Chapter 2:
Kara
Nina and Amber took me downstairs to meet the rest of the house members. As nervous as I was, Nina had assured me that everyone was really nice and that we'd get on great. They led me into what I'm guessing was the common room, where everybody who was at the front entrance earlier was now.
"Hey guys!" Amber yelled, causing everybody to look up from what they were doing. All eyes were on me when Amber continued, causing heat to rise up to my cheeks. "As you know, this is Kara! And she wanted me to introduce everybody to her!" I felt my face turn even more red as I became the center of attention. I never was a fan of being focused on- anybody could see you make a mistake.
"Kara," Nina said, gesturing to the group of people in the room. "I'd like you to meet the residents of Anubis house." I smiled to myself at the name of the house, I loved the ancient Egyptian theme of the school. On my way to the house, I also passed Osiris, Isis, Thoth, Seth, and Ra houses. It probably made me a nerd for knowing each one of those Egyptian gods, their appearance, and their role in mythology, but I dismissed it and focused my attention on Nina.
"This is Mara," Nina said, pointing to a petite girl with a book in her lap. She smiled at me and Nina moved on. "Sitting beside her is her boyfriend, Jerome." He gave me a sly smirk that caused a cold feeling to wash through my chest. I made a mental note to steer clear of him for the time being. I then noticed a blond boy who was sitting at the table flinch when Nina called Jerome Mara's boyfriend. I wondered curiously what the story behind that was, but then reminded myself that it was none of my business.
"Him and Alfie are the pranksters I warned you about. Alfie is the boy that's playing video games. Just so you're aware, he's dating Amber." I nodded and Alfie waved at me. I giggled at the goofy expression on his face.
"Lovin' the shirt, blue!" He called before looking back down at his game. I smiled and Nina, also smiling, continued.
"Over there, sitting next to Patricia is Joy," she said pointing to the girl she told me about earlier. It's easy to see her dumping water on somebody... She looked pretty scary. All her black clothes and eyeliner made her look near goth, and the angry expression on her face made me feel like she didn't want me here. The other girl, Joy, however looked really nice. She gave me a welcoming smile and a little wave. I smiled back.
"And the two boys stuffing their faces over there are Eddie and Mick. Like I told you before, Mick loves sports and never stops eating. Like, ever. Eddie is also American, and he's dating Patricia." I nodded. "And that there," she said sweetly, pointing to an attractive brunette boy on the other couch. "Is my boyfriend Fabian." He smiled at Nina, then gave me a short wave.
"Okay, let me see if I remember this," I said, turning the information over in my head. "Mara likes to read and is dating the prankster Jerome. Jerome is best friends with Alfie who is dating Amber. Joy is best friends with Patricia who is dating Eddie who is American, Mick likes sports and eating, and Fabian likes history and is dating Nina." I repeated, also adding in things that Nina told me earlier.
"You got it!" Fabian said giving me an encouraging grin. I smiled, proud at myself. I'd found that I was pretty good at memorizing things if I tried, which is why I knew everything about Egyptian history and nothing about American history. Can you spell boring?
"Tell everybody more about you!" Amber insisted, giving my shoulder a nudge and causing me to stumble forward slightly.
"Oh, I don't know Amber. I'm not that interesting..." I stuttered in reply.
"Sure you are! Everything you told us upstairs was super fascinating!" she pressed, raising her arm to push me again.
"Well..." I started, deciding that telling everybody about myself was better than being bulldozed by a fashion crazed blonde girl. However, I decided to leave out all the stuff about my fascination with archeology and history. I didn't want to come across as some boring nerd. "I really like music... I play guitar and have taken vocal lessons since I was five. I really love sports! I play softball, basketball, and football. Not American football, I don't understand that, I play soccer. I also like acting and reading and I have an extremely extensive brain of pointless knowledge." I said.
"Aaaaand?" Amber pressed again.
"And what?"
"Come on Kara! You won't sound like a nerd! We already have Fabian and Mara talking about nerdy things all the time!" She whined, pointing a finger at her friends.
"Hey!" Mara and Fabian both shouted, making me giggle.
"Haha! Okay..." I sighed. "I also really like history, more specifically Egyptian mythology." I said really quickly.
"Sorry," Jerome said, his tone mocking. "I didn't quite catch that." I kept my mouth shut, not wanting to repeat it.
"My god Kara!" Amber says. She turned to everyone else before saying; "Kara absolutely loves history. More specifically, ancient Egypt. She knows just about everything there is to know about Egyptian mythology! She came to England because of it's ties with archeology, and she's going to be an Egyptologist!" she blurted, causing me to turn bright red. I stood nervously in front of the penetrating gazes of all my housemates. My face slowly heated even more as I thought about how much of a loser I was.
"Hey! That's really cool!" Fabian said, taking me completely by surprise.
"Yeah! That's really awesome!" Mara added.
"Too bad you weren't here last year... Or the year before... Could have really helped!" Alfie said. I looked at him for a moment as some of the rooms occupants shouted at the boy.
"ALFIE!" Nina, Amber, Patricia, and Fabian yelled.
"What? Sorry! It slipped!" he defended, raising his arms in a defensive gesture.
Mara, Mick, and I gave everybody confused glances. Whatever happened last year, Mick and Mara were excluded from it.
"What do you mean?" I asked Alfie.
"Oh, nothing. He means nothing. He's not always the sharpest crayon in the box! Half the time we have no idea what he's saying!" Patricia said defensively. "Right Jerome?"
"For sure! Don't listen to anything he says. Trust me, he's more confused than you are." he said, backing up Patricia, causing Alfie to look a little hurt by his friends comments about his intelligence.
"I'm sure that's not true," I said, trying to make Alfie feel a bit better. "I'm sure Alfie is really smart, he just has a different way of expressing himself." Alfie perked up and gave me a huge smile.
"Yeah guys," he said, pushing out his chest and putting his hands on his hips. "I'm just different!"
"You sure are beau!" Amber said, going to sit next to her boyfriend which made him smile even wider, if that was even possible.
The next few hours were spent socializing with each other, talking about common interests and our summers.
"Kara, I'm telling you, Neville and Luna were made for each other!" Nina said to me as we conversed about Harry Potter.
"I don't know Nina, I just don't see it. I seriously think Neville and Hannah belong together. Luna would look good with Seamus!" I replied.
"Okay fine, but you have to admit that Ron and Hermione were a match made in heaven!" She defended.
"I don't know... I can see Hermione going out with Fred if he lived."
"But he didn't! So she belongs with Ron!"
"Okay Nina, she belongs with Ron!" I said, laughing.
"Oh my gosh, we're such nerds." Nina said, flashing a smile.
"I have never been more happy to be one!" I replied, continuing to laugh.
We were laughing so hard that Fabian came over and put his arms around Nina.
"What's so funny?" he asked, raising an eyebrow.
"Nothing!" I said while at the same time Nina exclaimed "I'm a nerd!" which made us laugh even harder.
"They were arguing about Harry Potter." Eddie stated from behind me, uninterestedly picking at his fingernails.
"Oh," Fabian said, unsurprised. I deduced that Harry Potter was a common topic in the house. "You nerd." He said to her before pecking her on the cheek and walking back towards the kitchen. I laughed so hard that I fell off the couch and hit the ground with a thump.
"Ouch!" I exclaimed in shock before sitting up and leaning against the couch.
"Are you okay?" Nina asked seriously. We shared a look before we both burst out laughing again. As we were calming down, we could hear loud boots clonking down the stairs. We all stopped talking immediately when someone's voice called out from the hallway.
"It's 10 o'clock," the deep voice boomed. "You have five minutes precisely, and then I want to be able to hear a pin, drop!" he said, followed by the quiet ding of a pin hitting the floor.
"What was that?" I whispered to Nina, slightly creeped out. She rolled her eyes before speaking.
"That was Victor's lights out speech. He's the master of the house, meaning he's in charge. He always says the exact same thing at the exact same time." she explained quickly, standing up. "Come on, time for bed."
I followed her up the grand looking staircase and into our room. As soon as I reached it, I crawled into my bed and shut my eyes before taking the time to think.
Moving to England was a good choice for me; I felt like I really belonged here. I shared an interest with everybody I'd talked to so far, which had never happened. Mara, books. Mick, sports. Fabian, history. Alfie, nerdy stuff. Patricia, music. And Nina and Amber, well, it's like we were made to be best friends.
I was just drifting off to sleep when I heard Amber whisper something to Nina.
"Sibuna meeting! Tonight at 12! In the attic!"
Sibuna? I thought to myself. What on earth is that? My curiosity was cut short however, as my exhaustion became unbearable, and I fell asleep.
Nina
I was just finishing writing in my diary about the day's events when Amber crept silently over to my bed. She gingerly sat beside my pillow and leaned in towards my head.
"Sibuna meeting! Tonight at 12! In the attic!" she whispered before hurrying back to her bed.
I watched after her in confusion, contemplating the purpose of a Sibuna meeting. Maybe Amber just wanted time to catch up with everybody... Oh well, school didn't start for another three days, so having the meeting wouldn't interrupt my sleep pattern.
At midnight I followed Amber up into the attic where Fabian, Patricia, and Alfie were already sitting.
"Okay," Amber said once we sat down. "I have called this meeting because we have some important stuff to discuss."
"Like?" Patricia asked, stifling a yawn.
"Well... We need to decide what to do with Jerome, Eddie, and Joy. They all know about Sibuna and the mysteries, but should we let them join?" Amber asked curiously, peering around at the room's occupants.
"Amber," Patricia replied. "Do we really need to worry about that? I mean, do we even really need Sibuna now? The mysteries are over. Is there any point in Sibuna continuing?"
"Of course we need to continue with Sibuna!" Amber exclaimed. "It's totally necessary! We need it, it's important!"
"Ambs..." Alfie started, placing a comforting hand on her knee from across the circle. "I think Patricia's right... As long as there's no mystery, we don't really need to be sneaking around at night, losing sleep."
"He's right," I said softly. "Amber, what's the point? What would we do? Just meet in the attic and play checkers?"
"But but but! We can't just end Sibuna!" Amber cried, her eyes becoming moist.
"We aren't ending it Amber, Sibuna still exists." Fabian said quickly, before she could make a scene and wake up the rest of the house.
"How about this," I said to Amber. "If something weird starts happening, if we run into another mystery, we'll call a Sibuna meeting and decide what to do about Jerome, Eddie, and Joy. For now, let's just put Sibuna on hold and try to focus on school for a bit, yeah?"
"Okay..." she sighed, looking down. "I'll miss this though."
"We can still call a meeting every once and a while if you want Amber." Alfie said. "Just not as much as we used to during the mysteries."
"Okay!" she chirped, perking up immediately. Patricia rolled her eyes before speaking up.
"I'm going to bed," she stated, irritation leaking into her voice. "See you in the morning." We all watched her go before turning to the rest of the group.
"We should get back to bed too Amber," I said. "What if Kara wakes up and we aren't there?"
"I guess you're right..." she replied, getting up. "Let's go." She started to leave, but then quickly turned to Fabian and Alfie and put her right hand over her eye as an afterthought. "Sibuna?"
"Sibuna!" we all echoed.
After the Sibuna club had been drawn to a close, we all made our way back to our rooms for a good night's sleep. Little did we know that the greatest mystery of all was about to begin...