Everyone chattered as they filed into class four, and took their places. Laura was telling Anita that she hadn’t got to sleep until ten o’clock last night, and Anita replied that she had stayed up until eleven! Maura said she hadn’t gotten any sleep at all, and Sadie listened with a smile on her face. Ondine seemed not to notice, she was engrossed in her book.
The yellow paint on the exterior was fading, and though you couldn’t really put your finger on it, there was definitely something odd about the office block. Fenella had always thought so. Strange things would happen, staplers went missing, staff left and never came back, indoor plants died for no reason. Something was definitely causing these bizarre occurences, but Fenella hoped that if she ignored it, it would go away.
That morning she couldn’t find her scissors.
“It’s probably nothing,” she said to herself.
She looked for them everywhere, but they really weren’t there. She stood up and looked around the room. Maybe someone had borrowed them, or there might be some other scissors she could use.
A big hole in the carpet opened up, and swallowed Louise from accounting.
“That’s weird,” said Fenella. It was getting more and more difficult to ignore the fact that something strange was going on.
Niamh couldn’t believe her eyes. She was horrified.
“Louise!” she screamed, and ran around the desks to pat the carpet with her fingers. There was not a hole for Louise to have fallen through. She knelt down and pressed her ear against the floor, listening for Louise.
“Quadratic equations,” announced Ms Garlic. “Page one hundred and seventy-seven.”
Ondine opened the textbook to the right page, and continued reading her own book.
Barbara came around the corner with a mug of tea.
“What are you doing?” she asked. “We haven’t got ants, have we?”
“No,” said Fenella, “Louise was swallowed by a hole in the floor, that’s not there any more.”
“Oh good, I’m glad it’s not ants,” said Barbara, sidling past carefully.
“But what about Louise?” shrieked Niamh.
“Try to keep it down, people are trying to work,” Barbara called back, as she left them lost in thought.
Alone together on the carpet, Fenella tried to –
“Ondine! Put that book down and concentrate on the equations,” Ms Garlic rudely interrupted. Ondine nodded, and pretended to buckle down.
***
Story continues tomorrow – or you can read the rest now 😀
Violet’s Vegan Comics – creating funny, interesting, and sometimes slightly bizarre vegan fiction since 2012
Violet's Vegan Comics 
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