Teacup and Bullets

 

The school looked normal on the fresh morning of the 13th. The Friday was calm, and absolutely uneventful, at least, so far. 3 silhouettes, a shadow within a shadow, navigated the courtyard with unwavering confidence, making no more noise than a breath in the wind. The way they moved was unexperienced, however the hidden guns and knives made sure that no one took advantage of this. Just by smelling the warm air around them one could tell they were not here for mercy or forgiveness. They were here for revenge.

 

***

 

He was still staring at me. The rapid beating of my heart had slowed and returned to a normal, the noise that filled my head faded and evaporated. Now the only obstacle between me and my drawing was him. I saw a shadow play across my canvas and I turned, biting my lip to keep myself from yelling. “Are you ok?” I asked him, a jagged edge to my voice. Joe turned; he was examining my drawing, a slight frown marring his otherwise perfect forehead. He turned to me, confusion evident in his eyes. “Who’s this meant to be?” I couldn’t tell if his darkened tone was one of building anger or of confusion. Blushing, I turned my canvas away from his prying eyes, getting out my fine tip paint brush and carefully going over all my pencil marks with the bold paint. “What?” He asked, his voice developing the cruel edge of a bully. “Embarrassed?” The first thought that flitted through my mind was pathetic and doleful and thus forth quickly dismissed. The second thought, hot on the first thoughts heels, was something along the lines of jackass. And lagging behind at third was probably the most practical of thoughts. Use the second thought. I can’t do that! His a jock! Like second in command to King Hudson himself! I stared at the canvas, trying to continue my painting, courtesy of thought number four. “Oh, you so totally are.” Joe sniggered, the cruel laugh cutting me as if he had used his razor sharp tongue (Just a bit of sarcasm there). Be strong, idiot. I told myself, worrying that talking to myself, albeit inside my head, still counted as the first sign of madness.

 

***

 

The concrete school building stood as fragile as a glass doll in the 3 men’s eyes. The measures of security were as brittle as old women’s bones, the alarms and lock down procedures as riddled as cheddar cheese. This will be easy.

 

***

 

My science-class-bipolar diagnose turned out to be correct as I once again found the sterile prac desks and dirty theory desks fun and exciting. Not to mention I now had Millie’s attention and it was so fun getting her frustrated. She was talking to the person next to her, determined not to let me slip my words through her pathetic mental barrier. “Hey Millie?” She ignored me, flicking her horribly bleached hair behind her shoulder. Ouch, that hurt. “Yes, that is an extremely intelligent response. No doubt Paris Hilton herself could’ve thought of a better one. And no I’m not calling you Paris Hilton.” Millie turned around; her face scrunched up as if a giant hand had grabbed her face at the centre and twisted. As you can guess, it was not attractive. “What the hell is your problem Winters?” She spat the words at me, like a viper with its fangs removed. I shrugged, nonchalant. “I’m bored. You make me laugh.” I saw beneath her i-don’t-give-a-shit mask, that her face lit up. Immeadiantly I felt my stomach squirm. Without meaning to, I let my head drop down to my paper, my messy handwriting, although was the minority on my page, filled my vision. “I do?” My stomach gave another twist. “Yeah.” I mumbled into my chest. “You’re a real riot.” I don’t think she heard me; she was too busy fawning over my supposed compliment. “Oh, I think you’re funny as well!” Millie let out the enthusiasm that had been hiding beneath the surface just bubbled out, a wide, true smile spreading over her face. I felt my heart sink and a stab of self-hatred pierce my brain tissue. I had no idea how to deal with this, so I told the truth, eagerly disobeying my parent’s examples. “You can be funny, nice and friendly if you just cut out the bitch crap. But at the moment with you wearing that mask, well, it doesn’t make people like you very much.” She blinked at me, her green eyes widening and making her look like an innocent doll. Shit, I was seriously regretting telling the truth.

 

***

 

The tallest of the three walked up to the door, the glass reflecting his every move like a puppet. Slowly his gloved hand reached into his pocket, drawing out something that glinted in the sunlight.

 

***

 

I rubbed the side of my head, wear Jonny’s pencil had clipped me. “Since when did you get to be such a good aimer?” I grumbled swinging back so my chair groaned onto its back legs. Jonny copied my movements and grinned, his hands stuck behind my head. “I have always been that good. I just hid my powers. Like batman.” I snorted and for a second I heard the groaning legs of the chair out balance my weight and a feeling of weightlessness descended on me. Then I was on the floor, my chair tipped over near me and a whole room full of people laughing. Instead of feeling like a wounded animal, all embarrassed and depressed, I laughed, because let’s face it; falling of a chair is pretty funny. “Yeah, completely co-ordinated.” Jonno said, his goofy grin all over his face, squinching up the freckles on his cheeks. The laughter was shaking near the surface of a voice. “Yes, I know. I am a complete Klutz.” The gawking crowd dispersed, chuckling and shaking their heads. I was still sprawled on the carpeted floor, elbows behind me to cushion my fall. They didn’t. I laughed to cover up the fact that my brain was rattling and pain was shooting up my arms. “Now help me up.” He stuck out a long skinny arm and I gripped his hand, using it as an anchor to help me up. I didn’t feel any pity as he swayed under my weight. He did laugh when I fell of a chair after all. Chuckling we high fived. Wicked.

 

***

 

The door opened easily under the lock pick. With a quick set of self-satisfied smiles the shortest man placed a gloved hand on the door frame. They could see a slither of the wooden corridors lined row after row of cobalt blue lockers. They were in.

 

***

 

“Listen.” I told Joe, my temper cutting short. I turned to face him, completely pissed at the smug look plastered all over his face. “I don’t really care what you think of my painting.” His brown eyebrows shot up, challenging my words. I am going to kill you. “Yes, wow, I know. A girl who doesn’t actually care what you think. It’s amazing. I’m a freak. Throw me in the stocks, I don’t really care. Just piss off and do your own painting.” I don’t think I had ever let my face be that expressive during school before, at least not to people outside of my friend group. I turned my stool around, grabbing the brush from the canvas tray and hovered over my painting. “Wow, I don’t think I had ever heard you talk so much.” I couldn’t decipher his tone. I didn’t know if it was mean or factual or flattering or what. For someone so popular he really needs to learn how to communicate. I smiled, full of sarcasm.  I dabbed the blank parts of my canvas, blotching the back ground in black. “You should though; you’re a lot more interesting to talk to than the bitches I hang around with.” I felt the muscles in my hand tense up and surprise flitted through my brain at 100km per hour. Against my will my eyebrows shot up, etching disbelief onto my face. Can ya say bipolar, much? I didn’t say anything else.  My quite (stranger quite, around my friends I am MAD) nature kicked in, previous actions not included. I am not the type of person who will stick up for anyone getting bullied or teased, that’s not to say I don’t want to or don’t care. It’s just that unreasonable fear to face down someone. “What? Are you going mute again?” What was wrong with this guy? Why couldn’t he just shut up? “No. I’m ignoring you. You’re seriously freaking me out, bipolar man.” The tragic words tumbled out of my throat and I clamped my hands over my mouth, trying to stop anymore regrettable sentence form and explode out of my voice box. I felt my eyes widen and I didn’t dare take my eyes off the canvas.

 “That’s more like it.”

 

***

 

Each man slipped through and into the corridors, silent as ghosts. Each classroom door remained closed as they padded silently to the end of the corridor. A plastic door stood still, a soldier defending their post. The dark haired man put one hand lightly on the plastic.

 

***

 

“Excuse me!” Oh crap. The bitch was back. Ha rhyme. Her eyes blinked at me and she had twisted in the chair to get a better look at me. “You heard me.” I said turning back to my notebook and doodling a skull with headphones. “At least I don’t pretend to Mr Rebel-without-a-cause” I rolled my eyes before turning around and fixing her with my most sarcastic smile. “You know, I really do care what you think about me. Your criticisms, I take them to heart.” Say goodbye to sunny skies and hello to storm clouds. Her face scrunched up and darkened before she turned away, resuming any injured silence. Heh heh. Problem solved.

 

***

 

The door pushed open, the man’s hand carrying the solid frame. All three men stepped in. A woman, the flowery pattern of her dress stretching uncomfortably, stood up and asked the men if they needed help. The tallest man didn’t answer. The dark haired men did, pulling a gleaming automatic hand rifle out of his cargo pockets.

 

***

 

“Man, that was epic!” The chair incident had been glorified in the few minutes it had past and now we finished recounting exactly what had happened. “Dude, it felt like I was flying.” We laughed again and high fived.  Johnny shook his head. “What would we do without you?” I smiled and threw a pencil at the wall. ‘I dunno, man. I dunno.”

 

***

 

He pointed the gun at the women, pleased at the immediate change of her facial expression. He ignored her pleads, glad that the office was empty in first period. As he pulled the trigger and the bullet buried itself in the women’s temple he thought they had remained undetected however he didn’t see her hand twitch and press the alarm until the loud droan of the lockdown bell snapped reality into place.