Soul Screamers, Volume 1

A teacher, probably, rendered unrecognizable by the weird gray fog that had overlaid my vision. I squeezed my eyes shut to avoid any future distractions.

Then, as swiftly as it had struck, the panic faded. Tension drained from my body like air from a beach ball, leaving me limp with relief and fatigue. I opened my eyes to see that color and clarity had returned to the world. My hands relaxed, and the scream died in my throat. But an instant later it tore through the air, and it actually took me a second to realize that the shriek hadn’t come from me.

It had come from the quad.

I knew what had happened without even looking. Meredith had collapsed. My urge to scream died the moment she did.

Again, I’d known someone was going to die. And again, I’d let it happen.

My eyes closed as a fresh wave of shock and grief rolled over me, followed immediately by guilt so heavy I could hardly lift my head. My fault. I should have been able to save her.

More shouts came from the quad, and someone yelled for someone else to call an ambulance. Doors squealed open, then crashed into the side of the brick building. Sneakers pounded on concrete steps.

Tears of shame and frustration poured down my face. I buried my head in Nash’s shoulder, heedless as my tears soaked into his shirt. I might as well have killed her myself, for all the good my warning had done.

Around the corner, the buzz of chaos rose, each terrified voice blending into the next. Someone was crying. Someone else was running. And above it all, Mrs. Tucker, the girls’ softball coach, blew her whistle, trying ineffectively to calm everyone down.

“Who is it?” Emma asked, still kneeling beside us, eyes wide in shock and understanding as she brushed back a strand of my hair so she could see my face.

“Meredith Cole,” I whispered, wiping tears on my sleeve.

Nash squeezed me tighter, wrapping his arms around mine, where they clutched at my stomach.

Emma stood slowly, her expression a mixture of disbelief and dread. She backed away from us, legs wobbling. Then she turned carefully and peeked around the corner. “I can’t see anything. There’re too many people.”

“Doesn’t matter,” I said, mildly surprised by the dazed quality of my own voice. “She’s already dead.”

“How do you know?” Her hand gripped the corner of the building, nails digging into the rough mortar outlining the brown bricks. “Are you sure it’s Meredith?”

“Yes.” I sighed, then rose and pulled Nash up, wiping more tears from my cheeks. He stood to my left, Emma to my right. Together, we turned the corner and entered the chaos.





Chapter 6





Emma was right—there were people everywhere. Several classroom doors had opened into the quad, and students were pouring out in spite of protests from their teachers. And since there were still ten minutes left in second lunch, the cafeteria was now emptying its usual crowd onto the grass too.

I saw at least twenty students on cell phones, and the snatches of conversation I caught sounded like 911 calls, though most of the callers didn’t actually know what had happened, or who was involved. They only knew someone was hurt, and there had been no gunfire.

Coach Tucker loomed on the edge of the green-and-white central throng, her sneakers spread wide for balance, pulling kids out of the way one at a time even as she shouted into a clunky, school-issue, handheld radio. Finally the crowd parted for her, revealing a motionless female form lying on the brown grass, one arm thrown out at her side. I couldn’t see her face because one of the football players—number fourteen—was performing CPR.

But I knew it was Meredith Cole. And I could have told number fourteen that his efforts were wasted; he couldn’t help her.

Coach Tucker pulled the football player away from the dead girl and dropped to her knees beside the body, shouting for everyone to move back. To go back into the building. Then she bent with her face close to Meredith’s to see if she was breathing. A moment later, Coach Tucker tilted the dancer’s head back and resumed CPR where number fourteen had left off.

Seconds later, the dance team’s faculty sponsor—Mrs. Foley, one of the algebra teachers—raced across the quad from an open classroom, stunned speechless for several seconds by the chaos. After a quick word with a couple of students, she gathered her remaining dancers into a teary huddle several feet from Meredith and the softball coach. The other students stared at them all in astonishment, some crying, some whispering and others standing in silent shock.

As we watched from the fringes of the mayhem, three more adults jogged down the cafeteria steps: the principal, who looked too prim in her narrow skirt and heels to even make a dent in the pandemonium; her assistant, a small balding man who clutched a clipboard to his narrow chest like a life raft; and Coach Rundell, the head football coach.

The principal stood on her toes and whispered something into Coach Rundell’s ear, and he nodded curtly. Coach wore a whistle and carried a megaphone.