Eeny, Meeny, Miney, Moe

Anna was alive.

She stood in the doorway, frowning at me, completely unaware that I had already watched her disappear from my life once before.

*“Are you going to stand there all day?”*

I continued staring at her. Same dark hair. Same impatient voice. She was fourteen years old again.

Before I could think better of it, I crossed the distance between us and threw my arms around her. Anna stumbled backwards beneath my weight.

*“What the—Mira!”*

I held on tighter, burying my face against her. She went stiff in my arms, her hands hovering awkwardly at her sides.

*“What is wrong with you?”*

*“I missed you.”*

*“You saw me this morning.”*

Not exactly.

As far as I was concerned, she had been dead for more than half my life. I had spent years learning to exist in a world without her, and now she was standing here, complaining because I had hugged her for a few seconds too long.

Anna eventually pushed me away and examined my face.

*“Did something happen at school?”*

*“No.”*

*“Then why are you acting weird?”*

*“I’m not acting weird.”*

Her eyes narrowed. *“You’re hugging me.”*

Apparently, that was evidence enough.

She picked up the schoolbag I had dropped and shoved it against my chest. *“Come inside.”*

I followed her into the house, still watching her as though she might disappear if I looked away for too long.

The smell of cooking reached me first. Mum was moving between the cooker and the counter, preparing dinner. She glanced over when we entered, then looked towards the clock.

*“You’re late.”*

I followed her gaze. It was four minutes past four.

*“Sorry.”*

*“Shoes off. Both of you.”*

Anna kicked hers aside. Mum looked down at them, then slowly back at her.

Anna sighed and returned to place them properly beside the door.

Everything was so painfully familiar that I felt like an intruder inside my own memory. The narrow hallway, Dad’s coat hanging beside the stairs, the familiar sounds drifting in from the kitchen—I remembered all of it.

You never realised you were seeing something for the last time while it was happening. Ordinary things disappeared quietly, and it was only afterwards that you understood how much they had meant.

*“Mira?”*

I looked up. Mum was watching me now.

*“What?”*

*“Wash your hands.”*

*“Right.”*

I escaped upstairs before she could study me any further.

My bedroom looked exactly as I remembered it. Clothes lay across the floor, books had been stacked wherever they would fit, and uncapped pens rolled around the desk. Half the wardrobe appeared to have collapsed onto my bed.

Apparently, nine-year-old me had been a slob.

I closed the door and leaned against it. For the first time since waking up in the classroom, I was completely alone, and the silence finally gave reality the chance to catch up with me.

I had died. I had travelled twenty-three years into the past and awakened inside the body of a child. Tomorrow morning, I would be expected to put on my uniform, attend school and behave as though none of that had happened.

I sat at my desk, pulled out a notebook and opened it to a blank page.

Right. Let’s establish what I knew.

The year was 2003. I was nine years old, and Anna was fourteen.

In my first life, she never made it much further than that.

Someone had blackmailed her. Nasty rumours followed, spreading through her school faster than she could control them. She never managed to tell us what was happening. Maybe she had been ashamed. Maybe she was frightened that we wouldn’t believe her—or that telling us would only make everything worse.

Instead, she convinced herself that there was only one way out.

She took her own life.

After that, our family was never the same. My parents withdrew into themselves, each trapped inside their own grief. The house became quiet, but not the peaceful kind. It was the sort of quiet that reminded you, every moment of every day, that somebody was missing.

And I had lost the only real friend I’d ever had.

Anna had been the one person who could make me laugh and forget how miserable my childhood was. One summer, when a group of bullies cornered me in the park, she had even charged into them and beaten up two before an adult managed to intervene.

She had always protected me.

But when she needed someone to protect her, I hadn’t even known she was in danger.

Her death pushed me into a depression I never truly escaped. I continued living in the technical sense—I woke up, went to work and moved through each day—but some part of me had died with her.

Now everything that had destroyed us was still waiting to happen.

I wrote **Anna** at the top of the page and pressed the pen down until the ink began bleeding through the paper. Then I stopped.

I knew how her story ended, but knowing the ending wasn’t the same as knowing how to prevent it. Back then, I had been too young and too frightened to understand what was happening to her.

This time, I would pay attention.

This time, she wouldn’t have to face it alone.

A knock sounded against my door, and I immediately closed the notebook. Anna entered without waiting for permission.

*Typical Anna.*

*“Mira, Mum’s been calling you to come down for dinner.”*

She left the door open behind her and disappeared down the hallway. I remained seated, looking at the closed notebook beneath my hands as another realisation began to settle over me.

Anna wasn’t the only thing waiting for me in 2003.

There were people I had spent years avoiding and even longer fearing. People who had once seemed enormous simply because I had been too small to recognise how insignificant they really were.

I thought about Rachel’s face and the way her smile had vanished the moment I looked her in the eye.

I leaned back in my chair and stared at the ceiling.

*Surely a woman in her thirties couldn’t still be afraid of a group of children.*

*Right?*

＊

The following morning, I woke before everyone else.

My body was still half-asleep when I reached the kitchen. Before I properly registered what I was doing, I had already boiled the kettle and made myself a cup of black coffee.

I stared at it, then at the doorway, then back at the coffee.

*Old habits died hard, apparently.*

I took a quick sip before anyone could walk in. A nine-year-old drinking black coffee first thing in the morning wasn’t exactly a common sight.

It was terrible.

I drank it anyway.

By the time Mum came downstairs, the mug had been washed, dried and returned to the cupboard. She packed our lunches while Anna rushed around complaining that she couldn’t find one of her schoolbooks.

For several minutes, I simply watched them. This had once been ordinary, and I hadn’t known how badly I would miss it.

*“Mira.”*

Mum placed my lunch on the table. *“You’ll be late.”*

I picked up my bag and followed Anna outside. When we reached the point where our routes separated, she stopped and looked down at me.

*“Try not to be weird today.”*

*“I’ll do my best.”*

She narrowed her eyes, apparently trying to decide whether I was being sarcastic. I smiled and walked away before she could reach a conclusion.

The school no longer looked intimidating when I approached it. It was only an old building filled with children who had once convinced me that they controlled my entire world.

When I entered the classroom, several people looked towards me, and the whispering began almost immediately. I ignored them and continued towards my desk.

Then I saw my chair.

Something pale and sticky had been spread across the seat.

Glue.

I looked towards the clock. The register hadn’t even started yet.

*Seriously? This early in the morning?*

I turned slowly towards the class. The whispering stopped, although several smug smiles remained. Some children lowered their heads and pretended to be interested in their books, while others watched openly, waiting to see what I would do.

Yesterday, Rachel had called me a freak. Today, somebody had covered my chair in glue.

The old Mira would have stayed silent. She would have cleaned the chair before the teacher arrived and spent the rest of the day wondering what she had done to deserve it.

But that girl wasn’t here anymore.

I left my schoolbag beside the desk and walked to the front of the classroom. Once I reached the board, I turned around and surveyed the children watching me.

Time to play my favourite game.

*“Eeny, meeny, miny, moe…”*

My finger travelled slowly from one child to another. A few of the remaining smiles disappeared.

*“Catch a tiger by the toe…”*

My finger stopped on a girl seated near the windows.

She hadn’t done it.

I knew that.

But when she realised I was pointing at her, her face twisted with disgust. There was no fear in her expression and certainly no guilt.

Only disgust.

As if she couldn’t believe *I*, of all people, had dared to single her out.

I walked towards her. She glanced around the classroom, waiting for someone to laugh or step in and remind me of my place.

Nobody did.

I stopped beside her desk, and she looked up at me with that same expression.

I raised my hand and struck her across the cheek.

***Slap.***

The sound cracked through the classroom.

She slipped from her chair and landed on the floor. For one stunned second, nobody moved. Then the entire room erupted.

*“What the hell?”*

*“She didn’t even do anything!”*

*“Why did you hit her?”*

I froze.

*She didn’t do anything?*

Slowly, I looked around the classroom. They were horrified. One girl had covered her mouth with both hands, while another stared at me as though I had done something unthinkable.

My gaze dropped to the girl on the floor. She was crying, one hand pressed against her reddening cheek.

So they could feel sorry for her.

When somebody put glue on my chair, they had laughed. When I was humiliated, they watched as though my suffering were entertainment.

But one slap, and suddenly everyone had developed a conscience.

A quiet laugh escaped me.

Several children recoiled.

*So I really had been the joke.*

I had always known. Having it confirmed still hurt.

I looked down at the crying girl. *“Sorry.”*

She flinched.

I smiled. *“Wrong place, wrong time.”*

The classroom fell silent, but it wasn’t the awkward silence from before. This felt different—heavier. I could see it in their faces.

Fear.

There was no laughter now. No whispering. Not even a poorly concealed smile.

I turned away and walked back towards the front of the classroom. Nobody made a sound as my shoes tapped against the floor.

*Tap.*

*Tap.*

*Tap.*

When I reached the board, I turned to face them.

*“Listen carefully, you pathetic little parasites.”*

My voice came out strangely calm, which seemed to frighten them more than shouting would have.

*“From today onwards, I’m coming for you one by one.”*

Their expressions changed.

*“Inside school or outside school, I don’t care.”*

I climbed onto the teacher’s desk. My feet didn’t reach the floor, which probably cost me several aura points, but there was no backing out now.

*“You can come at me in groups if that makes you feel safer.”*

I smiled as my eyes travelled across the room.

*“But eventually, you’ll have to go home. And eventually, you’ll be alone.”*

A boy near the back lowered his head.

*“Unless…”*

I turned towards Rachel.

There she was, watching me from behind her desk.

I smiled directly at her. *“…you tell me who’s behind it.”*

Whispers broke out immediately. Children leaned towards one another and exchanged suspicious glances as the accusation began spreading through the room.

Rachel’s face twisted with fury. Her fists clenched beneath her desk, her jaw tightened and I could have sworn I saw a vein twitch near her temple.

The anger in her eyes might once have frightened me enough to look away.

This time, I held her gaze.

As I watched her glare at me, I found myself wondering how long it would take to make her afraid of coming to school.

The corner of my mouth lifted.

*I supposed we’d have to find out.*

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