Left in the Dust: The True Cost of Following a Fool

Tags: Dust storm trap, Karma, Missed exam, Rebirth, Revenge On the day of the College Entrance Exam, a massive dust storm trapped our entire class on the highway. The charter bus was forced to pull over onto the shoulder. The driver told us our only option was to wait for rescue. Chloe, our class president, stood up, slung her backpack over her shoulders, and got ready to get off the bus. "It’s barely over a mile away! We’ve busted our asses for three years just for today! If we stick together, we’ll make it without a scratch!" Murmurs spread across the bus, and a few students actually stood up with her. In my previous life, I leaped up immediately and blocked the door: "In weather like this, who’s going to take responsibility if something happens to us? The school won’t, the driver won’t, and you definitely won't, Chloe." I stared straight at her. "I know you're terrified of missing the exam. But in a storm this bad, the board will definitely have an emergency backup plan." "If you drag everyone out there and someone gets hurt, do you honestly think you'll still be taking your exam?" The other students backed me up: "Let’s just wait. It’s way too dangerous out there." Seeing the crowd turn against her, Chloe stood there glaring for a long time before stomping back to her seat. We waited in that bus for over four hours. It wasn't until that afternoon that the rescue team finally arrived and escorted us to the designated testing center. Because we missed the official window, they arranged a makeup session just for us. When the exam scores came out, Chloe had bombed it—falling three points short of the university cutoff. The night the scores went public, she cornered me outside the school gates. "It’s all your fault! If you hadn’t stopped me, I never would’ve failed!" Catching me off guard, she shoved me hard. The back of my head slammed against the sharp stone edge of the flower bed. In the final second before my vision went dark, I saw my classmates standing there. Not a single one of them moved. When I opened my eyes again, I was back on the morning of the exam. Chloe had her backpack slung over her shoulders, once again getting ready to step off the bus. This time, I leaned back in my seat and didn't move an inch. The doors hissed open. One by one, the class started filing out. It was a Category 5 dust storm. Visibility was under ten feet. I couldn't wait to see how she planned on walking through that. The first one off was Kevin, our track star. The second his sneakers hit the pavement, a violent gust knocked him flat. His knees scraped violently against the rough asphalt, blood trickling down his shins. Yet he dragged himself up, hunched over against the wind, and kept pushing forward. Chloe shot me a vicious glare, her eyes burning with pure hatred and stubborn defiance. Then she hitched her backpack higher and stepped down into the gale. Within a minute, the bus was completely empty. Mr. Miller, our driver, stood by the open door, his voice turning raw from screaming: "Kids! Don't go out there! It’s suicide! Come back! Get back in here!" Nobody listened. Figure after figure was swallowed whole by the blinding yellow dust. The cabin grew increasingly hollow, until only myself and Tara, the girl next to me, were left. The door shut, cutting off the raging sand outside, but the windowpanes vibrated violently, rattling with low, ominous thuds. Tara huddled against the window, her lips drained of color, her knuckles white where she gripped the straps of her bag. She turned to look at me. "Serena... are they really going to be okay out there?" I flipped open my vocabulary notebook and shook my head. "No idea." In my past life, I stopped everyone. In this life, I couldn't care less. Tara froze for a second, clearly caught off guard by how cold I was. She parted her lips as if to say something, but thought better of it. Instead, she pulled out her study guide and began reviewing as well. The cabin fell dead silent, save for the howling wind and the rustle of turning pages. In my last life, after the exams were over, Tara was the only person who ever came up to thank me. She thanked me, telling me that if I hadn't blocked the door, she never would’ve known what terrible fate might have met her out on that road. She glanced back at me once more, then quietly sank into her seat. Suddenly, a phone rang. It was Mr. Miller’s. He picked it up, his tone frantic: "Hello? Ms. Lewis? Yes, yes, we’re pulled over on the shoulder." The voice booming from the speaker was loud enough that even from the back, I could hear every word. "Do not let those kids off the bus under any circumstances! Mr. Miller, listen to me: the board has already triggered the emergency contingency plan! Any student delayed by the storm will get an isolated makeup exam! Keep everyone on that bus!" Mr. Miller’s face went chalk-white. "Ms. Lewis... they already left..." There was a heavy, suffocating silence on the other end for two full seconds. Then came Ms. Lewis’s hoarse, frantic scream: "They left?! Where did they go?! When?!" "Just now. A few minutes ago." Mr. Miller's voice was shaking uncontrollably. "I tried to stop them, but I couldn't! Chloe led the charge, and the rest just followed her out like sheep!" "Are they out of their minds?! Every single one of them has lost their minds!" Ms. Lewis sounded on the verge of tears. "It’s a Category 5 dust storm! You can’t see five feet in front of your face! Do they have a death wish?! I’m calling the police right now! Did you call 911?!" "Yes, yes, I already did!" "Is there anyone left on the bus? Did all of them leave?!" Mr. Miller glanced back toward us. "There are two left. Serena and Tara. They stayed behind.""Put Serena on the phone!" Mr. Miller rushed over and handed me the phone. I took it and pressed it to my ear. "Serena?" Ms. Lewis’s voice was cracked and raspy, strained from all the screaming. "Listen to me. You and Tara stay on that bus. Do not step one foot outside, do you hear me?" "Our car is stuck further back in the traffic jam. We can’t get through, so we have to wait for the emergency crews. Promise me you won't get off that bus." "I know, Ms. Lewis," I replied calmly. "I’m not going anywhere." "Good, good. Keep an eye on Tara for me. You’ve always had a level head on your shoulders. I trust you." The call ended. Silence fell over the cabin once again. Holding the phone, I remembered that in my past life, Ms. Lewis had made the exact same call. Back then, the bus had been packed. I was throwing my body against the doorway to keep everyone inside while Ms. Lewis announced over the phone that a makeup exam was guaranteed, pleading with us to wait for rescue. After that call ended, Chloe had sneered at me. "Quit being such pathetic cowards." That was what she had said. *Pathetic cowards.* Facing a lethal, blinding dust storm, having the basic human instinct to survive was branded as "being a coward" by her. Back then, I didn't have time to process the insult because I was too busy holding the door. Hearing those words echo in my memory now, the fury that had been suffocating me across two lifetimes flared up violently in my chest. Just as the screen went black, a sudden pounding rattled the bus door. *Bang! Bang! Bang!* Desperate, frantic thumps. Mr. Miller rushed to open it, and a gust of biting sand rushed into the aisle. A boy tumbled in, collapsing face-first onto the rubber floor. He was covered from head to toe in thick dirt, deep bloody gashes tracing across his face. His school jacket was shredded, exposing raw, oozing skin underneath. It was Zach. He was the biggest kid in class, pushing two hundred pounds. He usually lost his breath just jogging, but right now, he was curled into a ball on the floor, shivering uncontrollably. It took all of Mr. Miller’s strength to slam the door shut against the howling wind. Tara scrambled forward immediately, frantically pulling wet wipes from her backpack to clean the blood from his cheeks. "Zach? Zach, what happened to you?! Where is everyone else?!" Zach lifted his head. His round face was paralyzed with sheer terror, his eyes bloodshot and wild. "Something went wrong... everything went wrong..." His voice shook violently, his lips quivering out of control. "So many people tripped... someone got blown away! I saw it with my own eyes! Kevin fell and smashed his head against a rock. His face was covered in blood! I tried to grab him, but the wind was too strong... I couldn't hold on!" "And then?" Tara’s voice began to tremble too. "And then I couldn't see anything! Nothing at all!" Tears spilled from Zach’s eyes, cutting two stark, pale tracks through the grime on his face. "The sand hitting my skin hurt like hell! All I could do was drop to my stomach and crawl forward! I couldn't see a damn thing!" "I heard people screaming... I heard people crying for help... but I had no idea where they were!" He curled tighter into himself. "I’m too heavy... the wind couldn't lift me... that’s the only reason I managed to crawl back..." "I don't know about the others, but I heard them screaming. More than one person!" His voice suddenly pitched up into a bloodcurdling screech: "My admission ticket is gone! My driver's license is gone! Everything is gone! The wind tore my backpack right off my shoulders! I lost it all!" He began frantically digging through his pockets, turning his jacket inside out, only to pull out a few crumpled napkins and half a pack of crushed crackers. He slumped onto the floor, completely hollowed out. "Three years of high school... down the drain. It’s all ruined..."Mr. Miller knelt down and placed a gentle hand on his trembling shoulder. "You're alive, son. That’s all that matters. You're alive." Tara crouched beside him, her eyes rimmed with red as she dabbed at his cuts, trying to soothe him: "Take a breath, Zach. We can figure out the paperwork and your ID later. Being alive is the most important thing." Zach buried his face in his hands, his shoulders heaving with ragged sobs. "I never should’ve listened to Chloe... I knew we shouldn't have gotten off... I didn't even want to go..." Tara’s hand froze for a split second. Her voice was faint, laced with a bitter edge: "Honestly, I wanted to tell everyone to stay too. But seeing how much everyone trusted Chloe, I didn't think anyone would listen to me." She looked up, glancing back at me. I sat quietly in my seat, not uttering a single syllable. I watched Zach sobbing on the floor. I watched Tara clumsily trying to comfort him. I watched Mr. Miller sighing as he dug out the first-aid kit. My heart felt completely flat. There wasn't a ripple of pity. If anything, a cold smirk almost tugged at my lips. In my previous life, I was the one who saved Zach. Back then, he was the very first person to jump to his feet, backing Chloe up and hyping everyone up to walk out, shouting that it was only a mile and that they could easily jog it. Later, because I blocked the door and held them back until rescue arrived, he got to take the makeup exam and comfortably got into a four-year college. And yet, when Chloe shoved me to my death later that summer, he was standing right there in the crowd. He didn't step forward. Not by a single inch. Chloe was gorgeous, ranked top ten in the entire senior class, and universally treated like the school’s golden girl. Throughout all three years of high school, everyone fawned over her, and the teachers treated her like royalty. Whatever she said was law. When she declared we should walk to the exam center, everyone blindly followed her out. When she murdered me, everyone just stood by and watched. Because she was pretty. Because she was accomplished. Because she was Chloe. As for me? Over those three years, my grades were above average, my looks plain, and my personality quiet. My presence was virtually zero. Nobody would ever mourn me. Tara stood up, walked over, and slid into the seat beside me. "Serena, are you okay? You look pale." I looked away from the window and returned my gaze to my vocabulary notes. "I'm fine." Outside, the howling wind grew deafening. Up in the driver’s seat, Mr. Miller was making call after call—talking to the police, reporting to dispatch, reaching out to the school board, one right after another. Zach slowly stabilized. Wrapped in a wool emergency blanket Mr. Miller had given him, he huddled in a seat, staring blankly out at the endless swirl of suffocating yellow dust. Tara went back to her seat and picked up her notebook, but it was clear she couldn't process a single word. Her eyes darted around, constantly flicking toward the storm outside. Inside the bus, time felt frozen in amber. The dust storm showed no signs of letting up. If anything, it turned more savage. Pebbles slammed against the reinforced glass with sharp cracks, sounding as if the windows could shatter at any second. The heavy bus swayed slightly in the gale, its metal frame letting out low, groaning creaks. I kept studying my vocabulary. As I turned the pages, I wondered where Chloe was right now. With her frail, paper-thin frame, how long could she actually last against a Category 5 sandstorm? What about the rest of them? Were the people who blindly followed her beginning to drown in regret? Kevin had cracked his skull open. Who else had collapsed? Who else had been carried away by the wind? The sky remained a suffocating, sickly yellow. It was impossible to tell whether it was noon or twilight. Finally, after what felt like an eternity, the roar of the wind began to subside. Outside the window, visibility crawled from three feet, to six, to fifteen. In the distance, flashing lights pierced through the settling dust—red and blue beacons cutting through the haze. State troopers. And search-and-rescue squads. Mr. Miller bolted out of his seat and kicked open the door, practically tumbling out. "Over here! Over here! We still have students on board!" A group of first responders in high-visibility vests hurried toward the bus, led by a state trooper wearing a heavy-duty dust respirator. "How many kids on this bus?" "Three students! They're all fine, none of them stayed out there!" Mr. Miller’s voice cracked with the overwhelming relief of someone who had just cheated death. The trooper stepped onto the bus, verified our IDs, and quickly escorted the three of us into the back of a squad car to rush us toward the testing center. Sitting in the back seat, the world outside the window gradually sharpened into focus. The car drove slowly. And then, I saw Chloe. She was huddled behind a massive boulder, curled tightly into a ball. Her hair was matted into coarse, filthy dreadlocks from the dust, her face covered in bloody lacerations, her bare arms mottled with deep purple bruises. Her backpack was nowhere to be found. She slowly lifted her head, her gaze locking directly with the squad car’s window.Our eyes met. Her pupils dilated instantly, as if running into me in the back of a police cruiser was the last thing she ever expected. Then she saw the flashing strobe lights on the roof. She saw the uniformed trooper behind the wheel. She saw Tara sitting calmly right beside me. Her cracked lips parted slightly. The car didn't stop. In the side mirror, I watched as another cruiser pulled up beside her, two officers stepping out to haul her limp body off the ground. The testing center had set up an isolated classroom for us. Just a small room, with our three desks spaced far apart. The proctor verified our information and handed out the exam packets. I picked up my pen and took a long, steady breath. I had already seen this exact test in my previous life. Even though I only managed to finish a fraction of it back then, after waking up in the hospital, I had combed through the official answer keys and explanations over and over again, countless times. Because I couldn't let it go. I couldn't accept that after saving an entire bus of people, I didn't even get to properly finish my own college entrance exams. I couldn't accept spending three grueling months in a hospital bed, missing every single rolling admission and regular decision deadline. I couldn't accept having to repeat senior year, walking back into that exam room a year later only to find that my whole world had crumbled. Now, all that bitter resentment transformed into ink beneath my pen. I essentially wrote down the answers from memory. When the final bell rang and I walked out of the testing center, the late afternoon sun was glowing warmly. The sky after a dust storm was breathtakingly clear, a fiery crimson sunset washing over half the horizon. Tara walked out right behind me, looking remarkably composed. "Serena, how do you think you did?" "Pretty good." My phone buzzed. It was Ms. Lewis. "Serena, are you and Tara done with the exam? If you're finished, please come to the hospital." She sounded utterly drained. "The rest of the class is here. A lot of them are badly injured... and two are still missing. Search and rescue is still looking." "Okay." After hanging up, Tara asked me what was going on. I told her Ms. Lewis wanted us at the hospital. Her expression instantly morphed into something complicated—a mix of dread, fear, and an emotion she couldn't quite name. We caught a cab to the regional medical center. The hospital hallways were swarming with people—students in torn jackets, frantic parents with tear-streaked faces, and police officers taking formal statements. The heavy stench of antiseptic hung thick in the air, laced with the metallic tang of fresh blood. Cutting through the chaotic crowd, I spotted Ms. Lewis. She was slumped against a wall, her hair disheveled, her eyes swollen and red. She looked like she had aged ten years in a single afternoon. The moment she saw Tara and me, she hurried over and pulled both of us into a tight embrace. "Thank God you're safe... Thank God you listened..." She squeezed us so hard I could feel the violent tremors running through her body. "What about everyone else?" Tara asked in a small voice. Ms. Lewis pulled back, hastily wiping her eyes. "Twenty-two students got off that bus. Aside from Zach, who managed to crawl back, all twenty-one of them were injured." Her voice hitched painfully. "Fractures, severe concussions, eyes sliced open by airborne gravel... and two girls are completely unaccounted for. Search and rescue is still out there in the desert." Suddenly, a piercing shriek echoed down the hall. "My baby! Why on earth did you get off that bus?!" It was a middle-aged woman with streaks of gray in her hair, wearing a worn factory uniform. She collapsed to the linoleum floor, wailing uncontrollably. A bystander tried to help her up, but her legs gave out completely, folding under her like wet cardboard. "Her father passed away when she was little! I worked double shifts to raise her all on my own just so she could take this exam! And now she’s gone! She’s gone!" Tara’s face turned completely white. Looking at that devastated mother, I was thrown back to my previous life. That was the exact same state my own mother was in when she got the call and rushed to the hospital. Collapsing onto the tiles, unable to stand, screaming until her vocal cords shredded. Back then, I was lying in the trauma unit with twelve stitches in the back of my skull, massive intracranial bleeding, fighting for my life in the ICU for seven straight days. My mother didn't close her eyes for an entire week. Tara gently tugged on my sleeve. "Serena... let’s go inside and check on them." I followed her into the ward. It was a large six-bed trauma room, packed to maximum capacity. Every single bed held a classmate. Boys and girls alike—some with their arms in heavy plaster casts, some with thick gauze wrapped around their heads, others with raw stitches on their faces, blood steadily seeping through the white bandages. In the bed furthest in the corner lay Chloe. Her injuries were among the lightest—mostly deep abrasions and dark bruises. But mentally, she was completely shattered. She stared blankly at the ceiling tiles, her skin as pale as fresh paper. When I stepped through the door, her eyes flickered slightly. She pushed herself up into a sitting position and croaked at Ms. Lewis, "Ms. Lewis... can we take a makeup exam?" Standing near the door, Ms. Lewis slowly shook her head. "There won't be one, Chloe. There are no makeups for this." Chloe’s face instantly twisted into pure panic. "Why not?! Didn't they have a contingency plan?! Didn't they say isolated testing was an option?! We were just late!" Ms. Lewis’s tone abruptly dropped to freezing. "If you hadn't gotten off that bus, none of this would have happened."