The Big Stone Demon Statue

"Nervous?"

Agnes poked her head into my room Monday morning. I stifled a yawn and waved her in.

"More tired than anything," I said. "What was all that screaming about the past couple nights?"

Agnes cocked her head and made a face at me. "Screaming? What screaming?"

"You didn't hear it? I swear to god, it was like someone was getting slaughtered out there." I checked my outfit in the mirror. I was afraid I looked like I was trying too hard with black jeans and black v-neck t-shirt. Maybe I looked too morbid. As an afterthought, I grabbed a plain blue ribbon and wrapped it around my wrist. "Tie this, would you?"

"Sure," Agnes said. "I slept like a baby last night. Sometimes Mary Ann has nightmares, but I've never heard her scream or anything. Maybe you dreamed it or something."

I thought about the locked door. "What freaked me out even more was the fact that I couldn't get out of my room to go see what was going on."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean, why are there locks on the outside of our doors. Why do they lock us in our rooms?"

Agnes shook her head, as if she didn't believe me. "I don't think they ever really lock them," she said. But she was wrong. I knew!

"Stop worrying," Agnes said. "Besides, you look hot. That outfit is so cute. It's very punk."

I laughed. "Thanks."

"Grab your bag. You don't want to be late for your first day."

Together, we made our way down to the Shadowhall van. I had half hoped we'd be taking the bus to school, but no such luck. They might as well have mounted a megaphone on top and shouted to everyone that we were freaks. I sighed. After the way Drake had treated me, I fully expected everyone at school to label me an outcast right away.

In the van, Mary Ann, Cat and Jace barely said a word. I wondered what things must have been like before I came along. Did Agnes talk their ears off nonstop? Or was she only this talkative because she hadn't had anyone else to talk to in so long?

"I'll show you where to go to get your class schedule," Agnes said as we pulled up to the high school ten minutes later. "We're both sophomores, so hopefully we'll have a few classes together."

I stepped out onto the concrete sidewalk and stared at the school. My stomach lurched. God, I hated starting new schools. With this latest string of foster homes, I'd started seven different schools in the past two years. Asheville High School made the Seventh.

The school itself was even smaller than I expected. A single brick building held most of the classes with only the gymnasium and one other small building off near the football field. Most of the schools I'd been to in Atlanta had more students in the tenth grade than this school probably had all combined. I tried to tell myself it would be an adventure. A kind of social experiment. Inside, though, I just felt nervous.

In big schools, you could always find your own crowd. There were always enough people around that you were bound to run into a few people who thought like you, looked like you, or at least were interested in getting to know you. Here, though, I had a feeling the variety was limited. Looking around at the students as they made their way to the front entrance, I noticed that almost everyone dressed the same. Jeans. T-shirts. Blue and black backpacks. Very apple-pie American teenager.

Suddenly I felt silly with my boots and black jacket. I gripped my new bag tighter and silently thanked Drake Ashworth for giving me at least one solid tip on how to fit in. If I was going to make it work here in Asheville, I was going to have to find a way to blend in.

"If you stand there long enough, you're going to turn into a statue like this guy." Agnes smacked the leg of the big stone demon statue that towered over the school's entrance.

I stared up at the demon, and for a moment, I felt all the breath leave my chest. I could swear I had seen that statue somewhere before. In a dream maybe? The ground seemed to jerk underneath my feet and I stumbled, reaching out to the cold stone to steady myself. My vision blurred, then the world around me turned black.