A Rose Tainted Black

"Class dismissed, and don't forget to work on your essay analyzing Fitzgerald's Great Gatsby," eleventh grade English teacher, Mr. Reiss, dismissively stated as the bell screamed and rejoiced at all one-thousand-and-odd students located within Pierce High. However, Reiss knew better than to think that they would spend their week-long spring break on work that didn't result in a signed slip of paper. No, he knew exactly what they would be doing - chatting with friends; slipping (or perhaps, undressing) into even more sexually appealing clothing; meeting up with friends they didn't know; chugging down several cheap beers; dancing provocatively in an obnoxious manner; and perhaps, if they are lucky, fall into bed with another person and perform all sorts of sexual favors. Yes, these were the sorts of things that ran deep inside the rather plain surface of Reiss' head, and it was also one of only two things that had managed to arouse him on end-of-the-week-days. If common sense were not a thing that he had, perhaps he would have already ran to the lavatory by now. Alas, because of this dreaded "common sense", Reiss shifted his arousal to the only other thing that he deemed worthy of his attention:

"Em," an ivory skinned and curvaceous girl by the name of Arianna spoke in a high pitched voice. Her skin was complimented by curly brown hair that flowed down just below her shoulders that were barely covered by her shirt that extenuated her breasts. "Can I have your notes for science? I fell asleep."

The girl she was referring to was Emily McDowel, who sat at the edge of her chair in the back of the classroom while she fiddled inside her medium-sized leather backpack. Her black hair lay strewn about her light brown face, as well as touching her shoulder blades that lay covered by the navy tee she had on as one or two bundles of fat rolled away from the confines of her jeans, barely being caught by her shirt. "What do you think I did in that class?" she asked sarcastically.

Arianna began to pout, "Oh come on Em, you have to have some of the notes at least."

Emily sighed at her helpless friend, pulling out of her backpack a green notebook that contained several drawings on its cover in thick, black ink.

"Thanks, you're literally the best!" she exclaimed in a grating tone.

Shrugging it off, Emily continued with the conversation, "What do you even have in science?"

To this, she just stared at her blankly before starting to exit the room, "Come on man, let's just leave already, I wanna go home and get something to eat."

Cramming the rest of her belongings into the backpack, the raven haired girl quickly followed pursuit, as well as dropping the subject of her grades, knowing that if she continued any farther she'd have to label herself a hypocrite.

As they walked out of the class, their surroundings immediately began to grow louder and louder, and their space to walk began to get narrower and narrower.

"Agh, I hate these fucking hallways man," Arianna exclaimed, "They're tighter than my goddamn vagina."

"I don't get it," Emily said to her friend, "How is it that you've fucked so many guys, and yet I've only had sex with one, and you're still tighter than me?"

"Don't even ask me, I'm sure we talked about it in Sex Ed., but I was always passed out the moment I got to my seat so..."

"You just love to sleep, don't you?"

"Of course, if I could take a class in sleeping, I'd have taken it in every grade."

"Uh, I think you already do, it's just not called 'Sleeping Class'..." Emily muttered to herself while chuckling before reaching her locker. It wasn't just her locker that she had her eyes on, however, fore in front of that locker was a boy of equal age, displaying a solid build and styled jet black hair as he chatted with two other boys.

"'Sup you guys?" the boy said in a calm manner, saying his goodbye's to the two boys as he distanced himself from the puke-green locker to allow Emily in. "How was Reiss'?"

"Oh, it was really interesting," Arianna started, "We went over how big of creeper he is."

The boy, who was named Thomas Smith, looked at the girl in slight disbelief before Emily bumped in, "She fell asleep, like she always does."

"Oh shut up!" she exclaimed, "So what if I sleep a lot."

"At least you don't sleep around a lot," Thomas suggested in an almost half-joking, half-serious sort of way.

"Oh, don't worry, she does that too," Emily said matter-of-factly as she broke into a laugh, to which Arianna hit her in the shoulder. "Alright, I'm ready," she said, closing her locker, signaling the trio to exit the school in a straight line.

"So, Emily," Thomas began as they crossed the busy intersection right outside the front entrance of the dilapidated building, "We hanging out tonight, or...?"

"Sorry, not tonight," she said with a sigh, "I need to get this essay for Reiss done tonight, or else I won't remember to do it. You know how I am with remembering things," she chuckled a little.

To this, Arianna stopped in front of her, her breasts struggling to leave her shirt for some air, "Hey, do mine while you're at it please?"

"Hell no, do it yourself," Emily put it bluntly.

"Come on! This is payback for when you forgot my birthday last year!"

"Oh shut the fuck up, I did not forget your birthday last year," she retorted, hitting her hip, "Your mind tricks won't work on me like they do with the guys you hang around."

"Damn! Thought I had you for second there," she admitted defeat before walking into a freshly cut lawn. "I'll see you guys later!" she screamed, waving all the while.

The couple waved back as each slipped one hand into the other. Their walk continued for several more blocks, and as usual, it was a quiet stroll. Neither needed to use words as their bodies did most of the talking for them - a squeeze of the hand indicated that they wanted each other to have a good rest-of-the-day, while bumping shoulders indicated that they didn't want to part ways anytime soon. It was a secret language for the two, one they had used even in the presence of others as they knew they would never be able to pick it up - even they themselves did not realize they were using this second language, that's how secret it was.

Eventually, the two, as always, would come to a halt right before reaching the local elementary school. They would stand there for several minutes, just listening to the meaningless chatter that would come from the world around them. Their hands would grasp tighter than previously, and they'd try to think of small talk that neither particularly cared for.

"Ah, I'm so glad spring break's already here," Thomas told Emily.

"Me too, I get so tired of school."

After another few minutes of shoe-gazing, the two would finally speak their goodbyes.

"Well, see ya," Thomas said while starting towards the street, "Maybe we could hang out sometime tomorrow? At my place?"

"Yeah, sounds good," she replied with a sliver of a smile, "See you."

Thomas then continued to walk into the street before he stopped once again, twirled around like a ballerina, and quickened his pace before he become extremely close to Emily. The two would then stare into each others eyes before promptly closing them and leaning inward for an intimate moment.

"See ya," he'd say once more before finally making his way across the street and into a house not far from where Emily still stand. Waiting until Thomas had finally entered his humble abode, she would then continue walking towards the elementary school and subsequently peer at the playground behind the building. Whenever she saw anyone back there, whether it be two children playing on the monkey bars or three middle schoolers smoking behind a bush, she would quicken her pace and walk all the way around the school. However, when she saw not a single trace of life, the quiet girl would sneakily walk over to the set of swings that rested a little ways off from the giant playground palace. She would then sit on the swing of her choice, although she had some trouble fitting on them despite the wide amount of space given.

There was an eerie squeak that could be heard with every swing Emily made, although she passed it off as just a staple of all swing sets made. The more she swung back and forth the farther away she grew from the brown soil and the faster she traveled up and down. She began to look up into the sky, as she had always done, losing herself in the myriad of shapes that the clouds made. Sometimes she'd see the most abstract designs up there, and other times she would see the most acute. While looking up, she took notice of one cloud in particular that appeared to still be forming a definite shape. It looked to take on many humanistic features, such as legs, and hair, and-

"Hey there," a bright voice popped up outside of Emily's vision, startling her to a halt as the cloud she took such a keen interest in disappeared.

Emily shifted her eyes to the sound of the mysterious girl's voice and froze. Her mouth began to open, trying desperately to throw up even just one small word to say to this girl who stood there, excited like a puppy. "Hi..." was all she could muster, but she internally cursed herself for fear of sounding too mean-spirited.

"How are you?" The girl asked in a lovingly smooth tone that would have definitely melted her heart had it not already been reduced to a puddle by Thomas.

"I'm... good," she choked out, unsure of how to feel about the girl who had then sat on the swing to the left of her. Her extremely thin build allowed her to move freely around the seat, and she made sure to become very comfortable, as if she were getting ready to see a Shakespearean play. The waning sun glistened off the half of her tan legs not cut off by her medium length skirt, and she wrapped her skinny arms tightly around the metal chains that suspended the seat in midair. The way in which the girl was positioned was very much how Emily had imagined a famous model would get set up for a photo-shoot - quickly and effortlessly without being imperious in the slightest.

The girl laughed a small laugh, her heading tilting upwards then lowering downwards. "I bet you think I'm a weirdo for just coming up to a complete random stranger all of a sudden."

"No.. uh... I don't," Emily replied, with a more constructed sentence this time. At that point in time, she really didn't think that the girl was weird for going up to a stranger. No, she was more enraptured as to why she had decided to come up to her instead of anyone else. Granted, there was no one else around, but surely this girl could have found someone a little further along that was at least a little bit more intriguing-looking to talk to.

She laughed once more, "It's okay if you think so, I would consider myself a weirdo most definitely."

There was a bit of awkward silence as Emily swung back and forth in small motions, while the long and raven headed girl made large sweeping movements on her swing.

"Who was that guy earlier?" the girl asked, disturbing the peace.

At first, the question had caught her off guard as she was still too preoccupied with the notion that someone other than Arianna and Thomas were trying to make direct communication with her. "Guy? What gu...Oh. He's... my boyfriend," she spat out, almost as if she found it hard to believe herself.

"Really?" she asked as she allowed her swing to take a short break.

Emily sheepishly nodded, inadvertently avoiding the girl's surprised glare by staring down into her shoes as she swung in a clockwise motion.

"You certainly got yourself a good one there," she said as she smiled brighter than the sun.

To this, Emily couldn't help but indulge in a small bit of happiness as the compliment reverberated around inside her head. "Thanks..."

"Yeah," the girl said, sighing happily, "Too bad he's going to be all mine soon."

Emily, however, had become too immersed in her compliment to realize the girl's newest remark. It wasn't until she had heard the loud sound of her small feet hitting the soil a few feet ahead that she had processed what was being told.

"Wait...what do you... mean..." Emily began to ask, but it was clearly too late as the girl had already traveled a good distance away from the swing set.

Before she grew too far away, however, the girl yelled over to Emily.

"By the way! I just moved here! My name's Savannah Hallsman!!" The girl then twirled around and began to walk away, but she stopped once more, turned around, and walked up a few feet closer towards Emily so she could hear her. Savannah then gave the most genuine and sincere smile one could ever give, as if Emily had given her some sort of great opportunity.

"I hope we can be great friends!" She then turned back around and hurried off along one of the many weirdly named streets and out of view. As Savannah began to turn, however, Emily got a glimpse of something peculiar that she had not taken notice of earlier - her eyes. For just that brief second, it was as if Savannah's eyes were purely black and devoid of all soul, similar to a black hole.

Even if it were for just a fleeting moment, Emily had begun to feel as if she were being sucked in by those dark eyes, and she started to actually feel herself gradually be pulled in by them as well. She desperately didn't want to, and the fear began to fully sink in as she attempted to pull away. The struggle was futile, and eventually she was pulled in closer, and closer. This feeling began to suffocate Emily, and it she quickly lose her ability to breathe normally. Before long, her entire vision had begun to cede into darkness, and she neared closer and closer into unconsciousness.

There was a sharp gasp from Emily as she jumped up from her slumber. She looked around cautiously, terrified at the scene that had just played out. Her breath, while at first rapid and loud, began to slow and quiet down after a few minutes of rational thinking.

That couldn't have been real... could it have? But I don't remember going to bed... or even making it home...

Her dream, unlike other nights, caused her a great deal of confusion. 

That was way too detailed to be a dream... but then what was it? It couldn't have been real... right? Maybe it was just a dream that crossed over with events from yesterday...? But then... is Savannah Hallsman real...or not...

The more Emily began to cook up strange theories inside of her head, the more and more puzzled she became. But there was one thing, above all else, that she knew without a doubt was something she had experienced - the feeling of being sucked in by those big black holes that had rested in Savannah's eye sockets. Just the acknowledgement brought about chills throughout her entire body.

Emily took a glance at her cell phone that laid beside her and, noticing how early it was, tried to get some more sleep. However, as she laid back down in her twin sized bed and closed her eyes once more, Emily understood that there would not be another time in her life when she would be able to sleep peacefully ever again.