8/5/15

Cursed

Chapter 3: An Enemy and a Friend

"I wish I could give you the tour right now, but I have a lot of work to do... you know what? I'll just let your roommate handle that. Let me write a note, then I'll take you to your room."

I nod my head enthusiastically and push up the straps of my backpack. We arrived at the Junior HIVE Academy about an hour ago, and since then I've been sitting in the Headmistress's office eating on a box of Oreos and listening to her babble on about what a good decision I've made. Even though I don't really believe her, what other choice do I have? I try not to gag at the mention of a roommate, because the idea of sleeping in the same room as a stranger doesn't sound good at all. She finishes writing the note and hands it to me.

"Come on, let's go find Jade," the Headmistress says, getting up from her desk.

I abandon the cookies and follow her out the room. We walk down a couple of hallways without running into anyone, before a girl with long blonde hair runs in our direction.

"Headmistress!" she yells. "Headmistress! Roy put a dead rat in my pillowcase again!"

The Headmistress sighs and whispers a word Dad told me not to say before saying, "I'll deal with it in a minute, Angela. I have to help our new student."

I try to pretend I didn't just hear the Headmistress's potty mouth as the girl, Angela, judgingly stares at me. I try not to do the same to her when I notice the small white wings sprouting from her back. At first I'm worried she'll say something about my skin, or my hair, but instead she wrinkles her nose and says, "Where did you get those clothes? The toilet store?"

It's true that my clothes have seen better days, but I've been wearing the same thing for a couple months now. So yeah, I know I need to change clothes, but it's really rude of her to point this out. I cross my arms and glare at her. She rolls her eyes as if I'm beneath her.

"Ladies!" The Headmistress shouts. We stop glaring at each other for enough time for the Headmistress to say, "Angela, come with me and we'll talk to Roy. Mallory, you and Jade are in room 413. To get there you'll need to make a right, another right, and then a left. Can you do that for me?"

I nod my head. "Yes Ma'am. I'll give Jade the note, too."

"You're rooming with Jade? Hah! Another loser in the loser room!" Angela laughs.

"Mind your manners, young lady!" The Headmistress snaps. She turns to me and adds, "Thank you for understanding. I'll call you to my office later so we can finish some paperwork. Until then, Jade will take care of you."

"In Loserville," I think I hear Angela whisper as they walk past me.

I sigh, feeling alone again. Waiting until they're long gone, I take a right, and then another right, and then a left, and scan the doors on the hallway for room 413. Most, if not all of the other doors are also marked with something like "Maintenance: Keep Out" or "Trash", so I guess we're the only ones with an actual room on this hallway. I can't help but wonder what Jade's like. Is she just as strange as me? Does she have weird powers too? Is she nice?

I finally find the door marked 413. With a nervous sigh, I knock on the door. No one answers, so I knock harder this time. When no one answers again, I try to open the door, but it's locked. I cross my arms and sit down on the cold white floor tiles. It's official- I hate my life. Why me?

When I'm about to give up and go look for the Headmistress, a little girl who looks to be somewhere between my age and Felicity's age (4 or 5, maybe) walks down the hall. Her black hair is tied into a long braid, and she's wearing a yellow dress with black leggings and tennis shoes. I can't place her exact race, but I'm pretty sure she's either Vietnamese or French, maybe both. The most noticeable thing about her is her eyes, though- the greenest eyes I've ever seen. You can't help but stare at them, wondering what secrets they hold. I stand up and get out of the way of the door.

"Excuse me, do you know where I can find Jade?" I ask. I remember that Angela said she didn't like her, and I can't help but wonder if that's the opinion everyone has about her. If so, it might be hard to track her down.

The girl nods her head. "Yep! That's me!"

I grin and hand her the note. "The Headmistress said to give this to you."

Jade snatches the note from me and unfolds it carefully. At first I'm worried that she's like Felicity, and she's too young to read, but when I see her nodding her head as her eyes scan the paper my worries melt away a bit. She bites her lip in concern, but when she catches herself doing it she stops. She looks up at me for a moment, as if wondering what her reaction should be. Finally, she hands the note back to me.

"I wasn't supposed to have a roommate," she sighs, "But I guess I should be happy it's not Angela."

"You don't like her either?" I ask.

Jade laughs. "Oh, you already met her? She's awful, isn't she?"

I nod my head. "She thinks you're a freak."

"Oh I know- not that it bothers me. Normal is boring!" Her eyes scan my clothes like Angela did, and she add, "We might wanna get you a uniform."

"You're not going to ask about the mud?" I ask.

Jade shakes her head. "You can tell me later. Come on, they're in one of the closets over here."

I follow her to the closet, a little surprised at how old she acts. "How old are you?"

"5 and a half," she says. "Why?"

I shrug. "You don't really act like it."

"Only because we've got a job to do right now. You just haven't seen my true colors yet. How old are you?"

I'm about to say 7, when I realize I don't know how much time has passed. "Depends. Is it September 13 yet?"

"Um, November 3, actually. I take it you missed your birthday?"

My heart breaks a little. I've been gone for about 3 months now. "I guess this means I'm 8."

"That's nice," Jade says, opening the door. "Go find one in your size. The ones on the right are the girl uniforms."

"Thanks," I say, looking through the stacks of uniforms. All of them are the same as what Jade's wearing, and come to think of it I think Angela was wearing one too. So it's kind of stupid that she was judging my clothes, since everyone wears the same thing here. I find my size and close the door so I can change. "Do you play tour guide often? You're a pro at it."

"Nah," Jade yells, "You and one other kid have been the only new kids since July. I think Headmistress is getting desperate. Her boss wouldn't want her to fail!"

"Boss?" I ask.

"His name's Brother Blood. He's kind of a jerk. My friend Lian told me he's got a stick up his butt. Oops, then she told me not to tell anyone she said that. But Lian's nice! I don't think she'd care!"

"Is she the other new kid?"

"No, she's not young enough to be here. She's the one who sent me, though. Or at least, her boss is. Don't tell anyone, but I'm kind of a spy."

I roll my eyes. Some kids just don't know when to stop playing.

"Then who is it?" I ask.

"His name's Roy. He's the only kid here I can be around for more than 2 seconds without wanting to strangle him. Other than you, of course. It's time for dinner now. We should hurry and get there before the older kids take all the food. We might see Roy there, but I doubt it. He's in trouble right now."

I finish changing and open the door. Jade takes my old clothes and throws them into our room.

"What did he do?" I ask, slinging my backpack back over my shoulders. Then I remember my meeting with Angela. "Did he put a dead rat in Angela's pillowcase?"

Jade turns around and gives me a funny look. "How did you know that?"

I grin. "Just a lucky guess."

I can already tell this is going to be fun. I don't think my parents would like it if they knew I was playing with the problem kids, but it's not like I'm going to find any better friends here. You get what you get and you don't throw a fit. Besides, I don't know that they're troublemakers yet. Maybe they won't be so bad after all.

….

Disclaimer: I do not own Teen Titans or anything else I may mention

(For anyone wondering what Speedy is doing here, or what Chesh is doing for that matter, just look at something our deadly killer in training said earlier.)

Anyways, sorry for the wait. I had this chapter ready on Sunday, but I've just been too busy to post it. Plus I've got one of the worst cases of poison ivy I've ever seen, so I haven't really felt like doing anything. I don't even know how I got it! My original guess was that my cat Silkie (yes, named after Starfire's pet) rubbed up against some and got the oil on his fur, but the day I got it I only picked him up for like 2 seconds before he squirmed away. So yeah, that wouldn't explain how it got ALL over my arms, on my chin, on my legs, on my wrists, on my forehead, and worst of all on my freaking mouth. I'm truly stumped on this one, tbh.

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Review Responses:

Ilovecookies2000- Thanks! I'm glad you like it

Opinionated Shipper- Don't worry, Kid Flash will show up soon (even if it's just a little cameo- he'll get a lot of those, actually). I'm a KF fan too, as well as a major Flinx shipper, so there's no way I'd keep him out of the story until he's supposed to show up. I'll keep it cannon though. I just have a way to have them meet without remembering it, and another way to have them meet without actually having them meet. It's complicated, you'll see what I mean later.

TwizzleCreampuff (guest)- Thanks! It's actually pretty hard to write kids without sounding dumb, but I make it work. The protagonist of my other fanfic series is 24, so it's a pretty big shift in ages.

Pinkgrande (guest)- Thanks :)

So there's that. Anyways, I'm going on a little mini-vacation tomorrow, and the drive there is either 3 or 5 hours (can't remember which) so I'll probably have a lot of time to write. And by write I mean listen to angsty music on my iPod while staring out the window and constructing AMV's in my head with clips that don't exist. So yeah, let's hope I don't do that the WHOLE time so I can get some progress made. I'm going to try to get this thing updated again by next Monday, earlier if I can get the chapter written in time.

Quote of the day!

"Do you hear that? It's an ice cream truck playing We Three Kings of Orient Are. Now what kind of ice cream truck plays the worst Christmas carol of all time!?" –Mr. Timn

If you haven't seen the Mr. Timn videos, you really should look them up. They're just short little videos on YouTube, but they're hilarious.

Titans go!

Spectrobes Princess