The choral climax of Beethoven’s Ode to Joy reached into Harper’s head and dragged his unconscious mind kicking and screaming into the world of the wide-awake. He’d slept folded in on himself like a withered leaf, and the way his back cracked when he righted himself made him feel just as brittle. As if to add to the list of disasters, he felt like he may have gotten sick, because his legs felt like lead blocks and his hands were so clammy he dropped his phone behind his bedside table instead of silencing the alarm, sending Beethoven’s symphony reverberating through his relatively small bedroom and drowning his ears in pure, horrible noise.

The boy took a deep breath. For better or worse, he was awake now. He got dressed in the dark, requiring several adjustments to the buttons of his shirt - bugger, he must've scraped his hand against something in his sleep, because his knuckles hurt as he was forced to flex them - and while the smell of freshly seared croissants and scrambled eggs lured him from his bedroom, it was the sounds of his family arguing that called him to the kitchen every morning.

“You’re getting an invitation to a boarding school for Christmas if you keep this up!”

“I’ll live on the streets for free! Anything would be better than this!”

The sounds of his mother and sister arguing in harsh Italian, to be precise. He squeezed past his father’s wheelchair on the way in, earning a gruff “G’mornin’” from Joshua Mellows, a man who Harper felt was the last on Earth to have a physical newspaper delivered every morning.

Breaking both of his legs months ago in a forklift was both a blessing and a curse; all the free time his father had in between physical therapy sessions had given him plenty of time to catch up on his passions, and he’d lucked into a kitchen appliances side gig that was going to take the family to Europe at the end of the year. On the other hand, the kitchen had turned into a display room for every cup, plate or bread basket his dad could slap an annoyingly marketable cartoon owl on.

“They’re civil this morning,” Harper said mildly, accepting a freshly-made mug of coffee from his dad. It was a Monday, so he graciously accepted the “I’M WITH STUPID” mug, while his dad’s read “GUESS I’M STUPID TODAY.”

“Don’t get involved,” his father said quietly.

“Pshh. Me? Think I got a death wish?” Harper muttered, letting his eyes drop to his phone as he got his first impressions of his social media sphere for the day.

“You were out late last night, love. Are you alright to walk to school? I can squeeze in driving you and your sister if you’re ready in five minutes.” Taking a break from the verbal sparring with her miniature offspring, Giuliana Mellows’ hands roamed over Harper’s uniform, flattening collars, finger-combing errant hairs back into line and straightening his tie. She didn't even have to fix any buttons this morning. Still, despite her meddling, the Mellows matriarch’s bright green eyes gave him once overs from two more angles before finally being satisfied.

“I’m fine, mum.” His mother’s rapid-fire language was met with Harper’s stilted, Australian-tinged dialect. “You do not need to go through all the difficulties to save me a twenty minute walk.”

He anxiously looked to his other friends’ families when he was younger, and it was the highlight of his eighth year on Earth to learn that not every child of an ethnic family was required to speak their mother tongue.

Still, it didn’t help that his sister had taken to it so much more easily. Fillipa Mellows’ hazel eyes settled on him as she took her seat at the table. Her hazel eyes, shared with everyone in the room, ran a quick evaluation on his state of dress, exactly the same way their mother just did.

“...What?” Harper asked.

Fillipa looked him up and down, as if searching for a reason. “Your shoes are undone,” she eventually settled on. “Do better.”

“She can walk by herself, Mum,” Harper instantly said, standing up to leave.

“She cannot!” Giuliana declared. “With all those girls that have gone missing? Another was on the news just last night!

“Yeah, yeah, alright,” Harper rolled his eyes, but tugged on his sister’s backstrap to start shepherding her out of the house. He met his father’s proffered fist-bump on the way out.

The gates of St Thomas Aquinas College stood tall and resolute in the face of the harsh winds and pelting rains, iron grates gaping inwards to accept the students it would be safeguarding for the rest of the year.

With its pristine slate cobble pathways and lush border hedges that separated it from the half-industrial-half-residential outskirts of the city it was built in, the school always maintained a ‘secret garden’ feeling, born of a true effort to set itself apart from the world it had sprung out of. But that was inside.

A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

Outside, parents held their children a little tighter, and cars seemed more urgent to reach their destination, as if being on the roads exposed them.

The world was laying low, waiting for the invisible storm to pass, and the school too, held its breath. When Harper crossed the boundary, he was met with furtive looks and hushed whispers. Students gathered in their clumps of navy blazers and scarlet ties, red dresses that flowered down to below the knees for the girls and maroon pants for the boys. They faced inwards, not letting their whispers leave their circles.

His friends hung around their lockers as per usual, looking just as moody as the rest of their cohort. Andrew greeted him with a stone-faced nod, his girlfriend Olivia gave him a small smile, and the Bible Twins, Mikhail and Samiel, conversed in terse Russian, barely acknowledging his presence.

“Good morning…?” Harper ventured. “Someone gonna tell me?”

The four looked to each other. “Who’s gonna..?”

“You can…"

“I should…”

“Rose Newman,” Sam finally said. “The junior conductor from big band?”

“Oh, yeah,” Harper nodded, and his friend’s face said it all. “You’re kidding. Since when?”

"Disappeared right out of her bed, she didn't take anything. Left her phone, her clothes, all of it."

"How'd you figure that?" Harper threw his bag in his locker.

"Because all of the missing girls are like that," Mikhail shrugged. "And our mum's friends with Rose's. They tried to get ahead of the rumours, say she was off sick. It… didn’t work out."

“Because she can’t keep her trap shut to save her life. It’s like a disease,” Sam sighed. "Our mum, I mean."

"Bloody hell," Harper shook his head. "And that's that, then? She’s just gone, no trace?"

"The police are working on it, man. They'll find her." Andrew said, holding Olivia a little tighter than he was before. She’d buried her face in his shoulder. Only then did Harper remember she and Rose were friends.

"...Sorry. Yeah, you’re right. They’ll find her."

Though the unspoken question of what state she’d be in by that time hung in the silence left in the conversation’s wake.

The bell for the start of homeroom rang, and the 33-odd students of Harper’s class piled in for the day. The tension in the air was palpable, and Harper was pretty sure he heard someone sobbing in the next class over, no doubt someone who took the news a little more personally.

“Settle!” Ms Swift called, her voice cutting through the wall of murmurs, though her demand only held back the tide for about five seconds.

"Did they find Rose?" someone blurted out. The class bubbled up again, some equally curious, while others were indignant that she was brought up at all.

Ms Swift's mouth simmered to a straight line.

"As far as I’m aware, the police are doing everything they can to find Miss Newman, but it’s important to remember that there's still no evidence that she's been harmed in any way, or that it’s connected to anything you’ve seen on the news. Not that any of you should believe that hogwash, anyway. I shouldn't have to remind you, but I urge you to not start this week distracted, for your own sakes. Exams aren't until next year, but-"

Harper let out a light scoff, though he soon found himself shrinking before the withering gaze his teacher shot him with for his insolence. Before she could admonish him, there was a knock on the door, and the school's principal let himself in, a sagely looking man with a beard that convinced Harper beyond all doubt of the rumors that he LARPed weekendly at Middle Earth Victoria as Daellemar the Ancient One.

"Rowena?" he asked. As usual, his voice barely raised above a whisper, though it commanded everyone's attention. Another point in favor to Daellemar. "Sorry for the interruption. I just need to borrow you for a moment."

And if there was one person who could wrangle his teacher when she was ready to embark on the warpath, it was him. One more point. "Of course, David."

The two staff left the room at once, leaving the class to erupt into speculation amongst themselves once again. One of the girls next to Harper did an almost-perfect job of hiding her utter dread, as if the teachers would return with news of another disappearance.

However, when they did, they were three. They had a younger girl, around Harper's own age, in tow. Her hair was as deep a red as the tie of the uniform she wore, and her large, round, mirrored sunglasses reflected the class' shocked faces back at them.

Ms. Swift, for once, was unsure how to begin. "I… understand this is slightly irregular since we're already half a term into the new year, but Principle Lonsdale assures me that everything has been taken care of. Everyone, I’d like to introduce you to your new classmate, Kate Baker."

The room was completely silent. Out of everything, this is what they expected the least.

"Hey, everyone," Kate greeted warmly, with an obvious Kiwi tinge. "I'll get to know you all, I bet. I'm looking forward to it." When she did her sweep-take of the class, she seemed to linger on Harper a fraction of a second longer than everyone else. The moment was so short, Harper had to question if he imagined it, because she was already shaking hands and smiling with the class captain and settling in her seat on the table beside him.

It was an act of social mastery Harper had thought only theoretical - he wasn't a totally unapproachable, basement-dwelling cretin, but she defused the tension in the room effortlessly, earning a laugh from the girls at her table in a single sentence. The atmosphere changed in a second flat, and Harper knew that the topic of Rose Newman’s disappearance just may have some serious competition on the yard today.

“You alright, mate?” Sam asked, nudging his side.

Only then did he realise he was staring at the new girl.

“Yeah," Harper said slowly. "Just.. thought I knew her for a second.”

He hadn’t processed that thought at all, felt no conscious spark of recognition.

He didn’t know why he said it, or why it felt so right rolling off his tongue.