Some Quiet Place

sense of someone watching drives me completely awake. Fear? My eyes open to darkness and take a moment to adjust. The black becomes solid shapes. Dresser, mirror, chair. I’m alone; there’s nothing but the furniture and the night. Yet there’s a hint of power in the air. I sit up, frowning. It’s raining outside, a light smattering against the glass of the window. It casts quivering shadows over everything. Something isn’t right.

“You did this.”

I turn. The voice comes from my left. Young, soft. I make out a human shape, standing in the dim corner, that wasn’t there before. Slender. Not an Emotion, my senses tell me. Something else. “Who are you?” I ask. Thunder rumbles.

The strange visitor doesn’t move. Doesn’t speak. For what seems like hours we both remain frozen. Questions linger on the tip of my tongue. The storm intensifies, and a flash of lightning illuminates the room. And I’m able to make out his features.

It’s impossible.

It’s wrong.

When he continues to stare back at me with accusation in those familiar eyes, there are no plausible explanations. Because it’s him. The boy who stars in all my paintings. The boy who never moves, never changes, never speaks. The one who the beautiful girl screams over with such anguish.

“You’re dead,” I tell him, clutching my blankets. Can’t be, instinct keeps insisting. This is another one of Fear’s games. Another illusion. My wall of nothingness stirs. I imagine a brick cracking, pieces of rubble showering down.

The boy doesn’t acknowledge this. Now that the lightning has subsided, he’s shrouded in oblivion again. For an instant I wonder if he’s gone—disappeared back to the recesses of my mind—but then his voice emerges, drifts to me again: “You killed me,” he whispers.

The storm bursts one more time, and I see that a stream of blood has slipped out from beneath his hairline to run down one side of his face.

My eyes fly open and I jerk upright, twisting instantly toward the corner where I know the boy won’t be.

Because it was just a dream.

No whispers, no blood, nothing but the realities of this world.

How strange.

The rain is gentle outside, not as portentous as it was moments ago. Oblivious to my plight, the millions of drops fall to the earth with a symphony of wet sounds. I shove my blankets to the floor. Hot, too hot in here. I lie back again and invite sleep to return.

I’ve known Joshua Hayes since we were small children, placed in the same kindergarten class. We’ve never been friends, exactly, but we’re always aware of each other. Once in the fifth grade, when a group of boys gathered together and tried to make me cry by pinching my arms over and over, Joshua defended me, landing in detention with even more bruises than I had.

It wasn’t until the beginning of high school that his feelings began to change. He watches me as if he sees more than what there is. He probably takes my silence as deep contemplation, takes my endurance of Sophia’s vicious treatment as patience, sees my solitary state as a choice to stand apart from the others. Though he’s right in his belief that I’m different from everyone else, he’s wrong about the reason for this. I’m not special or an independent thinker. Yet I’ve never bothered to correct him in his beliefs because he’s never approached me.

But he wants to. I see his desire growing each day, notice how the Emotions’ visits to him at school are becoming more frequent. I watch and wait, knowing I’ll have to put this fire out someday soon.

“I’m going to let you choose your partners for our first project,” Mrs. Farmer says early Monday morning, toward the end of class. She tiredly brushes her hair out of her eyes.

“What’s the project?” one of my classmates asks. Susie Yank, the tiny girl everyone has labeled nerdy and know-it-all. She’s really just lonely, taking solace in knowledge rather than drowning in her friendless existence. I see Longing standing beside her, touching Susie’s shoulder as the girl glances at Sophia, probably imagining what it would be like to be her best friend. Longing is a beautiful Emotion, with long sleek hair and slanted, exotic eyes.

Mrs. Farmer sighs. “I was getting to that. Your job, along with your partner’s, is to make a portfolio of your own work. We’re going to focus on creative writing for a while and take a break from the classics. I’ve given you partners because I know some of you struggle with writing. So you can help each other and feed off of each other’s ideas.”

“What does the portfolio—”

“Your portfolio”—Mrs. Farmer glares at Susie—“needs to have two poems and one short story, along with two peer reviews. This handout will have the details on what the reviews need to contain, as well as the specifics on the poems and story.”

As she begins to distribute the assignment, I feel Joshua’s gaze on me. I see that Longing has duplicated herself so she is also standing next to him—it’s how the Emotions answer so many summons. It seems that Longing is fickle today; instead of touching Joshua’s shoulder, she leans down and presses a long kiss onto his lips. Joshua can’t see her, of course, but humans have instincts just like the rest of the living creatures of the world and he turns away from me, frowning, touching his mouth. He’ll dismiss the sensation as nothing. Longing looks at me and winks.

“Poor baby,” she croons to Joshua, addressing me. “You torment him so, dear. Why not give him a chance? I bet he’s delicious.”

I don’t respond. Longing pats Joshua’s cheek, grins at me one more time, and disappears. She’s also left Susie, so there are no other Emotions in the room at the moment. Only their influence.

“Zombie.” Sophia holds the handout in front of my face. She waves back and forth, fanning my face. “Hello, anyone in there?” I reach to take it from her, but Sophia jerks it away from my grasp, disgust etched in the lines of her face. “You’re such a freak,” she snaps. “What’s wrong with you? Huh? Answer me.”

“Nothing I say will satisfy you,” I say, glancing at Mrs. Farmer, who’s staring at the clock now. Her glasses are crooked on her nose. I look at Sophia again. “Can I have the paper, please?” I know it’s fruitless, but I try because it’s what she expects, and what the kids around me listening expect. Sophia waves it in my face again.

“What are you going to do?” she hisses. “Try to take it from me. Come on, Elizabeth. Take it from me.”

She holds it in front of my nose again, prepared to snatch it away. I don’t move as I calculate. Mrs. Farmer hasn’t noticed us yet, but if I defend myself it could get me in trouble with the office, and thus in trouble with Tim. Sophia laughs at me, and a couple other kids do too, thinking I’m frozen because of Fear. But for once, he’s far from here.

“I’ll take it from you.” Joshua moves so quickly that Sophia doesn’t realize that the paper has slipped from her fingers until it’s too late. She glares up at Joshua.

“N-nobody asked you to get involved,” she says to him, her narrow face pinched with fury. She wants him to like her so badly, but she can’t bring herself to be kind to me.

Joshua grins, a lazy, insolent curve of the lips. “’Course nobody asked. That’s what makes it fun.” He gives me the assignment, his eyes saying more than his words ever could. Joy and Courage stand by him, both touching his shoulders. Joshua’s face is a mask of mischief, but the presence of the Emotions shows me the truth.

“Thank you,” I tell him.

Sophia has turned around in her seat, but her stiff shoulders and Anger beside her are hints of future pain I can look forward to. Anger ignores my presence—he’s never liked me, for some reason.

Mrs. Farmer has begun to talk again, so I pretend to pay attention to her.

“You’re welcome,” I hear Joshua say, which pulls my eyes back to him. Playing the part of the casual troublemaker, he grins at me, touches his temple as if to tip an invisible hat, and goes back to his desk. Joy has gone, but I know she’s still with him from the spring in his step. Courage stays by me—one of the few Emotions I haven’t met. I don’t know how I recognize him, but I do.

The bell rings and suddenly the classroom is alive. Kids shoot to their feet and speed-walk to the door like their lives depend on it. Joshua gives me a last, lingering look as he leaves. “Make sure to pick your partners by tomorrow!” Mrs. Farmer raises her voice to be heard. She’s following the throng into the hallway. Pretty soon I’m