The Revealing
Chapter 7

I wandered through the forest for about five minutes. My arms were crossed, and I was shivering a little. I couldn’t believe I hadn’t thought to put on a sweater before I left the window. Willow had given me some of her clothes so that I could have something to wear until we bought a new wardrobe. I thought that at that point, I might as well turn around; the lights had probably gone out by now, and there was a vicious wind. However, the moment I turned around, I heard voices.

“Hurry up, guys! I’m freezing!” That was a girl’s voice.

“Oh, calm down. Just warm yourself up with your hands,” said a boy.

“It doesn’t work that way, David, and you know it!” said the girl. Then there was a flash of light through the trees, and the boy cried out.

“Are you kidding me? These are new shoes!”

“Well, then hurry up!” said the girl.

I heard them throwing things onto what I thought was a pile. I stepped closer and peered through the trees. My eyes widened as I saw three boys tossing the contents of garbage cans onto a huge pile of garbage. Then the boys argued over touching one particular piece of the garbage. The girl sighed, walked over, picked it up and tossed the contents at the pile. At that point, I knew why they were arguing: the garbage was from the girls’ bathrooms.

“Okay, that is everything,” said one boy as he wiped his hands on his pants. The girl stood back and raised her hand toward the garbage pile. Then, strangely, each item burst into a bright light and disappeared.

Oh! I get it. This is their way of disposing of garbage. Very clever.

Another gust of wind dove into my spine, and I shivered uncontrollably. Now that I’d appeased my curiosity, it was time to go back to my room. I ran back in the direction I had come, able to see the mansion from where I stood. Thank goodness for that. Who knew how long it would have taken to replace me in there and with that wind? I probably would have been dead by the time they noticed I was missing.

I found the roof ledges under my window. I stared up at the six-foot-high ledge and considered my options. Clearly, I had not thought this through. I looked around to see what I could use to my advantage, and I found a stump. It was big, and it looked heavy. My only other option would be to come clean about leaving the mansion. Mason would kill me, so I dragged the big, fat stump over to the wall under my window. I was about to lift myself up, when I heard footsteps heading in my direction. I panicked, jumped up and grabbed the ledge of the roof. My feet dangled, and someone grabbed a hold of them, which scared me even more. Even though the person was helping me up, I startled myself so much that I lost my grip and fell on top of my helper. I rolled over quickly to apologize and realized who my helper was: Damian.

“Hey, don’t look at me like that. You are the one outside in the cold without a jacket,” he said. He handed me his sweater and added, “I’m only doing this because Mason will kill me if I let you get pneumonia.”

Of course, because he can’t just do a good deed without a well-put-together explanation. I didn’t thank him, but I put the sweater on. I was still annoyed and embarrassed about what had happened in the showers that day. He took me to a back door and opened it. Strangely, I wasn’t getting the lecture that I’d thought I would. He was acting as if this were normal.

“If we go this way, we can get back to the girls’ dorm without being seen,” he said, smiling.

“Why are you smiling?” I said, annoyed.

“Because my jacket makes you look so small. It completely dwarfs you, Bunny.”

There’s that name again. I sighed and stepped through the open door. We made it to my room within three minutes. I turned around to thank the jerk, and he was gone. I sighed, shrugged and stepped into my room without another word, ready for sleep.