What Actually Happens After The School Bell – Part 1 of 2

Sophie Smith kept her hands neatly folded on top of one another above her desk and her eyes were glued to the teacher. Mrs Lane paced around the classroom reading from a history textbook, tapping on the desk of any student who was not listening. Sophie jumped in her seat with every new tap. She needed not only Mrs Lane, but all of her teachers to think that she was one of the best students in the class while she thought about her escape. To where? She wasn’t sure. But Sophie knew that school was no longer a place she could stay when she uncovered what actually happens after the school bell rings.

All the students at Greenvale School knew that Sophie Smith was Mrs Smith’s daughter, but that fact had never really bothered her as much as some students had supposed it might. Particularly those who thought that it might be a valuable use of their time to pick on her about having a teacher for a mother. For most of her time at school, Sophie actually considered the situation to be rather positive. If she forgot her lunch, for example, she could just ask her mum for some money for the canteen. Her mum never missed a school performance and homework was always made that little bit easier when it was explained to her by her mother using her special ‘teacher voice’. The main drawback, however, was that, due to the amount of marking her mother had to do and the many meetings she had to attend, Sophie had to stay back after school long after the rest of the students had left. For the first three years, this didn’t bother Sophie too much as it was a bit of a novelty getting to play on the play equipment and explore the school with no one around. Last week, however, Sophie made the terrible mistake of opening the door to the staffroom during the weekly Greenvale School Teachers’ Meeting. A mistake she would come to regret for the rest of her life.

It happened on a Tuesday afternoon at 3:34pm. Sophie remembered the time because, somehow, the digital watch her grandmother had given her for her birthday had moved forward by one hour, giving Sophie the impression it was 4:34pm. Although this is not late by some teachers’ standards, it was far later than Sophie had ever stayed back at school before. There was one rule that Sophie had to follow while waiting for ‘Mrs Smith’ to finish her school day and that was to keep herself occupied. Only in the rare event of an emergency was Sophie allowed to disrupt her mother. On this occasion, Sophie had simply miscalculated the time and was looking for her mother when she opened the staffroom door to see if anyone knew where she might be. As she opened the door, she gasped in horror at what she saw.

Monsters. There were monsters everywhere.