“Oh, thank you. That might be fun, writing.” Kikyo gaze slowly drifted up from the camera in her hands as Kaya spoke. Tension left her shoulders as the moment passed on by with only a few words, and the little smile returned to her lips. Just the lights making funny shadows, that's all. A little mystery solved. She settled back into the couch listening and munching on her snacks as Kaya provided the next story. A wonderfully spooky little tale about the very off-brand soda they were all sipping from. She snapped a quick photo of the group as Kaya finished her tale, Mae’s expression was cute and Akari had that one look in her eyes like she knew exactly what she wanted to do with her story.
Kikyo leaned in a bit as Akari dimmed the lights and started the next ghost story. She knew elements of the story, this wasn’t the first time a magical girl with no eyes was slinking about in the shadows, still Kikyo was pulled in as she always was by Akari’s knack for telling the story. Kikyo drew in a breath as the story neared its climax, a sharp sound in the dark room. She held her breath as Akari neared the big scare and then —
CRASH
The door swung open, slamming into the wall and causing Kikyo to bounce up in her seat. The no-eye’d girl? Here? Someone screamed.
Out of pure reflex Kikyo pulled her camera up and she snapped a picture. The flash illuminated the little group, catching their expressions frozen in that moment before it was swallowed again by the dark.
The person at the door called a hello. Do evil ghosts say hi?
“Hullo! I’m Kikyo.” She called back, perhaps unhelpfully, she was sitting in the dark after all.
Well, if the chips are off the table - or on the table, as it were - maybe the soda will be better. Miko fiddles with the little tab on top, trying to get it open without chipping her carefully-done nail polish.
Finally, triumphantly, she manages to crack the top with a soft hiss, but before she can take a sip, Kaya goes into the story on its origins. Miko frowns at the brightly colored can in her hand and dejectedly lowers it to her lap. Mae may be more vocal about it, but it’s clear Miko isn’t quite sure what to think of the story either.
It’s probably just a joke, right? She raises the can again, and then the lights go off. “Eep!”
Her attention is drawn to the only source of light in the room, and she presses back against the couch as Akari’s tale unfolds, looking around in the darkness fearfully. Haha, it’s just a story, just a story-
SLAM!
“AAAaaaaaaH!” Miko screams, high pitched and terrified, as a dark shape collides with her. The soda drops from her hand, sugary liquid splashing all over the couch before the can rolls under the table.
The light from the hallway reveals who it was that had crashed into her- not an eyeless magical girl bent on revenge, but Mae. Miko sits back again with a sigh, placing a hand over her racing heart. “Oh my GOSH, you guys.”
She takes another moment to recover before looking towards the brightly lit doorway once more. “Hi, Riet. You aren’t a ghost, are you? We’re telling ghost stories, so this would be a good place to be if you were, but also maybe not.”
Mae seemed to be taking this all very seriously. Too seriously? Kaya wasn't sure - she'd have to check in on that and make sure the other girl was okay. Akari took over the storytelling thread, adding another creepy dimension to it in a way that had Kaya on the edge of her seat, even though she had been the one making up the whole start of it in the first place. Things were getting spookier and spookier, so Kaya took a minute to lean over towards Mae and whisper, quietly, "It's okay, it's just a- AAAAHHHH!"
Okay, that hadn't ended quietly, but the door slamming open had interrupted her reassurances at exactly the wrong moment. Fortunately, Kaya hadn't been the only one screaming - Mae definitely had, and she was pretty sure about half the room had joined in. Kaya collapsed in giggles with an "Oh, man, that was great" as Kikyo got up and... took a picture.
Apparently the ghost was another girl. Or maybe it was a ghost girl. Well, even if it was, she'd probably still want to be welcome, especially after she introduced herself. "Hi, Riet! Welcome to scary stories time! Come in, we have questionable snacks! Oh, and I'll get some paper towels for that, Miko, I saw some in one of the cabinets." Kaya hopped up from the couch, searching through the cabinets - which was a lot harder using her phone as a flashlight - and coming up with a roll of paper towels on the second try, bringing some over to Miko and tearing a couple off to start helping with the spilled soda. It was no big deal, really, but better to clean it up sooner than later. "Anyone else know any good stories? That one came out great!"
Riet's (admittedly rather abrupt) entrance into the room was greeted with a chorus of screams, causing her to flinch back into the corridor. And the room was almost entirely dark; what had she almost walked into?
Out of pure reflex Kikyo pulled her camera up and she snapped a picture.
Riet caught a glint of the camera's lens just in time to swing the door closed again. It was a bad reflex. She'd picked it up from her parents, after her health had begun to deteriorate (did she need to be thinking about that now?). There was a flash--of course there was going to be one, what with all the not-light--but the only thing it captured of her were her pale fingers wrapped around the door's frame. After a few seconds, she swung it open again at a much more sedate pace, and issued a decidedly less confident greeting than she'd planned.
“Hi, Riet. You aren’t a ghost, are you? We’re telling ghost stories, so this would be a good place to be if you were, but also maybe not.”
"Er. Not yet! They seem interesting, though?" She'd done some research on ghosts, before she'd given up on it as an option. "Interesting" was one way to put it; "fantastically limited" was probably more appropriate.
Accepting--er, she hadn't got a name from her; whatever--one of their invitations, Riet stepped into the room and slid along the wall until she was at the snack cabinet. There she remained, hovering with what she hoped looked like excitement or interest, and not nervous energy.
“The only thing that ever stopped me being exactly who I wanted,” she said, “was the worry that I would soon be dead … and now I am dead, and I am sick of roses, and I am horny for revenge.” -Harrow the Ninth, by Tamsyn Muir
A bright flash and more screams, adding to her imagined terror as she buried her face into the arm of the sofa. Mae’s heart pounded as her mind raced.
Who did I fall over? Something wet splashed across my legs! blood!? This is a nightmare! Screams and giggling? A flash of lightni….a camera? But the blood!
She reached down to feel the droplets running down her legs. Yes…no….It’s cold and..sticky? Soda?
Taking a deep breath, Mae lifted her face to the still somewhat dark room to the sound of greetings and laughter. If her face could glow it would have lit the whole room with her embarrassment. Okay, so there wasn’t some eyeless psycho girl; there was just a girl with an over active imagination that caused a mess. Feeling the cushions beneath her, Mae made sure it wasn’t soaked in soda before slipping back around to sit.
Of course this was one of many firsts for a homeschooled girl who had practically been a shut in for two years. The whole day had been one big emotional roller coaster ride. On the bright side she was still trying, Mae only hoped she hadn’t made anyone else upset or angry for overreacting.
Oh yeah! Miko! I better apologize, I just rolled and crawled over her after all.
“Um…I er. I’m sorry. I guess I’m not good with the scary stuff. Kinda funny…er maybe I guess. Eh he..hehe….sorry um Miko? Right?”
It was kinda funny, right? Yeah er, I’d better help clean up.
Seeing Kaya had found some paper towels, Mae stands to help wipe up the mess she had caused. It was the least she could do regardless what anyone thought.
“Huh? huh?” It didn’t make any sense, and the longer she looked down at the screen the less sense it made. She had the faces of the four girls who were sitting around the couch, but the door was closed. There had been a person there, right? The door had been opened, she had heard it, no, the others had reacted to it, so it had to have happened. But the door was closed in the picture. Then had there not been someone there? Kikyo’s brow crinkled with confusion as she plopped back down onto the couch. Was Riet really a ghost? If the other people heard her then that had to be the only reasonable conclusion to draw.
Kikyo looked up from her camera with a little frown as she looked to the muddled shape of Riet in the gloom of the room. She still felt certain that evil ghosts wouldn’t give their name, so maybe Riet was just not an evil ghost? Kikyo nodded slowly to herself.
“Does Riet want to tell a story then? If not I could try to think of something.” Kikyo said. It seemed like a good idea, a ghost had to have some fun stories right? What else was there for a door slamming ghost to do? Well, other than slamming doors that is. She lifted her camera back up to her eye and snapped a quick picture of the girls as they cleaned up the aftermath of Mae’s panic. Something charming about it really, a nice little memory. She frowned again, she was forgetting something wasn’t she? Right, yes she was.
“Oh, uh, do you need any help?” Kikyo asked, standing back up.
//... into the dark she stepped, but never did she feel free of the gaze...//
Miko takes a moment to set a concerned hand on Mae’s shoulder when the other girl emerges from her terrified huddle at the arm of the couch. In the face of Mae’s stuttered apology, she puts on her best, brightest smile. Idols bring light into the world, and comfort people who are scared!
“That’s alright! We all get scared sometimes,” she says cheerfully. Kaya returns with paper towels, which Miko accepts gratefully. “Thanks, Kaya.”
She pulls out her phone, turning on the flashlight and setting it on the table to illuminate the mess. First, she ensures that she didn’t get any soda on herself - luckily, she didn’t, most of it having splashed across the furniture and floor. As Mae stands up to help, though, Miko notices the soda on her legs and offers her a few paper towels. “Oh! You got some on your legs, sorry about that.”
Miko kneels down to pick the soda can off the floor, careful to pick it up in a way that doesn’t spill any more of the sticky substance. “Wait a second before you start a new story, there’s soda all over the floor. I think we’ve got it though.”
She gets to work cleaning that up and, with three of them all working together, they’ve minimized the mess in no time. The couch is still slightly damp and tacky, but there’s enough un-soda’d cushion for her and Mae to sit.
And so she does, sitting primly and patting the space beside her. “You can sit by me, Mae. I’m sure the soda will make the couch fully ghost-proof.”
Akari totally didn't scream. And if she had, it wasn't that loud. And if it was, other people had screamed, too - and, come to think of it, it was probably the other people screaming that Akari had heard, and not her own screaming, which was, as previously established, something she didn't do. Clutching a clawed hand to her still racing heart, she moved over to the lightswitches, flipping them back on in a single sweep of her arm. The gaggle of girls on the couch were in a pile, spilled soda all over both the cushions and Mae's legs. Akari bit back a laugh. Not because the scene wasn't funny - it just felt a little rude. Instead, she turned a level stare to the newest arrival, the one who'd slammed the door in the first place. Something about her looked a bit - familiar - but Akari couldn't quite put her finger on it.
"Hey, Riet."
She tilted her chin up in the girl's direction, tossing her a can of uni-cola her way.
"Snacks in that cabinet, we got a few more here. Yeah, ghost stories. Pretty cool, huh?"
Come to think of it, this girl looked a bit like a ghost, all pale and shadowy and skittish. Pretty cool indeed.
"Got a good pic, Kiki? Bet we're scared shitless in it."
Yesterday, upon the stair, I met a man who wasn't there! He wasn't there again today, Oh how I wish he'd go away!
Akari turned the light on, which made cleaning up the spilled soda way easier than trying to do it by phone-flashlight. She really did seem to be the competent one. Kaya didn't begrudge her that, it was good to have someone like that around who did the obvious things instead of fumbling around in the dark like the rest of them.
That was supposed to be a metaphor, but she wasn't really sure it had come out right. She tried to fix it in her head so that she could say something inspirational-sounding outside, but by the time she thought she had the right words in the right order, the moment had pretty much passed. On the bright side, though, at least the soda spill was mostly taken care of, so they didn't need to worry about that. She wondered who it was who cleaned the upholstery - probably a cleaning service. Actually, definitely a cleaning service, there had been something in one of those incoming-student informational packets about how common areas and hallways were cleaned by a professional service, but students were responsible for keeping their own dorm rooms in good order.
"Thanks for the lights. I think we're as cleaned up as we can be - I'll leave a note for the cleaning service so they can make sure to go over things. For now, we'll just avoid those couple couch cushions. There's plenty of other places to sit. Or stand! Anyway." She waved vaguely at the newest girl, even though she'd already said hi. "Sorry, I was thinking about the soda spill and forgot to introduce myself properly. I'm Kaya, nice to meet you. We're all just getting to know what scares the soda out of all of us, and apparently it's doors opening? But don't worry, guys, by the end of our time here, I'm sure we'll all learn how to face our fears!"
She was kidding. Mostly?
"So. Awkward question, what brings all of you to Jade Seal? Was it your first choice, or... not?"
Yeah, not, because if they'd had magical powers, they wouldn't be here, right? But maybe not everyone felt that way. The rest of Kaya's family certainly felt that way. Pretty emphatically, as it turned out.
Ugh.
She might as well get it over with.
"I'm... part of the fourth generation of my family to go here. Everyone goes here in my family. They're... not real big on all that magic stuff." Kaya sighed. "I mean... there's nothing wrong with not having magic, of course. I just... sometimes feel like I wanted to be... different."
“I got a great one!” Kikyo said with a wide smile as she held her camera up. “Mae has a really amazing expression, Kaya too.” She flipped the camera around so the other girls could take a look at the little screen. A can of soda falling to its final demise, four girls caught in their screams, a ghostly hand on the door. A nice spooky little photo, and at least Riet seemed like she was a nice ghost. Must be sad to not really show up in photos.
“Wow, four generations? Your family must know all the little secrets then.” Kikyo said, with a smile. She did learn about the snacks from her sister, so no telling what other little things that she might know! Though, it might be a little boring too? Get stuck in a rut like that. “Would be cool to be special too, my younger sister goes to one of those schools. My parents wanted me to go to Jade, so I guess it wasn’t really much of a choice.” Kikyo said, her gaze sliding away back to the corner that had the flickering light.
“Would be nice to be special, I think. Just do whatever.” She repeated, her expression strained for a moment before she looked back to the group with a smile.
Last Edit: Feb 23, 2022 23:58:10 GMT by UmbraSight
//... into the dark she stepped, but never did she feel free of the gaze...//
Oh, they'd been cleaning. Should she have--well, no, it was too late, now. And anyway, she'd have gotten in the way, she was pretty sure. Her head was already going a little foggy.
A story? Er... She had a few, but none of them seemed particularly appropriate to the moment, and anyway--oh, they were moving on; excellent. She settled down against the wall, until she was almost sitting. The snacks could wait until they were done with questions.
"So. Awkward question, what brings all of you to Jade Seal? Was it your first choice, or... not?"
Something about Kaya's story made Riet want to open up a little about hers.
"My family used to live in this area! I don't think any of them went here, exactly, but, well... I guess they thought a bit of time in the Old Country would be good for me." It was hard to keep the bitterness out of her tone, but she thought she mostly managed it. She didn't want to come off as unhappy to be here. "Anyway, I heard some--" hmm. "--interesting things about this place. Which made it feel like a better option than some of the other schools in the area. And my parents really liked it because... The same reason as Kaya, I think, basically; they really hate the idea of magic." Okay that was maybe too much; if she kept talking about that she wasn't going to be able to maintain her bright, cheery tone. She shrugged, sliding the rest of the way down the wall into a sitting position. "Anyway, it seems nice so far?"
“The only thing that ever stopped me being exactly who I wanted,” she said, “was the worry that I would soon be dead … and now I am dead, and I am sick of roses, and I am horny for revenge.” -Harrow the Ninth, by Tamsyn Muir
Mae gratefully accepted the paper towels from Miko, taking notice of her smile which did make the situation feel a little less awkward. The cola certainly seemed to clean better off the sofa than her legs. It already felt like syrup as she tried to wipe it off, just what was really in this stuff she wondered. One more little puddle of…unicorns blood..off the floor and it was done at last.
When Miko offered Mae to sit beside her she was relieved. Not so much that she wouldn’t be quite so frightened by any more stories, but rather relieved that the girl wasn’t angry for plowing over her in the dark.
“Are you s..sure you don’t mind? “
She looked at the dry spot on the cushions next to Miko, right next to Miko, like personal space next to her. Well she did offer, would it be rude to decline? Just sit Mae, don’t make a big deal out of it…
As she sat down , her side brushed against Miko. How long had it been since she sat so close to someone other than her parents? It was kind of nice, even if they had only just met. Not awkward at all. Well at least it wasn’t until Kikyo showed the photo she had snapped at the perfect moment. Gods how embarrassing all over again, and now there’s no shadows to hide her glowing cheeks.
“ Akari’s s..story was just so er scary, and then the door and er……ugh.”
Mae sighed, no use in making it any worse. At least it seemed scary story time was over, that was a plus. She decided just to keep her mouth shut a minute and listen as Kaya and the other girls shared why they ended up at Jade, offering a little wave to Riet since she hadn’t greeted her yet.
"Sorry 'bout that, Mae," Akari said, rubbing at the back of her neck and looking genuinely bashful. "Just - uh - story I heard at a lock-in, once. Didn't think it'd be too much."
She grinned, moving back over to the couch and settling on the arm.
"Seems like you guys were supposed to be here. I'm kinda lucky I got here at all. Got into trouble a lot back at my old school, and up until now, I thought I was gonna end up going to one of those reform school places."
She wiggled her fingers.
"Looks like either my mom and dad forgot, or they thought a place like this'd be better somehow. Who the fuck knows. Guess I should be happy I'm not going to some place that makes you wear tracksuits and mop the floors, huh?"
A snort, and she reclined, kicking her feet back up onto the table.
"So yeah, it's pretty okay. No offense, Kaya."
Yesterday, upon the stair, I met a man who wasn't there! He wasn't there again today, Oh how I wish he'd go away!
“Not at all!” Miko confirms when Mae asks about sitting next to her. She tries to give her as much room as possible, but there isn’t a lot of dry couch to work with, honestly.
The wannabe idol laughs delightedly at Kikyo’s picture. Oh, what a group they make! It’s like the promotional pictures she’s seen in magazines, with idol groups hanging out in their downtime. Of course, this isn’t a staged picture, but she’ll take what she can get.
Her laugh sends her shoulder bumping into Mae’s, trying to replace the girl’s embarrassment with jubilance. Just as soon, though, Kaya’s question has Miko going tense, her smile turning wooden.
She listens to the others’ answers as she tries desperately to think of a non-bitter way to phrase her own. Even if everyone else seems similarly disappointed, she shouldn’t… idols are supposed to be good examples, bringinging spirits up all over the world.
Assistance on that front comes from an unexpected source; Akari, whose story isn’t necessarily happy, but also isn’t as bleak as the others. Miko can’t precisely match her laid-back energy, but she can try to keep the mood light.
“I was going to try to join an idol group right out of middle school, but, uh,” her cheery tone falters, but she forges on, the words tripping out of her mouth all in a rush, “didn’t-really-work-out-so-now I’m here! And it really is a lovely campus, isn’t it? Lots of trees and flowers and all of you lovely people.”
The photo was... somehow perfect. It was perfect because it wasn't perfect, because no one looked their best and everyone was obviously in the middle of something, and it was rushed and crazy and chaotic and... perfect. It was the sort of photo that was the beginning of something. Kaya grinned when it was passed by her. "I love it, Kikyo. Will you send me a copy? I want to put it up in my room."
It'd be a great reminder of how they all met - because as the stories unfolded, none of them were perfect either. A lot of them were hoping to go somewhere else, or be someone else. There were families that weren't perfect, plans that weren't perfect, and everything was just... it was life. It wasn't a ghost story, where everything went according to the plot. It was all messy and unpredictable, and there was something in that that was just... perfect.
Which was not saying it wouldn't be more perfect with magic fireballs thrown on top, but Kaya supposed she couldn't have everything.
"I guess maybe it's all right after all," she agreed, giving Akari a nod of appreciation. There were definitely worse places to be in life. "I don't know if I know too much though. You'd think after four generations I would know everything, but no, I know things like 'the sixth step between the second and third floors in the east staircase squeaks' and 'don't put your books by the radiator in room 307 because it leaks' and 'they tell you that the white tulips were planted in cooperation with a visiting school sixty years ago and they've bloomed ever since, but actually the groundskeeping staff replants them every two years in the fall.' And 'there might be snacks in the cabinet,' which is, I guess, at least marginally useful."
A lot of what Kaya knew was like that: marginally useful. None of the things she knew were bad things to know, really, but none of it was special or... or... magical. She guessed the word she was looking for was 'magical' all along, wasn't it? That was the story of her life: Kaya the Not Magical Girl.
"I guess I do know one other school story - kind of a ghost story, in a way."