Walk Through Thorns

Chapter 4

Chapter 4

Next Friday, Greta sat next to me in science again. Her green haired friend was sitting alone this time. Greta had walked right past her to join me.

I said, "You can sit with your friend if you want."

Greta gave me a brace filled smile and said, "I sit with Avery all week long. Let me catch you up."

Turns out, I had missed a lot. The english and math teachers told me what chapters to read, what questions to do for homework. I could spend a few hours each night following along the same lessons they did during the day. Come Friday, I would hand in all my homework and do the tests in class. But, science was all about hands on labs. That made it a bit of a challenge to do from home. Auntie didn't keep bunsen burners in the cupboard afterall.

Greta ran me through her notes from this week of labs before the test began. It was a real life saver. I had read the textbook, but I would have been confused by half the questions if not for the refresher.

As tests were handed in, the class sat in silence, most stared into flip phones. The only noise was the scribbling of pencils on scantron answer sheets, a few rushing to finish. After Greta dropped hers off, she pulled out her sketchbook again.

She had moved onto a new character now. This one was a woman with devilish horns curving from her head. She smiled a wicked grin as fire erupted from her hands and around her feet. Greta was able to capture the fantastical robes she wore whipping in the wind as the fires stirred. I was enthralled by the way she made the image seem like it was in motion.

I whispered, "How do you come up with those?"

Greta's hands reached to close the sketchbook, but she caught herself. It must have been an instinct for her. She turned the book towards me and blushed. "They are characters from a game we play."

"Like a video game?"

Greta shook her head. "Dungeons and Dragons. We play with dice and it is all imagined. Kind of like we are telling a story, but as a group."

"So you made up that character?" I asked.

"Yeah! This one is me," Greta said, and flipped back to the knight in armor. "And this one is Brandon."

"That's someone else playing the game?"

Looking at the drawing again I could sort of see it. The devil-woman's face had elements of Greta in it. The knight looked our age, imagined in a more heroic way.

"Yep, and he makes up the monsters for us too," Greta said, "He doesn't go to school anymore, but he is really cool. I'm going to draw Avery's character next."

Fascinating. "How do you come up with the characters?"

"There's a rulebook," said Greta, "You decide if you're like a human or an elf, and you pick a class. I'm a warlock, Avery is a rogue."

I asked, "So how do you win?"

"You don't," Greta said, "You just make up the story as you go. It keeps going. We've been playing for a year."

"You've had the same story going for a whole year?"

Greta nodded, proud. Green-haired Avery continued to keep an eye on us from across the room.

After lunch would have been history class. This week was a field trip. They packed all the grade twelves into a row of musty busses and drove us out to Creighton — what was left of it anyway. They dropped us off in an uneven parking lot surrounded by sagging chain-link.