Raven
Darren Delmonico…who are you? As I wander through the echoing halls of whatever nightmare castle I'm in, I try to find Darren's room. I didn't like the way his eyes raked over me.Like he knew me. He doesn't know me, no one can know me. If I'm known I can be pinned down. I like having fun too much to be pinned down. I rake my finger across the dark wallpaper as I wander through the twining hallways, watching as the color palette changes, downstairs is dark gray and black. I wander up the stone stairwell. I feel a pulse in my hands once I reach the second floor. A curling whisper like a finger beckoning me to come near. I turn and see a steel door marked "The viper" set into it in brass. I walk over to the door and jiggle the handle, nothing happens. I roll my eyes at the inconvenience, pulling a bobby pin from off of my bra strap. I knew these would come in handy. I shove the bobby pin into the door handle and gently maneuver the lock out of place and the door swings open.All the lights are off but I can tell the room is made of steel based on how cold it is. I can see my breath in the frosty air. I make out a shape in the center of the room, A mannequin? It looks like a little boy, there's something familiar about it. I flick on the lights and a huge breaking noise sounds before the dummy is alight with flame. The blast sends me sailing against the wall and my vision goes dark. I'm lost in dark depths and muddled memories until one, clear as day and vivid as if it were happening for the first time.
We were walking our usual route from school, Ian and me. I was skipping and humming. Listening to the rattle of my newest art projects in my backpack. My parents had just started allowing me to walk home and I was so happy they were finally seeing me for the responsible second grader that I was. But the truth is, I didn't like Ian much. He was rude and snotty and would always push me around and call me a stupid girl. But I'm not stupid, I know I'm smart. I'm going to be smart just like my parents and I'm going to change the world, he'll see. The brown haired boy was taunting me. He was saying that I was going to fall or trip and that he was gonna laugh. He told me my parents were just going to throw away the projects I had been working so hard on, "They are not!" I yelled at him "Are to! Your parents are gonna throw them in the trash as soon as you turn your back. I saw your art, it was ugly. Just. Like. You." He stuck his tongue out at me, I tried so hard to ignore him, but he was just so rude! "I'm not ugly, you're ugly!" at that Ian stuck out his foot and tripped me. I hit the ground, I saw something shiny and black laying in the gutter… "What're you gonna do? Cry?" he taunted. I picked up the mysterious object. I sat criss cross applesauce on the ground and fiddled with the object. It looked like a lighter, I've seen my dad use these. I ran my thumb along the spinning piece and pressed the button, A small flame lit up my gaze. "Woah!" Ian said, "How'd you do that?" he tried to grab the lighter from me but I wouldn't let him. "No! it's mine!" when he still made an effort to grab it I took him by his shirt and placed the lighter against it. The fabric caught fire. It burned through the shirt like paper. Ian kept thrashing and thrashing. He was the stupid one, he didn't even know that fanning the flame only makes it bigger I watched as the flames burned his shirt, then his hair, his skin, the bubbles that showed up on his skin were a furious red. I wanted to pop them. Ian screamed and screamed and screamed. But all I could do was watch the flame consume him. The flame was hungry. Violently so, it ate at his flesh until I could see the bone. Sirens showed up at some point, police officers along with them. But Ian was long dead before anyone got there. I stared at his burnt body on the pavement. Everyone said it was shock, that's why I wasn't talking. That's why I was staring at the body with no emotion. But he knew better. The man with dark graying hair and dark eyes approached me. "Hello Valerie." The man cooed at me, "I couldn't help but notice you seem a little upset. Would you like to tell me why?" I held out the lighter and pointed to it "All the juice is gone." The man smiled, "Well, that just will not do, will it? Tell you what, your parents said you could come with me, just for a short while. We're looking for special children like you Valerie, we could really use your help with something. If you come with me, I'll make sure you get a new lighter. How does that sound?" I thought about it for a moment, staring at the empty lighter. "Okay." I shrugged.