Miss, Do I Know You?

35 - Wednesday, March 10

Perpetually out of step with the clock, I had the misfortune of living my life a few minutes, or an hour, too late that day. I was late for almost everything. Martha had caught a cold, leaving me out of bed and at work before the crack of dawn, and during lessons I struggled to keep my eyes open even more than usual. Lunch came and went in a blur, too, one where I didn't even remember tasting my food.

The day had greeted me with muted pastiness. I was tired, and not the kind of tiredness that comes from a late night out or a bout of insomnia, but the deep-seated one that accumulates. Perhaps it was the intruding thoughts, or the constant doubts. The confusion, the uncertainty. Whatever it was, it seemed to have cast its net like a spider and bound me up, worn me down to the bone, and was dragging me down further by the second. My head was a paradox in itself, floating as if buoyant with helium on one end and straining under the weight of lead on the other.

Mere consciousness felt like a chore. Only the impending quiz kept me rooted in my seat, but eventually, even that wasn't enough to keep me from resting my head on the desk. My dream was dense and foggy, incomprehensible landscapes and conversations. And then, a sensation of plummeting and an abrupt halt jerking me to awareness. I found myself in a nearly empty classroom, silent if not for voices on the other side of the windowpanes.

I was on the verge of slipping out of my seat when the door opened. Alex, a folder under one arm and a cup clasped in the other, was in conversation with someone I couldn't see but could guess she wasn't particularly interested in, given her uninterested nods and barely contained yawns. She glanced inside mid-conversation and narrowed her eyes at me, and if I didn't know any better I would've said she had trouble seeing, but I knew I was about to get cursed out.

A long sigh marked her colleague's departure, and the folder was thrown onto the desk with exaggerated flair. "Finally," Alex remarked. "I was starting to think I was gonna have to kiss you awake."

"Shit," I muttered, passing her the paper I had fallen asleep on. My eyes kept darting to the clock, still losing focus. "Sorry."

"Could've done without the drool stamp." She set the cup on my desk. "Relax. You're off the hook for PE."

I let my nerves ease out. My gaze was drawn to the warmth of coffee below, but it was the warmth of Alex that I really wanted. Merely to sense her nearby. The ambiguity between us was torturous at times, more so with every day that we shared that classroom which stripped away our quiet intimacy and revealed the lines we silently agreed not to cross. I should've just gotten up and left so that the problem didn't have a chance to plant itself deeper; I knew better than to ask for anything then, for we wouldn't have reached any answers we weren't actively dodging, anyway.

With furrowed brows, Alex eased into her chair. "You're starting to worry me. Mendez told me you slept all through his class."

"I'm fine," I mumbled dismissively. "Just one of those days."

Her expression grew even graver as it took in my paper. "And you didn't even finish half of it..."

"You're well aware that I know it all already."

"You'll retake this next week."

"Do I have to?" I asked, but my words were met only with a frosty stare. "I'm sorry, okay? It's been difficult to focus on school lately."

"Maybe we shouldn't have stayed up so late." Alex sunk deeper into the chair, dragging her fingers down her face until she yawned out a barely intelligible, "Am I a distraction?"

"Well," I sucked some air through my teeth and offered a rueful smile, "you are quite hot even in your passive-aggressive mode."

"Mikayla, don't talk to me like that. I'm serious. Do you think I'm a distraction?"