The Blood Society chapter 2 (SOO SORRY FOR THE LONG WAIT!!! PLEASE READ AND COMMENT!!!)

by Jen in Hogwarts, watching the wrackspurts zoom around my head.

Chapter 2

Don’t worry about him.” Carly said as I walked back into the room. “That’s just Travis. He’s kind of a jerk, from what I hear. I just got here a couple of weeks ago.”
I was starting to get the feeling that Carly liked the sound of her own voice.
A bell resonated from the hall through the still open door.
“Oh!” Carly said. “Dinner!” she leapt up off her bed and bounded through the door. At the last second, she turned around and said, “You coming? I heard it’s pot pie.” She licked her lips and stared at me expectantly.
“Umm…. I’ll meet you there.” I said with a strained grin, and she said okay. When the pounding of her footsteps faded in the distance, I flopped back against my bed. I coughed and got back up as a cloud of dust rose into the air. Gross.
I coughed some more, then attempted to grab a suitcase off the floor. It hadn’t gotten any lighter, so I just unzipped it there. Half my wardrobe spilled out onto the carpet. I gathered all my street clothes and made my way towards the closet.
Dumping them in a drawer, I went back for my, ahem, delicates, then my uniforms. I only had three of them, which was all my parents could really afford, and hung them up in a neat little row.
The school uniform consisted of a white shirt, then an optional black jacket over it. The skirt and tie were blood red, which made for the most morbid outfit I had ever worn. But I supposed I could get used to it.
As I stood there staring at the uniforms, I tried to muster up some excitement. I really did. But I just couldn’t. All I felt was… well, nothing.
Nothing at all.
As I walked back into the room, I hauled my now empty suitcases over to the closet and stashed them in a corner. Then I decided to just get it over with and head to dinner.
I looked at myself in the mirror. Carly had just been in a purple hoodie and jeans, so I assumed that dinner wasn’t exactly black tie formal. But I did my best to smooth out my rumpled T shirt, that my dad had gotten free at work, anyway. My jeans had a ketchup stain from the burger I had eaten on the way. I grimaced. I changed, then walked out into the hallway.
Back at the elevators, I had to wait a few minutes, but when the elevator came, I sighed in relief. There was no one in it. I stepped in and pushed the little G button that signaled the ground floor. I whistled along to the elevator music as we stopped at the third floor, then the second, and finally the first. The doors slid back open, and I stepped out.
Across the room, there was a map of the school, and I saw that the dining hall was all the way across the grounds. I groaned and headed out the door.
That elevator music is really good at getting stuck in your head. I found myself humming it all the way down one of the sidewalks that connected all the buildings. My sneakers slapped across the concrete, tapping out the rhythm to that stupid elevator tune.
By the time I got to the doors of the dining hall, I was ready to slap myself.
I stared at the doors apprehensively. I was strongly reminded of a giant monster’s jaws that were about to eat me.
Okay, I thought. Can I do this?
Sure, why not.
I pushed the door open.
Instantly, the sound of two hundred high schoolers assaulted my ears, and the smell of cafeteria food made me want to barf.
Maybe private school wasn’t so different from public school.
My eyes scanned the room, and I saw Carly waving to me. She was sitting alone. I made a beeline for her table.
“Hey Moon!” she said with a big grin. The smell coming off her pitiful excuse for a pot pie was disgusting.
“Hey.” I said, wrinkling my nose. I grabbed her fork and poked at the pot pie. It made a farting noise. My eyes widened and I gently set the fork down.
She picked it up wordlessly and dumped it in the trash can right next to us. We looked at each other.
“So.” Carly said.
“So.” I said in agreement.
Awkward.
I stared at the table across the room, where a bunch of sweaty guys in soccer jerseys were scarfing down pizza like there was no tomorrow. Scanning the rest of the room, I realized that that Travis guy wasn’t anywhere to be found.
“Hey do you know where that Travis guy is?” I said. “I never got to properly thank him for carrying my bags.”
“He always eats like really fast, then disappears. Poof!” She opened her hands and eyes wide. “And he eats a lot. Even more than them.” she jabbed a thumb in the soccer team’s general direction.
“Hm.” I mumbled, dropping the subject.
The papers on the next table over flew into the air as a girl zoomed past. She overshot ours, then moon walked back. Her short brown ponytail bobbed as she sat down.
“Hey Katie.” Carly said nonchalantly, as though this happened every day.
“Hi!” Katie said. She looked like she had just eaten an entire bucket of sugar.
“Oh!” she looked at me. “Who are you?”
She stared at me like I was a particularly interesting bug under a microscope.
“Hi, I’m Moon.” I said shyly.
“OMG epic name!” Katie squealed, brown eyes shining.
“I know right?” Carly looked up from her purple Nokia, which she had been texting on.
I smiled. Two friends in twenty four hours. That was two more than I had before I came here. Maybe I would like it here. I stood up a little straighter.
Katie glanced over at Carly’s phone. “Ooooh, who’re you texting?”
“Nobody.” Carly’s eyes got wide, and she went to jam the phone into her pocket, but Katie was too fast for her.
“Aha!” Katie held up the phone like an Olympic trophy. I smiled, amused.
“Logan, ooh, a boy.” Katie gave Carly a look, then kept reading. “What's up? Who asks that? So boring."she looked at Carly incredulously.
“None of your beeswax!” Carly squealed, grasping for her phone, but Katie held it out of her reach. Suddenly feeling adventurous, I reached over and plucked it out of the air, then kept reading.
“Oops, gotta go. Band practice calls. Winky face.” Katie looked at Carly.
“Ooooh, somebody has a boyfriend. Details. Now.”
“Oh, he’s nobody important.” Carly said, but the blush creeping up her cheeks said otherwise.
“Oh, a nobody who's a BOY?” Katie said, an excited grin creeping across her face.
“Okay, okay!” Carly said. “I met this guy at camp last year.”
“Logan.” Katie interjected.
“Yeah, Logan.” she shot Katie an annoyed look, then went on. “He was totally cute, and we ended up dating, well, as well as you can date at camp anyway, but camp ended, and he lives in like England, and like, yeah.” she ducked her head, embarrassed.
“It’s nothing to be embarrassed about…” Katie bumped Carly’s arm. “I bet he’s totally awesome.”
“Yeah, he is.” Carly said, smiling. “He plays guitar, and sings, and he’s a totally great kisser…” she turned beet red again.
I handed the phone back to Carly, and she tucked it into her pocket with a small smile on her face.
Suddenly, the screeching sound a microphone makes for no reason anyone can explain ripped through the cafeteria, making me clamp my hands over my ears. Katie and Carly did the same.
I turned around to see a woman standing at a podium that I somehow hadn’t noticed until now. Her blonde hair was pulled into a bun, and her cherry red lipstick glinted. Her sparkling blue eyes scanned the room, then she cleared her throat and began to speak.
“Hello. My name is Lilith Fritz, aka your headmistress.” she smiled, showing a row of perfectly straight, brilliantly white teeth. Okay, she was way too perfect. I looked up and down her body, searching for something wrong, one little flaw. But I couldn’t find a thing.
She cleared her throat again.
“Welcome to Scarlet Elm Academy! I need to lay down some rules before classes start tomorrow.
“First, no going into the woods after dark. There are many dangerous animals out there, like bears, even wolves, and, er-” she mumbled something that sounded like “we’re not insured”
I looked at Carly and Katie in alarm. They looked wide-eyed back at me. Carly leaned across the table and whispered, “When I get back to the room, I’m taking out a life insurance policy.”
Katie giggled, then we all looked back at Ms. Fritz again.
“Two,” and then she went on about no stealing, no cheating, no killing each other, yadda yadda yadda yadda…
“And third, most important of all, please do not go into Basement Sublevel C. That is off limits to anyone but teachers and seniors.” she smiled.
Everyone looked at her expectantly, waiting for some explanation, but she just kept smiling.
“Have a great year!” she gave a little wave, then hopped off the podium and walked through the door, her heels click-clacking across the linoleum.

So sorry!!! NO tidbit this time, I've gotta go to bed. School tommorow!!! I'll give you one tommorow though. Probably be in the comments. Hope I get some!!! Peace out!!!

Jen