Soul Salvation

Walking through the doors of her new high school on the first day, Rania smiled. She was generally excited about the idea of making new friends. She'd never had problems with it back in middle school, before she moved. But she was aware that now she was a freshman, and things were going to be different. The thought didn't disturb Rania, though; she was prepared to take whatever was coming head-on.

It was relatively easy to find her homeroom--much easier than in her old school. Rania couldn't help but notice that Huntington Beach High School was quite a bit smaller, at least with the number of students if not with the size of the school itself, than the junior high school Rania had attended back in New York City.

Taking a seat in her homeroom that was slowly filling (considering Rania had arrived about fifteen minutes earlier than the time homeroom was to begin), she scanned the other occupants of the room. Other than herself and the teacher there were only three other students, two girls and a boy, who Rania had decided to sit near.

Before she even had a chance to introduce herself, the girl seated closest to Rania turned and gave her a smile.

"You're new, right?" she asked, causing the other two, who Rania figured were friends of hers, to turn their attention toward her. "I mean, I'm only assuming that since I've never seen you before."

"Yeah, I just moved here a few weeks ago. My name's Rania," she replied, watching as the girl who had deep brown eyes and natural blond hair nodded at the information.

"Rania?" the boy seated in front of her asked as he turned around. "That's a pretty name," he said, and Rania smiled, quietly thanking the boy who had very dark brown hair and hazel-green eyes. "Are you Indian?" he then asked, taking in the girl's appearance.

"Half," Rania said. "My mom's Indian, but my dad is Persian," she explained.

"Persian?" the third girl with light brown hair asked, her eyes showing confusion.

"...Iranian."

"Cool," the first girl said. "Anyways, my name is Jackie. That's David and Ariel," Jackie said, introducing herself and the other two. "So where'd you move in?"

"Oh, it's kinda...out of town a little ways. The Haner Manor?" Rania asked more than stated, and she was confused when the other three students' impressions changed.

"Oh..." David said, shooting identical looks to the other girls, but Rania didn't know what he meant by it.

"What?" she pressed, wondering if she said something wrong. "Is that not a good place to live?"

"Well, the house used to be gorgeous when the first family lived there-" Ariel started to say, but quickly shut her mouth when she was elbowed by Jackie.

"No one goes there. It wasn't really supposed to be put on the market," the blond girl practically exclaimed.

"What do you mean?" Rania asked, brows knit together in question.

The trio looked between each other before Jackie continued with a sigh. Rania felt like maybe it was a touchy subject for them. Maybe she couldn't have asked.

"Other people tried living there after the first family--...uh, well they said really weird stuff happens there and everyone ended up moving out before they were even settled."

"What happened to the first family?" Rania asked, curiosity getting the best of her.

"Murder," Ariel replied bluntly.

"The whole family?!"

"It wasn't murder," David said, waving off Ariel's answer. "The guy that had the house built...I can't remember his name.... Anyway, reportedly he died in the house, and then his wife and son moved away."

"How did he die?" Rania further pressed, now very intrigued of the history of the house she'd just moved into.

"Well, everyone has their own story, but I don't know if anyone really knows. It happened about seven years ago," David explained.

"So like, now the house is haunted by his ghost," Ariel then cut in. "Some people even claim to have seen him when they sneak into the house."

"Really?" Rania asked, though she felt very skeptic about it. She knew how her parents felt about ghosts and spirits and the like. She just wondered how well the words of the three students could be believed.

"Yeah. A few weeks ago, I assume before your family moved in, two seniors went up to the Haner Manor with a Ouija board, to see if they could contact the ghost. They came back really freaked out, said weird stuff happened with the board. Both of them claim they saw his ghost," Jackie explained.

"Well...we've been living there for two weeks and nothing really weird has happened," Rania said. She decided it was probably best to leave out the incident on the ladder while she was painting her room, when she could have sworn she felt a hand on her back helping her to keep steady.

"I personally think they're just stories," David said, and Jackie sent him a pointed look.

"That's not what you said last week," she snorted, causing him to roll his eyes. "Anyways," she said, looking at Rania again, "if you ask people over to your house, don't be surprised if they say they can't. No one goes there."

Frowning slightly, Rania could feel that situation was going to make it harder for her to make friends. If she couldn't invite them over, she'd only ever see them in school, unless she was invited to their houses.

As homeroom wore on she kept thinking about it. Rania decided she'd ask her parents. Maybe they'd heard something about the house.

"So how was your first day?" Amrita asked her daughter as they all sat down that night for a meal of chicken tikka masala, basmati rice, and naan.

"It was good. The students all seem really friendly," Rania answered, grabbing some rice with a piece of her naan and dipping it in the creamy masala sauce before eating it. "But...I heard some stories today. About the house."

"What do you mean?" Saied asked, taking a bite of his own food.

"There are some kids in school who think our house is haunted. They were going on about it for awhile. Apparently the first family...the one that built it...the husband died here. They didn't say how, but they think his ghost haunts it now."

The dinner table was silent a moment before both Rania's parents laughed.

"Kids and their imaginations," Amrita chuckled.

"I assure you, Rani, no one died I this house. It's not haunted either. It juts looked a bit run-down. And I'm sure the real estate agent would have known if someone died here," Saied said, seemingly amused. "They're just stories."