I Was Just Hungry

The creak of my front door was like an eerie tune, hummed by a bloodthirsty witch. I pulled my covers tight, closed my eyes tighter.

Nothing can hurt me as long as I’m in my bed. 

This was a line I’d recited thousands of times. As a child, it protected me from monsters; as an adult, it warded off the anxieties du-jour.

But this was different. This was real. And this was my fault.

The door was opening. Exposing me. Every inch yielded was another layer of skin peeled back.

This is my fault. I have to face my mistake. 

The bed moaned as my feet hit the cold floor. Beyond the bedroom was a living room, a kitchen, and a bathroom; the home of a struggling teacher.

But tonight, there was something else: a shadow. From the shadow came a whisper, “Mr. Davis…” Those were the same words that started this nightmare.

“Mr. Davis,” Shawn began. He was a scrawny seventh grader with mismatched eyes: one blue, one green. He was holding a pair of red-handled scissors, his hand inching closer to the blade in a way that made me nervous. “Is it true?”

“Is what true?” I replied, gently prying the scissors from his hand and placing them on my desk.

Shawn’s hands twitched. “About Winston? Is he really, you know—expelled?”

I sighed. “I’m not sure.”

Shawn started plucking at his fingernails. “But this was his third strike?” His head was down, eyes on the ground. “No more chances…”

At the Benedict Reformed School, there was a strict three-strikes policy. Winston had earned his third strike this morning when he’d stolen a candy bar from my lockbox.

“Winston!” I’d yelled, snatching the Twix bar from his chocolate-stained hands. “I hope that candy was worth it!” I was irate, perhaps more than I should have been.

It wasn’t about the candy; I was giving it to the students anyway. It was the violation. He’d picked the lock to my safe, rifled through my belongings. It was an invasion that could not be permitted. That’s what I told myself as I dragged Winston to the dean’s office. It’s what I told myself as the dean expelled him. It wasn’t my fault, it was his.

I was following the rules.

But the tears streaking down Winston’s sunken face seemed to scream, “FORGET YOUR RULES!”

I’d never noticed how skinny Winston was. His arms were like pipe cleaners, the skin on his face was tight, black bags engulfed his eyes.

He wasn’t stealing candy. He was stealing food. 

“Dean,” I began, “I actually—” The dean cocked an eyebrow.

“What was that, Mr. Davis?” he asked, annoyed.

I looked to Winston, seated in the chair, head bowed, then back to the dean, “Nothing, sir,” I answered glumly.

He dismissed me from his office so he could go about the unpleasant business of calling Winston’s parents.

“Yes, Shawn,” I said, “Winston will be expelled.”

Shawn nodded. “Thought so,” he mumbled, tucking his hands into the pockets of his jeans.

I held my chin up, feigning confidence. “Everything will be okay.”

Shawn’s head tilted upward. “I guess—” His eyes flicked; something behind me had caught his attention.

I began to twist my head when a cold metal hissed across my hand. “Ow!” The scissors had fallen from the desk, slicing my skin.

Shawn barely reacted, his attention still glued to the doorway. But when I turned to look, nobody was there.

“You okay?” Shawn asked, noticing the crimson line bubbling between my thumb and index finger.

“It’s fine.” I pressed a tissue against it. “What were you looking at before?” I asked.

“Oh.” Shawn shook his head. “Nothing…” The lie was painted on his face.

“Shawn?” I pressed.

He looked to the doorway once more, then admitted, “I thought I saw Winston, but it was just the shadows playing tricks.”

Shawn exited, but his parting words hung heavily in the air.

I couldn’t stop thinking about Winston. What would happen to him now? Benedict's was not a school for college-bound students. It was a place for students to stay out of trouble, a place to keep them from becoming the worst versions of themselves, and it was a place that provided two hot meals a day.

I needed to learn more about Winston. I needed to know if there was any way to undo his expulsion.

“Don,” I said to the school’s head of security. “Do you have a minute?”

The hefty man was seated in his office, a dozen camera feeds lit his face in an ethereal light.

Don spread his arms. “For the man who brought me a bacon-egg-and-cheese last week, I got all the time in the world.”

In truth, the deli had given me two by mistake, but Don didn’t need to know that.

“Do you know how Winston Craft got his first two strikes?”

Don leaned back. “I don’t know exactly,” he replied, his chair squealing. “But I’m pretty sure the first two strikes came from the Ice Queen.”

“Mrs. Curvone?”

“That’s the one. The lady gives more strikes than the head of the umpiring union.”

Mary Curvone was an older woman with a penchant for punishment. Students and teachers did their best to stay out of her way.

“Why you asking?” Don inquired.

I explained how I’d gotten him expelled. Don slapped the air. “Don’t sweat it, Teach. That wasn’t your fault any more than it would be this bag of Doritos’ fault if my ticker finally clocked out after I ate it.” He ripped the bag open, then tilted it toward me.

“I’m okay,” I said. This situation had left me with little appetite. “You don’t have a record of what happened?” I prodded, knowing there wasn’t an inch in the school that wasn’t recorded.

Don frowned. “I mean, I got it somewhere…”

I nodded. “I get it, you’ve got a lot going on.” I started to leave. “I won’t waste any more of your time.”

Don sighed. “I’ll see what I can do. But it isn’t gonna be easy. You should still go talk to the Ice Queen.”

Sadly, I was planning on it.

Mary Curvone taught science, and despite her nickname, she kept her room at a balmy 78 degrees. Still, a chill ran down my neck as I knocked on her door.

Mary’s voice answered like a cracking whip. “School is closed. If you take a single step into my classroom, you will be thrown in the detention center faster than you take a puff from your vape pen.”

I nearly turned around, but the image of Winston’s brittle arms pushed me forward. “It’s me, actually,” I said, as if she would recognize my voice.

Curvone was standing over a terrarium that housed a dozen frogs. She was unwrapping twelve sets of scalpels and laying them across a table. Her expression softened as she glanced in my direction. “Ah, sorry. Thought you were one of the kids. You can never be too careful; some of these brats are dangerous.” She chuckled. “Mr. Douglas, was it?”

“Davis,” I corrected meekly.

“Right. What can I do for you?” She retrieved a plastic crate from the floor. It had a black casing that obscured its contents.

“I wanted to ask you about Winston Craft.”

Curvone slid open the top of the terrarium, then opened the small box. A swarm of flies fell among the frogs. Twelve tongues flashed as the flies were devoured.

“What about him?” Curvone asked.

“Do you remember why you gave him two strikes?”

“Of course I do,” she replied. “Little brat tried to steal from me.” She pointed toward a large metal cabinet in the far corner of her room. “That’s where I keep all my lab equipment. Caught Winston trying to shake it open on multiple occasions.”

“Did he ever get in?”

“No, it’s locked tight. But he shook it so hard it nearly came crashing down.”

“Would you mind?” I mimed turning a key.

She shrugged, then shoved a rusted key into the lock. It opened with a groan. It was filled with beakers, petri dishes, and measuring tools. All the boring science stuff that I hated as a kid.

What could Winston have wanted—

On the top shelf were ten bags of marshmallows. “Are those always there?”

Curvone hitched a wrinkled brow. “Yes, I use them to model molecules.”

“Do you remember if you did that with Winston’s class? Before he tried to get in, I mean.”

Curvone shrugged again, “I don’t recall.” She locked the cabinet, then turned to me. “Look, I heard about what happened with Winston. Can I offer you some advice?”

“Sure,” I replied. It seemed Curvone was much kinder to adults than kids.

“It’s our job to hold these kids accountable. Winston was a thief; he got caught, and now he’s gone. Are there kids capable of way worse at this school? You bet. But like I said, we can only hold them accountable for what we see.”

I left Curvone’s room, her words bouncing around in my skull. I rubbed them over my guilt like a salve, but they wouldn’t take.

A rusted hand on a clock was inching toward five. I never stayed at school this late. It was time to go home. At least, it would have been, if my phone hadn’t buzzed.

It was Don.

Found the tape. Is this some kind of joke? 

“It’s no joke,” I said, arriving at his office a few minutes later, out of breath. “What did you find?”

Don’s face was washed in sweat. “See for yourself.” He smashed the play button.

On the screen, Winston stood alone in Curvone’s classroom. The sickly boy was a few feet from the cabinet. He slowly moved his hand toward the handle; his fingers tugged on the door with no success.

“Don, I’m not seeing the problem…” Just as the words were leaving my mouth, the cabinet started to shake.

The cabinet thrashed violently, its insides clinking madly; then, abruptly, it stopped. Curvone stormed onto the screen, pointing a bony finger at Winston.

Don stopped the footage. “What’s going on, Teach?” he asked, voice laden with fear.

I thought of the scissors that sliced my hand, how they seemed to fall from the desk on their own. I thought of the lock to my safe that had been picked clean.

“I’m not sure,” I said, not wanting to share the insane thoughts boiling in my mind.

Don shrank into his chair. “I’ve been here sixteen years, and I’ve never seen something like that.”

Me neither.

“I have to go.” I had the urge to get far away from the school. To never return, to never think about Winston Craft again.

I ran through the hallway, past rows of rusted lockers, towards my classroom. As I rounded the corner, I saw a note pinned to my classroom door. My stomach acid swirled. The note was written in melted red crayon.

Mr. Davis, I

was just hungry

I raced out of the building without collecting my belongings. I had to make this right. I went to the supermarket and filled a shopping cart with food. I spent an hour tracking down Winston’s address and another forty minutes driving there.

Winston’s family lived in a ghastly apartment building. It had hideous red bricks that reminded me of melted clay. As I entered the building, I was accosted by the smell of weed and sour meats.

I carried five bags of groceries up seven dangerous flights of stairs before arriving at Winston’s door. I went to knock, but stopped when I saw the note pinned to the door.

Eviction notice.

I knocked anyway. Nobody answered, but the door swung open.

A rat exploded out of the door, grazing my pant leg. Its long tail brushed against a bag that was filled with ramen.

This is my fault. 

I knew that was insane, illogical, ridiculous, but I believed it nonetheless. I had ruined Winston’s life by getting him expelled.

I ran out of the building, leaving the bags of food outside of the abandoned apartment.

I locked my apartment door and threw myself under the covers. This had always been my safe space. Winston, the boy whose life I’d ruined, could not harm me here.

Nothing can get me as long as I’m under the covers. 

But I knew it was no longer true even before the door screeched open. Before the high-pitched childish voice floated across the apartment.

A shadow moved across my kitchen.

“W-W-Winston?”

The shadow moved, stepping out of the darkness. “Mr. Davis.” The boy’s smile was cruel, cold. His eyes narrowed, one blue, one green.

“Shawn…” Winston’s best friend, the one who had come to my room earlier to ask about him. “What are you doing here?”

Shawn grinned, stepping toward me. He held something behind his back, something silver and sharp.

“It was you,” I said, pieces clicking together in my mind. “You were inside the cabinet in Curvone’s room, shaking it!”

“You picked my lock and told Winston to open it!”

“And you slid the scissors off the counter when I wasn’t looking.”

Shawn’s grin widened, but he didn’t say a word.

“Why? I thought Winston was your friend?”

Shawn giggled. There was a knife in each of his hands now. He held them in his fists like he was preparing for a steak dinner.

“Put those down,” I said, backing away.

“I’m sorry, Mr. Davis; you really have been fun to play with. But I get bored quickly. I got bored of Winston, and now I’m bored of you…”

He darted forward. I screamed, raised my arms to defend myself. I felt a rush of air as a knife stabbed forward, then another. It was so dark, and he was so small and fast, that it was impossible to tell where he was.

I swung my arms around desperately, screaming the air out of my lungs.

I hadn’t even realized my eyes were closed until I opened them.

Shawn was gone. Two knives had been jabbed into a couch cushion. The door clicked shut. I hit the lights, not sure that I’d ever turn them off again.

There was a note on the counter.

Thank u 4 

playing with me. 

I should have called the police. Instead, I crawled back into bed. I buried myself under covers that had always been my safe haven. But no longer. I was haunted, not by Shawn’s murderous gaze, but by Winston’s sunken eyes. He was expelled and evicted. What right did I have to feel safe while he suffered?

None. None at all.