Eighth blog.
I’ve been taking a break from this blog to reflect on myself, but I seriously think something is wrong. I know that there are a lot of things wrong with Paper School, but this one’s different. I think it happened somewhere around Monday, I don't know.
So, I'm in class, right? The first three periods started normally. Miss Circle did her math class, the teachers roamed the halls, you get the idea. So where’s the scary part, you ask? Well, it happened during Miss Thavel’s class.
So we’re going around, passing out papers, checking each other’s works, and sitting down. We’re preparing to show her the homework we did today, and to our relief, no one got hurt. Once that was done, Miss Thavel went up to the board and began her class on Spanish.
That’s when the speaker blared. Not even halfway into the lesson and there was already an announcement.
The words were simple, and directed to her: you have a visitor. At first, I scoffed. “You have a visitor?” What was this, a prison? Miss Thavel only sighed, told the speaker to “bring them in,” and continued with the lesson. I leaned back in my chair, chatted with a few other students to pass the time, and threw a few paper airplanes.
A few minutes later, though, this tall, almost charming man with dark hair entered the classroom. He had a brown trench coat — perhaps to protect himself from the rain — and a polite smile. Strangely, he had also brought some of the teachers with him to watch from outside. The whole class was confused but decided to play along. The man then asked Miss Thavel to stop the lesson and for him to come up to the board. Reluctantly, she agreed.
That’s when something strange happened.
He took out a stack of papers and began passing it out to the class. The contents of which were pretty inappropriate to show to children. Then, he starts addressing us:
“What you’re seeing here is a collection of crimes done by this teacher outside of the school.”
He places his hat down on the desk and continues, “This woman has killed children who haven’t failed their tests, drowned them in lakes, and is a prime example of a failure of the education system.” He takes out a copy of the document he handed out to us and flips to a new page. “This woman has no official dossiers in education and is nothing more than a serial killer who doesn’t follow the rules of the school she works at.”
Miss Thavel tries to intervene, but he stops her.
“In fact, her most recent crime up to this date-” he flips to a new page and shows it to the class, “-is the use of drugs. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, drugs.” We turned to the teachers standing outside the room. We knew it was in their nature: teachers stand up for other teachers. Or, something like that.
But to our surprise, the teachers were driven livid. They actually believed him. Miss Thavel argued that the documents were fake, but they weren’t hearing it. And what happened next is probably the most terrifying incident I have ever seen at Paper School. The man in the coat pulled out a GUN and began threatening Thavel to turn herself in.
By reflex, I and the other students threw our chairs at the windows and clamoured out (we weren’t having it anyway) and began escaping. Unable to decide where to go during school time (if we were to go home, we’d probably be punished), we decided to book it at the nearest cafe some of us went to buy snacks before going to our houses.
I looked back, and hundreds of children were pouring out of the school. The kids on the top floor began jumping into the bushes, sliding down pipes, or making their way around the building to get to the ladder. Some of the students were bleeding from their foreheads and their arms — probably because they got cut by the glass or were also caught in the riot.
We waited a few hours, wondering if we should go back. I mustered up the courage to be the volunteer and slowly walked to the school again. When I got there, it was plain empty. Aside from the shards of broken glass, no teachers remained. There was only a sign reading, “PLEASE COME AGAIN” on the front of the door.
I didn’t want to risk going in, so I ran to the cafe and informed the others. We left most of our belongings inside, but we knew it wasn’t worth it. We did a quick head count to make sure all of us were okay. Most of the students had escaped, though only one was missing from her class. I think her name was Ellie or something. Either way, she’s probably gone. Dead or alive, I don’t know.
Scared that we could still be punished though, we waited until the school was officially over before deciding to head home.
The next day, everything was back to normal. Miss Circle taught math, there was a new substitute, everything! We waited for the school to be over, were dismissed, and headed home. The next day was the same.
After a few days had passed, everything was finally going smoothly. I never saw that man since. Nor do I know why he knew about those things.
That was until now. Today, when I got out of class, I headed back to the cafe, hoping to buy a soda from the vending machine. I was pretty hungry (lunch was awful) so I was also hoping to get some ice cream. When I got there, I checked my pockets. I had run out of coins. I cursed myself and grabbed my forehead in dismay. That’s when the man appeared in front of me again.
And when I mean he appeared, I mean he appeared. I didn’t hear any footsteps or anything, all I could see was him towering over me. He put a couple of coins in the machine and took out two cans of sodas. He gave one to me and smiled. “Do you also want some ice cream?” he asked.
I almost wanted to turn down his offer, but I didn’t want to seem rude, so I nodded, still scared. He walked to the counter and bought the vanilla flavour. Maybe it was a lucky guess, but he knew exactly what I wanted that day.
He then patted a spot next to himself on the couch and invited me to sit next to him. I gulped and accepted the invitation. We ate together in silence. “So why did you kill Miss Thavel?” I asked. He shook his head. “I didn’t kill her,” he answered.
“Then where is she?”
“She’s sick.”
“Sick?”
“At home.”
“Where’s her home?”
“She’s moving away.” He takes a sip from the can and sighs. “Why’d you want to expose her then?” I asked finally. “Expose?” he questioned.
“Yeah. How’d you get all those photos and documents?”
“Those weren’t photos and documents.”
I raised an eyebrow. “What do you mean?” I stammered. I tried to use the most polite tone as possible.
“There were never any photos and documents about her crimes. She did nothing wrong,” the man patted me on the back. “But the papers—”
The man held up his finger to me. I quickly stopped talking. “Those were fake. I made those myself. The photos were simply photoshopped. Simple as that.”
“T-Then she died—”
“For nothing, yes.” He threw away the can and got up. “I take it you also want to know what happened to Ellie?” he asked. I wanted to say yes but decided against it. “Your choice,” he smiled. “What's your name, by the way?”
“Oliver, sir.”
“Nice name, Oliver.” He pats me on the head, getting in my personal space. “Name's Elias.”
Then he left.
I sat there for a while, thinking. After a few minutes, I got up and left too.
So as you can see, I had a rough couple of weeks. I don’t know if I’ll see that dude again, but I sure hope I don’t. The other students hope so, too.