Did you know this place is haunted? Well, I mean, of course it is. You can’t build a place out of cold gray stone with gargoyles everywhere and dark wood floors and not expect a few ghosts to show up. Especially if you go back in time and build it two hundred years ago. It’s like a ghost’s natural habitat.
This place is modeled after Oxford. And that’s part of what makes it snooty. It’s funny how in America every time you model something after something in England, everybody thinks, oh, it’s the best thing ever. If it’s so great, then why are we all here anyway? Why did the fathers of our country take a look at that old place, say no thanks, and jump on a rickety, rat-filled boat with hardly any food and nary a chance at survival to get out of there in the first place?
Because it sucked over there, that’s why.
I know, I know. You’re not supposed to say that. Everybody is supposed to think it’s oh-so-sophisticated and we should be respectful and care about the queen and the monarchy and those guys in red suits and black furry hats standing still all day. But I’m not buying it. A queen? Seriously? In this day and age? You might as well just throw up your hands and say, “Let them eat cake!” Then you could punch all the poor people in the stomach on your way to your castle with those guys in funny hats standing at attention.
Don’t get me wrong. I’m not a communist or whatever. I just don’t see why anybody is supposed to care about a bunch of people because of who their parents were. Aren’t you supposed to care about what someone does? What they do with what they got? Like Maya Angelou, for instance. She wasn’t born in some red-velvet bed. She had a hard, horrible, terrible life, and then she just flew up out of the ashes and became a world-famous literary genius. Now, that’s what I call a queen. Not some random zygote who hails from a long line of blue bloods mating with other blue bloods. Seriously. It’s like we all bought this swampland long ago and we just keep buying it. Hook, line, and sinker.
And, by the way, this place is not only buying that idea, this place is selling it. That’s why they copied the plans. This place is selling that idea from every plaque to every statue to every quad.
There’s a green. There’s a cloister. There’s a bunch of gothic buildings facing off, silent and judgy. There’s a Thiswicke dorm. Yup, Thiswicke. Say that with a lisp. It’s the haunted one. I googled it.
According to the legend there was some girl at the turn of the century taking a bath in kerosene in the middle of the night. Why was she taking a bath in kerosene? Oh, I’m so glad you asked. It’s because she thought she had the plague. Obviously. Everybody knows if you ever think you have the plague you’re supposed to take a bath in kerosene and, also, put a bunch of candles around said bath because, of course, you are taking the bath in the middle of the night. Taking a bath during the day is just not done. Especially if you have the plague.
Well, you can see what’s coming. Of course, one of the candles accidentally fell in the bath and then the girl accidentally caught on fire and then she accidentally ran the entirety of the fourth-floor hall, all the way to the end, where she accidentally jumped to her death out the window and now accidentally haunts the dorm in the middle of the night.
Nice place. Very comforting.
My room, of course, is on the fourth floor. Right next to the bathroom. Yes, the bathroom where the ill-fated kerosene soak took place.
Don’t worry. I am completely prepared for a haunting. Here is my plan: If I hear the bath in the middle of the night, the first order of business is to crawl under my sheets. That’s number one. Then, the next order of business is to pull the blanket up over my head. That’s two. Then, the third order of business is to find God.
Yes, I will pray. I haven’t decided yet to whom I will pray, but I figure I’ll just pray to them all and hope one of them comes to my aid. Even a broken clock is right twice a day.
But it’s not even dark yet, so don’t get ahead of yourself. We’re fine. All I have to do is just unpack my bags. Bag. I have to unpack my bag. Traveling light over here. Mostly because my arms aren’t that strong. Seriously, though. Am I the only one whose arms get tired washing my hair?
Don’t answer that. I know I’m lazy. God, what I would do to exercise! Wouldn’t it be great?! I really would love to do it sometime. And I will. Someday.
I’ll get a supersporty outfit and fancy all-terrain shoes for my twenty-mile runs through the woods, over puddles and creeks, through the forest, over the town, maybe even the track. No one will be able to stop me. It will be four in the morning, but I won’t care. It will just be me against the world. And against myself. I will be my fiercest competitor. You will see me in the morning light, see my breath coming out in bursts against the cold. I’ll follow the path along the river and my face will be stern, thinking about the crime I am solving, because in this fantasy I am suddenly that lady on Law & Order: Special Victims Unit. I am sassy and a fox and no one can mess with me. I have seen it all, but I still have hope for humanity. That’s why I do this job, and jog next to the levy at four in the morning. I’m a tough cookie. A cookie who jogs.
I really can’t wait.
But for now my arms get tired washing my hair.
So, baby steps.
It appears I have this whole room to myself. Maybe no one else wants to live up here in ghost city. Maybe the riffraff like me gets the last pick of the real estate around here.
That’s okay, maybe when I see the ghost, I can ask a few things about the afterlife. I have some follow-up questions from Bible school.
I wonder if the ghost will be able to sense my diabolical plan to hurl myself into the abyss. I wonder if the ghost will be happy to have the company. Maybe the ghost is lonely.
The wood floors here are dark brown, practically black. And there is elaborate molding involved. I know. They are not kidding around with this Oxford stuff, are they? It’s a corner room, so I have windows on two adjacent sides. That means next to each other. I know you probably know that, but in my school back home I had to explain to this cheerleader what “astute” meant. Astute! I can guarantee if you don’t know what “astute” means then you probably are not.
Down out the window, four stories down, I can see the green. And everybody walking back and forth to the campus center. It’s actually a pretty superfantastic vantage point. It’s like the catbird seat. Down below everybody is rushing around, books in hand, backpacked, plaid uniform miniskirts swishing, a few uniform blazers slung over shoulders. One girl’s wearing a carefree scarf. And socks. And glasses. Everyone rushing, rushing. You gotta figure at some point, one day, everyone will look back and wonder what the shnook they were ever rushing around for. Like, enough with the rushing already. We’re in high school. I’m pretty sure Vladimir Putin is not waiting on the latest dispatch from The Pembroke School quadrangle.
My dad got me a fitted sheet set with owls on it. They are knowing but also kind of eclectic. Also, he’s sending me a comforter, so I won’t “get a chill.” Word has it there are owls involved there, too. My dad. He thinks of everything. Although I bet he will also send me something really weird. Like a Tuscan-themed welcome mat with vines and trellises everywhere. Or something vaguely French. Or worse, he will try to be “cool” and send something with pink and black scribbles all over the place.
Something with Justin Bieber on it.
Until then, I will have to do with these knowing, alternative owls protecting me. I don’t even have one picture to hang. What would I hang? A poster with a cat balancing off a tree? Hang in there! Or what about a picture of the Eiffel Tower? Isn’t that what everybody does? It shows you’ve got class. Or how about that picture where that sailor guy is kissing that girl in Times Square? You know, the black-and-white one? If you look at that picture real close it kind of looks like she doesn’t even really want to be kissed. I dare you. Check it out. That girl is totally not into it.
Wait! There is one thing. I take my picture of Gabriel from the front pocket of my backpack. I place it on my desk and stare at his swirling deep-brown eyes, the ones I imagined myself falling into during some cheesy, slow-song sway in the crepe-paper-festooned gym.
Except now, all of a sudden, I don’t really get why I imagined it so much. I’m looking at this same picture I drooled over, and all of a sudden it hits me. Meh. Gabriel is actually kind of . . . average. Maybe he is just a Gabe after all. Maybe now that I am here he is too . . . provincial.
I crumple up the torn bit of paper and sink it into the little wastebasket in the corner.
As if on cue, a text from my dad.
Proud of U. Call if U need me. ♥.
I could call him and start blubbering all over the place, but that would just make him worry.
No. Be strong, Willa!
Class doesn’t start for two days so that means I have exactly forty-eight hours to sit here in my catbird seat and try to catch a glimpse of Remy. No, I’m not stalking her. I just want to see if she has any friends. And, if she does, how I could be one. Maybe.
But I’m not stalking her.
Please. Never.