The School That Never Existed

If Blackwood Academy never existed, why was I expelled before I was even born?

Stranger still, explusion letter was signed by someone who has been dead for seventy years, and somehow the handwritting looks like mine.

So there is a girl, a brilliant observer, clever, smart, and loves reading thriller books. Her name was Christoper Sinclair, age of approximately 11 years. She went to a boarding school alone that nobody has ever heard the name of. To her suprise, when it was the very last day in her own house, all alone, the doorbell rang: “Ting tong!”

She peeped through the peephole. There was nobody, but she still opened the door, and she found a box that looked ancient, historical, and full of layers of dust. She took the box in her hands and went to her bedroom. She needed a key to open it, so she randomly put any key on that box and opened it with trembling hands. She found out… that the key was wrong all the time!

She needed a 348G key to open it. She remembered her mother had one to lock her almirah. She searched the whole house, from cupbord to drawers, but she didn’t find it. But she found the key in an old, dusty book that was named “The Only Survivor.”

She opened that box quickly, and to her suprise, she found out that it was completely filled with many documents. She opened them, and in them she found a very rust 90’s photograph attached to a list of students. The list had 19 students, but in the photograph there were 20. When she looked closely, she saw that the photograph of the school was of nothing else but her own boarding school, BLACKWOOD, and that photograph also had her own photo!

Then she was so frightened that she could not even speak or think for a minute. Her brain froze; her hands and feet got cold. She saw a book and started reading. It was all abiut a girl who studied in Blackwood, whose name was Christopher, and who wore a green ribbon on her neck, just like her. She was 11 years old and got expelled.

She screamed in horror, and then suddenly the telephone rang: “Tring tring!” She got soo scared that she slipped into the corner of her bed. But she was brave, so she went to the ground floor and, with shaking hands, answered it. Then she heard only a single line: “U R READING THE STORY OF THE WRONG STUDENT!!”

The voice through the telephone sent a chill. There was silence. Then, after a deep breath, Christopher said, “How do u know what I’m reading?”

Then someone laughed. She went to explore the box and saw that, at the last line of that book, it was written: “WELCOME BACK, STUDENT NUMBER 20!!”

She was not scared because she was not like other people. But whenever she noticed the photograph, the ink looked fresh, like the photo was replaced with her face. She scratched it and found out that it was a replaced photo of her. There were many questions that arose in her mind: Who sent that box? Who replaced the photo? And lastly, can she trace the call?

While she was thinking of those answers, she heard the sound of the doorbell again, ringing repeatedly. She opened it, and there was no one other than her parents. She hugged both of them tight, but when she wanted to tell everything, her parents were so busy that they told her only one single thing: “NO ONE TALKS ABOUT BLACKWOOD.”

She had no choice. She just went to her bed and hoped that her first day in boarding school would be fantastic. She packed her bag along with that box and went to sleep, tired from too much adventure.

THE NEXT SILENT MORNING

She woke up and sat in the car with all her belongings. Then her parents sat in the car. Her father drove, and the whole car ride was extremely silent. No one talked about anything.

After they reached their destination, her mother said only one thing to her: “IT WILL BE A NEW LIFE FOR U THAT WILL BE DIFFICULT!!”

CHRISTOPHER SMILED AND ENTERED THE GATE OF HELL. She saw nobody. The silence was making her dead in her inner self.

She entered her room and found a bed that looked very rusty and eaten by pests, but still she had to live there… And then there was her roommate, who was going to live with her. Her name was Alex Pinto, and she was the same as her.

Besides that, Christopher found a list of rules on her bed. She got suprised, and the rules were like:

The Wet Footprints: If you find wet footprints leading directly into your empty desk, sit in it anyway. Leaving the chair empty implies you think the owner hasn’t arrived yet.

1. The Lost Voice: If you hear your own voice calling for help from the dark end of the hallway, do not answer it. It is still learning how to copy your face, and answering speeds up the process.
2. The Whispering Chalk: If the chalk starts writing on the board by itself, read the sentence carefully. If it spells out your exact home address, you have three seconds to swallow your eraser.
3. The Final Bell: The 3:15 PM dismissal bell rings once for normal students, and twice for those who need to stay. If it chimes three times, the doors are locked from the outside—find a hiding spot under a desk before the lights cut out.

By seeing these rules, she thought, “Now I will find the mystery of this school.” She went to attend classes, following all the rules. She went there and attended sincerely.

In the night, she missed her parents. While looking at those pictures, she cried a lot but could not do anything. Then she heard loud shouting near her room, like she was shouting. But then she remembered the rules and ignored those sounds.

She woke up and went to the library to explore something. When she entered, something felt unusual. The smell of the air was so disgusting that she could not handle it. But she saw a little card fallen down with the name “Christopher Sinclair, Batch 1984.”

She ran towards the librarian and asked about it. She answered, “You should not be here, Christopher. We already sent u back once.”

And when Christopher looked at the register, her name disappeared. She went to her class with sadness. Then she questioned herself: “How did the librarian know my name without me telling?”

THEN THE LIBRARIAN SHOUTED FROM THE HALLWAY, “Christopher, wait!!”

When she turned around, she was gone, and the light was flickering. The only thing she could see was a register and a little slip of a note sticking out.

Then she saw there were only five letters: “DO NOT TRUST ANYONE HERE.” She couldn’t understand what they meant. I folded the paper and hurried back to my dormitory.

When I reached my room, everything seemed normal. My books were on the desk, my uniform was hanging in the cupboard, and my bed was perfectly made.

But something was different.

There was a photograph lying on my pillow. It showed me standing outside the library. I turned it over. On the back, someone had written: “U should have stayed away.”

Someone shouted, “Open the door!” Some familiar voice that sounded like me. Because when I looked in the mirror, I understood why nobody questioned me: she was never the real Christopher Sinclair. The real one was kidnapped and died 11 years back. She just stole her identity.

But when I turned the photo back, it showed there is no Blackwood Academy: “YOU R STUCK IN THIS LOOP FOREVER!!”

If BLACKWOOD HAD NO TEACHER, NO STUDENT, AND NO HISTORY, WHY DID IT REMEMBER MY NAME?

SAID BY CHRISTOPHER… OR MAYBE…

By Sukriti Rai

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