Paper Skeletons

Everyone crowded in a high school gymnasium that smelled like sweaty teenagers. They spoke in nervous chatter as Hurricane Ian raged just outside its walls. He clawed the building like an angry child, trying to get in; a banshee wail of 140 miles an hour. Just when everyone relaxed, Ian would throw something at a window that banged against the aluminum storm shutters and jerked them back to attention.

The gym was already decorated for Halloween. Paper skeletons hung on the walls in awkward poses. Cut-outs of smiling jack o'lanterns. Witches with curved noses and green faces. A scattering of bat silhouettes. Ghosts made from toilet paper dangled from the basketball hoops.

We’d been there for hours in a state-ordered evacuation of the blocks along the coast. I had my cat Peanut with me in her carrier. She complained about being in there. I agreed with her.

They had cots and blankets set out for us that took up the whole place and there were still people who had to sit on the floor. Some stood and leaned against the wall, a bleacher, or whatever they could find. A kid started crying. I agreed with him, too.

A lady in white cotton sweat shorts and a bright orange polo stood by the basketball basket and clapped her hands over her head a few times.

“People,” she called, still clapping. “People, we just got word that Ian has stalled over the Tampa Bay area. We’ll be stuck here for the rest of the night and probably into the morning.”

A groan came over the crowd, already weary from hunkering down in a stuffy gym for the last five hours. Some guy stood up from his cot, cursed loudly, and stomped off to the back of the gym. Someone else made a “Tsk” sound.

“I’m sorry,” said the lady in the orange polo. “I’m just the messenger. Everyone get comfortable. They’re bringing out bottled water and snacks, shortly.”

“May as well use the bathroom,” I said to Peanut. “C’mon.” I picked up the carrier and took her with me.

I hadn’t seen the inside of a school for decades but somehow this one looked enough like my old one to give me PTSD about getting beat up in the parking lot. I didn’t have a lot of friends. But this time I had an attack cat with me, so I was safe.

The halls were painted yellow and royal blue, the school’s colors, and covered with more Halloween decorations. A squadron of witches on broomsticks flew over the row of lockers and looked very happy to do so. More bats flew with them.

The bathroom was down a right and two left turns at the end of a row of lockers. And I knew that because there were helpful signs in giant black scary Halloween font on printer paper, taped onto the walls at the corners. I obeyed them and took the corners where I needed to.

“Wait here,” I said to Peanut as I set her carrier by the door and went in.

The men’s room was empty. More bat silhouettes accented the upper corners of the mirrors above the sinks. My footsteps echoed off the yellow and blue tile walls as I walked to the urinals.

While I was washing my hands on my way out, I heard whimpering from one of the stalls. I guess I wasn’t that alone.

“You alright?”

He didn’t answer.

“Hey. You alright?” I dried my hands.

More whimpering.

“I know the storm sounds pretty scary, but we’re safe in here. I even brought my cat. You think I’d put her in danger?”

I didn’t hear anything, so I knocked on the stall door.

“Hey.”

Nothing. I looked down and saw blood on the floor of his stall. A lot of blood. I bent down to look under the door and found it pooled around the toilet. His feet and legs leaned over at an odd angle. The side of his pants was dark with blood.

“Hey, kid!”

When I didn’t hear anything, I tried pushing open the door, but it was locked and stayed shut.

“Kid!” I banged on it hard. “Kid!”

As soon as I turned to run out the door to get whatever maintenance person could unlock it, I heard the sound of it unlocking. I turned back and saw it open slightly.

I swung the door open to find a young boy, barely old enough to go to this high school, sitting on the closed lid of the toilet and slumped on the side of the stall. His throat had been gashed over and over, making it look like it’d been chewed open. Blood poured down his side and onto the floor.

I almost threw up. His skin was sticky with sweat and white as a sheet, but I still recognized him from the gym. His family had the cots a row over from mine. I even saw him get up to come back here.

He swallowed hard and blood pulsed out of his neck. His face scrunched up with pain.

“You’re still alive!” I took off my shirt to put over the wound on his neck like it would do any good.

He looked up at me, locking his eyes on mine. His mouth hung open and spittle mixed with blood spilled out of the corner.

“I’m sorry,” I said, not knowing what else to say.

He took my hand and squeezed. Then he let go and stopped breathing.

I actually gave him mouth-to-mouth as if there wasn’t a gash in his neck big enough to slide my hand into. I breathed for him as if it would do something. Once I was winded, I backed up and saw his eyes. They stared unblinking at nothing.

I finally screamed for help.

* * *

“What do we do with the body?” asked a skinny man who looked like he was in his 20s. “We can’t just leave him there.”

“Shouldn’t we worry about who did this to him?” asked a woman standing next to him with her arms crossed, who looked about the same age. “He’s been murdered.”

A little boy was with them. He was probably somewhere around nine or ten years old and should not have been in a room with a murder victim. “Dad,” he whispered loudly.

“That makes it a murder scene,” said an older man with a cane. “You can’t disturb a murder scene. It’s against the law. Leave him be.”

“Dad,” the kid whispered again.

“Not now, Terry,” the skinny man said to him without looking at him. “Can’t we just cover him up with a sheet? I mean, what if it was you?”

“If it was me,” said the old man. “I’d want you to leave as much evidence as undisturbed as possible so my killer could be brought to justice.

“Dad, I have to pee,” said the kid, stomping his feet in place.

“Not right now. You can hold it.”

“But—”

“Come on, Terry. You can use the girl’s room.”

“No, I can’t. That’s for girls. I’ll get in trouble.”

“Special circumstances. C’mon.”

“What if someone sees me.”

“I’ll stand guard outside. Let’s go.” She took him by the hand and led him out, but he still didn’t look like he wanted to go.

“For all we know,” said the skinny man, gesturing to me. “This guy killed him. He found him. He was alone in here with him.” He took a step closer to me.

“I didn’t kill him.”

He shook his head. “And we’re just supposed to believe that, why? We don’t know you.”

“Because if I had, I would’ve left him here and snuck out.”

“Unless you wanted to take the spotlight off of you.” He stepped a little closer and puffed out his chest. “You were the only one back here. For all we know—”

“Easy, son,” said the old man, stepping between us with his hands up in a whoa-there gesture. “You don’t know anything. The person that did this probably slipped out right after like he said.”

“Do you want to be locked in here with someone capable of—that?” The skinny man gestured to the body of the boy still slumped on the toilet. The place was already starting to smell of it; a moldy copper smell that seeps into your pores and never wants to leave. Just standing there made me want a shower.

My cat Peanut called from her carrier, still by the door of the bathroom. I slipped by the other two men to see to her.

“Oh, you’re just going to leave now?”

“Leave him alone,” said the old man. “See to your wife and son. Stay with them and don’t let anyone wander off alone. Okay?”

The skinny man nodded his head. “Okay.”

I knelt in front of Peanut’s carrier. She called to me, probably hungry or thirsty. We’d been there a while.

The woman in the orange polo leaned into the bathroom, keeping a grip on the doorframe. “Come on out of there. I’m locking it up, so no one tampers with anything.” She gestured into the hallway with a snap of her head.

“What about—” the old man started.

“We’ll figure it out, later. C’mon.”

The two men left the bathroom, leaving the corpse of the boy to its lonely self.

Peanut meowed at me.

“I know. Me too,” I said back to her. “Let’s see what we can do about that.”

* * *

Peanut’s fur is as soft as goose down. The top part of her is raven black while her belly and paws are swan white. There’s also a bit of white on her nose, which looks as if whatever god painted her gave her a boop with their brush when they were done. She does like a good boop.

I let her out of her carrier for a minute to let her have some food and water in some disposable bowls and use a fold-up travel litter box that I got for her after the last hurricane. The dogs in the gym weren’t being a nuisance so I thought it was okay to let her out for a bit. It’s not her fault we were in the middle of a natural disaster.

I didn’t see the boy’s mother at her cot, anymore. Her bugout bag was still lying on it, but her purse was gone. They must’ve called her away somewhere to give her the news. I might’ve heard the sound of crying over the murmur of the gym, but I could be wrong.

The woman in the orange polo came back out and clapped her hands. “People. People. I need your attention.”

The crowd quieted and looked up at her.

She continued, “There’s been an assault in the boy’s bathroom.”

The crowd started to murmur again.

The woman put up her hands. “The bathroom has been locked. If you need to go, use the girl’s room. We’re asking people to stay together. If you leave the gym, do so in groups. Hurricane Ian is expected to take all night to pass us by. Let’s be safe.”

The crowd complained and grumbled. People swore. Other people complained about their swearing. Babies cried, not caring what was going on apart from their immediate needs.

“Hey,” said a kid walking up to Peanut and me. She was tiny. She might’ve been waist-high to me if I was kneeling. Her long dishwater blonde hair was in one giant braid that hung down her back.

I looked at her with creased brows. “Hey,” I said back.

“Is that your cat?” She held her tiny hands behind her back and swayed like a palm tree as she stood just a couple of feet away from Peanut.

“Sure. This is Peanut.”

Peanut sat up to look at the little blond girl.

“Can I pet her?” She almost didn’t wait for me to answer before she asked the question.

Peanut walked over and stood up on her hind legs, putting her forepaws on the girl’s belly. She extended her face and twitched her nose, smelling her.

The little girl giggled and stroked Peanut’s back.

“Peanut says that would be acceptable,” I told her.

She kept petting her. Peanut put her paws on the girl’s shoulders.

“She wants you to pick her up, but you’re not big enough. Here. Sit down and let her cuddle you.”

She sat down cross-legged, and Peanut sat in her lap. She was so big that she took up all of it and spilled over the side. The girl hugged her tightly and grinned like a maniac.

“I’ve never seen a cat just come up and do that to someone,” said a woman standing just off to the side. By her blonde hair and blue eyes, I took her to be the girl’s mother.

“She likes people,” I told her. “When I went to the Humane Society, she was the one to pick me. So, I took her home.”

“Do you live around here?” she asked. “I guess that’s a dumb question. I mean, of course, you must. You’re here…”

“I actually live north of here,” I said, trying to help her out. “This was the closest shelter that took pets.”

The blonde woman folded her arms and looked at the little girl.

“Is this your daughter?” I asked, trying to keep the conversation going.

She nodded. “Kids are great, aren’t they?” It sounded practiced, like ‘How about that weather?’

I snort-laughed. “I guess they can be. Being stuck in a high school is giving me PTSD.”

She looked at me and smiled. “You didn’t like being a kid?”

I shook my head. “I hated it. I like being a grownup so much better.”

She looked back at the girl. “I loved it. It was me and my friends against the world. No responsibilities. No fear. We were unstoppable.”

“And no money,” I added.

She laughed. “Well, there was that, too.” She watched her daughter play with Peanut for a minute and added, “Do you think we’ll lose power?”

I shrugged. “Probably. I remember we lost it during Irma and that wasn’t half the monster this one is.”

“I wasn’t there for that one. How long was it out for?”

“A week or so. They knew it’d go down, so they had electric trucks from other states waiting for the storm to pass, up at the Georgia line. As soon as it did, they came in and started working.”

“And it still took a week?”

“It was a lot of work. Irma was pretty ruthless.”

I wasn’t sure if that made her feel any better. Maybe I should’ve told her everything was going to be fine.

She watched her daughter play with Peanut for a moment. Then a WWWWAAAAAMMPPP sound came from outside and the lights flickered.

“Was that...?” the woman asked.

“A transformer blowing, yeah,” I said. “I don’t know how it works but I remember we heard a few of them go before we finally lost power.”

She nodded.

Peanut stood up from the girl’s lap and stretched. She continued to pet her.

“Okay, Amanda. It looks like Kitty’s done. Let’s go back to our cot and wait it out.” She reached out her hand to take the girl’s.

“Mommy, can we get a cat?” she asked standing up and not brushing off Peanut’s fur that was now matted to her clothes.

“We can talk about it. Come.”

The girl took her hand. “Okay.” She turned around and waved to Peanut. “G’bye, Peanut.” And then she blew her a kiss.

I couldn’t help a smile.

“Nice talking to you,” said the blonde woman with a nod, leading the girl away.

“Nice talking to you,” I replied with a smile. I put Peanut back in her carrier. Another transformer blew. WWWWAAAAAMMPPP.

* * *

I was asleep on my cot when we lost power. The screams from people all over the gym woke me up. I opened my eyes to complete blackness and the sound of the raging storm, just outside. Ian had dug in and demanded the people of Saint Petersburg pay respect to him.

People turned on their cell phone lights and pulled flashlights from their bugout bags. Their beams swept through the gym like frantic searchlights in a sci-fi movie.

They checked on each other and comforted them.

“Are you okay?”

“Where’s Bella?”

“John. Where did you go?”

“What happened?”

“John?”

“Will anyone fix it?”

“Bella?”

I leaned to the side to check on Peanut in her carrier. I didn’t register it at first, but it was open, and Peanut was gone. I shined my cell phone light inside to be sure. She was gone.

“Peanut?” I called, shining my light across the gym to find her. “Peanut?” All I saw were panicked people and their animals, doing the same. “Peanut?”

“I’m sorry,” said the voice of the blonde woman as she made her way over. “Amanda let your cat out to pet her while you were asleep. She ran off when people screamed.”

I grit my teeth to hold back some swear words. “It’s okay. She’ll be alright for a night. The worst she could do is crap under some kid’s school desk.”

“I’m sorry,” she said again and wrung her hands.

“It’s okay, really. Kids will be kids.”

Someone screamed louder than the others, just behind me. I turned to see several people shining their cell phone lights

The flash of a gunshot went off that blinded everyone for a moment and echoed through the gym like a hammer to our ears.

We all looked in the direction of the gunshot for some explanation to present itself. Then another one banged through the gym.

Some guy shouted, “I saw him! I know I saw him!” He pointed at something, and I heard a clatter. I ran the distance between the man with the gun and me and tackled him. The gun slid across the linoleum floor. I punched the man in the face as hard as I could.

“That was my cat! What is wrong with you?” I kept punching and screamed, “If you hurt her, I swear to god I will kill you, myself.” I kept punching until someone hooked my arm at the elbow.

“That’s enough,” said a deep male voice from behind me.

I kicked the guy with the gun in the stomach as I was being pulled off of him.

* * *

“What’re we going to do with Six-Shooter McGee, over there?” the old man with the cane asked the woman in the orange polo.

We’d gathered around a table in the far corner of the gym, the skinny man, the old man, the woman in orange, Six-Shooter McGee, and me. The rest of the people in the gym were as oblivious as people get, talking amongst themselves and playing on their cell phones while they still had power.

“Why do we have to do anything with him?” she replied. “He didn’t hurt anyone.”

“He just fired a gun in a school. Someone could’ve been killed.” He gestured toward the man with the gun in a big, sweeping arm movement.

“And we have his gun,” she held it up to the light of his cell phone. “The cops can figure out what to do with him, later.”

“I was trying to protect us from a murderer,” said Six-Shooter McGee.

“You were going to shoot my cat!” I replied.

“Enough,” said the woman in the orange polo. “What’s done is done.”

“There’s a murderer on the loose,” said the skinny man. “This guy is the only one of us who’s tried to do anything about it. And you’re all treating him like a criminal.”

“Because he shot a gun in a school and almost killed his cat,” said the old man like the skinny man was crazy.

“I was protecting all of us!”

“You were endangering us!” I shouted back at him, now inches from his face. I could smell the Doritos on his breath.

Six-Shooter McGee straightened himself, standing at his full height, not veering his eyes from mine. He smiled on one side of his face and said, “So, you’re one of them—”

“Boys!” said the woman in the orange polo. “That’s enough. You’re upsetting the rest of them.”

I looked over to see they had been watching us, silhouetted by their cell phone lights in the dark. I could hear them breathing and not talking. The occasional dog would shift, and I could hear the tags on their collars clink together.

“What’re we going to do about—that?” asked the old man, gesturing to the revolver.

“I’ll lock it up,” said the woman in orange as she grabbed it from the table. “This is still a high school. I’ll just put it with everything else I confiscate from these kids.”

Six-Shooter McGee threw up his hands in resignation. “That’s my property!”

“You can explain it to the police when they get here after the hurricane passes.”

“I could take it from you,” said Six-Shooter McGee.

“You think I can handle a school of teenagers, but I can’t handle you? Is that it?”

He looked at her for a moment.

“Go ahead,” said the woman in orange. “Step up. In front of all these people. Show them how tough you are.”

Their silhouettes kept watching, silently.

“You people are crazy,” said Six-Shooter McGee. “We’ll see how tough you are when the police get here.” With that, he shuffled back to his cot.

“Now that that’s settled,” said the woman in the orange polo as she spun around and headed off to lock up the gun.

“There’s still a killer on the loose,” said the skinny man. “It could be any of us.”

“Just stay together and you’ll be fine,” said the old man as he headed into the crowd of people.

“Hey.” I looked over to find the man who pulled me off of Six-Shooter McGee. He had the girth of a palm tree but none of the leaves, completely bald with no facial hair.

“Hey,” I said back, looking up to meet his eyes.

“I need to pee, and we should stay together.”

“Sure, that makes sense.” I went with him.

* * *

The hallways were black as a void. We had pocket flashlights with us, but they only lit up small pieces of the corridor. A flash of blue and yellow here. A cutout of a smiling vampire there. Enough to see that we weren’t going to trip over anything. The light seemed to vanish into the nothingness of the hallway as if the world had decided it was no longer there. Ian’s constant banshee wail reminded us of what was just outside the walls.

“Who do you think did it?” asked the leafless palm tree walking beside me.

“Did what?”

“The body.”

“I’ve been trying not to think about it, actually. I’m thinking about my missing cat and what the hurricane is doing to my house, right now.”

“How can you not think about it?” asked the palm tree. “Someone was just murdered in the bathroom. How often does that happen?”

“I said I was trying.”

“Did you see it?”

I nodded. “Yeah.”

“What did it look like?”

“You don’t want to know.

We came up to the sign taped to the corner, telling us which way to turn for the bathroom.

“There’s the sign,” I said, gesturing with my flashlight.

The palm tree grabbed the back of my neck and squeezed. “That’s not where we’re going.” His grip felt like a steel clamp, cutting into the muscles of my neck. I thought it was going to pinch my head right off.

I tried to scream but his grip hurt so much that nothing happened when I opened my mouth.

“You were the only other one to go down that way, tonight. It had to have been you.” He walked me past the turn for the bathrooms and down the hall. I dropped my flashlight to loosen his grip on my neck, but he only squeezed harder.

“You killed a kid, tonight. You didn’t just kill him, you kept slashing at his neck like it was a side of beef.”

I was no longer walking by that point. My legs were trailing behind me as I tried to get a foothold on the floor to push myself out of his grip. Nothing I did made any difference, no matter how hard I squirmed. He kept pulling me along like I was a bag of trash.

“I can’t let you put anyone else in danger,” he said.

He dragged me to the double doors at the end of the hallway. I could hear Ian scream on the other side. I tried to free myself as hard as I could, but the palm tree barely noticed.

He opened one of the doors, just a crack with his other hand. Ian was there with all of his rage.

“The storm can have you.” He threw me out into the racing winds and shut the door.

Winds that were still over a hundred miles an hour bowled me over and I fell into a stream of water. The rain stung my face and arms, shooting me like tiny arrows. I couldn’t hear myself scream over the roar of the wind.

The door was shut tight. I braced myself against the wind and put up a knee. It was only a few feet back to the door, but the wind was so powerful that I had to fight the whole way there. I was exhausted in just a few steps.

I tried the door, but it was locked. I pulled as hard as I could until a gust threw me back to the ground as if I were just in its way. My elbow hit the asphalt of the parking lot and slid, scraping off skin and driving pebbles into the resulting wound. I screamed but couldn’t hear myself.

I had to shield my face from the wind and rain as I crawled back to the door. When I got there, I pounded as hard as I could for all the good it did. The palm tree wouldn’t let me in and everyone else was at the other end of the hallway. They’d never hear me. I pounded until my hand was sore, anyway.

Just when I gave up and wanted to find something to hide in, the opposite door from where I’d collapsed on the ground swung open wide as Ian caught it. He stampeded into the opening like a pack of hungry dogs.

A hand reached around from the other side and grabbed me by the forearm. I followed it back into the school, staying as low to the ground as I could to stay under the wind. When I got inside, I fell back to the floor and looked up.

Standing over me, enveloped by the wind screaming in from the open doorway, was the skinny man.

“Where is the palm tree?” I asked him from the floor.

“Who?”

“The guy that pulled me off of Six-Shooter McGee. He’s the one that threw me out in the storm. He tried to kill me.” I stood up to my full height as soon as I had the strength.

The woman in the orange polo walked into the beam of the flashlight, still lying on the floor, and flipped on one of her own.

“We need to talk,” she said. “Now.”

* * *

“Can’t you see he’s a killer?” asked the palm tree, pointing at me with his whole arm from across the room.

We’d gathered in the principal’s office, the woman in the orange polo, the skinny man, and the palm tree. The woman in the orange polo sat at the desk while a cell phone’s flashlight app lit the cramped space.

“Exactly what does a killer look like?” she asked.

“He was the only other person that went back to the bathrooms, tonight. That makes him the only suspect.”

“Suspect? Are you the cops, now?”

“You know what I mean.” He squared his eyes with mine. “The cops won’t be here until the storm passes. Meanwhile, we’re trapped in here with a murderer.”

The woman in the orange polo slapped her hand on the desk hard and made a defining clap. “That’s not your job! That’s for the police to decide!”

“And until then, we’re stuck in here with him! How many more people is he going to kill until you get it in your head?” The palm tree leaned over and rested his hands on the other side of the desk, standing like a tripod to seem more intimidating to her. “You’re putting our lives in danger.”

“I told you to stay together, but instead you played vigilante. You’re the one putting people in danger.”

“You little—”

“Hey!” shouted the skinny man. “She’s right. Now back up.” He puffed out his chest and stood close to the palm tree.

He stood up to his full height and put his hands on his hips. The palm tree stared down at the skinny man who didn’t flinch. They stood inches apart from each other, posturing.

“Stop it!” shouted the woman in the orange polo slamming her hands on her desk. “I have to put up with this from testosterone-fueled teenagers every day and I am not about to put up with it from you two!”

I caught a quick flash of motion from the corner of my eye. Just outside the open door to the principal’s office, and low to the ground. And black and white.

“Peanut!” I shouted and went after her.

“Where are you going now?” asked the woman in the orange polo as I left to follow Peanut down the hallway.

“Peanut. C’mere,” I said as I followed her. “Don’t run. It’s okay.”

I could see the white of her paws dart into the blackness, so I quickly dug out my cell phone and turned on the flashlight app. It lit up the dark in the pale glow of an LED.

“Peanut, it’s okay. Come on.”

She darted into an open doorway on the right, so I followed her in.

Windows ran along the far side of the room, uncovered so I could see Ian raging, just outside. The streetlights and windows of the neighboring buildings were also dark. The wind continued to thrash trees and street signs. The roof of the house across the street had been ripped off like the lid of a tin can. The windows were blown in. Rain and wind invaded the guts of it with the entitlement that only the earth itself can provide. Ian howled.

I found myself in what looked like a Social Studies classroom. Posters of world maps decorated the walls. Photos of all the presidents lined the tops of them, going all the way around the room. A homework assignment had been written on the chalkboard at the front of the classroom.

“Peanut,” I said over the sound of the wind. “Peanut where are you?” I looked under the rows of desks and didn’t see her. I thought maybe I should just leave her be until the morning.

“What are you doing in here?” asked the woman in the orange polo. I turned around to see that she’d followed me into the room. “Someone almost kills you and you just run away?”

“I saw my cat run in here. Have you seen her?”

“Your cat? Just leave her. Cats are self-sufficient. People need more care than they do.”

“You’re right,” I said surveying the room for the motion of little white paws in the dark. “It’s not like she’s going anywhere. I’ll look for her when the sun comes up.”

I turned back around to watch the blade of a knife come out of her throat. Her mouth opened and her eyes bulged. She flailed her arms and tried to reach behind her. Blood ran from the wound and tears from her eyes.

The knife backed out of her throat, and I saw pain come over her face. A hand reached around stabbed her in the side of the throat and pulled forward, severing her trachea as well as her jugular and carotid. Blood flowed from her neck and washed down her shoulders and chest.

In her last moment of life, she looked at me with questioning eyes and then collapsed to the floor in a growing pool of her own blood.

In her place stood the kid who died in the bathroom, holding a bloody knife. His face was covered in it, but no gashes on his neck. His skin was back to its healthy color. And he smiled an unnerving smile.

“I gave you mouth-to-mouth,” I said.

“I murder someone right in front of you and those are your first words.”

I looked at him for a moment.

“Halloween makeup and fake blood, idiot.” He shook his knife at me. “Am I going to get this stupid when I get older?”

“But I gave you mouth—”

“Okay, get over it!” He shook his knife more.

“Why?”

“With everyone locked in here, they’re just fish in a barrel. And if they think I’m dead, I can get away with whatever I want.” He was blocking my way out of the room, and he stepped over the body of the woman in the orange polo to walk toward me. I backed up to keep my distance.

“I’m glad you wandered in here by yourself. It makes things so much easier,” he said.

I backed into one of the desks and almost fell over. “But I gave you—”

“Oh, shut up.” He raised his knife hand over his head and made to lunch at me when a screaming cat attacked him.

Peanut jumped on him and drove her razors across his face and arms. He screamed and dropped the knife. Peanut slashed at him in a flurry and her own banshee wail.

He grabbed her and threw her across the room, her claws opening his flesh as she left him. She hit the far wall, dropped, and disappeared. He and I looked at the knife on the floor and then back up at each other.

Then at once, we both lunged for it. He got to it first and swung at me. I jerked back and he missed. I fell back and hit my head on one of the desks. He came over to me, raised his knife hand and the bang of a gunshot filled the room in a flash of blinding light.

The kid stopped in his tracks and looked down at the hole in the middle of his chest. Blood soaked his shirt and ran down the front. He kept looking with a mix of curiosity and surprise as the blood kept flowing.

He raised his eyes to me and began another lunge when the second gunshot filled the room. This one was a headshot. Bits of his grey matter sprayed all over the classroom as he fell to the floor, beside me and knocked over some of the desks.

The blonde woman stood at the door, still holding Six-Shooter McGee’s revolver in her hands, and still in the shooting posture, in shock and frozen in place.

“Thanks,” I said. “Wait, where did you get that? I thought it was locked up.”

“It was,” she said, still watching the corpse on the floor. She remained stiff like she was waiting for him to jump back to life and try again.

“You can relax now. You got him.”

She nodded. “I saw him come in here after you and her. I recognized him as the missing kid from the gym and came to see what was going on.”

I stood up to my full height and stepped over the kid’s body, now lying in a pool of actual blood.

“I’m glad you did,” I told her as I carefully stepped through it and around the corpse of the woman in the orange polo. “You can put that down, now.”

She realized she was still holding it then quickly set it down on the teacher’s desk, revolted by what she’d just done.

* * *

The next morning, the Florida sun burned through the remaining clouds. The light of day made the destruction of Ian’s rampage clear. Trees pulled out by their roots and thrown aside like trash. Buildings torn open like Christmas presents. The football field had been turned into a swamp from so much rain the night before; the goalposts were gone, entirely.

Police cars blocked off the front and back entrances to Gibbs High School. They wouldn’t let us leave until they’d interviewed all the evacuees. All 533 of us.

They pulled me into the principal’s office for my interview. The open window lit the room and I felt like I saw it for the first time. Officer Ortiz sat behind the desk, leaning forward as he took my statement. A paper skeleton hung on the wall behind the desk, smiling friendly.

I answered all of Ortiz’s questions. He wrote my answers in his notebook. The stubble on his face made him look like he hadn’t slept in a while. Can’t blame him.

“One more question,” he asked, still writing. “What made you go in there?”

“Go in where?”

“The Social Studies room. You knew there was a murderer on the loose and you left the safety of the group and ran off into the dark alone. What was your motivation?”

“My cat.” I shrugged. Peanut was cleaning her paws and quietly relaxing in her carrier as if we were going home from the vet.

“Your cat?” He looked confused.

“Sounds dumb when I say it out loud. In the end, she was the one who saved me.”

He made a ‘whatever’ gesture with his hands, resting on the principal’s desk.

“Do you need anything else?” I asked.

He took out a business card from his breast pocket and held it out for me. “Nothing right now. I’ll call you if I need anything else.”

I nodded, took it, then picked up Peanut in her carrier and left.

THE END