and Jessica on the floor next to my bed. They scream more when I sit up and scoot away. So it had just been another stupid prank? A joke? I wasn't having a nightmare?
The door opens and Miss Vanderbelt and another staff member Ms. Kinders step into the room. They're both in their pajamas and they do not look happy. Martha and Jessica get off the floor and back away.
"What is going on here?" Ms. Kinders asks.
"Girls, what are you..." Miss Vanderbelt starts, but she stops and stares in my direction before rushing over and grabbing my left arm. "What happened?" I look at my arm to see what the fuss is about. It's covered in blood.
"We didn't do anything," Martha lies.
"It was just a joke," Jessica says.
"Get up," Miss Vanderbelt says, ignoring them. I do as she says, but she doesn't let go. She uses her free hand to push my left shoulder and walks next to me at an odd angle, guiding me out of the room, away from the stupid girls and to the bathroom. She lets go when we get inside and goes to the sinks, turning the water on. I walk on my own towards the sink and run my arm under the water. It stings a little, but it doesn't hurt as bad as hurting it in the first place. She leaves and comes back with a towel and a white box that she puts on the edge of one of the sinks. By now the blood is mostly cleaned off. She turns the water off and wraps my arm in the towel.
"What happened?" she asks.
"..." I don't want to tell her, because she won't understand. She presses the towel on a little tighter, but it doesn't hurt.
"I need to know what happened." Her voice is stern. I don't think she's angry with me, but she's not happy. The rules are to not draw attention to myself. This is attention. If I tell her she's not going to understand, but if I don't tell her, she might not let it go.
"I woke up because I felt something under my bed and they whispered my name," I say quickly. "I thought I was dreaming and I wanted to wake up so I pinched my arm, but that didn't work, so I started scratching."
"Why would you do that?" I knew she wouldn't understand. "Didn't it hurt?" I nod. "Then why do it? If it hurt you should have known you were awake." That's not true. The nightmares always feel real. It's hard to know if I'm dreaming or not and pain there can be real too, but it hurt when Martha hit me and it woke me up. Maybe if it' hurts enough I can wake up. Wishing to wake up doesn't work. Nothing else has worked. If I had been dreaming, the cuts wouldn't be real. It's because I didn't know I was awake.
"Don't do it again, you shouldn't hurt yourself because you're scared. If someone is trying to hurt you, you shouldn't help them." That makes sense.
"I just wanted to wake up." I mumble again.
"It's not supposed to hurt if you're dreaming," she repeats. I don't answer her. She moves the towel and in the white box she takes out a white paper packet and opens it. Inside there's a wet cloth. It hurts when she wipes it over the scratches, but I don't say anything. When she's done, she puts big sticky band aids on the bigger marks. It's unpleasant and they even restrict the movement of my elbow a little. If I was at home, I could just heal them myself, but if I do it here people will notice. I have to let them heal like a normal person.
She closes the box and rolls up the towel before putting it under her arm. I follow her back to the bedroom. The other girls aren't asleep yet. They're all sitting on their own beds, even Martha. The light is on and Ms. Kinders is still with them.
"Girls what did I tell you?" Ms. Kinders asks.
"We're sorry," they mumble half-heartedly. I know none of them mean it. The only thing they're sorry about is getting caught.
"Now go to bed. I don't want to hear another peep from you tonight." Ms. Kinders says. I go to my bed. There's some blood on my blankets, but it's mine, so it doesn't bother me. I climb under the covers and lay down as if I'll go to sleep.
"I'll be checking on your all again. If I find anything, but sleeping little girls there will be trouble," Miss Vanderbelt says. They turn off the lights and leave. The other girls whisper and mumble among themselves for a few minutes, but eventually they go to sleep.
They had been so stupid... They're lucky I didn't do anything or they could have ended up like that woman at home. I almost killed her because of him. I could have hurt them too and then people would know about my powers and then they would find me and then everything would be over, for everyone.