Dead Beautiful

CHAPTER 9

The Flood

I WOKE UP THE NEXT MORNING TO A DIFFERENT world. Outside, everything was dusted in white. It was the first snowfall of the season; the unexpected kind of snow that drapes itself over the ground like a blanket, covering street signs and burying cars. I blinked. Last night couldn’t have been real. But it must have been, because there was Dante, lying beside me. His eyes were closed. Asleep, he looked statuesque, as though his features had been carved out of stone. I held out my hand, my fingers quivering as they grazed his cheek. Suddenly, his eyes opened. I gasped and pulled back my hand.

He smiled. “Did you sleep?”

I nodded and stretched my legs like a cat. “Did you?”

He propped himself up on an elbow and played with a lock of my hair. “I never sleep.” I rolled my eyes. “You must’ve slept at least a little.”

He traced his finger around my elbow. “Let’s get you back to campus before they realize you’re gone.”

Instead of going through the main gate, Dante walked me to a street on the edge of town. Because he was a day student, he was allowed to go on and off campus as he pleased. I, on the other hand, had to be more careful.

“How do I get back?”

“There are two ways. You can try to sneak past the guards at the gate, but they practically sleep with their eyes open, and there’s a good chance you’ll get caught.”

“What’s the other option?”

Dante hesitated. “It isn’t pleasant.”

I looked up at him expectantly. “That’s okay.”

Dante didn’t look particularly excited about it, but he nodded and took my hand.

We stopped in front of a run-down house with a dirt driveway lined with overgrown shrubs, now covered in. We kept to the edge of the yard, crouching low behind the bushes. Behind the house, the yard expanded into a white field surrounded by a circle of naked trees.

“Where are we going?”

But just as the words left my mouth, we stopped. In front of us, shrouded by a crab apple tree, was a stone well. Its narrow mouth was covered by a wooden board. Dante wiped off the snow and tossed the board on the ground.

“Remember those tunnels from the article?” he asked.

I nodded, my cheeks growing red from the cold.

“This is one of them. It leads to campus, beneath the pulpit of the chapel. I found it by accident when I was wandering around out here last summer. Supposedly there are dozens of others, but this is the only one I know of.”

I peered into the well. The hole was dark and narrow, just large enough for a body to fit through. A warm draft emanated from somewhere inside its recesses. I couldn’t see to the bottom. “Is there still water in it?”

“It was never a well,” he said, wiping his hands together. “It doesn’t even run deep. You just have to climb a few feet down and then it curves and opens into a tunnel.”

It looked like it could crumble at any minute, and the fact that it had been built in the 1700s merely affirmed my doubts. I kicked the ground with my shoe until I found a pebble beneath the snow. Picking it up, I threw it into the well. It didn’t make any sound.

Frowning, Dante gazed at me, deep in thought. “You’d better climb in or you’ll be late for class.”

I looked up at him with surprise. “You’re not coming?”

Dante shook his head. “I don’t go underground.”

I gave him a strange look. “What do you mean?”

“It’s a childhood thing. Bad experience.”

I hesitated, wanting specifics, but then nodded. After all, it was just a tunnel, right?

Dante rummaged around in his bag. “Take this.” He handed me a candle and a box of matches. “You might need it. When you’re down there, just walk straight. Don’t take any turns.”

I pushed a lock of hair behind my ear. “I’ll see you in class, then?”

“Yeah. But in case we don’t get a chance to talk, meet me in front of the chapel tonight? Eleven o’clock?”

“Why wouldn’t we have a chance to talk?” I asked, trying to hide my bewilderment.

“Just meet me in front of the chapel. I have something to tell you.”

I nodded, and Dante helped me into the well.

A makeshift ladder was made out of bits of stone sticking out of the well’s interior. “Bye,” I said, and began climbing down. With a worried look, he watched until I disappeared into the darkness.

The well was murky and constricting. I couldn’t see anything, and I barely had enough space to bend my knees. I climbed slowly, unsure of what would meet me at the bottom. A few rungs down, my foot hit dirt. I struck a match.

In front of me was a cavernous tunnel, big enough to stand in. The walls were made of caked dirt, which crumbled off under my fingers like chalk. It smelled faintly of mulch. Feeling around in the darkness, I struck another match and lit the candle. Every so often I felt a cool breeze coming from the opposite wall, where the tunnel forked off to the left. I pressed myself closer to the wall, trying not to think about what would happen if I got lost. Finally, it sloped upward, and I came to a dead end. Blowing out the candle, I pulled myself into the damp air of the chapel.

I emerged below the pulpit, through a corrugated grate.

The chapel groaned and wheezed as the winter wind blew around its steeples, and I could hear bats chirping from the stairwell. Light filtered through the stained-glass windows, casting red shadows across the floor. Not wanting to linger any longer than necessary, I snuck through the pews, my footsteps echoing off the vaulted ceilings as I unlocked the dead bolts and stepped out into the November morning.

In the snow, the Gottfried campus was transformed into a sprawling, pristine landscape. Each tree, each cobblestone, each blade of grass was frosted in a delicate layer of white. A group of boys passed me on the way to the dining hall, and I checked my watch. It was almost eight a.m., and I still had to shower and get through all of my classes before I could see Dante again. Buttoning my coat, I ran across campus, replaying the events of last night over and over in my head.

When I got to the dorm, I opened the door only to step into a big puddle of water. Startled, I jumped back to discover that the entire first-floor foyer was flooded. I ran upstairs, where I found girls crowding the hallways. Everyone looked sleepy and irritated, the freshmen complaining about the wet carpets in their rooms. I wandered through the crowd, looking for Eleanor, pushing past throngs of girls wearing robes and slippers, nightgowns, flip-flops, and oversized T-shirts. Finally I spotted Rebecca. She was standing in the corner with Charlotte, Greta, Maggie, and Bonnie.