The Dead Pixel Society

© 2026 Zoë Taylor

Lewis wanted to go back to the music wing, to find the blonde with the sheet music, but his dread of having to dance the Clarity Shuffle with the NFC reader kept him in the main building at least for now. And now, he smelled like he’d been bathing in a Sephora perfume counter thanks to that damn lilac scented soap. He was pretty sure he hadn’t gotten it all washed off, either, with trying to beat feet out of the girls’ room before Madison changed her mind and screamed.

But he had to find somewhere quiet, somewhere out of the way.

The library.

The school was almost all digital nowadays right? Right. So some place like the old library was probably a dead zone - literally and figuratively seeing as how even classrooms required wi-fi repeaters to keep the signal alive. And when he got to the library door, it didn’t even have a damn NFC lock on it - bonus!

He ducked inside. There was a student here, and another girl no less, but she genuinely did not seem to even notice him, her nose deep in a physical copy of Edgar A. Poe’s consolidated works. For just the briefest moment, it gave Lewis a reason to smile to himself. She was clearly an athlete. She was svelte and poised, long, dark red hair in a high ponytail with her letterman jacket slung over the back of her chair bearing patches for cheer and a big basketball patch, and yet she was here, like him, seeking a quiet place to just breathe.

And she was reading Poe, one of Lewis’ unironic favorite authors. He wanted so, so badly to talk to her, but if he valued his own privacy here so much, he figured she most certainly did as well, and decided not to disturb her, instead just disappearing among the shelves to find something to read, too.

“Let’s see...” he said as he ran his fingers over the shelves. “Read it, read it, read it twice... Oh, what are you doing here?” he said, picking up the 1995 copy of Wicked. It was stuffed to the far right of the shelf, and, at least to his vague recollection of the Dewey decimal system, was completely on the wrong shelf.

A yellowed, old index card, fluttered to the ground. He knelt down to pick it up, turning it over.

‘If ur reading this don’t throw it away. Put it back where u found it. But, if ur looking for amazing acoustics, ask Jessica in the skool theater. She’ll show u the way to the utility corridor! -W.W.’

His heart skipped a beat. Jessica? He knew Jessica was an extremely common name, especially back then, but still to see it written out like this in another real note from W.W. whoever they were - with no nasty petrified gum in sight. He shivered. “The utility corridors... The space between spaces?” he said softly, not a whisper. A whisper was a harsh, cutting sound, but a soft word was barely audible. A whisper could disturb a silent room and a silent reader a few shelves over - the last thing he wanted.

Lewis carefully tucked the old note back where he found it, leaving just the slightest edge poking out for the next hapless idiot like him, searching for sanctuary to find. At this point he’d take whatever miniscule victories he could get. Now though, now he had to do the Clarity Shuffle with a new dance partner, the school’s theater and auditorium.

“Nope,” he said quietly and picked up the copy of ‘Wicked’ again, careful not to disturb the index card he had just put back a moment ago. “Screw all of that.”

Wednesday morning provided only a brief reprieve from the heat in the form of an intense microburst of a heat shower. It had rained just enough to cascade the sweet smell of freshly watered grass across the campus, and to crank the humidity up to 11. At least this morning the air conditioning was working again, and a little too well. He shivered under his comforter half the night and even getting out of bed was a race to get into the polyester slacks and starched crisp shirt before frostbite could set in.

He coasted through the morning classes without any gum related mishaps, at least, and he no longer smelled like lilacs - just the usual sweat and desperation of a freshman who was in way over his head. But he had a new quest in the quest log today. He had to find Jessica.

She had to be a teacher or an advisor, for a note to be telling the reader to ask for her, and a pretty chill one at that if she was going to let students just crawl around in the utility corridors like that. The thought actually made him smile just a little. Maybe things were finally looking up.

They were not. Murphy’s Law was on Lewis this week, and was not about to let go, and because the universe has a sense of humor, the Clarity Shuffle actually let him into the theater on the first try, only to discover to his horror that the theater itself was extremely in use, a full rehearsal of a musical going on up on the stage, ‘Beauty and the Beast’ if he had to guess.

The blonde girl was on the stage - the Phantom of the Opera sheet music owner, and singing her heart out to a modified, production quality rendition of Belle’s “Bonjour” song from the start of the movie. Lewis just stood and listened in awe.

She was every bit as talented as him, and absolutely a mezzo soprano who could ghost those soprano notes in her head voice if she needed, at least on the lower end of the upper range. He actually found himself humming along as he stood next to the theater’s back entrance. He nearly jumped out of his skin when he felt a hand on his shoulder.

“I’m sorry!” he said reflexively, apologizing for even being here. The arm belonged to a girl with ash blonde hair, but rather than the scholar standard silhouette, she was wearing a black tee shirt and dark denim jeans - and most notably, a professional broadcast quality headset. She grinned at him.

“Yeah? Me too,” she giggled. “I didn’t mean to startle you. Just wanted to ask if you needed something?”

“I’m looking for someone... Jessica? Sorry I don’t know her last name, but I think maybe she’s a teacher or advisor or something.”

“I know like, five Jessicas, including myself,” the apparent Jessica answered, adding, “But, my friends call me by my middle name if that helps. I’m Heather,” she added. “But, I don’t know any adults named Jessica. Sorry. Oh just a sec.”

Heather ducked back into the sound booth at the back of the theater, where Lewis now realized she had emerged from to take ten years off his life to begin with. The music stopped playing and the blonde haired girl down on the stage waved.

“Can we take it from the second verse? I’m just not confident about my mark,” she said.

Heather’s voice boomed over the PA. “Sure thing Lyra. In 5, 4, 3...” The music started up again, and Lyra began to sing.

“Hey, sorry,” Heather said, “Gotta keep on my toes you know,” she giggled. “You want to stay and listen awhile? You seem pretty into it.”

“Can I? I don’t want to intrude,” Lewis answered.

“No way, stick around
!” Heather said, only she had accidentally hit the ‘talk’ switch on the battery pack on her belt, causing it to boom over the PA, and causing Lyra to shriek in surprise.

“Oops... Sorry Ly.”

Lyra, laughing with relief from the shock, gave Heather a two finger Roman salute, and grinned. “One more time from the top? I almost got it this time!”

Lewis bit back a small, embarrassed laugh as he sat down in the comfortable theater seat next to the sound booth. As he watched Lyra strut around on the stage, pretending to interact with people who just weren’t there, something caught his attention. The spotlight flashed over a sparkle of red on a backstage door, partly obscured by something.

It almost looked like a dress? He watched more closely, when Lyra strutted past it a second time, and he realized someone had painstakingly painted Jessica Rabbit on the door. Ask Jessica. He literally put his palm to his forehead.

“Oh, talk about a rabbithole,” he groaned to himself. But, there was just no way he could get up there right now, not with a full blown theater practice going on. Maybe later tonight, or tomorrow? Weren’t these student spaces open 24/7? ‘For your convenience’ or whatever.

“She’s amazing huh?” Heather said, at least not scaring either him or Lyra this time.

“Yeah. I had no idea she was classically trained when I bumped into her yesterday. Her projection is stunning.”

“You should hear her performing ‘Aria di Mezzo Carattere’,” Heather said. He turned to look up at her.

Aria Di Mezzo Carattere was what even got Lewis into choir in the first place, and here she was trying to tell him that she not only knew the piece by its official title and not just ‘Celes’ Opera Theme’ but that Lyra could sing it, too?

“You’re joking,” Lewis said with a skeptical, guarded tone.

“I’m dead serious,” Heather answered.

That’s such a deep cut reference even my retro JRPG loving parents would only get it if I flat out called it Celes’ Opera.”

Heather’s cynical, borderline bored smirk dissolved into a genuine grin as she flopped down on the seat next to Lewis, between him and the sound booth. “Not gonna lie, I did not expect you to get that. Nobody ever gets it. It’s just a stupid private joke between me and Lyra.”

“I’ve played the absolute crap out of Final Fantasy 6,” Lewis laughed. “My parents are retro game collectors so I’ve just always had access to original hardware. It wasn’t until I was like eight or nine that I realized most kids didn’t even know what a power glove was, let alone how janky they really are.”

“I love the power glove. It’s so bad,” Heather answered. They both giggled as Heather jumped up again, but this time she waved her hand for Lewis to follow her into the booth.

The sound booth was more than just sound equipment, to Lewis’ surprise. There were two massive sound mixing stations, true, with more faders and knobs than Lewis could even fathom, but then to the left of all that sat a massive lighting control board, too. Recessed at the back of the booth, a huge, mechanical red button had a note written on yellowed paper that read ‘DO NOT TOUCH - Raven’ on it.

As she used a finger to manipulate the Ableton Live software displayed on a 23” touch monitor with one hand she motioned with her free hand to the extra seat. “Cop a squat and stay awhile, Aria.”

“Thank you,” Lewis said, sitting in the extra seat that to his shock, was even more comfortable than the theater seats had been, supportive and firm, but cushy too, like they were made for much longer use than a few hours watching a production or play.

“So what are you doing here? I mean, what are you really doing here? Why is Jessica so important?” Heather asked.

Lewis shrugged. “You’re just going to laugh.”

“Try me,” Heather said. She looked over at Lewis.

Lewis sighed, looking between Heather, down through the window of the sound and lighting control booth to the stage. The view from here of the Jessica door was even better than it had been. There must have been some kind of curtain or something blocking the view from the theater seating.

“So the other day I was in the music wing and I found this note from a W. W. It said ‘Don’t let the bastards grind you down’ with an arrow pointing down... I turned over the piano bench and there was another note. This one said ‘Search for the space between spaces’. I know this sounds crazy, but it’s like they were talking directly to me even though these notes are probably like 50 years old.”

“So who told you to ask for Jessica?” Heather asked. If she knew anything, she wasn’t letting on that she did.

“I found a note in the library, in an old copy of ‘Wicked’ that said the acoustics in the catwalks are amazing, and to ask Jessica to show me the way. Of course I assumed Jessica was a theater teacher or something. And then I saw that door, or, well part of it anyway. Enough to realize that’s what the note meant. I know this sounds completely insane, and I’m probably being pranked by ancient notes, but I mean, I got nothing else to do, you know? I just... I want to find somewhere I’m not being judged for breathing wrong.”

“Well,” Heather said, “At least you’re honest. I like that. I’ll make a deal with you. I’ve got a full production of Beauty and the Beast, a dozen actors, one backstage manager, and two stage hands between the two of us. Everyone wants to be on the stage, in the spotlight, but nobody wants to move props or handle rigging. If you’d be willing to help me out in the catwalks, I’ll give you the run of them.”

“You... You’re asking me to be a stage hand?” Lewis asked.

“I’m asking if youll be my eyes and ears in the catwalks while I’m stuck down here.” She paused and looked up. Lyra was leaning in the doorway, grinning at them. “Oh! Sorry Lyra. I was just negotiating with a new helper.”

“RIP your sleep, huh?” Lyra giggled.

“Shush!” Heather laughed. “What was it you needed? I’m so sorry.

“You’re good,” Lyra giggled softly. “I just wanted to say I’m taking a breather to drink some water and go pee.” She waved casually and then turned to step out through the nearby door.

Heather turned back to Lewis. She tapped the ‘DO NOT TOUCH’ note from Raven. “I’ve seen a few of those notes myself. From what I can gather, which isn’t much, they were written by the original 2008 theater geeks who stayed with the school back when it went private in ‘08. I honestly can’t tell you much more than that though. But if you’re willing to lend me a hand I will absolutely owe you a favor.” She offered Lewis her hand, at that.

Lewis started to reach for it, but Heather retracted it, spit theatrically on it, and then stuck it out again. Lewis stared in abject horror.

“Well?” Heather grinned. “You ready to get your hands dirty or what?”

Lewis sighed. “I hate you,” he said, shut his eyes tight, and tried really hard not to think of the gum as he took the offered hand. Heather gripped his hand firmly, bringing up a bottle of hand sanitizer that she squirted into his palm afterwards, before squirting some into her own.

“I’m not a monster,” Heather giggled. “I just wanted to see how far you’re willing to go. You didn’t flinch - well, okay, you did, but you shook anyway, and that’s even better honestly. Welcome to the theater. Just, promise me if you find out anything, you’ll share it with me, yeah?”