Free Uncanny Day by Cory Clubb Page B

whatever it was, had made inside Stephanie’s mind. I darted my eyes to the floor, turned, and kept moving.
    Farther down the hall at my locker, I tried to breathe deeply as I spun the combination. The first attempt failed, so I tried again—still nothing. My fingers shook.
    Come on, stupid thing . I turned the combination once more and it clicked open. I grabbed a notebook and slammed the door shut.
    Then I felt them. Eyes were on me. I don’t know why I hadn’t felt them before. They were lurking and heavy, like they all knew. I felt like a criminal. I turned my head and caught a pair on me as they passed in the hallway. What were they looking at? What did they know? Why was I suddenly getting this awkward attention, or was I? Maybe these eyes had always been on me and I didn’t know it till now. I had to find Dean.
    I moved from my locker. The eyes were still on me. I couldn’t track them, but I didn’t need to—I could feel them. I jerked my head to the left as I walked, trying to pinpoint whose they were. I saw a girl, but she quickly looked away and caught up with a group of others. Had I read her mind before? Did they know my secret? My business paired me up with dozens of people all over school. It was hard to keep them all straight. A mind room flashed in my head. Whose mind was that?
    I singled out a guy wearing a letter jacket tracking me. I turned to get a better look, but when I did, he was talking to someone else. I wanted to scream. The eyes on me were beginning to become worse than the voices.
    I needed an escape closer than Dean and the cafeteria. Up ahead of me was the newspaper staff room. I prayed Kate would be inside. I felt something tingle behind me—more eyes. I turned around and just about jumped out of my skin when a hand slammed against the locker in front of me. It was Trent. Out of all the people in school, it had to be Trent.
    â€œWhat up, Uncanny Day?” he said.
    â€œI don’t need this right now, Trent,” I said. “I’ve had a messed-up day.”
    His fractured grin told me he didn’t care.
    â€œI want to be very clear with you,” he said in a firm whisper. “I want you to stay away from Dean Mitchell.” His finger pointed at my chest.
    â€œDude, you do know I live with the guy. That’s going to be sort of hard,” I said.
    Trent laughed. What was the joke? He suddenly turned serious again. “Get out. Run away. I don’t care,” he said flatly.
    â€œWhat? You’re psychotic.” Surprisingly enough, I inched my body past him.
    â€œYou had better listen, man!” he said, half yelling.
    Entering the school newspaper room, I shook my head. I had no idea what Trent was talking about, although at least he had taken my thoughts off the craziness for a little bit. But it was just replaced with even more helpings of crazy.
    The newspaper room was…well, let’s just say it was messy. I wasn’t sure I’d been in there before. Old issues of the Weekly Beak sat laid out, some in piles. A six-foot-long table held a collection of books, notebooks, papers, and pens, as if somebody had spilled everything on top of it. A few chairs dotted the outside. A string of computer stations clothed in bright-colored sticky notes sat empty on the far wall against a set of windows. On a wire that stretched across the width of the classroom, photos hung from clothespins. They looked like sports pictures from some playoff. I caught Dean in one of them.
    I released a breath I didn’t realize I’d been holding when I saw her. Nobody else but Kate seemed to be in the room. “What’s up?” I asked, ducking under the hanging photos as I made my way across the room. Kate was behind a huge desk, her nose buried in her laptop screen, the back of which was covered in stickers. One of them read REBEL with the Star Wars logo next to it.
    Without looking up, she answered, “Researching