Shortlist Saturdays: Teacher's Pet by Kim Cubitt

Four children had gone missing. It happened quickly. Sixteen days before the end of school. Summer break fast approaching. A lot of kids to disappear in such a short period of time. A small school. A tiny town. Everyone had noticed. Everyone was on edge.

The police had come to the school today, their visit arranged by the principal and the guidance department. Faculty had been questioned. Janitorial staff too. Parents had been called in. They were to be present while their children were questioned. It was supposed to feel safer for the kids this way. Familiar.

Four families were conspicuously absent. 

Andrea Bloom hadn’t arrived with the other parents. Everyone had been hoping it was because Tommy was sick. Not seeing his mother meant that something had happened to her favorite student.

The confirmation had come only hours ago. She’d been asked to compile Tommy’s info. Told there was no class today.

The Detectives saved her for last. It had given her time to put together what they’d requested. Her orders came directly from the School Board. Sit down. Discuss those four specific kids. Present police with her observations of each child. Pass along anything she’d noticed that was out of character for all of her students, no matter how small.

Detective Sarah Helms was young. She’d graduated from here herself, before going into law enforcement.

Frank Payne was older. His brown eyes were hollow. There was hurt there. He was relatively new to town and the gossip was, that he’d been a homicide cop in New York before moving here. Looking at him, it was clear he carried a lot of baggage.

She introduced herself. Terry Cutler. Handed over her ID so they could write down her driver’s license and insurance numbers.

They discussed how the entire class was suffering. How her year filling in here had started. She’d only signed on to cover a maternity leave. Her next placement had already been accepted. She was leaving in a few days when school ended and summer began. Another maternity leave to cover. It was several towns and one state over.

She’d passed them the files compiled for each of the four children. Fear had invaded the kids like a creeping cancer. None of them wanted to talk about what had triggered it.

The first child to go missing had been Rory. Quiet. Shy. Always a bright smile. She had been musically gifted. Her passion had been for the piano.

“Any signs of stress?” they’d asked.

Only that Rory had seemed tired. Not sleeping well. She'd even fallen asleep a couple of times in English over the last few days she’d attended school. She’d stopped playing the piano. Rory had told the other students about the sounds in her bedroom. Strange noises. They’d woken her. It had started three days before she went missing. The experience worsened each night. She had tried to describe it. Failed. The closest she’d come was a weird, skittering sound. Like nails running along the floor. Lots of nails. Whatever made the noises stayed just out of reach of her nightlight. She had no idea what it was. She’d guessed maybe a giant spider. That was what the kids repeated to each other.

After that, someone had started calling it ‘The Skitters.’

The Detectives had pulled out the file for Josh next. Following the timeline, they flipped through the documents. The same kind of questions followed.

Truth was, he had exhibited the same exhaustion. Tense. Easily startled his last days in her class. He’d stopped bringing his trading cards to school to play with his friends. Stopped talking about baseball.

Josh said The Skitters visited him too. He thought it was a giant centipede because of how it moved. Tiny, short bursts of sound and speed. The creature terrified him. He hadn’t been able to see it. It hid in the dark. 

His experiences had started three days prior to his disappearance. Three days after Rory had vanished. The kids started asking if three nights was a coincidence. Things went oddly quiet. Still. For three days.

It almost felt safe again.

Then, Tammy vanished. She’d loved horses and gymnastics. Her excitement over her new pony and her first competition had been silenced. Exhaustion clung to her. Unlike the others, she had seemed genuinely afraid to close her eyes. Every shadow that moved, every sound, made her jump. No one knew how long Tammy had been plagued by the Skitters. She’d refused to speak of it.

The rest of class had guessed, though. Three days. Once you heard The Skitters, you only had three days before you disappeared. Nights.

She told the Detectives everything she could remember. After the three kids had vanished, the remaining students were ill at ease.  Timid. Oversensitive to the slightest stimulus. Everyday occurrences had them spooked. Simple things, like a door closing down the hall, had them all jumping right out of their skins. The whispers about The Skitters had spread like wildfire.

Tommy had been the brave one. The hardest for her to talk about.

He hadn't lost who he was in the chaos. He was the same, incredibly sweet kid, with a wide, easy smile and a dimple that had played at the left corner of his mouth. Tommy had a way of lighting up a room whenever he entered. He was an amazing athlete, who loved singing and art. His favorite part of the day was sitting at his desk, reading a book. 

Tommy got teased for being the teacher’s pet. He was always bringing something to class to leave on her desk. An apple, sometimes a cookie, or wildflowers he'd picked on his way to school. He was the kind of kid that shared half his sandwich with his friend Robby at lunch because Robby’s dad was laid off from work and money was tight. He knew they couldn't afford much. That was Tommy. Always thinking of others. He asked after his missing classmates every day. There was something intrinsically good about him.

She’d told the Detectives about the rules. Apologized for forgetting to mention them at the beginning. They had started the first day Rory had been distracted in class. Passed in hushed whispers between students. Simple, finite, monster laws. Everywhere she’d taught, kids seemed to know the rules. Sleep with a light on. Keep your closet door closed. Do not look under the bed. Hide under the sheets. Hold your breath. Call for help. Never, ever, get out of bed alone.

They were too young to understand that whatever had happened to their classmates had nothing to do with a monster under the bed. No ghost in the walls. Not a boogeyman in the closet. She didn't have the heart to tell them that monsters were real. That their rules wouldn't save them. Kids had the strangest notions. They believed if they saw it, it became tangible. It could hurt you. If you knew what it was, you could find a way to fight it.

Innocence was so refreshing in such a jaded world.

The Detectives reached for the final file. Tommy’s documents. On top was his last school writing assignment. It trembled in her hands. The paper clung to her fingertips for a moment before she handed it over.

The Skitters had found Tommy too. He had written all about it. Reading his experiences had shaken her. It had shown up in his room. Arrived in the far corner, under his window. He’d startled awake. It hid in the darkest of shadows. Terrified, he ducked under his sheets, screaming for his mom. She’d burst into his room. He made her turn on all the lights. They found nothing. Tommy had slept in his mom's bed that night. He hadn’t been ashamed to admit it.

The next night, The Skitters ran around the perimeter of his bedroom, checking out every dark corner and crevice to best hide in. Tommy called for help and his mother had come running again. Still, nothing.

On the day he had turned in the writing assignment, he’d brought her an apple. Big, red and shiny. It had tasted fantastic, like sweet spring finally arriving. She’d eaten it as she graded all the papers. There was the smallest, translucent, round drop near his name on the bottom of the page, where the juice from the apple had dripped.

The last paragraph of his story had stuck with her. "I will not be afraid anymore. I am going to face The Skitters. I am going to beat it. I won’t let it hurt anyone else." He had never seen the A+ on the top of the page.

The cops flipped through the folder, finding a piece of art he had turned in that same day.

“I think you could keep this one, if you wanted to. There’s nothing that would be of any significance to our investigation.” Detective Payne offered it back to her. His voice was sympathetic. The picture was of her classroom. She sat at the front desk. Tommy had written ‘Thank you, Ms. Cutler’ in blue crayon block letters on the bottom of the page.

 The paper felt odd. Heavy. Tommy had given it to her on the same day he planned to confront The Skitters. Had he known he wouldn’t be able to thank her later? She barely managed to whisper her gratitude past the lump in her throat.

With the interview over, the officers thanked her and stood. She asked if they had any idea what had happened to the children. They shook their heads sadly.

No leads. Thankfully, also no bodies.

There was still a glimmer of hope. Everyone in this small town was holding onto it with a death grip. Praying. Wishing.

The blue and red strobe lights caught her attention. Colours coming from the quaint house across the street. The corner of Elm Road and Oak Place. Wild ivy choked the off-white picket fence. Her gaze turned to the bedroom at the far-left corner. The entire house was dark, except for the sallow glow from that lone room. She could see inside the widow. Tommy’s mom was there. Haunted in the pale light. Crying brokenly. Rocking as she hugged herself.

The Detectives had arrived.

She stared at the creeping dark around that one small, faint light. There were odd, almost indented circles on the fading paint, just beneath the windowsill. So small. No one had noticed them.

A smile twisted her lip. A slow baring of pointed teeth.

She had chosen each child carefully. Planned perfectly. Timid Rory had been her appetizer. Disbelieving Josh, her salad. Petrified Tammy had been her hearty main course.

But Tommy…he had tasted sooo delicious. She licked her lips, thinking about him. He’d been dessert. Strawberry rhubarb pie – bitter from fear and sweet with kindness. The perfect ending to her four-course meal. 

Tommy had tried to stand up to her. He hadn’t listened to the rules. She’d been a nameless predator for millennia. None had come close to catching or stopping her. To beat her, there had to be no fear. She was fear itself. They couldn’t face her and not be terrified. The rules had gotten Tommy killed. He’d been the first one to call her The Skitters. She liked it. Hopefully, the name caught on. 

She rubbed her tummy as it gurgled. She hadn’t eaten this well in twenty years. It had been a little town outside of New York. Detective Payne had been a rookie then. Thankfully, he hadn’t recognized her. Blending in was her specialty.

He was in the home across the street now, dealing with new ghosts.

She chittered her teeth. Opened the car door. Slipped inside. Fangs receded. She returned to her pretty, human self. Mask carefully in place. She addressed the GPS. Backed out of the driveway. Turned down Elm Road. The highway was close.

Hopefully, she’d find herself another teacher’s pet like Tommy in the next town.

Kim Cubitt was born in Sault St Marie, Ontario, but has spent most of her life living in New Dundee Ontario. She has a distinct love for all things macabre, monster, mystery, parnormal and especially, supernatural. Halloween is by far her favorite time of the year. She can normally be found with her dog on her lap, reading a good book or enjoying a spooky movie or tv show when she isn't writing all about all the voices making trouble in her head.