I woke up the next five weeks like this:

  I yawned, stretched, changed my clothes, took a shower, ate breakfast with my family, and off I zoomed to school on my bike. Nothing had changed these past couple of weeks and even though my grades had been doing surprisingly good. To the point where they’ve stayed afloat for longer than one day. I did feel like something was missing...

  I didn't know what, though. I was too focused on school to care.

  I'd usually meet my friends during the school day seeing Jack, Maurice, Steve, and Angel in homeroom. Seeing Steve again and, of all people, Veronica in A period which was a mix of Chemistry and Biology. If you want to know how it feels like to be in a constant loop of torture, just be within 10 feet of Veronica.

  Then in B period Angel, Emily, and that girl I had seen on the first day I would usually see. That classroom was mathematics and yes, I and a few other students switched our mathematics class from the last of the day to B period. This was because mathematics sucked, or in other less favorable words, was the shittiest class since the teacher had a few screws in his head lost.

  In my C period I had Fron in the Gym. This was honestly pretty good, it's the only class I had apart from D period that had an actual teacher which was English, Language & Arts. I changed it from cooking after that one particular Emily and Jack egg incident.

  Finally, in D period, I had Robert and that girl that I had seen the first day once again. If I must be honest, I'd rather not talk about the teacher for that class. It just makes my skin crawl even talking about her.

  Anywho, I tried to ask Angel how it was nearly the end of September now even though we had our first day of school at the beginning of August. She checked her calendar and legitimately looked utterly astonished. It was incredible how time flies when you're not having fun and just studying for the next test to come by.

  My friends, myself included, realized that high school was—to put it in shortened terms—extremely plain. I decided that after school some of us could make plans together to go out somewhere. After all, it had been five weeks ever since we've all seen each other at the same time.

  Robert and Angel were unfortunately unavailable due to their families needing them while Emily couldn't go because she suffered a sprained ankle after one of her pranks didn't work out so well.

  And that "prank", if I should even call it that and not a [REDACTED] attempt, involved her trying to shut the power off throughout the entire school. You can guess how that went since she wasn't an electrician. She's lucky that she only got away with a bruised ankle because she tried kicking the power box in the D building.

  However, Steve, Maurice, Jack, and Fron were available!

  I texted all of them on my home phone and made sure the group chat we had was locked by a password I could only remember. My brother Coal was prone to snooping around the home phone whenever no one was around. As we had recently exchanged numbers a few weeks ago, creating the group chat was as easy as smashed pie. The chat went something like this:

  "Hey! Are you guys up to meet sometime this weekend?”

  "Still got my ankle to heal. Sorry :/" Emily texted.

  "LOL. Anyways, sorry George I can't come." Angel replied.

  "Sure I can go. Just gotta convince my mom first which should be easy since your mom and my aunt are good friends." Steve texted.

  "What?! No way your relatives know each other!"

  I couldn't tell if Emily was being sarcastic or not. But either way, yeah. It was an odd story about how my mom and his aunt met.

  Now that I think about it more, it was really weird how they met. Supposedly, as Coal puts it, it was through my father's funeral that Steve's aunt met my mother. She had known my father from working with him in the military. Afterward, they automatically hit it off and started to plan little play dates with Steve and me. But honestly, I'm getting tired of Coal repeating that story to me whenever Steve was around.

  "Oh yeah, I can come. Just gotta know the date and time!" Fron texted.

  "Yeah. Me and Jack can go too!" Maurice texted from Jack's home phone.

  I knew this because the text bubble usually shows you where that phone number is from and whoever texted that text from that phone number. How? I have no clue, you’d have better luck getting that info out of a donkey than me.

  Welcome to the future!

  "Uhhhh, Maurice? Why are you at Jack's house?" Steve texted back.

  "He stole my heart."

  The texting stopped. I could feel Steve's heart shattering into a million pieces all the way from here. However, I was a bit more logical,

  "Do you mean your Hart?"

  "Hm? OH YEAH, HART!! My bad!!! Stupid autocorrect!"

  I sighed in relief. A Hart was just the badge that we used to be recognized as a freshman, sophomore, junior, or senior at our high school (basically an updated lanyard). We had gotten them recently since our Bases had worn out. I wondered why Jack had stolen her Hart in the first place?

  "Alright, that means Fron, Steve, Jack, and Maurice can come. Anyone else?

  "I CBA Geo. I have to do smth asap with my fam srry." Robert texted.

  I didn't know what half of those words meant, but I just assumed that he probably couldn't come since he said sorry. Or well, 'srry'.

  "Where should we go even?" Steve asked while Robert and Emily went offline. Angel still stayed online surprisingly enough.

  "I heard of this place called the Waterway. It's a cool café at the edge of town that has a waterfall and forest area at the back of it! It could be a cool spot where we could hang out." Fron texted.

  I thought it was a great idea apart from one little thing. Does the café have railings around the waterfall? Because knowing how Steve and Jack could get sometimes, they just might be clumsy enough to fall in. Even with those railings…

  "Sounds great!" Maurice texted.

  "It sounds like a fantastic idea. Where did you hear this from Fron?" Steve texted back.

  "My mom's friend works there and she usually tells her about it when she's on the phone." Fron texted.

  "Ooooh, that's so cool! Do you think we might get some special treatment since she's your mom's friend?" Maurice asked.

  "Ehhhh my mom's friend hasn't seen me in years. So I would doubt she would recognize me." Fron texted.

  "Aww, god damn it." Maurice texted back.

  "I hope I have some cash still in my wallet." Steve texted.

  "Why don't you just check it yourself, bozo?"

  "Because uh. I'm too lazy." He texted back. I chuckled and saw Maurice texting, or well Jack.

  "Hey, it's Jack. Why don't we meet on Saturday at around noon time?"

  "What happened to Maurice?" Steve asked.

  "She's just sitting next to me. She has her Hart back after constantly annoying me about it." He texted back. Then apparently, Maurice grabbed the phone from him and texted,

  "Don't believe him! He's just a jerk!" Before the phone got swiftly taken away by Jack once again.

  "Alright, then it should be settled. At around noon we go to the Waterway Café to meet up!" Steve texted.

  We all agreed and I settled my phone down onto my hardwood bedside table. I caught sight of my sister playing with a penny on the ground. I asked her,

  "Obsidia. You know that's a penny, right? We have some toys for you upstairs." Even if those toys were limited and were worn down to bits and pieces of its former self.

  "Yeah, I know that. But something so small can be so interesting!!" She exclaimed, holding up the penny to my face. I smiled and I couldn't disagree with her, that is one cool-looking penny.

  ?????°? ☆ ?°?????

  I woke up the next day and did the same routine I'd been doing for the past five weeks. Get up, yawn, stretch, bathroom, and get myself changed. I picked up my backpack and headed downstairs where my mom was cooking scrambled eggs. The smell was as recognizable as my home.

  "Hey, honey! Here." She stated, giving me the scrambled eggs with bacon on the side. I ate it all up as long as it takes a car to travel a foot and back.

  "Thanks, mom! I gotta go now if I don't want to be late, cya!" I exclaimed.

  "See you later!" She shouted back.

  I hopped onto my bike stored in the garage and rode it to the unfortunate high school I go to. I skimmed around, seeing the birds flying up towards the trees, water sprinklers on lawns turning on and off in synchronization, and the sunrise on the horizon. Only one day away from October and the café meetup. Better yet, it was Friday!

  I arrived at the school and parked my bike next to the multiple hoverboards hovering over the bike rack. I placed a lock securely placed onto the rim of my bike just to make sure it wouldn’t be stolen.

  I put on my Hart; a pin on the back of our shirts and walked inside the A building. I ran up the stairs and got to the second floor where I saw Steve and Jack already there in the homeroom. However, they were standing outside with a ton of kids surrounding the doorway.

  "What happened?" I asked Steve.

  "I don't know, I just got here. I tried to ask Jack, but he doesn't know anything either. Though, I think he heard that there might've been a fight in our homeroom today." He said.

  "Oh shoot. Who fought?" I asked him. He shrugged as Jack shoveled himself through the crowd to get to us.

  "So, I got some more info. The pick-me girl and another kid got into a nasty fight at the back of the classroom. We're going to have to go to the B building for our homeroom today." Jack said.

  Ms. Svena then walked up to us and rubbed her neck. She said in a strained and somewhat stressed tone,

  "Sorry about this, students. But it seems like the two students that fought are going to be indefinitely expelled from this day forward. Please go to the B building and on the second floor there should be a door labeled 'F channel'. That is where you'll be going. Thank you." She stated.

  My mind gradually grew worried that perhaps Angel or Maurice was the other student who fought that pick-me girl. So, I rushed over to Ms. Svena.

  "Ms. Svena! Ms. Svena!!"

  "Yes, George?" She turned around to face me.

  "What happened exactly? If you don't mind me asking." I asked her. She sighed once more and took off her baseball cap, swiping her hair back before putting it back on.

  "Jessica, the girl that started the fight, was picking on another girl. I think her name was Angel."

  This story has been unlawfully obtained without the author's consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.

  Oh no.

  "Anyways, another girl stood up against Jessica and they started to get heated up. Everything would've been just fine with them only having a bad attitude against each other…”

  “If it wasn't for that Jessica girl deciding to throw a stapler at Angel. Resulting in the girl defending Angel launching at Jessica. I believe she has a fractured skull and is in the hospital as we speak while the girl that defended Angel will be indefinitely expelled, as well as Jessica. I don't have any stance against either of those girls. But if you asked me personally." She leaned down towards my ear and whispered,

  "Jessica may have or may have not deserved it." She winked and walked inside the homeroom.

  My mouth was open in wide disbelief, how could someone be so heartless to the point where they would throw a stapler at someone they’d disagree with?

  "So, what happened?" Steve asked me suddenly.

  "Angel was getting picked on by that pick-me girl, who's named Jessica of all names. Another girl stepped in to defend Angel and they fought each other. Jessica and the girl who defended Angel got expelled." I responded quickly, still trying to process what I had heard.

  "Oh crap, I hope Angel is okay," Steve said.

  "Good on that girl for defending Angel. What a prick Jessica is, glad she's expelled." Jack stated.

  "Yeah, I just feel like this incident wasn't coincidental," I muttered to myself.

  We quickly walked to the exit of the A building and walked over to the B building where we were instructed on where our new homeroom was. Ms. Svena was right, the door did have a big sign that said 'F channel'.

  "Why are these rooms called channels?" Steve asked me. Jack and I shrugged since we had no idea why. Once we got inside, we caught sight of Maurice was already at the back and we walked over to her.

  "Hey guys! Did you hear what happened?" She asked us.

  "Yeah. I feel bad that girl got expelled." Steve said.

  "You mean Jessica?!" Maurice darted her vicious, black-hued eyesight towards Steve.

  "What!? Oh no, not her! I meant the girl that defended her." He said, raising his hands up in the air. I wondered who decided to avenge Angel from being hit in the head by a stapler. I personally wanted to thank her.

  "What are you thinking?" Jack asked me.

  "Hm? Oh, nothing. Don't worry about it." I stated.

  "Well, I'm wondering if Angel's okay after all of this," Steve stated. I sat down next to Jack, forcing Steve to sit next to Maurice. He noticed this and gave me a wrathful glare. I smirked and focused on what the robotic teacher talked about…

  Honestly, I have no idea what the teacher was talking about. I only caught the words 'run' and 'the physical concept of a core'. Try to decipher what that teacher was saying by just those two clues, I'll wait.

  Meanwhile, Angel never came into the homeroom which I would expect from her. She had just gone through her second bullying experience in five weeks. I would take the day off if I were her, but knowing her, she might try to repeal the expulsion of the girl who defended her.

  As soon as the virtual bell rang throughout the loudspeakers, I walked to my first period—the one with Veronica and Steve. I sat down next to Steve while Veronica sat at the very front. The robotic teacher came in and began teaching us about the mitochondria and about how it's the powerhouse of the cell. I ignored this, though. Because believe it or not, I had ALREADY LEARNED THIS IN ELEMENTARY!”

  I didn't know why this high school had been teaching us nothing but crap we'd already learned. I guessed it was a glitch with the robotic teacher program. Although, perhaps this news wasn’t as bad as I had thought. I could just relax while these robotic teachers could teach us things we already knew like long division and the division of cells.

  Ah, what am I thinking?! What about Ms. Svena? And even though I despised them, I still have to include the Foyagers too. Where will they work after all of this? I could only imagine what the Foyagers would do after leaving high school. They would probably join the military again and—

  "Yo, the teacher asked you a question," Steve whispered to me. I looked around the classroom and saw that everyone was staring at me as Veronica gave me a smug look. I stared at the teacher’s ridiculously plain face and internally panicked for a second or two before I just blurted out,

  "It's the p-powerhouse of the cell?" The teacher looked delighted and shouted,

  "CORRECT!" I sighed a huge relief while Steve looked dumbfounded.

  "Dude, the teacher asked what is the process that plants use to convert sunlight, water, and carbon dioxide into sugars and oxygen. How the hell did the teacher say that was correct?!" Steve whispered to me.

  "I guess I'm just that much of a genius!" I looked towards Veronica and gave her a raspberry back in appreciation for her “support”. She looked at me in disgust and turned around quickly as the robotic teacher continued to teach us things that we'd already learned.

  ?????°? ☆ ?°?????

  The bell soon rang and I was on my way to the third floor where my mathematics class was. It would've been with Angel and Emily. But because they were both gone with Angel likely recovering from something that was out of her control and Emily recovering from an ankle totally in her control. I would be all alone. As I walked into the cramped classroom full with kids that could care less about being here. I sat in the middle of the classroom where I spotted the mysterious girl from the first day.

  She was sitting right next to me.

  Again though, she seemed so, perhaps too familiar. I couldn't pinpoint where exactly I saw her before. Middle school? Pfft, no way. I remembered all of the faces from middle school and she didn't look like a girl I had met there.

  Alright then, maybe a childhood friend? I moved around a lot since my mom worked different jobs in entirely different counties from time to time. But I never really interacted with my neighbors at all. Even when I did, it was usually just a ‘hello!’ or a 'how was your day?' type of conversation. Nothing deep. Plus, I still didn't recognize her from being a past neighbor.

  Then the only option there could be was—

  "Elementary school?" The girl asked me. My heart beat ever so faster than ever beforehand as I looked away from her. My mind was, as swift as an online argument, suddenly surprised by her speaking to me. Yet, before I could respond to her, the robotic teacher yelled in a screeching voice,

  "OKAY CLASS!! LISTEN UP, WE ARE FOCUSING ON MULTIPLYING FRACTIONS TODAY!" The whole class groaned and I have to admit, I did too. I hated fractions.

  I wanted to ask her if she knew me from elementary school. But between me looking at the robotic teacher, making sure I didn't miss the teacher calling me, and the rigorous work that the teacher just would not stop giving to us. I didn't have any time to ask her anything and soon enough, the bell rang and she rushed out of the room.

  God damn it, I missed my chance. But at least I still had D period I could use to ask her a couple of questions.

  Next up was lunch and to be honest, I didn't do much during this time other than consuming a PB&J my mom had packed me before school started. It was delicious and as I looked over the trees surrounding me as I was sitting outside during lunch. I closed my eyes and relaxed for the remaining serene minutes of lunchtime.

  I’d better go to the gym at the back of the A building before I was late. I walked from the B building to the A building, following a gravel pathway that had haphazardly been paved, and I got to the swinging front doors of the Gym that looked more like a prison than anything. Its iron bars blocking out the windows combined with its abnormal rectangular shape forced my brain to stare at it for a moment of shifting time.

  Then, in the blink of an eye, I saw Fron stretching right outside the door and I waved towards him.

  "Hey, man!" I exclaimed.

  "What's up, George? Ready for the gym? I can't wait until I beat that record!"

  "You mean the record for the highest stick jump you can do while running? Bro, that record is like seventy feet and was made by a guy three times your height."

  "Soo?! Many people my size have done forty to fifty feet before! Why can't I go for double that?" He was legitimately 6’0”. The guy who had previously broken the record was nearly eight feet tall. I may have lied about the three times your height part I said, but I mean come on! Even I wouldn't dare to do it and I stood at a normal 5'7".

  "Ay, keep dreaming Fron." I said.

  I hadn't noticed this before, but he'd gotten more comfortable shouting at my face. Even though that sounds like a horrible thing, in actuality, it was a good thing. In middle school, he wouldn't dare raise his voice to teachers like the Foyagers and students yelling at him for something foolish he had done.

  Now, he's confident enough to yell at me. How much he's grown up in only a few weeks! It could make a grown man cry.

  As we entered the gym, I forgot to mention that it was relatively small. At least smaller than my middle school one. But that might be because while the middle school had thousands of students all crammed into one building, this high school only had one to two thousand scattered around three buildings. An upside to the gym was it had been completely cleaned. Meanwhile, back in middle school, you would be lucky to find a corner not infested with rats.

  "It even smells clean in here," Fron stated, having the same thought I had. I nodded and moved to the main court area. Fron decided to sit in one of the levitating bleachers. Trust me, those bleachers sound cool but in reality, they're just suspended by construction wires.

  "Where's everyone else?" Fron asked me. I set down my backpack and looked at my Scruplot to check the time.

  "We're three minutes early. Some people should be coming in right about—"

  The doors opened and multiple students piled into the courtroom. The gym coach jogged in a couple of seconds after the rest of the students, announcing we would be playing dodgeball. Girls v. Boys.

  "Oh boy. Are you ready for that?" Fron asked me.

  "Born ready!"

  Now, the girls here at the high school weren't only ruthless in emotional damage like Jessica, those three girls I saw on the first day, and Veronica. But they were also ruthless when it came to gym activities. Hell, the score between girls and boys is even with us winning four games and them winning four games as well. This being a tiebreaker, meant they were going to try twice as hard to knock our brains out from our skulls.

  As the gym teacher lined us up and the dodgeballs were placed into the middle of the court in a single line. The coach then blew his whistle and all of us ran for the dodgeballs. I slid down to pick one of the balls up, aimed, and fired.

  What happened next you may ask?

  I have no idea.

  I mean it. I literally have zero clue what happened next. One second I was conscious and in the process of throwing a dodgeball at a girl. The next second I was in the nurses' office getting stitches on my head while Fron stared worryingly at me by his seat. He stood at the entrance of the nurses' office, rapidly tapping his foot on the hard concrete below. The robotic nurse said to me something along the lines of,

  "You were lucky to not have a concussion. Please drink plenty of water and make sure your head isn't in contact with anything else."

  That's odd. Lucky? I'd call myself unlucky since not having a concussion meant I couldn't go home. Either way, I was able to walk with some stability with Fron helping me walk back to the Gym’s court where I sat for the rest of the game. After about an hour of play, the boys had lost to the girls in a miraculous 3-2 score. I was honestly surprised we somehow got two considering the boys were nervous that they were going to end up like me. Which makes sense.

  After the match, it was now free time where we could do whatever we wanted inside the Gym, as long as we stayed in the Gym and didn’t wander out of here. Fron decided to sit with me and made sure I was okay by asking a plethora of stupid questions,

  "Does your head hurt?"

  "Yup."

  "Can you focus on anything?"

  "Yup."

  "Would you jump off of a bridge for Veronica?"

  "Yup."

  "CAN YOU PAY ATTENTION FOR TWO SECONDS!?!"

  Sorry Fron, but I really couldn't since the questions you had asked me were so damn obvious that even a blind and deaf man would be able to answer for me. My head was aching and although I could focus and wasn't in the mood to throw up, in other words, symptoms of a concussion. I was still having a hard time with light.

  After gym was over, it was now time for the last class of the day. Which for me was English, Language & Arts. As soon as I got to building A’s side entrance, Fron told me,

  "Hey. Can you at least be careful for me? Remember, you have to survive for that Waterway Café!" I did want to go to that café after all…

  Fine, Fron.

  I walked up the stairs and held onto the railing so I didn't fall down the stairs and crack my head open like an egg. As I got to the third floor of building A, I swiftly passed through the main hallway lined with lockers and closed classrooms. I soon realized after a handful of echoing steps that I might’ve lost my way.

  I walked over to one of the lockers, placed my backpack between my body and the locker, and unzipped my backpack. I opened it and took out my Scruplot where I could barely see the screen. Remember, I couldn't exactly look at light very well. Nevertheless, I saw that the classroom was on the second floor. Looking at the time, I had exactly thirty seconds to get to class. Well, now twenty-nine.. twenty-eight—

  SHOOT, I NEED TO HURRY UP!

  I quickly put my Scruplot into my bag and somehow skipped through three stairs at a time to the second floor. I rushed over to the open room and rushed inside as soon as the bell rang loud and clear in my thumping eardrums.

  PHEW!

  I looked around only to see that my seat was still open. I spotted Robert not far from where I was but he was far from where I sat. Because the teacher was about to begin the class, I skipped over Robert and sat myself down. I felt bad that I ignored Robert, yet the teacher was stabbing daggers at me. It wasn’t because of me being nearly late, no. It was because my teacher was.. ugh.

  "Hello, class. Now as some of you may know you cannot get to class late, please remember that!" Mrs. Foyager exclaimed in her fraud of a smile.

  "Anyway, today we shall focus on the use of ABAB poetry. Now please, acquire a book and flip to page 78 where we'll be taking a look at William Shakespeare." She said. Gosh darn it, I should've known this bit—

  Woman, would've planned on picking me in her class after we called out her husband for something he entirely did.

  Now, to get a book was surprisingly easier than it was in middle school. All I had to do was look at my desk and press on a screen at the top of its steel surface. After I tapped on the screen, I simply requested a book and the screen slid out of the way to put a book on my desk. I flipped it over to page 78 and glanced towards my left.

  My god, she was still staring daggers at me! What the hell was wrong with this woman!?

  "Geez, that woman hates you." A girl said to my right. I usually focused on my book, so I didn't look around me all that often. As a result, I had no idea who this girl was. I spoke without directly looking at her.

  "Pfft, are you talking to me?"

  "Yeah. She's been muttering vile curses under her breath while staring at you the whole time."

  "And how do you know-" I turned around.

  It was the same girl that was in my B period, the same girl that I saw on the first day, the same girl that looked so familiar from elementary school! And finally, the name came to me,

  "-that, Aquafene?"