A secret

 Both Father Chibuike and Ivie stared at it in shock. The former because she had been so well behaved with the others he hadn't expected her to pull such a stunt and reveal this secret this early, and the latter because she hadn't expected the cat to make such a grand entry. 

 Dread filled her as her eyes locked with its yellow and blue. "Tell it to go away." Her voice expressed the horror she felt. 

 "She won't bite," Father Chibuike told her. 

 "Tell it to get away or I'll scream and everybody will get to know that you own a cat and the school would send you back to wherever you came from."

 "Really? You would do that to me? And here I was thinking we're beginning to be friends. You hurt me Ivie, I didn't tell on you when you messed Sister Gabriella's office up."

 Seriously, how could he afford to be dramatic now of all times? "Tell it to get way, Jesus, please!"

 He chuckled and walked to where she stood. Carrying her in his arms, he petted her head, moving to hide her behind the sofa. 

 Not contented, Ivie said. "Put it in the bag."

 "She gets aggressive when she is in a tight space, she's very claustrophobic."

 Ivie did not care. "Put it in the bag. For a cat who attacked me twice in my dream, she's aggressive whether in a bag or not."

 Father Chibuike paused his movement to turn and look at her, his expression one of surprise. "You dreamt about my cat?"

 "She attacked me, wanted to eat me."

 "Now, that's a first, she doesn't attack people, good people. Maybe you're not as good as you think you are, I could perform an exorcism for you to cleanse your bad spirit."

 Ivie's jaw dropped. "Are you not scared I'll really scream?"

 "You know how you trusted me and still trust me not to tell about Sister Gabriel, that's how I trust you in this."

 "And you accuse me of telling the Dean," she murmured. 

 He smiled. "Haven't you heard of the term Trust But Verify?" He coaxed the cat into a bag and kept it behind the shelf this time. "Happy?"

 "What are you doing with a cat? Do you know what it means? Do you know what people will think?" It surprised her, his calmness did.

 "What would they think?"

 "That you're doing juju, of course."

 "Do you believe in the supernatural, Ivie?"

 "I don't have a choice." She found herself in the world of the supernatural more often than one.

 He narrowed his eyes at her. "That's an interesting way to reply."

 "What if this was someone else? Is that why you needed something against me, so I can keep my mouth shut?"

 "She usually knows when to hide and who to hide from." This was a first that she appeared unannounced to a stranger, except she wasn't entirely a stranger. According to Ivie, they had spent a moment or two. "But if it wasn't you who told the Dean, who could it be?"

 Her earlier annoyance returned remembering why he called her. "I would like if you spare me from it." She started to leave but stopped. "Did you see any other person by my window last night?"

 "Why do you ask?"

 "I received something," she replied truthfully. 

 "Something you wanted or didn't?"

 "Something I want, but I would like to know who sent it." She eyed him suspiciously. "Tell me who gave you the note you gave me."

 "Told you, maybe, it came from me."

 If Father Chibuike wasn't a priest, she'd have killed him by now, she just didn't want to get on the bad side of God. She turned to leave, for good this time. He called her back. 

 "Not a word about the cat, let it be our little secret."

 Later, she told her friends, when they met in the woods, "I hate Father Chibuike."

 "Again? You should relax" JohnMary told her. "I think you hate this priest not even because of what he does, you just hate him, your defenses are too high against him."

 JohnMary was like that, too observant, subtle details catching his eyes. Or maybe it was because he was so attuned to Ivie that he noticed first what her other friends didn't. Sometimes Ivie liked him for it, sometimes she wanted to put a bullet in his head and shoot him for it. 

 "Is it because of the cat?" Gaga asked. 

 Holy crap! Gaga was not doing this.

 "What cat?" Aisosa asked. 

 "She claimed to have seen him with a cat on the day he arrived."

 "Really, Ivie?" Itohan sat on the branch. 

 "I was just seeing things. I looked, I saw something that looked like a cat. I blinked, it was gone." And now she was lying. Well, it wasn't completely a lie, that was what had happened, but considering that she now knew the cat really exists, it felt like lying. 

 She should tell her friends, it was better someone else knew, she'd be safer that way. But Father Chibuike had wanted it to be a secret, telling them would mean betraying him. Why would she care? "I—"

 "But when he called me to his office today, I didn't see any cat," Aisosa said, thinking.

 "Me too, nothing looked suspicious," JohnMary agreed. "I asked about last night, he said he arrived to see Odion. You know, I was thinking someone else had come before us, but he didn't see anything ."

 "He called you to his office?" Ivie asked them and they nodded. "Gaga too?"

 "Didn't he call you?" Itohan asked. 

 "Ugh…well, he did." Lying would only put her on the spot. Father Chibuike called all her friends and not her? That would give her away. "What did you talk about?"

 Aisosa shrugged. "Nothing really. Just asked a few questions about school and how I was coping."

 "Same," Itohan agreed. "You know Campfire day is coming, wanted to know how we celebrated it."

 "But he called all five of us, only the five of us, separately to ask questions concerning the school?" JohnMary pointed out. "What did he ask you, Ivie?"

 She felt at loss for words. He had called them all to know who had ratted him out, but it was only herself he told his real intention. Hardly it was because he trusted her, maybe he wanted her to believe that he did. But had someone really gone to the Dean to put him in trouble? Surely it wasn't her. 

 Gaga talked too much, so the possibility was high but that it was the Dean shattered it. 

 JohnMary didn't care about things like that, she was sure he didn't even remember what the priest had said. 

 Her last resolve was Aisosa or Itohan, but none of them loved the Dean enough to gist him what the priest had said. Then who was it?

 "Did you have such a long discussion that you find it hard to remember what you talked about?" Itohan asked, breaking through her thought. 

 "Eh? Oh, no, I… he just asked me same questions, hinting that I should be of a good behaviour, you know how that priest likes to annoy me, oh God, how I wish I could kill him." Now she was lying on him. 

 They all look at her suspicionsly. 

 "What?" She questioned them. "What could Father Chibuike and I possibly discuss, y'all know that we're not the best of friends, so what secrets can we possibly have?"

 "It's not like I'm doubting you, I just find it suspicious that he called just the five of us separately." JohnMary said. 

 "Only God knows what he was thinking." She found if suspicious too that one of them had told the Dean. Like, the Dean wasn't somebody you'd see on the hallway and stop him to report something a priest had said, you needed to go into his office, you needed to have intentionality. Whoever had reported to the Dean wanted to report to the Dean, and until she knew who, Father Chibuike did not have a cat.