Candle in the Attic Window(11)

My teacher says something. I had to stop writing for a moment there, to listen to it. He got a note from someone outside in the hall. A shadow behind the crooked glass door. The note said that we are trapped. The teacher reads this, tells this to us with an air of authority.

We are snowed in. We cannot even open the doors.

I look at the window and all I see is a wall of white.

I feel like crying, but I don’t. I don’t want to be known as the girl who cries. That is worse than being invisible.

The note continues. Authorities are trying to find a way to get us out. It could be a day or two, at the least. We are to stay in the gymnasium overnight. The faculty will be laying down beds for each of us.

When the teacher is done reciting, he looks out the window. His face is convulsing, twitching. His eye is moving, like someone is pulling a string and making it go. His lips peel back in a sneer.

He was never attractive. But here, in this state of half-madness, he is downright ugly. I want to stand up, to be excused. But the bell has not rung yet; the period is not over. There are still more lies to be learned.

I am going to pull out my book and read some more. I need to be away from here for a little bit. I need to be someone else, somewhere else.





Thursday: The Gymnasium





I write this in my bed. Well, it is not really a bed. It is a blanket on the gymnasium floor. With a pillow. The pillow and blanket are grey. The floor is cold and hard. I can see my breath as I write this. Rising from my mouth. The ghost of my words.

My pen has a light on the end. It was a birthday gift last year, from my mom. Before she crawled under the bed and into the tunnels beneath my house. I am glad she gave it to me. At the time, I thought it was a stupid gift. Tonight, it is a lifesaver.

I crouch beneath the blanket as I write this. I can hear sounds around me. Even though they separated us – boys on one side, girls on the other – I can hear people sneaking and talking. Whispering, moaning. The shuffling of blankets and the sighs of sex.

I wonder if Mister Harvey is out there. Crawling beneath the blankets with the sword girls. Just the thought of it makes me sad and embarrassed. And yet, at the same time – very aroused.

I am going to play a game. I hear moaning now, several voices. And people whispering be quiet – and hush, and please don’t get me in trouble. I am going to try and guess who each of them is. Try and figure out what is going on beneath other grey blankets.

Names escape me. I am awash in the sounds, the rubbing of bodies. I feel a bump next to me and know that whoever is right over there is doing something as well. I feel a soft touch of skin, an electric sensation all along my body.

I am filled with thunder. I hear them, moaning, moving. Thrusting. Faster. That skin rubbing up against mine. Accidental contact. Motion, emotion. Flames inside of me.

I have to put the pen down.

I have to put this notebook down.

I know I will feel guilty in the morning, even though I will do nothing wrong.





Friday: The Gymnasium





In the morning they give us stale donuts and bagels. The donuts are hard; the bagels are chewy. I eat like it is my last meal. I made sure to check to see who was lying next to me last night – to see who those mysterious figures were. Nobody was there. Just an empty grey blanket and pillow.

I read after breakfast. First period will resume at nine am, like it does every morning. It seems there is no reprieve from the schedule. No matter how much the world has changed.

Everybody else chats while I read. I hear them, in the distance. Like muttering echoes from behind a wall. Talking the usual talk. Boys, colleges, work, who is cute and who is not. Who is cool and who is not. The names always change, but the pattern is the same.

I am at my favourite part of the book. The main character is a peasant girl named “Alisandre”. She is very pretty, with dirty-blonde hair and intense eyes. In the book, her only desire is to become a knight.

The section I am at now is her trial for knighthood. Fourteen different rituals must be observed. A dragon must be slain. Sacrifice of self and family must be undertaken. Each time I read, it the rituals and trials change. But the result is still the same. She is knighted by the Prince of Butterflies. This is the first time she meets the Prince. When the Prince’s hand touches her shoulder, she falls in love.

Now for a little explanation. The magical land where the book takes place is called “Iblio”. In Iblio, gender and rank are determined not by birth, but instead by trials that are assigned to each station. With each gender and title come responsibilities and awards, as well as rules for how you are supposed to act and what you are supposed to do and whom you are supposed to marry. What time of the month you are to have sex, what day of the year you are supposed to give birth. What you are supposed to wear and even how you are supposed to wear it.

Geoff would love the appendices in the back of the book. They go into exquisite detail on the different ranks and genders, and the different trials and honours awarded. It is the sort of thing he would read and re-read over and over again.

Even though the prince and the knight are in love, they can never do anything about it. It is forbidden. One of them would have to undergo the trials of the princess, and neither of them wants to do that.

This is where the book’s main plot comes into focus. After this point, it is about their forbidden love and the people who want to destroy them. Including the evil princess Earwig, who wants Alisandre for herself.