Visions (21 page)

36

Walking back through the school was eerie. All the staff had scarpered shortly after the bell, and walking through the empty school was eerie. I reassured myself with the fact that the caretaker had to be around somewhere. Morgan had told me before that he always did a quick tour of the school before locking up because he’d seen staff doing some strange things when they thought no-one was about. Things that he shared with Morgan and Hazel when they bought him drinks on nights out. Morgan had said the cost of the drinks were always worth the entertainment he offered.

              I felt more secure when I reached my classroom, like a child who has made it to the safe-zone during a game of tig. Luckily it was still light outside at this time of year, or I wouldn’t have made it down the deserted corridor. Sitting at my desk going through the papers, I found myself unable to concentrate fully. Every rattle of a pipe or creaking of the old building made me uneasy. They were probably noises that were muffled by the sound of children throughout the school day, but now they seemed loud and intrusive. I checked my watch and decided that it would be better to head back to the bus stop sooner rather than later. It simply wouldn’t do to miss the next bus as well. As I gathered my things back together, I heard footsteps on the corridor so I hurried. That had to be the caretaker. I would feel one hundred times more at ease if I caught a glimpse of him. I rushed through the door and glanced around. Someone scurried round the corner. It must have been him. Who else would be walking around the school building at this time?

              I put my bags down while I locked the classroom door.

“Miss Morgan?”

I turned round, startled. It was Darren Pierce. How the hell had he got into the school building? I mustn’t have secured the entrance properly and now here he was, towering over me in his oversized black hoodie. The sneer on his face was enough to tell me I was in trouble. Fight or flight battled like two swarms of butterflies in my stomach.

              “Darren, you know that you’re not allowed in the school building anymore,” I stated, pulling myself up to my full height, which was still a full foot beneath him.

He didn’t back down. Instead, he came closer until there was no more than an foot between us.

              “Are you threatening me, you bitch!”

It was at that point, when he was glaring down at me with utter fury and hatred in his dark eyes, that my knees went week and my sight blurry with fear. It was through these eyes that I realised. He was the angry teenage boy in my vision and now it all made sense. The reason why I hadn’t had any visions recently was clear. Everything had been leading up to this point. Darren Pierce was going to kill me. There was nothing after this point.

              Seeing me cower from him, Darren grinned, showing his teeth. Knowing I still had to fight for my life, I made eye contact with him again. They were huge, dark and full of madness. He was high on the thought of intimidation and violence.

“Darren, listen to me. The best thing you could do now is turn around and go home. When the caretaker comes round, he’ll see you and call the police. Think how disappointed your mother will be. No matter how angry you are, it’s not worth it.” I wasn’t sure that in his current state of mind, Darren was even capable of comprehending what I was saying to him. Judging from the crazed expression on his face, my words had made no difference to his intentions.

              “You have ruined my fucking life and now you tell me it’s not worth it. Don’t you get it or are you too far up yourself to see what you’ve done? My mum can’t find a school that’ll take me, apart from the one for kids with criminal records. I’ll have to sit with a bunch of idiots who belong in jail because of you!” He was starting to get so riled now that the volume of his voice was increasing. I realised this could be an opportunity to alert the caretaker or any other staff working late that there was a problem.

              “I don’t think you can realistically blame your being excluded on me, Darren!” Now it was his turn to recoil slightly. The venom in my voice had shocked him.
Good! Let him scream at me.
“You would have been excluded for sexual assault whether you’d bothered spending your time trying to intimidate me or been a perfect angel. I’m sorry, Darren, but being excluded is solely down to you and your bad choices.”

              “I was on my last warning because of you!” he screamed.

              “And do you think that would have been the case had you kept yourself away from me after you were removed from the class or, better still, behaved like a normal human being and been civil towards me?” I waited for the screaming to burst out of the rage he was clearly feeling.

He stayed silent.

I saw his arm pull back and felt the force of his fist when it hit my cheekbone. Then I was on the floor, a crumpled mess mangled with the books and papers that had been in my bags. I held my hand up to feel my face. There was blood. It

seemed to be coming from my eye.

              I opened my mouth and screamed louder than I thought myself capable. “Help! I’m being attacked!”

Darren lifted his foot above me and brought it crashing down on my shoulder.

              “Shut the fuck up, you stupid bitch. Like anybody gives a shit. You deserve this!” His foot went up and came down again. “You think you’re so perfect but the truth is, you’re shit at what you do.” He knelt down beside the ball I’d curled myself up into and leaned in close. “When it comes down to it, you just couldn’t handle me. Call yourself a fucking teacher!”

              “Darren, listen, please. Scott spoke to me when you first started having problems in class. He said he was worried about you.”

              “Yeah? Well, I haven’t got any mates anymore, have I? They fucking hate me now. They don’t even answer me when I call after them in the street. That’s all because of you, too, though, isn’t it? You came here and turned them all against me.” He slapped me again, but it didn’t have the same strength behind it. All of a sudden he seemed more sad than angry. “I had Scott and Phil. We’d been best mates since primary school and now they think I’m a fucking rapist and because they believe that, they also believe the shit you went around telling everyone about me stalking you.” He paused, breathing heavily.

              “Scott said that you changed when your dad left. He said you weren’t haven’t always been like this.”

              “Scott knows nothing. My dad’s never been bothered about me. My mum said he used to leave me hungry so he had enough money for his fags.” He was still kneeling beside me, shaking his head now. His eyes were on the ground. I dragged myself away a bit and leaned against the wall.

              “He said you were a bit cheeky, but not aggressive. What happened, Darren?” Just as I thought we were getting somewhere and that I might actually get out of the school alive, his whole body tensed.

              “Now? Now you want to ask me what happened? No fucker in this school gave a shit when I needed help, did they? But now you want to play the fucking psychiatrist with me. Well, it’s time to face facts. You couldn’t be bothered putting the effort in with me.” He was rising to his feet now. I covered my head with my arms waiting for the blows. “All you could think about was getting rid of me, so every single thing I did, you went running to Mrs Mooney or Mr Briggs to tell stories on me. Do you know why? I’ll tell you why. It’s because I’m not worth the effort.”

              “I never said that, Darren,” I pleaded with him.

              “You didn’t need to. My dad doesn’t need to say it when he doesn’t bother ringing me to tell me that he’s changed his mind about taking he can’t take me to the big match that our team’s got because he wants to earn points with the new slag he’s seeing. He thinks if he takes her son instead, she’ll let him in her knickers, my mum said. So I find out because Phil sees them there while he’s with his dad. My mum doesn’t need to say I’m not worth the effort to her when she gets up and goes to the fridge every morning. Oh, she doesn’t go for a carton of milk to pour over my cereal. Oh no. She doesn’t give a shit if I have breakfast or not; she goes for a bottle of wine! Scott and Phil don’t need to say I’m not worth the effort when they delete me on Facebook because they’ve heard I’ve sexually assaulted some little bitch in the park. They didn’t bother asking me for my side of the story at all. Nobody was interested!”

How could nobody hear him with the level he was shouting at? Where was the

caretaker? I glanced at my handbag, wondering if I would be able to get my phone out

without him seeing.

              “Surely the police gave you chance to tell them your side of the story,” I said softly, hoping he might think I was on his side.

              “They’d already made their mind up once they’d spoken to Amelia. They didn’t want to hear that the little tart turned up with a skirt on so short I could see her knickers. I tried to tell them that she sat on top of me and asked me if I wanted to touch her. I was on top of her ready to take my jeans off when she started screaming at me to get off. She’s a tease!”

              “No, that isn’t fair,” I said, soothingly, while I slowly edged towards my handbag.

              “Nobody gave a shit about it then. You can’t talk,” he shouted, making me freeze. “You didn’t think I was worth the effort, either. All you wanted was me out of your classroom and even then that wasn’t enough for you. You must have loved it when I was suspended. You must have loved it so much you wanted to make it permanent, didn’t you?”

My whole face, shoulder and back throbbed agonisingly, but I forced myself to stay focused. Time was still passing, no matter how slowly it seemed to me, and I had to hold onto the hope that somebody would come around the corner any second.

              “I tried with you, Darren. I tried to speak with you. Trust me, the last thing I wanted was for any of my students to feel the way that you clearly did. I kept hoping you would start to behave but you didn’t, and I had no option but to follow the school rules.”

              “No, but if it had been Amelia playing up, you’d have taken the time with her, wouldn’t you? You know that me and Ally used to go out together. She was my girlfriend for ages on and off. When you arrived, it was like she just couldn’t be bothered with me anymore. I told her everything. She knows everything about me. She told me to stop being a dick in your lessons. I told her she must fancy you if she couldn’t see through you. I lost Ally because of you, too!” He crouched back down beside me and stared intently at my face as though trying to make a decision.

              “Darren,” I appealed, “I know that you’re really angry with me right now, but do you remember when you broke your hand? Can you remember how much it hurt? I think my shoulder might be badly hurt right now. Please, just go and let me get some help.” He weighed me up and down and though I saw no sympathy in his eyes, he held out his arm. Knowing I had no choice but to pretend
I trusted him, I took hold of it with my unharmed arm and allowed him to pull me to my feet. “Thank you.”

              Then, he took a step back. His hand went in his pocket. I saw the fluorescent light from above reflect off something shiny in his hand before he punched me in the side. He staggered a few steps backwards as I slid to the floor completely winded. Then he turned around and scarpered away.

              I lay on the floor for what felt like an eternity, drifting in and out of consciousness. For some reason, I could not get my breath back from being winded, so I couldn’t call for help. Darren had made sure to kick my handbag further away than I would be capable of dragging myself. At some points, my shoulder hurt the most. The arm connected to it had no feeling whatsoever now. It seemed the blood had all drained from it, making it totally numb. Other times, I would awake thinking about how my face felt like it was going to split open, starting at my cheekbone, right up into my scalp. Every so often, I would feel a twinge of discomfort in my side where he’d hit me. I felt that I was wet before I saw it. With a fleeting cringe of embarrassment, I realised that whoever found me would know that I’d been so scared that I’d wet myself. Then when I looked, I didn’t care so much about that. Whoever found me was probably going to find a dead body. Darren had stabbed me and I was surrounded by an ever growing puddle of dark red blood.

37

Sirens echoed in the distance. Fluorescent lights, hot and far too bright, bore down on me.

A familiar voice calling my name reverberated around me. Mr Briggs? “…and I’ve called your mother straight after. She’s going to be there, too. She’s going to try and get hold of your fiancé. Can you hear the ambulance? It must be outside now but they’ll find us. I’m not going to leave you.”

I tried to open my eyes, but didn’t have the strength. My side was killing me now. It felt as though someone had put a ton of bricks onto me and I was slowly being crushed to death.

“Here!” Mr Briggs shouted, his voice clear now. “Follow my voice and you’ll find us! I’m not going to be able to leave her. I’m trying to stop the blood flow!” He continued to shout until there was a flurry of movement and noise around me. Someone was touching my neck, firmly pressing around my collarbone. Then I was being rolled onto my back and hoisted into the air. Vomit rushed from my stomach and I was choking. This was simply all too much. Death seemed inviting right now. Anything to escape this pain, the terrible fear I felt and the awful images that rushed through my mind. Death was what was meant to happen, I thought as I let go. I knew that. I’d told Theo. There hadn’t been any more visions for ages because this was fate.

              Before I let go fully and focussed on the darkness inside my eyelids, I heard Uncle Carl say, “We’re losing her.”