Zuna didn’t make it very far through the haunted house. She’d gotten about halfway through when an alarm went off at the school. At the same time, a text alert appeared on her phone.EMERGENCY ALERT: MAKE YOUR WAY TO THE NEAREST SAFEHOUSE. DO NOT STAY IN YOUR HOMES. DO NOT GATHER YOUR BELONGINGS. MAKE YOUR WAY TO THE NEAREST SAFEHOUSE IMMEDIATELY.
Zuna groaned. Right in the middle of the haunted house? Seriously? But she made her way back to school dutifully, let herself get herded into the auditorium, listened to that terrifying broadcast…
That had been…what, half an hour ago? And it hadn’t been a nice one. But now that they were finally allowed back to their rooms, Zuna needed something to distract her. She hadn’t been disturbed like this in, well, in a long time. In a very long time. She was shaking all over. She needed something to distract her—even the primitive part of her brain knew this, because it was continually directing her thoughts to those two boys, Quilo and Yaviss, with whom she had meant to be spending the evening. She needed to talk to them. But she didn’t have the courage to. So she pulled out a notebook in the safety of her room, and, still shaking, began to write.
Dear Quilo,
I don’t have friends. I’ve never had friends—not really. So you asking me if I wanted to go to Haunted Hallows with you was…unprecedented. I acted like a jerk and ran off without you guys, after pressuring you into something you didn’t want to do, so I feel like I need to apologize to you, and maybe explain what the hell.
I’m probably just really freaked out by that broadcast, but…whatever. I need someone to talk to, and since you’re the only person who’s ever reached out to me, I guess you’re the best person for me to talk to. Y’know. If you want to listen or read or whatever.
So. Uh…the reason I ditched you.
I like haunted houses. I like being scared and being freaked out—well, sort of, I mean, see right now? My hands are shaking all over the place and I’m being totally illegible, I know, but it’s really hard for me right now. So. I like going to a place where I know I’m in no danger but get to feel like I’m in danger. It’s a no-risk environment for scares and excitement. I think that’s the reason most people like haunted houses—I mean, most people who like haunted houses, anyway. People who don’t obviously don’t like it, for whatever reason they don’t like it. Whatever. Point is, I do, and you did kind of convince me to hang out with you because you knew where the haunted houses were, so I guess I felt betrayed that you reneged on your promise. Or what I perceived as your promise. Whatever.
So I got huffy and I got in a snit and I left without you. Oh, and I don’t like beanbag tosses that much—they’re sort of a little kid thing, especially when they’re surrounded by little kids, and I don’t like doing little kid things—I don’t like them because I guess I’m worried people will think that I want to be a little kid, which implies I have no maturity? I mean…I guess I don’t have maturity, not in the proper sense of the word.
I mean, you asked a couple of strangers to hang out with you. That takes guts. And guts are a big part of maturity. It’s a way of facing your fears. Little kids with lots of fears don’t confront them and we consider that to be immature. You strike me as being a lot more adult than I am.
But I guess the real reason I’m so worried about being a little kid is that, well, I’m not a little kid, and I never enjoyed being a little kid.
Quilo, you’re literally the first person I’ve ever told any of this to, and I’m sure I’m gonna get an anxiety attack later about telling you all of this, but like I said, I’m super hella panicky right now and I need someone to chat at.
I didn’t enjoy being a little kid. It wasn’t fun. To be honest, being a teenager isn’t all that much fun, either. I don’t like being a teen. It’s not as fun as it was supposed to be. But I like it more than being a kid. I mean, more than I liked being a little kid, is what I mean.
My dad was a gangster. Like, a proper member of an actual organized crime ring. He used to do all sorts of bad stuff, and he liked to scare people. I think that’s why the X broadcast has me so wigged out right now, I can’t help but wonder if my dad ever made a video like that. I mean, probably not, because M the leader of his gang would have been super hella pissed, but that guy in the broadcast…
My dad didn’t have a happy childhood, either, and he tended to blame everything he did on how terrible his parents were. So seeing a guy like X say “Oh, I’m going to mess you guys up because some people you hate hurt me”? Yeah, that’s some real messed up stuff right there.
And I guess I’m really freaked out because I can see me doing that to other people. I’ll admit it, I’ve got a chip on my shoulder, I’ve got a real problem with other people. And I guess that’s because I didn’t have any friends. I had a criminal dad who didn’t let me socialize much, and used to cut people’s hair off. I don’t know how much you know about Naiad culture, but that was sort of like keeping a collection of people’s ears. When his trial went public and people found out about that, it changed the way my classmates thought of me, and when kids in the foster system found out about it, they wouldn’t let me live it down, either. I was the creepy kid.
And I’ve let all of that influence me and the way I act and the way I treat others. Just like X. And just like my dad. I don’t want to be like that anymore. I don’t want to hurt people just because my dad was a creep-o. So yeah, I’m sorry I lashed out at you and called the game stupid and left you guys even though I promised to hang out. And I’m sorry I’m a jerk. The only excuse I have is the same one that psycho criminals use, so I’m not gonna use it. I’m just going to say that you didn’t deserve to be treated like that, you were trying to be nice, and that I’m going to try to work on that part of myself in the future. I’m going to try to be a better person.
Zuna sat back and reread the letter to herself. Trembling, she nodded. That summed it up, more or less.
So what should she do now? Hide it? Tear it up and throw it away? Or should she give it to Quilo?
She read it again. He deserves an apology, she thought.
She picked up the pen again. Sincerely, Zuna, she wrote. Below that, she wrote, PS, if you see Yaviss, let him read this too, I think I was more of a jerk to him than I was to you.
She folded it up, addressed it to Quilo, and left her dorm room. It took a bit of searching, but she found the hybrid’s dorm room in the Eldritch dorms. She slid the letter under his door and went back to her room.
She could honestly say that that was the most terrifying thing she’d ever done.
