Chapter 9

The room looked old. With cobwebs on the ceiling and floors made from wood creaking with each step.

"Hey, what's wrong?" Taylor looked at him with concern.

"I can't sleep" Tarot answered her honestly.

"Me neither." Now that he looks at her closer, there were dark bags under her eyes; barely concealed with make-up.

"It's because of what happened, isn't it?" She inquired.

I didn't answer, knowing that she already know what silence meant. We sat there waiting for the others. Until they came in the room.

"Yo!" Billy shouts with his left hand on his pocket while his right hand holds his bag reclined on his shoulder.

"I hope everyone had a great summer this year." Prima announced.

"Not really." Tarot tiredly says. "I've been having dreams..." Tarot rubs his hand on his face.

"Everyone dreams everyday, Tarot." Prima says.

"This time's different." Tarot looked tired. "I'm afraid of what I see... You're smart Prima, you know what I'm talking about."

"Why didn't you say anything earlier?"

"Too many ears. What do you think people would think when they see me so - can't believe I'm saying this - down."

"Do you have it with you?" Tarot asks Prima expectantly.

"Not really." Prima answers, copying Tarot.

"What do you mean?" Tarot frowns.

"There's a complication." Prima says a little bit nervously.

"What kind of complication?" Taylor eyes her heatedly.

"I'm not really sure." Prima nervously says, thinking what to say.

"What aren't you sure of?" Taylor asks while crunching her face.

"Well..." Prima drags.

"Just say it!" Taylor shouts impatiently.

"Okay Okay..." Taylor puts her hands as a sign of surrender and sighs heavily. "You guys remember what we talked about the first time I had you read the book?"

"Yeah, we remember" Everyone nods or says yes.

"I made a mistake" Prima says honestly.

"What mistake?" This time, Taylor was getting more impatient.

"To be honest, I didn't do it intentionally. I was almost caught and I didn't know what to do. So, I was hurrying up and I read something I shouldn't have. WhichconsistofusandthenIneversawthebook."

"What?!" Taylor asks confusedly and tiredly at Prima.

"Breathe, Prima. Breathe." Lotus says while comforting Prima and patting her shoulder. Prima was known for getting anxiety attacks whenever she was cornered.

"I never saw the book again after I read a part of the book." Prima says each word slowly.

"What did you read?" Taylor asks, this time trying to reign her impatience. They have all noticed of how different Prima used to be. One time, she's cunning and the next she's meek.

"I can't tell." Prima says grimly.

"You can't or you won't?" Ted asks.

"Can't."

"Okay, since she can't tell. Why don't we talk about of what has happened to each of us?" Ted takes the reins.

"You think something happened?" Billy asks.

"If something happened to Tarot then something happened to all of us then" Everyone was silent for a while.

"There were people near my house. People I don't know. Usually it would be just the normal bodyguard thing. But...one day, while I was outside - they weren't really near - I could make out the words they were saying. They said...*You remember, don't you?*" There were goosebumps on Lotus as she narrates what happened. Her hands were trembling with each word she says.

"I asked my brother if he knew them. He told me there was no one outside the wall. But when I looked back...they were there...looking at me..." There were tears in Lotus' eyes as she used her hands to hugged her body. It was a memory she dares not remember again. But she knows what they're talking about. She remembers what happened that night.

"Shhh..." Taylor comforts Lotus as she runs her hand behind her back.

"I was outside when it happened to me. There were noises in my head. It's like I can hear them speaking, whispering in my ears. I closed my eyes for a while. And when I opened them. They were in front of me." Billy was looking down on the floor, reminiscing.

"I run...and run...and run...until they cornered me. When I looked up I was in my room." Billy says heavily.

"I was in the woods, looking for our dog. It was weird, it wasn't supposed to rile me up but it did. I was walking, there was a flap above me and deers in my vision. They were running away and when I looked back behind me, there was nothing. So I looked back to the deers...then it appeared." Taylor says, not wanting to continue anymore.

"Do you remember of what we had to give up? The things we carried, the memories it gave us, that we had tossed?...I remember. And you all too." Ted says, as if reminding them what they had benefitted and what consequences it gave.

"And what do you suppose to make us do? Let it have its way? We can't just do nothing!" Lotus angrily says.

"I didn't say that!" Ted shouts back.

"Then why don't you tell us what happened? Tell us what you saw." - Billy

"You're this way because Daddy doesn't look at you" - Ted tells him.

Billy placed his hands on Ted's chest and harshly pushed him. Then it was like havoc. Everyone was shouting at each other angrily.

"Guys, stop...stop it...I said STOP!." Prima shouts at the group. It didn't work.

"What do you guys would Hadrian think when he sees us like this?" Prima says. That made them stop.

"What do we do with the new girl?" Mike asks curiously.

"What we always do best." Prima says.

RING! RINGGG!

The bell rang.