Christa Appleton always knew she wanted to be a teacher. She wanted to teach elementary school. As a young girl, she took piano lessons. Born with perfect pitch, she was a gifted musician. But her music was not to be shared. When she entered college in the fall of 2004 she majored in elementary education.

Christa was ecstatic when she was accepted to teach at Wingdale Elementary. But her head started to throb, as she recalled the day, Emily Pruet, and that awful noise.......

A transfer student, Emily Pruet was a beauty. She looked at Christa, her dark eyes enormous. "Miss Appleton, I drew a pony!" she stated excitedly, tugging at Christa's skirt. "PLEASE, EVERYONE BACK IN YOUR SEATS!" screamed Christa.

The day had begun like any other, except for the fact that the principal texted her to meet in her office first thing. "Have a seat." gestured Mrs. Snow. "I asked you to meet me to discuss one of your new students - Emily Pruet." 

"Is anything the matter?" Christa responded, suddenly alert.

"No,,,,Emily is a darling child....." the principal's voice trailed off. "There was a terrible tragedy at her former school, you know. She’s lucky to be alive. How is she fitting in?"

"Like you said, she's an angel.”

"The teacher's pet?" Mrs. Snow remarked.

“I guess you could say that. I have to ask, what happened?” Christa felt her palms grow clammy.

 "It's under investigation... there was a string of terrible accidents. Many children began having seizures. A girl had one crossing the street, and she was killed. Another drowned."

Christa was horrified. "How?”

"Speculation is that her school was built on land that was chemically contaminated. Toxic exposure. Odd, all the students were in Emily’s class.”

"Of course, her parents left immediately. Too many horrible memories.”

Amy White stopped breathing. It happened during recess, after the noise, after…..

 Christa had asked the class to draw. It began, slowly at first, gradually getting louder and louder, until Christa heard...high C. Her perfect pitch, long dormant, heard a high C. She looked up. Circles, nothing but circles. Several of the girls had walked to the blackboard, and began drawing circles, pressing so hard it sounded like fingernails dragging across the surface. The noise was deafening. She covered her ears.  She heard Emily Pruet’s voice. “Look, Mrs. Appleton, I drew a pony!”

Christa dialed 911 and the sound of the siren could be heard in the distance and seconds seemed like hours as little Amy’s life trickled away. Christa didn’t feel little Emily’s hand slip into hers. When they pronounced her dead, Christa glanced down for a moment at Emily, and fainted.

Later that evening, the phone rang at the Pruet house. It was the school, asking them if they would like to attend a memorial for poor little Amy White. The phone dropped from Mrs. Pruet’s hand as she looked over at her husband and said, almost whispering “We have to move, again…….”