Heartache High (12 page)

‘This isn’t a
dream is it? You
are
here, aren’t you?’

He leans down,
kisses me delicately on the lips.

Yes, he’s
here.

‘We did it? I’m
back?’

‘Yes, you’re
back,’ another voice I recognise declares confidently.

I twist my head
slightly.

Dave and Jassy
are alongside me, grinning like a couple of Anime cartoon
characters.

‘Dave? Jassy?
You’re here too? You’re sure this isn’t a dream?’

‘We’re
sure
this isn’t a dream,’ Jassy assures me.

‘You’ve been
asleep for a while, sleepy head!’ Iain chuckles. ‘We left you; we
thought you deserved it after everything you’ve been
through.’

‘But how did you
get here?’ I ask Jassy dully.

‘How did
I
get here?’ Jassy repeats with a puzzled laugh.

Dave leans
closer towards me.

‘You’re here,
Steph,’ he says. ‘Back at Heartache High.’

*

Iain had woken
up in his own room, just down the hall from mine.

He’d been
bewildered at first, just as I had been.

When he’d walked
out onto the lawns, however, he’d seen me, fast asleep on the
grass.

Once he’d seen
me, it didn’t take him long to see the others worriedly clustered
around me.

It should have
surprised him, of course; but after all he’d been through, what was
so odd about ghostly students appearing and solidifying before
him?

I laugh as he
finishes explaining why we’re all still out on the lawn.

I reach up with
my arms, curl them around his head, draw him close, kiss
him.

‘Wait!’ I say,
suddenly letting him go. ‘That
doesn’t
explain what we’re
doing
here
, does it?’

I look about me
urgently.

‘Panthia!
Where’s Panthia?’

They were no
longer holding her prisoner, like they had been when I’d last seen
them all.

‘We couldn’t
hold her,’ Jassy apologises.

‘We think, now,
that it was all a trick; that she let herself be
captured.’

Dave pulls a
disheartened face.

‘A trick?’ I sit
up on the grass, reaching for Iain’s hand, grasping it tightly.
‘How could it be a trick?’

‘Well she
suddenly threw us all off, no problem at all, saying, “Mother’s
finished”. Then she vanished.’

‘Mother’s
finished
? Lamia’s dead, you mean?’

They all shake
their heads sadly.

‘We don’t think
so,’ Dave says. ‘We think she meant it as in finishing whatever it
was she set out to do.

‘I remembered
another gift that Zeus had granted Lamia, see,’ Jassy adds
ashamedly. ‘When she takes her eyes out? It’s the gift of
prophesy.’

‘So we figure
she more or less knew how things would eventually pan out, even if
the details were sketchy. The main thing is, they wanted to draw
you out; to see want you were capable of.’

‘With Iain being
so in love with you, he could see Panthia wasn’t the real deal.’
Jassy adds to Dave’s explanation. ‘They needed to see how much of a
threat you both were.’

‘Which wasn’t
much of a threat at all, seeing as we’re both here now,’ Iain says
with an incongruous grin.

‘But how? Why
is
Iain here?’

‘Ah, well, see,’
Jassy says unsurely, ‘we reckon Lamia took over Iain’s
body.’

Before I can say
that’s ridiculous, Dave jumps in.

‘See, one of the
girls here, Lizzy Harding, she vanished. After being here over
forty years.’

‘And she was
mixed race.’

‘And very
beautiful.’

‘And, in the
real world, almost sixty, no matter how well Lamia had managed to
hold everything together for so long.’

‘So she gets a
young, handsome boy as a new body.’

‘And,’ Jassy
says with a poor attempt at a smile, ‘wipes out a potential threat
at the same time.’

*

It was tempting
to start a new series of classes setting out everything we now knew
about Heartache High’s relationship with the real world.

But how would
everyone take being told that the people they loved were probably
being slowly devoured by succubae and incubi?

Only a carefully
chosen few were initiated into the new findings.

Even so, rumours
will always circulate.

‘Excuse me;
Stephanie?’

‘Yes?’

It was the girl
I’d seen wandering around outside the school’s porch when I’d first
studied the list of classes.

I hadn’t
realised then just how beautiful she was.

She had been in
a bewildered, miserable daze.

Now, when she
smiled, she looked as if she could be posing for a Vogue
cover.

How could a girl
like this have her heartbroken?

How could any
boy resist someone so impossibly gorgeous?

‘I’m Gillian,’
she says, offering me a perfectly formed hand. ‘I wondered if you
knew any way I could help my boyfriend – the boy I’d
wanted
to be my boyfriend – as I think he’s in trouble.’

‘Gillian,’ I say
firmly, resolutely determined to tell her the truth.

Then I relent,
saying instead, ‘Sure, let’s have a chat shall we?’

How can I tell
her the truth?

How can I tell
that no one
ever
leaves Heartache High?

*

Thing is, I’m
luckier than most students at Heartache High.

Because at least
I now have Iain here with me.

And sometimes,
you know, as we walk hand in hand across the lawns, or kiss beneath
the shade of the trees, I wonder if I could wish for anything
more.

Was that against
the rules of Heartache High?

That you should
find happiness here after all?

You know
what?

I don’t think
there
is
a rule against it.

End

Available soon!

Be
sure to read:

Heartache High: The Primer

Heartache High’s Primer for Students,

as
written by Stephanie Johnson,

Heartache High Permanent Student

Chapter
1

At some point in
their lives, most people enrol at Heartache High.

But anyone who
enrols can never leave.

Chapter
2

You know how it
is; you fall for a guy, you work out the wonderful times, the
amazing future you’re going to have together.

You know; nights
out at the movies. Or staying in, watching that sitcom you both
fall about laughing at. Weekends spent down the mall together, or
out with a group of friends who think, wow, are they the real item
or what?

Oh yeah, but you
forgot one thing, didn’t you?

You forgot to
check it out with this guy if all this was all right with
him.

The big flaw in
your plan, yeah?

Don’t worry;
we’ve all been there.

We all
understand.

Sure, we get it;
you just sort of haven’t got around to asking him yet.

But you’re
meaning to ask him, right?

Any time now, in
fact.

Or maybe you’ll
just drop him a few hints.

Hoping he’ll
pick them up.

Knowing he
won’t.

But then, why
should
you
be the one doing the running?

Why is it
you
that has to drop the hints?

That’s not how
it’s supposed to work, is it?

The
girl
asking the
boy
.

It’s gotta be
the
boy
asking the
girl
!

We can’t just go
turning that old tradition around now can we?

Ah, but there’s
the problem, see?

What’s a girl
got to do if a guy’s too shy to get around to asking?

Or worse, what’s
she gotta do if a guy’s way too
confident
?

That’s
far far worse, yeah?

Because, let’s
face it, he’s not
really
shy, is he?

Not when it
comes to other girls, anyway.

Thing is, you’re
not really getting the vibes that he’s in too much of a hurry to
ask you out, are you?

Fact is, he’s
not really even talking to you on the sort of level that might mean
he’ll even get around to it.

No, it’s more on
the level of, ‘Hey, you; you seen Jemma/Chrissie/Kassy
around?’

Thing is – we’re
sure you’ve noticed – is that when it comes to these other girls,
he doesn’t even seem to have to actually ask them anything,
right?

You can’t quite
work out how it works, but, hey, what do you know, it just seems to
happen between this guy and these other girls perfectly
naturally.

Ouch!

You just wish it
would work that way for you too, yeah?

Chapter
3

You’d be surprised just how many girls who enrol for
Heartache High actually enjoy being here.

They
don’t think they do, of course.

The
think they’d rather be anywhere else but here.

But
really, they’ll accept the agony just so they can enjoy those odd
flashes of joy when, their imaginations working overtime, they
dream of how it all might have been if only, if only…

They
enjoy feeling sorry for themselves sometimes, too.

So
you see, Heartache High is a very happy place, in its
way.

How
else do you explain all these people who leave each semester, only
to come back the next?

Excerpt End

If you enjoyed
reading this book, please remember to click that you liked it on
the Kindle Rating icon.

You may also
enjoy (or you may know someone else who might enjoy) these other
books by Jon Jacks.

The
Caught

The
Rules

Chapter One

The
Changes

Sleeping Ugly

The
Barking Detective Agency

The
Healing

The
Lost Fairy Tale

A
Horse for a Kingdom

Charity

The
Most Beautiful Things

The
Last Train

The
Dream Swallowers

Nyx;
Granddaughter of the Night

Jonah
and the Alligator

Glastonbury Sirens

Dr
Jekyll’s Maid

The
500-Year Circus

P

The
Endless Game

DoriaN
A

Wyrd
Girl

Coming
Soon

Heartache High: The Primer

Heartache High: The Wakening