Chapter 34: Logic and Shit

"Just open your mouth."

Miss Rolt dangled the buccal swab between her fingers, tapping the plastic device twice with her red nail before pressing down with a full fingertip.

"Skin and bone, this one. Mr. Thwaite, you need to feed the boy and test him later!"

"Please proceed." The principal attempted a sip from the tea cup again and succeeded, barely.

"Are you eating?" She searched Milo’s face. "You’re not eating."

I’ve been on a vomiting streak, miss.

Her green eyes softened while she waited for an answer, and he found himself remembering Aldous’s offer to bake for him. Calling the man a fraud had been easier before his wife started worrying about Milo’s meals.

Either way, there were still sick students, and he could do something about them.

"When Aldie’s back, he’ll wish to hear the story from you himself, start to finish. I don’t want to pump you for information, as you should delight in a charred-crust ribeye first."

"I can see you’re an avid fan of meat and cake, Miss Rolt," the principal said, gaze on the painted meadow.

"But fear not, love. You weren’t the entity Mr. Thwaite over there was worried sick about."

"I followed procedure."

"Aldie’s been gone for hours. He’ll be checking the farm tracks for anyone hurt. He makes a parade of the walk home, too." The dial on the device glowed yellow. "Your bruising needs to be taken care of. He’ll take it hard, hearing what went on in here while he was away. The man worries like a mother cat." She smiled at him over the swab. "Open your mouth, love."

But if Milo understood things right, the school had been split into the asymptomatic and those showing signs of the Plague.

Since there were few isolation rooms and the Plague had had plenty of time to spread, the students were kept in one open area. Especially with everyone believing the Plague went away once the Host was Turned.

Therefore, a negative test would put him with everybody else, on the wrong side of a locked door.

"I eat, just so you know."

"Too little."

Starting in the sick yard would let him see whether his orders did anything.

After a miracle occurred, which everyone would take for the Host’s retreat, the groups would merge and he would be back among the rest of the students.

Milo opened his mouth. The swab was a finger’s width from his tongue when he coughed.

"S-Sorry..." He wiped his lips with a sleeve. "It’s..." He coughed again.

Behind the desk, Mr. Thwaite’s eyes widened. His tea cup stopped rising.

The swab came closer, so Milo gave another cough. And another. And one more, just in case.

"Oh, love..." Miss Rolt lowered her hand. "Not good."

"The sick yard," the principal declared. "And that stays here."

Milo followed his gaze to the Iron Turnhook and kept it upright as Miss Rolt reached for the pole.

"I took it for self-defense."

"Of course, love. But you can’t bring it in among the others."

Hunched over the flail beneath his sweater, he released his grip from the hook.

Miss Rolt carried it to the corner behind her paper bags. As she rotated it to fit against the wall, he tried to see into the join beneath the hook.

From here, he couldn’t tell whether the dark line was dirt.

"Will I get it back?"

"It’s academy property," Mr. Thwaite said.

"For now, let’s get you cleaned up."

Miss Rolt fetched a damp cloth and superficially wiped his face and hands.

The door closed behind him a few minutes later. Cold air entered his nose, and he had picked up seventy or so staring eyes in the school’s backyard.

One ladle did the rounds of the whole crowd, returning to a single water barrel by the wall after every sip.

"This place can’t be hygienic..." he muttered.

The stares stayed on him.

"Ugh." He raised his voice. "I was haunted. I’m not haunting."

At that, conversations resumed, with a few faces still turned his way.

"Milo! My man!" Ollie called, jogging over, dipping into a cough along the way. "Where have you been? People were starting to pray to you. Every time I asked, someone had a new story."

"So it goes deeper than the gifts..."

"The gifts are the prayers, bro. Come sit with me while they get used to looking at you."

The boy led Milo to a bench, its paint flaking off in curls, and went on talking before either of them sat.

"Look at them now. Loud, right? That’s relief. You were a ghost at the door; now you’re sitting here with me. Imagine what’s going on inside their heads."

"Can’t imagine." Milo scanned the students split into loose groups, all their mouths moving, glances flicking his way.

He’d play the doctor after a bit of a breather. A miracle commencing the second he walked in was too suspicious, however ridiculous it was to pin it on him.

"I never bought it, for the record. Day two I start coughing, and I think: okay, the ghost hates five people. Why spend Plague on me?"

Milo raised an eyebrow.

"Wait, they thought I caused the Plague outbreak?"

"Think about what they had. Milo goes missing, the whole bullying quartet goes missing, and everyone starts coughing. One story for all three questions. Who turns down a deal like that?" Ollie leaned back. "They treated you like shit, so they figured you’d shit on them back. Like, shit badly."

"Shit badly?"

"Terribly! We’re talking Magnitude X shit, bro, and somehow an apple fetish got mixed in. No idea where that came from, but apparently the ghost accepted an apple."

"So who’s the ghost supposed to be now?"

"Nobody. Every first witness I tracked down heard it from someone else. If you’re calling it revenge, though, explain why you’d go after the guy who sits with you." Ollie picked at the loose paint beside his knee. "You wouldn’t do me like that." He shrugged. "It’s... logic. And shit."

"Logic and shit." Milo licked his dry lips. "Yeah. Good way to put it."

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