The Sleepwalker Chapter 2

Chapter 2

Me and my friends duck under the table. We’ve never had a lockdown before so this is serious stuff. Everyone is whispering from under the tables and the teachers are frantically trying to keep us quiet. That’s not hard for me, I’ve never been much of a talker, but it’s hard for other people. Like Bethany Whyte. She’s the school gossip queen. At the moment she’s bawling her eyes out. Not surprising, while she may the school gossip queen she is also quite soft on the inside.

Unlike english, the lockdown seemed to only take 5 minutes. Which is sad as I wouldn’t have minded not going to science. Finally the teachers come out from their hiding spots and tell us that it is safe to go back to our classrooms.

The rest of the day goes by really fast. I just want to go home to mum to see if she's alright. When the bell rings for the end of the day, everyone rushes for the doors, only to be stopped by security guards. Apparently we aren't allowed outside until our parents come and pick us up.

I'm at school with a couple of other kids. There's about 5 of us in total waiting for our parents to come come. The police have gone and so have the teachers. We were going to wait for the rain to stop but it doesn't look like it's stopping anytime soon. We decide to go to the office and turn on the heaters. There is an old log burner in there as well, just in case the power goes out.         

When we get there, we dump our bags on the floor or the desk and sit in the waiting chairs. We sit there in silence for a while. Someone gets up and starts pacing, stopping every once in awhile to look out the window. It's around 5 P.M. and it's already getting dark.  Suddenly their breath hitches and I look up. The person is Penelope, she’s part of Bethany’s group.  I scan the rest of the room. I hadn’t really paid any attention to the rest of the kids. There is Tyler, he’s the quarterback of the football team and doesn’t do that well in the academic side of school, Justin is on the mathletes team and Maddy, I don’t actually know much about her. But she’s really shy. I look back at Penelope. Her face has gone white under her fake tan and she’s shaking her head. I go over to see what's wrong and peek out the window.

There is a man walking towards us. The car headlights are on and he is covered in blood. He has an axe, also covered in blood. He is around forty years old and has a bruise over his right eye. He is coming right towards the window and raising his axe. I stumble backwards and grab the back of Penelope’s shirt to pull her back too. Then l run. So does Penelope. I grab my bag off the desk and bolt to the door. I look back and see the others copying suit, but looking confused.

I open the door and run down the hall. I head towards the photo room because there are no windows. I can hear the rest of the group behind me. I reach the room and open the door. I go and sit on one of the tables while the rest of us come in demanding an explanation. Penelope has got some of her colour back and is sitting on the teacher’s chair with her head in her hands. Tyler comes over to me to ask what was out there because Penelope, it seems, has gone into shock and isn’t talking to anyone.

“There was this dude.” I say

“Yeah? Why is that scary?”

“Because,” I reply. “The dude was covered in blood, had  bruise on his eye and was holding an axe that was also covered in blood.”

“Oh”

He went over to the other side of the room to try to comfort Penelope, who was now sobbing.

We decided to stay the night so Maddy and I went to the sick bay to grab blankets out of the cupboard. We also got some food from the cafeteria for dinner. We were silent the whole time. When we got back, Penelope had tipped over and stacked some desks to make a changing room or something like that and had changed into her ‘night clothes’ which turned out to be her P.E. uniform.

We put the blankets and food on a desk and turned around. It seemed like the other two had made their own little bedrooms too. Later that night we ate leftovers from lunch that day. Then we went to sleep.