Wuthering high: a bard academy novel (20 page)

“Don’t!” I say to them, putting my hands up and stepping between them and Heathcliff. “It’s okay. He’s not what you think.”

“But he’s a killer!” Hana shouts.

“He’s not. It’s okay. Let’s all just calm down,” I say. I’m actually far more worried for them than for Heathcliff. He could do some serious damage to the three of them if he wanted to.

“That’s it, run!” Samir says, looking over my shoulder.

I turn and see that Heathcliff has gone. He’s heading toward the cafeteria. He glances at me one last time before he disappears inside the doors.

“Did you see that, ladies? I
totally
scared him off,” Samir says, slapping the stapler against his palm.

“You didn’t scare him,” I say. “Please. As if you could scare off a rabbit.”

“I wasn’t the one doing the running,” Samir says. “So you do the math.”

“Where is he?” says Ms. W, appearing behind Samir. She has Guardians with her and Coach H.

“Cafeteria,” Hana says, and before I can stop them, Ms. W, Coach H, and the Guardians swarm the cafeteria en masse.

Twenty-six

Without even thinking
about it, I run after them.

Hana, Samir, and Blade trot after me, but I’m faster. I burst through the cafeteria doors. It’s on the early side for breakfast, but there are a surprising number of students dressed and here already. The cafeteria is nearly a third full, even though most of the students are in line, and not yet sitting.

I see Ms. W and Coach H on the fringes of the students, trying to calmly look for Heathcliff without arousing too much suspicion among the students. The Guardians fan out around the tables, doing the same. I scan the crowd looking for him, but I can’t seem to find him either.

“Miranda!” someone calls. I turn to find myself staring at Ryan Kent. He’s waving at me and walking toward me. Ryan! I’ve
completely
forgotten about him. I suddenly feel awful. Last time I left him he was in the infirmary with smoke inhalation — the end of our date — and I’d gone the whole night and not given him another thought. What kind of person am I?

“Ryan — God, how are you? Are you okay?”

“I woke up in the infirmary about an hour ago with a raging headache. Nobody was around, so I just got up and walked here,” he says. “How about you? I was worried about you. I couldn’t find you and the last thing I remember was leaving you on the stairs.”

Poor Ryan. He really does look worried. And why wouldn’t he be? Our date ended in a raging fire and me fainting.

“I’m fine. Really — it’s just been a crazy night.”

“What’s happened?” he asks, perplexed.

I blink at him, not sure where to start. The ghost faculty? Dracula? Heathcliff? None of it makes any sense.
Oh, hi, Ryan, you’re going to think I am completely insane, but the world might end because there are fictional characters running around in our dimension breaking the laws of physics, and by the way, I think you are gorgeous — would you consider taking my virginity?
Yeah, somehow I think it’s not going to fly. You have to see it to believe it.

“Long story,” I say. I can’t help but glance around the cafeteria. I see that Ms. W and Coach H are still on the prowl. Heathcliff isn’t in sight. I wonder if I’m relieved or worried. I’m conflicted, that’s for sure. Part of me wants him to escape. The other part of me is screaming that it could bring on the end of the world as I know it.

“I can’t believe the Bard arsonist crashed our date. But I will make it up to you, I promise,” he says. “Fire is just the first date. You should see what I do for the second.”

“Um, sorry, what was that?” I’m not quite listening, I have to admit. I’m a little busy here — we’re talking potential end-of-the-world-scenario. And
where
is Heathcliff?

“Uh, you seem a little distracted,” Ryan says.

“What? Me? Oh no, I’m just…”

“Looking for someone?” he asks me.

“No, well, sort of…” I trail off just as my eyes fall on Heathcliff. He’s standing near a group of students. Actually, girls…. In fact, he’s talking to…
Parker Rodham
?

Ryan’s eyes follow mine.

“Do you know him?” he asks me.

“Sort of,” I say, wondering what Parker is up to and why Heathcliff is tolerating it. He’s not exactly the social type. Unless he likes Parker. I’m not sure why, but that thought annoys me.

Parker sees me watching them and then she leans in and puts her hand on his arm. I swear, she’s flirting!

“Parker seems to like him,” Ryan says.

I glance at Heathcliff’s face, but I can’t read it. He’s just scowling, as usual. He looks down at his arm, where Parker is touching him, and frowns.

“You know she thinks she’s trying to steal your boyfriend,” Hana says, coming up behind us.

“Boyfriend?” Ryan echoes, concern on his face.

“He’s not my boyfriend,” I say, but Ryan looks doubtful. He is watching me watching Heathcliff.

“She’s so going to get what she deserves,” Hana says. “She doesn’t know that she’s playing with fire.”

It’s then that I remember that in
Wuthering Heights
the only thing Heathcliff cares about is Catherine. Everyone else is expendable. If he thinks I’m Catherine, then Hana is right. Parker is in for a rude awakening.

“And we’re not the only ones who have noticed him,” Samir says, standing beside Hana. That’s when I notice that Coach H has seen him. He’s headed in that direction. I have to warn Heathcliff. And, I guess, I have to admit that I should warn Parker, too.

And that’s when I do something I know I’ll regret — aside from helping Parker. I’m going to walk away from Ryan Kent.

“Ryan, I’ll be right back,” I say, pushing past him and moving between Heathcliff and Coach H, hoping to intercept him.

Heathcliff notices me then and my eyes flick over to Coach H, who’s moving in fast. He follows my gaze and nods.

“What are you doing?” Hana hisses at me, coming up quickly behind me. “You’re helping him get away.”

I look over and see Guardians moving in behind him. He’s surrounded.

“Parker!” I shout. “Look out!”

She just looks at me, giving me a smug smile. She doesn’t see the Guardians. She thinks I’m jealous. What an idiot.

My eyes shift back to Heathcliff, who grabs Parker hard by the arm and spins her around so her back is pressed up against his chest. I was right about him. He doesn’t care about her. It dawns on me in that instant that he intends to use her as a hostage.

“Told you Parker would get what she deserved,” Hana says. “Trying to steal your guy and look what happens!”

At first, Parker is just surprised. Then she seems to take it as some kind of compliment, like he’s trying to hug her, but then when it becomes clear he means to take her into the path of four large Guardians she starts resisting. Heathcliff easily brings her along, as if she were nothing more than a small dog. Out in the aisle, he roughly whirls her in front of him and grabs her by the hair. Ouch. She struggles against him in earnest now, because it’s become obvious to her what’s already obvious to me. He intends to use her as a human shield.

Parker has made a big mistake. Heathcliff is no good boy in bad boy’s clothes. He’s an OMDB Boy, through and through. The original bad boy since 1847.

“Get back,” Healthcliff tells the Guardians, who slow their approach. Parker is seriously squirming now, and calling Heathcliff all kinds of names. He’s completely unfazed.

Everyone in the cafeteria now is looking at them and all chatter has stopped as everyone waits to see what’s going to happen. Are the Guardians going to win? Or is Heathcliff? I can tell you right now that most of the kids are rooting for Heathcliff. This is a reform school, after all. Nobody in prison cheers for the guards to win.

Heathcliff inches closer to the front doors of the cafeteria as the Guardians follow him tentatively, their arms up. A few more Guardians come up from behind. They plan to trap him. But Heathcliff sees it all coming. With one quick motion, he shoves Parker hard toward the first set of approaching Guardians. She whirls, off balance, and stumbles into them. One of the Guardians flings her away and tries to lunge at Heathcliff. She falls to the ground, hard, her skirt flying up and revealing the fact that she’s wearing pink polka-dotted underwear with Hello Kitty on them. I can’t help but snicker a little (yes, I’m a terrible person and I’m probably going to hell, blah, blah, blah, but this is Parker Rodham, remember? I can gloat about her accidental
Girls Gone Wild
moment. It’s my right).

Meanwhile, Heathcliff uses the distraction to make his escape. In one swift motion, he jumps
on top of
the edge of a table, leaps straight into the approaching Guardians from the rear, and with a couple of quick and furious blows, he’s free of them. He slams open the doors and is free. The two Guardians he bested are on the ground, groaning.

Some of the kids, in awe, start applauding.

Parker, however, is livid. Her face is bright red and she glares at me as if she wants to kill me with her bare hands. She is so mad, she actually shoves one of her own clones when said clone tries to help her to her feet. She then starts shouting at Coach H, who is trying to calm her down, but she is in full-fledged tempertantrum mode. There’s no calming her down. Eventually, the Guardians have to take her by force back to her dorm. Her clones follow after, as if on a string.

I turn around to look for Ryan, hoping to start up our conversation where we left off, but he’s gone.

Twenty-seven

Heathcliff makes good
on his escape. He has a knack for disappearing and he eludes the Guardians with ease.

“If you insist on helping him, I don’t know what we’re going to do with you,” Ms. W says to me, looking very disappointed as we walk back to the dorm. Hana and Blade are with us, but Samir and Coach H have headed back to Macduff, the junior/senior boys’ dorm.

“I didn’t help,” I say.

“You did, and lying doesn’t improve matters,” Ms. W says. “I don’t know how much clearer I can make this. He doesn’t belong in this world, Miranda.”

“But you said yourself you don’t know if him being here will really cause the end of the world. You said you don’t know exactly, but you think it could.”

“Do you really want to take that risk?” Hana asks me. “I mean, I know he’s hot and all, but you have to use your brain here.”

“He’s not hot, is he?”

“Duh,” Hana says. “He so obviously has bad boy mojo, and you are
completely
falling for it.”

Am I?

“He’s only going to end up doing more harm than good,” Ms. W says. “Remember Tyler?” she reminds me gently.

It’s true. People tried to warn me about Tyler, and I just didn’t want to listen. Maybe Ms. W is right about Heathcliff, and I just don’t want to see it.

Back at our dorm, Ms. W orders the three of us to go to bed. We’re given a full day’s pass from Saturday activities — which include mandatory study hall and assembly — and ordered to go straight to our rooms to sleep. I’m so keyed up that I don’t think it’s possible for me to sleep, but amazingly, I put my head on the pillow and I’m out. I sleep like the dead, probably because I’ve spent so much time with them. I slip into a dream that’s so real, I could swear it’s really happening.

In the dream, I’m standing in a graveyard, which under normal circumstances would seem creepy, but here for some reason just seems sad. There’s a funeral going on, and everyone is dressed in black, in period clothes — I’d say more than a hundred years old. The crowd around the grave disperses and I see Heathcliff, standing and staring at the grave. As I approach him, I see the name on the gravestone. It says: Catherine Earnshaw Linton.

Heathcliff’s true love.

Heathcliff, normally so strong and stoic, drops to his knees and starts sobbing and clawing at the gravestone. My heart breaks watching him. He’s in misery.

I put my hand on his shoulder and he looks up at me, then wraps his arms around my legs, sobbing. I’m not sure what to do, I put my hand on his head to try to comfort him.

That’s when, out of nowhere, Emily Brontë, the raving woman in the black dress, appears before us. She lifts her hands and the ground beneath our feet gives way. Heathcliff and I are both falling, tumbling, straight into Catherine’s grave.

I wake with a start, cold sweat dripping down my back.

The dim light of morning is shining through my window and it takes me a moment to realize that I’ve slept the entire day and all night. I guess this is what happens when you don’t sleep for a month and then are up all night.

I rub my face to try to wake myself up from the nightmare. What could it mean? I can’t help but think that Heathcliff isn’t the dangerous one. Emily Brontë is.

Everything from the night before (or night before that, technically) comes rushing back to me. Was it real? Or was it all a dream? Ghost teachers of the literary variety, fiction coming to life. That’s when I notice on my bedspread, lying across my feet, there’s the page from
Wuthering Heights
. The one Kate Shaw had hidden in her closet.

I just stare at it. Where did it come from? Coach H took it ages ago and now here it is, back on my bed?

I glance around my room, but Blade’s bed is empty. She must’ve gotten up a long time ago. Tentatively, I pick up the page. I hold it like it might be dynamite. I don’t know what kind of powers it has, or whether just holding it might bring about the end of the world.

I look at the page; I hadn’t really read it carefully before, but it’s the scene between Heathcliff and Catherine when Catherine is dying (has made herself sick because Heathcliff and her husband Linton can’t get along), and Heathcliff is accusing her of betraying him by marrying someone who isn’t her true love. It’s a heart-wrenching scene.

I turn it over and that’s when I see handwriting.
Kate’s
handwriting.

It says, “You are in danger.”

“Kate? Cathy? Whoever you are. Is that you?” I say to the room. “If you’re there, I need some help. What should I do? How am I in danger?”