The Students of Sarila by Elsie Janda (the beginning after the end novel read .txt) 📕

He really was a mysterious man. He came into the little diner every day for breakfast, and always did the same exact things. But I must say, he seems to be extremely kind. I don’t know his name, but he knows mine. Don’t worry – he’s not creepy. I wear a name tag while I work.
The man frightened me when I first started working here. I thought he smiled way too much to be normal. Now, I've just accepted him as a nice, mysterious person who enjoys a good cup of coffee.
“Sir, your breakfast is ready.” I said, setting the plate down next to his laptop. I noticed his coffee, which he had received at least ten minutes ago, had been left untouched. “Sir…” I reached out to touch his shoulder. When my fingers were less than an inch away from his leather jacket, I felt something like being electrocuted and saw a flash of baby blue.
The man looked up at me, and then down at his food. “Oh, thank you. Say, it smells delightful in here!”
I inhaled deeply through my nose. It smelled like seawater. “Yeah, it does.” I replied, and I sounded almost like I was in some sort of trance.
“Tina!” The call from the kitchen snapped me out of that.
I hurried back to the kitchen, where I picked up a plate of food. I delivered the food to its rightful place – a table with a boy that looked to be about my age.
“Thanks.” He said as I set the food down.
“Can I get you anything else?” I asked.
“No, I’m good.” He told me, attacking his scrambled eggs.
Then I remembered to tell him my shift is almost over and someone will be taking my place. “Um…” I started, reaching out to touch his shoulder.
Then it happened again. The zap. The flash of blue light. Only this time, a dark blue was mixed with the lighter shade.
The boy looked up at me. “Did you just…” He began.
“Uh, I’ve got to go.” I interrupted, which was probably rude, but I needed to get out of there ASAP. I ran from the diner.
I didn’t stop until I reached the bakery. It was only open three days a week, but I had a key that opened the front door. I unlocked the door and walked inside, finding the owner in the back room. “Hi, Sally.”
“Is something wrong, Tina?” That’s Sally for you. Always reading my facial expressions and detected my emotions, which at the moment were creeped out.
I didn’t lie or keep anything from my dear friend. “Well…” I began to explain everything, starting with the odd man, and ending with the boy. When I finished, Sally had a dazed, almost scared look on her face. “It’s begun.” She whispered.
“What?” I asked, slightly (and by slightly, I mean extremely) confused.
Sally shook her head. “Nothing. Let me braid your hair. It always looks so nice braided, dear.”
I sat down in front of her and she began to braid my long black hair. The room was completely silent until Sally said, “Tina, you know that man you were telling me about? The one in the leather jacket?”
“Yeah.” I replied.
“If you see any sort of flame in the bakery, run back to the diner and bring him back here. Okay?” She instructed me.
I got really scared. “Sally, what’s going on?”
“Just trust me. The man will explain everything. And remember – I love you, Tina.” Sally pulled me into a hug. And that’s when I saw the flame.

I ran from the backroom and climbed out the window, barely hearing Sally say, “Ignatio! It’s been nearly forever, darling!”
When my feet hit the ground, the rest of the building was being consumed by fire. I ran back to the diner and found the man. “Sir, I think my friend Sally might be in trouble. Her bakery… just caught on fire! And she told me to come get you. Please, help me!” I pleaded, holding back tears. What if Sally got hurt?
He jumped from his chair and looked me in the eye. “Don’t worry – I promise you and your friend will be safe. Come with me.”
Suddenly, it happened again. The feeling like being electrocuted, along with the flash of blue light. The man and I turned around to find the boy, the one that I had last served at the diner. “Is something wrong?” He asked us.
The man looked at me, and then at the boy. “Yeah. In fact, you should probably join us. If you enjoy living, that is.”
The boy’s eyes widened. I expected the man to say, “Just kidding,” but he never did. We ran and ran until we reached a small black car. “Get in.” The man instructed us.
Under normal circumstances, I would never get into a stranger’s car. But these circumstances were anything but normal. In fact, I’m kinda scared that this is life-or-death for Sally. I was mortified when the man began to drive us away from the bakery, rather than towards it as I had expected. “Aren’t we going to help Sally?” I asked, very frightened.
“Getting you two as far away from the bakery as possible is helping Sally.” The man told me.
“How so?” I questioned.
“Just trust me. I’ll explain everything when we stop driving for the night.” The man answered. “By the way, I’m Alexander.”
“Tina.” I said, mostly for the boy’s sake. Alexander already knows my name.
“I’m Peter.” The boy said quietly. “Can someone please explain what’s going on?”
I began to tell Peter and Alexander everything that had happened that day. I finished by saying, “Sally called him Ignatio.”
“I’m… really sorry. I’m sure your friend will be fine. Don’t worry.” Peter was trying his best to comfort me, but it didn’t really work.
“Oh, I know Sally will be fine.” Alexander assured me.
“I didn’t even know that you knew Sally.” I said.
“Sally and I have known each other since we were very, very young. We both grew up in Mackinac City.” Alexander informed me. Like I would ever need to know where he grew up.
“She never mentioned you.”
“I’m sure she didn’t.”
We were all silent for quite a while. I was busy staring out the window, admiring the beautiful sunset. It wasn’t often that you saw something so picturesque. Eventually, Peter interrupted my train of thought by asking impatiently, “Where are we even going?”
“I need to find a place for us to spend the night. I don’t suppose the two of you would appreciate sleeping in the backseat of my car.” Alexander told us.
“And after that?” Peter pushed on.
Alexander didn’t respond for a while. “I don’t quite know.” He finally said. “But we’ll find out by tomorrow afternoon, probably.”
That’s what made me break. “What do you mean, probably? Sally could be hurt! She could’ve burned to death! What if she’s dead? And what did you do to help her? Drive away! Leaving her there in a burning building!” I screamed.
“Tina, just calm down. It’s okay.” Peter put a hand on my shoulder.
“How do you know? Sally is the only person in the world who has ever cared about me! I need her.” I snapped.
Alexander pulled over to the side of the road. I saw a hotel down the street a bit. “Tina, maybe you should walk over to the hotel. Let yourself think a bit and cool down.” He suggested.
I gave them both angry looks before getting out of the car and beginning my stroll to the hotel.

For the duration of my walk, I only thought about what I had said to Peter. “Sally is the only person in the world who has ever cared about me!” I had said. The more I thought about it, the more I realized it was true. Suddenly, all the memories I had flooded my mind.

When I was an infant, my parents dumped on the doorstep of an all-girls orphanage. I was raised there until I was eight. I had never been accepted at the orphanage, so being adopted was really cool at first. But it turned out I was only supposed to clean the house and care for a newborn baby. Any mistake gave me a night spent in the tool shed out back. I spent a lot of time in that tool shed.
No matter what I tried to do, it was never good enough. I didn’t completely dust a tiny glass figure. The baby’s bottle had a smudge. Small, silly things like that. After years of the torture, I was put in a boarding school when I was 13.
School was almost as bad as the orphanage or living with my guardians. The professors were cruel and strict. The other students were no better. They were constantly rude to me. The weirdo. The orphan. Angry at the world, I wanted to stop living. I hated everyone and everything. That is, until Sally came along.
I still don’t know how or why, but Sally became my legal guardian. I came to live with her in the apartment above the bakery. She began to home school me when we weren’t running the bakery together. This summer, I got a job at the diner to save up for college. I wanted to take art classes.
My life finally started to go as I always dreamed it would. I started to learn what love is like. And I’m not going to let that Ignatio take this away from me.

The hotel turned out to be really nice. We got two rooms; one for me and one for the guys. Alexander let Peter and I order pizza while he ate salad (gosh, old people and their health foods!). The two of us were sitting in my room eating pizza and trying to be friends. After all, we were going on a potentially dangerous trip to who knows where.
I was in the middle of telling him about the time I dropped Sally’s favorite pair of earrings in a bowl