6 A Potential Turning Point

Salem awoke the next morning thinking about how easily the massacre he had caused could have been avoided if only he had sought to understand the situation and listened to Krystal. The day of his new school year had arrived faster than he'd hoped, so he dressed in his all black school uniform and headed out into the foggy morning. He was fortunate enough to live next to one of his former school's rivals in football, so he was required to attend it for the rest of his remaining three years of school. The school's colors were red and black, so those colors were flaunted heavily throughout the hallways and exterior of all the buildings. Salem walked through the hallways looking for his homeroom, which he found after what felt like forever. He walked insider and noticed that the room was very similar to Japanese classrooms, which he found rather pleasant.

"Would you like to introduce yourself," the teacher said while smiling widely.

Salem looked on at his new classmates and noticed that all of the girls had stopped talking and chatting to stare at him in awe, which he liked, but wanted to avoid after what had happened the last time he was in a relationship. He walked to the front of the room and began to introduce himself.

"My name is Salem, I'm 16, and I just started going here, so I'd like you all to go easy on me," he said with a laugh.

Some of the girls began to cheer, while some remained quiet and shy. The guys looked at him with distaste as he posed a challenge for those trying to date the girls. He took his seat, and the girls immediately crowded him and began asking questions. He answered them the best he could, but many of them felt that he was upset about something because his voice was very monotone and held a deep sadness in it. The crowd eventually went back to their normal places and listened to the teacher as she spoke, but Salem's mind was elsewhere. 'Is this really the right thing to do? Do I really have the right to sit amongst these normal teens as though I'm one of them?' Salem must've been staring out the window for too long, because the teacher called him to the board.

"Salem," she said. "Since you're so adamant about staring out that window, perhaps you'd like to solve this equation."

Salem didn't even realize that his homeroom teacher was also his trigonometry teacher, but he walked up to the board with a blank expression on his face. The teacher became angry when Salem solved the equation as though he knew what he was doing, which he did. He walked back to his seat through the various shocked faces staring at him. He sat in the very back corner of the room, so he did nothing but stare out the window to the football field, remembering his past football coach, another victim of his massacre.

Salem walked into the field house early that morning since he had nothing better to do, so he walked to his locker to make sure everything was where it needed to be for the day, which it was. The floor was made of concrete, the walls were white, and the lockers were black. This was the familiar scene that felt like home to Salem. As he turned to walk out the door to head to breakfast, Salem heard walking coming from the metal stairs to his right.

"Hey there, Salem," his coach said as he put his hand on his shoulder.

"Morning, coach."

His coach got a drink of water from the water fountain and came back to talk to him before he headed out to breakfast.

"I really think the world of you, Salem. You have a good heart, mind and body. I know you remember when I brought you that canned food a few months ago when you didn't have nothing."

It was indeed true that Salem was going hungry after he had gotten mugged for all his cash on the street, so coach brought him an entire box a various canned goods.

"I did that because I care about ya. You're like a son to me, so if you ever got something you want to talk about, I'm all ears."

Salem was tempted to tell coach everything that had occurred and was happening, but decided not to for the fear of being seen as delusional and a burden to others.

"I appreciate it, coach," Salem said walking out into the misty Autumn morning.

It was memories such as these that repeated through Salem's mind as he sat staring each day out the window. It was a pleasant view, with birds flying through the sky and the occasional student walking down the sidewalk to do various tasks for teachers. The sky in the mornings was a pleasant orange that would eventually turn to the usual soft blue, and Salem, for the first time, truly felt at peace watching the seemingly mystical scenery.

Weeks passed and Salem had befriended the few girls who didn't practically faint when speaking with him, and things began to change for the better for a while, but Salem knew that nothing would last forever. Not with him being the monster he was. One of the girls, Elena, was a girl who dated many guys, but most of her relationships only lasted for two or three months before a simple problem arrived and she called off the relationship. The problems were never large, but she was such a picky person that finding the right person was just impossible for her. Salem would often giver her advice and guidance since he had been in many of the same situations she found herself in, and this included telling her when and how relationships would fail. He was hardly ever wrong in his predictions, but Elena never listened to him. They were sitting next to each other in class when they found themselves in a conversation turned argument.

"I want to lose my virginity like Meagan did," she began. "But I don't have any options."

Salem thought to himself for a moment before coming up with an idea.

"We could be friends with benefits if you want."

Elena said nothing for a moment, and Salem looked on at her with his now normal piercing blue eyes since his right eye returned to its normal state.

"I don't know about that," She replied. "It'd be weird afterwards."

"If we did it one time then it wouldn't be, and plus it'd be with someone you trust. You also wouldn't have to worry about me spreading your business like Ryan, your ex, did."

Elena was once again lost in thought as she mulled over the option Salem had given her.

"Nah. I don't think I'd want to."

Salem chuckled for the first time in a whole year. The classroom was full of chatter, but it was noticeably quieter than usual. This to Salem meant that people were listening to his conversation.

"Then make sure you don't get selfish and do it with someone who's eighteen," Salem chuckled.

"What do you mean 'don't get selfish?'

Salem was puzzled at the question, but answered anyway.

"If you have sex with someone 18 or older, then you're being selfish by knowingly allowing them to commit an act that could potentially ruin their future."

"But they made a choice too, so how am I being selfish?"

"Because they can't go through with that choice unless you let them, thereby being selfish."

The conversation amongst the two became louder and louder as one became angrier at the other who became angrier as well.

"You're telling me I'm being selfish because of my decision," Elena spoke in a loud and angry tone.

"Selfishness is based on actions, Elena," Salem spoke in an angry voice he had not used since he massacred his old school.

The angrier he became, the more distorted and demonic his voice became.

"You're slut shaming me! When you do something it's fine, but when I do something I'm wrong!"

Salem heard a voice in the back of his head as his right eye turned black again.

"Will you allow history to repeat itself," it said.

Salem ignored the voice and continued to yell at Elena, causing the teacher to call the principal on the phone.

"i'M sImPlY sAyInG tHaT yOu'Re DoInG sOmEtHiNg FoR yOuR oWn PeRsOnAl GaIn DeSpItE tHe ObViOuS rIsK tO oThErS!"

Salem was keeping himself under control, but he almost completely lost himself upon hearing Elena's next words.

"I'm glad that Natalie bitch died!"

This was anger similar to that which caused him to go berserk a year ago, but it felt more potent and concentrated. It took every fiber of his being to prevent himself from repeating his atrocious act from a year ago as he grabbed Elena by the throat and lifted her clear off the floor.

"YOU DON'T KNOW A DAMN THING ABOUT ME OR HER, SO THE NEXT TIME YOU OPEN YOUR MOUTH ABOUT HER OR ME IN ANYWAY, I'LL KILL YOU AND YOUR FAMILY!! DON'T THINK I CAN'T," Salem screamed as his left eye began to slowly turn black.

Elena began to cry out in fear and panic as she noticed Salem's black right eye and partially black left eye, so he threw her back against a wall hard enough to knock her unconscious. He fell to a knee as he began to will himself back to reality, but only his left eye turned back to normal as Elena had reopened an old wound. Salem turned to the rest of the class who was now cowering in fear in the corner of the room. The school resource officer had witnessed the scene, so he pulled out his taser and fired it into Salem. A normal person would have succumbed to the voltage received from a taser, but Salem stood strong as the electricity flowed through where he had been shot and into the ground. 'This taser is really weak for some reason.' Salem frowned as he realized that being normal wouldn't be possible anymore with his recent outburst, so he walked with the officer down to the principal's office. The conversation was long, but Salem played the victim throughout the intervention and was eventually let go without punishment, but Elena was given a week of ISD for bringing up Natalie's tragic death. He was released from school early that day and went home, so he went to sleep and readied himself to enjoy the rest of the week he had been allowed to remain at home from school.