The First Day of School is a scary story about a student who moves to a new town and starts attending a new school, but has trouble finding the right classroom.
First Day of School
The first day of school is always nerve-wracking for any student. My first day at a new school was an absolute nightmare.
I was 14 years old and my family had just moved to a new town. moved home. My Dad had been offered a job with better pay and a mere week later, we had sold our house and rented an apartment in the town we moved to. It was during the summer we moved, so it was simple starting at my new school.
On the first day, I walked alone to the school. I was nervous about having to make new friends. When I arrived, I picked up a timetable and saw that my first class was Mathematics. It was in Room 104.
I began walking down the hallways, searching for the room, but the school was like a maze. Eventually, the bell rang and the students made their way to their classrooms. In less than a minute, the corridors were deserted.
I stopped in front of a pair of old looking wooden double doors. I pushed and with a scraping sound of metal on wood, they opened. I found mysef in a corridor that was old and dusty. The lockers were all hanging open and the stench of mold and damp hung in the air. I was about to turn around and go back the way I came, when I noticed the numbers on the classroom doors. “100… 101… 102…”.
I began walking down the hallway, but when I peered through the windows of each classroom, they were empty. Then, I came to room 104. I peeked through the window. All of the students were sitting at their desks, the teacher was standing at the blackboard and class was in session. I quietly opened the door and went inside.
None of the other students paid any attention to me. I started to apologize awkwardly for being late, but the teacher just turned her back on me and began writing on the board. Turning red from embarrassment, I hurriedly found a free seat at the front of the classroom and sat down.
The teacher had already written her name in chalk on the blackboard. It was Mrs. Taylor.
I was nervous and self-conscious, so I didn’t want to draw attention to myself. Throughout the class, I just kept my head down and concentrated on solving the maths problems.
Eventually, after what seemed like hours, the bell rang and the class ended. The other students scrambled out of their desks and ran out the door. I looked at my watch and was shocked to see that it was already 3 PM. The school day was over and I had only attended one class.
I walked down the corridors, trying to find the exit. All of a sudden, I heard someone calling my name and looked around. There was a teacher making his way towards me and he had a frown on his face.
“You! Yes, you! You’ve the new boy, aren’t you?” he said.
“Uh… Yes,” I replied.
“Where have you been?” he demanded. “I’ve been searching for you all day! Why didn’t you go to your classes?”
“But I was in class,” I protested.
“Which class?” he demanded.
“Mrs. Taylor’s class,” I replied. “Room 104”.
The teacher’s eyes grew wide and he flew into a rage.
“I suppose you think you’re pretty funny, don’t you?” he shouted. “Well, you’re not. It’s no laughing matter. Now get out of my sight!”
I was very confused and, on the long walk home, I kept wondering what I had said that got him so upset. As soon as I reached my house, I turned on my laptop and went online. I started searching for the name of the school and the teacher, Mrs. Taylor.
What I found scared me to my very soul.
There were old news articles about a terrible massacre that happened in the school 10 years before.
One morning, bright and early, a crazed gunman had simply walked into the school and started shooting. He stood at the doorway of a classroom and shot the teacher. Then he picked off the students one by one until every single person in the class was lying dead in a pool of blood.
There were pictures of the classroom where the murders happened. I recognized it immediately. It was room 104.
There were also photos of the victims. I recognized them too. Trembling with fear, I gazed at the smiling faces of Mrs. Taylor and all of the students I had been in class with.
I felt sick to my stomach. My hands were shaking and a chill ran through me. I spent all night trying to convince myself that it wasn’t true.
The next morning, I was too terrified to go back to school. I broke down and told my parents what had happened. At first, they thought it was just nerves, but eventually, after I had refused to go to school for a whole week, they gave in and enrolled me in a different school.
I managed to get on with my life and tried my best to forget all about the incident. I almost succeeded…
This morning, I received a letter in the mail. There was no stamp on the envelope and no return address. It had been hand-delivered.
When I opened it and read the printed card inside, my hands started shaking again.
It was an invitation to a class reunion…
…and it was signed “from Mrs. Taylor”.
