My Soul to Take

~~Demon In My View~~

~*~Prologue~*~

There was a time in my life when I thought I was normal. Admittedly, that was a long time ago but I do remember. It's an elusive memory, tattered around the edges and sepia toned like an old photograph, stored haphazardly in my mind somewhere.

My last vestiges of normalcy vanished when I was five. My twin brother Luke and I had just been enrolled in pre-school, and the pretty young teacher had deposited us into the play area with the other children. That's when I asked her about the dark shadow, translucent and smoky, that framed her whole body. I didn't understand her confusion; wasn't she aware of it? I remember glancing at Luke, hoping he'd back me up, but he was just as clueless.

That night, the pretty young teacher was murdered, strangled beside her car outside the supermarket.

No one connected me to her premature death. Especially not me. At five, I didn't, couldn't, comprehend what death actually was. To me, it was just like she'd gone on an extended vacation to someplace wonderful and magical.

After that, I started seeing the shadows with a regularity that began to seem disturbing. The second one occurred just a few months after the teacher's death. My mom was walking me and Luke down the sidewalk downtown, holding tightly to our hands lest we wander off, when I saw a man stumbling towards us. He was wreathed in a grayish shadow that didn't obscure his features in the least. I saw that his eyes were a hazel blue and slightly glassy, his nose was hooked and his lips were flat, compressed against his teeth in agitation. My hand rose unconsciously in a wave, but my mother jerked me out of his way, muttering something about disgusting druggies. He met my eyes for the briefest of moments before stumbling away, out into the street, directly into the path of a minivan.

I screamed. And screamed some more, watching the man's body as the grill of the van impacted him, sending him up to the windshield where a spiderweb crack appeared in the glass. He landed brokenly on the ground, unmoving. Completely motionless as I continued to scream.

I think that's when I began to crack, my mind slowly fragmenting. That was also the day I damaged my vocal chords so severely, I'd never manage a falsetto again.

Every time I saw the shadows after that incident, I tried to warn people, but my warnings went unheeded. I wasn't sure if they would've helped anyway. As I slowly deteriorated in my own mind, helplessness over my inability to prevent these things causing me to retreat within myself, I still gained some knowledge. Like the darker the shadow, the more brutal their death would be. I saw a lot of the dark shadows, and each one added to my increasing insanity.

I was institutionalized for the first time when I was twelve. At first, I attempted to tell the psychiatrist I was assigned to the truth, until I realized it was futile. He thought I was crazy; I sure sounded nuts. He quickly diagnosed me with schizophrenia and prescribed me some antipsychotic pills. Soon after that I was released back into the world.

Those first few years afterward were pure bliss. There were no more shadows and I met my first real, honest-to-God friend. Ryan came to mean the world to me, especially because Luke and I had drifted apart. My twin couldn't understand me, though he honestly tried for a while. We became strangers living in the same house, and that was when Ryan appeared in my life. I think I came to rely on him, on the feelings he evoked within me. For a short time, I could pretend I was a normal teenager, with no crazy past shadowing me.

Then came the day, when I was fifteen, Ryan showed up at school bathed in a muted gray shadow. I flipped, there's no other way to explain it. I would call it a case of temporary insanity if I wasn't already bat shit. I later learned the damage done to the classroom I was in during my freak out consisted of broken windows, overturned desks and chairs, and papers and other miscellaneous items scattered all around the room like a tornado had ripped through.

Ryan died that weekend, drowned while camping. He got caught in a hidden current and because he wasn't a strong swimmer to begin with, he was swept under. I didn't even get to attend his funeral because I was institutionalized for the second time, whereupon I got to add mood equalizers to my growing cocktail of drugs.

When I was released that time, Mom had grown tired of my craziness and Luke's constant expulsions from school for fights, and sent us both to a boarding school in the Rockies. I think it was as far away as she could manage without actually sending us out of the country. She needed distance from us and we obliged as gladly as we could muster.

Now I'm eighteen, a senior, and I'm no less crazy than I always had been. Maybe a little less high-strung because it'd been so long since I'd seen a shadow. Up here in the Rockies, secluded from the rest of the world, Death didn't have many reasons to visit.

Although all this silence and stillness just gives me too many opportunities to get lost inside my own head. I frequently found myself contemplating my own name. Layla. I'd looked up its meaning before and one of them is simply dark. Layla means dark. Now, there are many interpretations of that single word, but for me it can only mean the shadows.

I can't help but fear my own name was a premonition of doom, set upon me at birth.

If you're still with me so far, I commend you for your saint-like patience. Read on. What follows is the culmination of my degradation into full-fledged insanity. Or, hell, maybe it's actually my salvation.

~*~Chapter One~*~

It was snowing again. Of course, because the universe couldn't be kind enough to gift the students at the Cornick Academy with a balmy 35 degrees Farenheit without snow.

Layla Chadwick sat in the window seat in her dorm room, knees drawn up to her chest, gazing out at all the phosphorescent brilliance laid out before her. Today marked the first day of her senior year and she had nothing to show for the summer she'd spent back home in Florida. No tan because she boycotted the beach, no hilarious stories of catching up with old friends because she had none, old or otherwise. Even her eighteenth birthday had been uneventful, just another day on the calendar.

No, her summer had been spent sequestered away in her bedroom, alleviating the constant loneliness by listening to intense, hardcore rap. It was easier that way. Alone, she didn't encounter any of the shadows that had plagued her since she was five. She didn't have to be the freaking harbinger of death for some poor person who envisioned a bright, endless future for themselves.

It was almost a relief when Layla and Luke had to catch a plane back to Colorado for school. In the Rockies, the tight restriction around her chest eased a bit, allowing her to breathe a little. Whether it was the freezing air that burned her nose and crystallized her lungs in frost, or the fact that she was surrounded by a small amount of healthy teens that were in no danger of dropping dead, all that mattered was that since she was fifteen, she hadn't seen one single shadow. Not since Ryan.

Pushing down the grief that attempted to choke her at just thinking his name, Layla stood and gazed speculatively at her reflection in the full length mirror bracketed to her door. She saw a diminutive girl staring emotionlessly back, long, raven black hair cascading in shiny waves to her waist, smooth, alabaster skin with a faint tracery of blue veins visible just beneath the surface. Her face was flawless, no blemishes to speak of, high cheekbones, a small, straight nose and sensually plump lips a natural reddish-pink. Then there were her eyes. They were so dark as to appear black at just a short distance, but upon closer inspection they were a deep grape purple, kind of like orbs of Welch's grape juice.

Layla was glad no one was willing to room with her because she would have received a reputation as a conceited bitch along with being a freak. She had a habit of looking at her reflection more than the average person but not because of some latent narcissistic trait. She couldn't understand why God would gift her with such an alluring, ethereal beauty, but then curse her with something that guaranteed to keep people at arm's length. They could sense the wrongness in her and steered clear. Thus, she spent considerable amounts of time scrutinizing her reflection, trying to find in her image the imperfection that turned her peers off. Surely they couldn't know what exactly she was able to do.

Sighing, she turned away from the mirror in disgust and hurriedly threw on some clothes. All the other girls in the senior dormitory were already at breakfast by the time she went downstairs to the common area. It wasn't like she'd expected any of them to wait for her; in all the time she'd been there she hadn't put forth any effort to establish friendships and neither had anyone else. Solitude was best for Layla. Friends were overrated.

Shoving out the door, a frigid blast of air momentarily stole her breath, bringing forth involuntary tears. Forging ahead, she hugged her arms around herself, burrowing deeper into her hoodie. It was a short walk from the dorm to the school but she cursed herself for leaving behind her big, warm winter coat. It had seemed rather pointless to wear it when she'd be taking it off the moment she entered the hot sanctuary of the school. She was suffering for that mistake now.

Luke was waiting for her up ahead, right outside the double doors of the cafeteria. He was dressed similarly to her, in jeans and a hoodie, but unlike her he seemed impervious to the cold. His blond hair, which was perpetually tousled, flopped forward onto his forehead, green eyes bright as emeralds in all this brightness.

They couldn't be more different, especially in appearance. Layla had damaged her body with only one tattoo on her back while Luke used his body as a pincushion. There was a diamond stud in his left ear, his right eyebrow was pierced, tongue, both nipples. Those were just the ones she knew about. Then there was their personalities, which could only be described as night and day. When she'd had Ryan, Layla came to the realization she was pretty effervescent, able to laugh and joke with abandon. She just needed someone to open up to. Luke, however, was an angry teen boy without the angst. He was apathetic on the outside, with barely suppressed fury inside.

"Hi, Luke," she murmured.

He nodded in greeting.

After a moment's hesitation in which they stood in awkward silence, they both reached for the door handle in perfect synchronization. That twin connection that never really had a chance to flourish. Luke held the door open silently, allowing her to enter first, where they then went their separate ways.

It never failed. For the past few years, starting on day one at this school, Luke always waited for Layla outside those same doors, then they'd walk in together and sit on opposite sides of the cafeteria. They never interacted at all, in school or out. In their whole lives, Layla could count the number of conversations she'd had with her twin on both hands, and that was being generous.

Keeping her head down because she didn't want to chance encountering the shadows, Layla released a sigh and found her usual seat. This year was already shaping up to be more of the same old routine.

~*~*~

It was fucking snowing again. Perfect.

Huddling down in his coat, peeking over the collar at his brother, Shane Chambers tried to ignore the cold seeping into the marrow of his bones. He resented the hell out of leaving the sunny California beaches behind. For the last couple of months, it had been a 24/7 party, playing beach volleyball, surfing and getting down and dirty with the beach bunnies. He'd gotten sand in every inconceivable place but it'd been worth it. Then there'd been his eighteenth birthday, which he'd celebrated first with his brother at midnight with a shot of whiskey, then that night with a bonfire on their private stretch of beach. It had been perfect.

Now this.

"I swear," he muttered through chattering teeth, "if Dad didn't monitor our bank account so closely, I would have splurged for a Caribbean cruise. Then I'd settle on some island, change my name to Rio and live off mangos. I'd never set foot on this godforsaken mountain again."

"Who's the gay one here?" Evan laughed, his breath puffing out in white, ectoplasmic clouds that dissipated with the next chilly gust of wind. "You're turning into a drama queen."

"Bro, if that were the case, I'd be complaining about the snot that has frozen itself to my upper lip and lamenting that this big ass coat does nothing for my figure." Shane grinned at him over his raised collar. "That's your department."

"And when have I ever stressed about my figure?" Evan asked with an eye roll. "Oh, that's right. Never."

Smirking, he slung an arm around Evan, holding him close as they headed for breakfast. The disparity of their height was comical to everyone. Even though Evan was older by thirteen months, two weeks and six days, Shane stood a whole foot taller than him. Evan was small and wiry, Shane was big, as in tall, and leanly muscled. Evan had inherited their mother's fine bone structure, her auburn hair and electric blue eyes. Shane, on the other hand, was the spitting image of their father. Chocolate brown hair with eyes to match, his features sharp.

As they were nearing the door to the cafeteria, Shane asked his brother, "Hey, how did things go with Christopher this summer?"

Evan shrugged, and to Shane the motion appeared evasive. "Okay, I guess," he said.

"Come on," Shane prodded. "You spent practically the whole summer with him. How'd it go?"

Evan shrugged again, noncommittally.

His hands raised in surrender. "Okay, fine. I get it. You don't want to talk about it."

"Look, Shane, it's nothing. Seriously. Chris wanted something I couldn't give him. End of story. We're friends and nothing more."

Their conversation was cut short as they finally entered the loud, boisterous crowd of the cafeteria. Evan wasn't out at school, and that was mostly for his own protection. Shane knew he had remarkable self-defense skills but there was only so much he'd be able to do to defend himself against the homophobic assholes here twice his size. Shane wished people could live by the "Diversity Breeds Knowledge" motto but they clung to the "Bigotry Maintains Ignorance" one. No matter what century they were in, there were always going to be people who feared what they didn't understand, hated anything different from them.

It was a sad reality but a true one unfortunately.

"I gotta talk to the drama department," Evan said, unwinding the scarf from his neck. "I'm supposed to build a set for their opening production and I'm still not sure what the hell the play is supposed to be about. Catch you in first period."

"Give those thespians hell, bro."

"Not if you give 'em hell first." With a wink, Evan was off, soon talking animatedly with a few guys from the drama department.

Chuckling to himself, Shane shrugged out of his coat and after purchasing a cinnamon roll for his insatiable sweet tooth, took his regular seat with the jocks. The guys were all boasting about their summers abroad. Mason went skiing in Switzerland, Johnny went snorkeling in Australia, Frankie joined his brother, the famous photographer, in Africa. It was a friendly game of one upmanship, arguing about who had the best vacation. Shane listened halfheartedly while finishing off his cinnamon roll.

Chloe came up, dressed to impress as always, leading two guys he didn't recognize. "Hi, Shane," she purred, leaning forward and pressing her shiny lips to his cheek, arms around his neck.

"What's up, Chlo? Who's the newbies?"

"Oh!" She stood up straight and he unobtrusively wiped the lip gloss smudge from his face as her attention was diverted. "This is Damon Leviathan and Christian Savior. They're friends from New York."

Damon, his pitch black hair long enough in the front to veil his fathomless midnight eyes, smirked. "Yeah, Christian's dad is a televangelist who exploits people's faith for money."

Blond hair short and blue eyes calm, Christian smiled tightly. "And Damon's father is a satanic cult leader. Whatever you do, do not drink the Kool-Aid."

Okaaaay, so not friends after all. Maybe frenemies?

"And this," Chloe continued with the introductions, "is Shane Chambers, the captain of our esteemed varsity basketball team. He's going to lead us to another championship this year."

"I'm going to try," Shane corrected modestly. "It was nice to meet you guys."

"The pleasure's all yours, I'm sure," Damon said with another smirk. It wasn't clear whether he was joking or not, but Christian was frowning in disapproval at him, which Damon didn't notice or was more likely ignoring.

Shane was glad when Chloe led Damon to the buffet of breakfast foods, leaving Christian behind. It was disconcerting the way Damon stared at him, like he was looking right through him while simultaneously finding every bad deed Shane had committed and laying them bare for all to see. Even more disturbing, that smirk he kept flashing seemed to say he knew something others didn't. On anyone else it would be vaguely annoying, but on Damon.... It had a malicious undertone.

Shaking his head at his ridiculous thoughts, he turned his head to check on Evan, but instead his gaze landed on Layla Chadwick. She was sitting two tables down, her back to him, head bowed as she focused intently on some sketch. She'd attended this school for as long as he had but in all that time he never saw her socializing with anyone, except maybe her brother on rare occasions. Her solitude gave credence to all the rumors circulating about her but he still didn't believe any of them, even though most rumors were based on some small shred of truth that were later blown out of proportion.

She was undoubtedly strange but there was also something oddly captivating about her. She had an understated beauty, gorgeous without flaunting it, unlike girls like Chloe. And when she smiled, which he'd only seen once or twice, man, it knocked him on his ass.

Why he was fanning the flames of his attraction for her, he didn't know. It would be so much easier if he could just ignore it because there was no way, if she ever came out of her shell, she'd ever go for a guy like him. He wasn't one of the people who ridiculed her but his friends did and he'd never done anything to prevent it. To her, he was probably a stereotypical jock who bullied others to deal with his own insecurities.

Shaking his head again, he began shredding his napkin in frustration just as Chloe and Damon returned. Damon slapped Christian hard on the back as he sat down, making the other guy wince and grimace. Yeah, those two definitely weren't friends.

"So, tell me about the school," Damon said conversationally, spearing a piece of cantaloupe with his fork. "Which teachers are the strictest, who gives the hardest assignments, which geek do I pawn those assignments on and who should I avoid like the plague?"

Chloe nibbled daintily at her blueberry muffin. "Well, Mr. Kline and Mrs. Harper are by far the strictest. You can't get away with anything in their classes. Mr. Lemmons always gives out the toughest assignments but you can get Max Elliott to do them for you. He's a pervert, though. Every times he looks at me it's like he's undressing me with his eyes. Those lascivious looks are disgusting."

Shane scoffed. "Oh, come on, Chlo. Lascivious? I doubt Max even knows the meaning of the word."

"It's true," she insisted, indignant. "Every time I talk to him, he watches my lips and his eyes glaze. I don't want to know his lustful thoughts."