I'm sorry if the chapters are too short/ have little content in them it's just that otherwise it would take me too long to finish them (like the previous ones). Also this is not a very good chapter, just giving a heads up.
"I want to propose something different this time" Miss Caterflow said walking to the middle of the classroom. The students were sitting in a circle with the easels in front of them and many of them whined to her words, it was never a good thing when the art teacher "proposed" something different.
"Now, now" she reprimanded them "don't get your panties in a knot. We have been working with the a naturalistic approach when painting objects but, like I said" she glared at the students who had complained so they wouldn't do it again "I want to do something different, so today you are going to paint whatever comes to your mind" she leaned into her desk and crossed her hands looking at her students. The teens stayed quiet and many exchanged confused looks.
"Is there are problem?" Miss Caterflow asked amused "You only got…" she checked the time in her wrist watch ".. forty-five minutes left to complete the task, I'll suggest you get started with it"
"But.. Miss" a soft voice said from behind of an easel "What are we supposed to do?"
"Like I said Caro, anything that comes to you, it can be a flower, a face, a piece of clothing" she gestured each word with a gesture with her hands. "It can be something that you have seen or it can come from your imagination, whatever it is you have forty-five minutes" she smiled and went to sit on her desk, she pulled a magazine from her suitcase and started to go through the pages.
The kids stood silent for another moment and then chaos broke loose; all stood and went running to the painting cabinet afraid that the good utensils run out. Some pushed, others tried to grope whatever they could and the teacher had to put a calm to it.
"I don't know why they always do that" Melissa said jutting her chin to the mess in the corner of the room "Its not like they are gonna get a higher grade with a better brush"
"I think they are just dumb" the girl sitting next to her commented, "wild animals running loose"
"Damn right!" Melissa said laughing, "I don't even know what I'm going to paint" she picked a brush and made some movements over the white surface, like trying to define an image, "How about you guys?"
"I'm gonna paint something like a landscape or a flower" the girl said squeezing green painting from an almost empty tube, "Maybe I'll thrown some unicorn or something magical in there"
"I…" Cassie began staring at the easel "… have no idea" she admitted with a sigh and accommodated herself in her seat.
"You know you don't gotta try so hard" Melissa said applying painting on her brush and testing its flow on a paper, "just paint whatever you want and then sell it, after all she can't put a bad grade because we have no imagination" she finished with a giggle.
"I know… I'll think something up" she remained staring at the white surface trying to come up with something. She didn't want to paint just anything because if she did, if she tried to use any image she wouldn't put much effort to it, and Miss Caterflow would know, she had a special nag for it.
"What could I paint? What could I paint?" she sang to herself. Out of the sudden an image appeared in her head, a scene that she never saw before. It was dark, she knew tha,t but it felt right painting that, maybe it was because of everything that had been going on, or maybe she had taken it from a horror movie, who knows?
Before she lost the image she picked her brush and paint and started to draw the linings of it. She concentrated in making it as accurate as possible, capturing shades and shapes with extreme precaution.
"Cass!" Melissa called her after a few minutes. The girl sitting next to her, Sarah, had gone to the cabinet to look for more paint, "Check this out" she said with a big grin. Cassie got up and walked to her side. Melissa was painting a big orange daisy in the middle of what it seemed to be water.
"Look" she pointed the daisy and it started to move, back and forth, like being rocked by the waves. Cassie let out a gasp of surprise.
"Cool, right?" Melissa said, her smile even bigger.
"How did you do that?"
"You just got to think about it and it will happen! Come" she got up from her seat and walked to Cassie's painting but she stopped suddenly upon seeing it, "Cassie, what's that?" she asked and her tone sounded scared.
"What?" she asked stepping closer to see her face; she was pale and staring at the painting. "Mel was wrong?" Cassie lost her smile and was worried.
"Where did you get that? That picture, where did you see it?" her voice was a whisper now, and Cassie was afraid she might pass out.
"Nowhere! I just pictured it… eh it's something that I imagined it didn't came from anywhere!" Cassie assured her.
"You sure?" she said calming a little and she looked at her.
"Yes! Mel, what's wrong?"
Melissa looked around to see if anybody was looking at them "I'll tell you later, after class" she gave her a small nod and went to her painting.
Cassie stood there watching her for a moment longer and then decided to get back to her painting as well. Melissa was right, whatever it was it was better if they were not heard by their classmates. However that didn't calmed her down, and she found herself paying an occasional glance toward Melissa.
At the end of the class the teacher saw each painting and graded them, there were no surprises and no low grades except for a guy who had drawn a joint.
"What do we have here?" Miss Caterflow said approaching Cassie's painting.
"It's just something I pictured Miss" she said a bit uncomfortable. She always had that feeling when a professor was checking her work in front of her.
"It's… dark but good" the teacher complimented her but Cassie saw that she was looking strangely at her, "good work Cassie, really" she squeezed her shoulder and went to the next student.
When the class was over they left the paintings to dry and went to the next class.
"Come" Melissa grabbed Cassie by the hand and rushed her to the girl's bathroom, despite the urgency nobody paid them much attention. Once inside Melissa closed the door and crossed her arms over her chest.
"I haven't told anyone because I didn't want to frighten them" she started and Cassie nodded encouraging her to go on.
"After the attack with the witch hunters, when I got home" she held her hair in a pony tail and turned her back towards her "I found this on my neck" she pointed a place in the base of her skull. Cassie stepped closer to examine it. She saw nothing, at first, but when she moved a lock of hair she found it.
"Holy…!" Cassie exclaimed. Melissa had a sign tattooed on her neck, a black dot and a drop-shape like, exactly the same that what she had drawn on her painting, but hers had been on a full moon.
"It wasn't there before"
"What is that?"
"Dunno" she dropped her hair and turned to face her again "Why did you paint it?"
"I don't know… I didn't know what to paint and that image came to my mind.. I" she struggled to know what to say next "I've never seen it before"
Melissa nodded and let go a breath she didn't know she was holding, "Good, it's probably nothing then, maybe just a witch connection or something" she waved it off "It will be fine"
"What? You can't know that, Melissa this is serious!" she grabbed her by the arm and stared at her intently "We have to know what that symbol means and why witch hunters tattooed it onto you"
"Fine, we'll ask the Spilch"
"And if she doesn't know? What do we do then?"
Melissa thought about it for a moment and then sighed "I don't know! ok? I don't"
"This is stupid!" Cassie cursed, "I'm tired of this I'm going to ask my mom"
"You can't!" Melissa shook her by the shoulders "What if she.."
"She, what?" Cassie cut her "She is not going to do anything if I ask her not to"
"Cassie" she paused and touched the symbol in her neck, "are you sure?" she looked worried but Cassie knew that she trusted her.
Cassie smiled, "Yes, don't worry she won't do anything"
Melissa nodded, "Ok, you talk to her"