Veridis Quo

Chapter 36 - There Are Thirty One Days of Summer Vacation

There are a hundred and~

Wait, scratch the record!

That wasn't right, the most we could have was ninety... something days of vacation. I didn't remember which months had thirty and thirty one days. Who did anyway? It was as trivial as the birthdays of US presidents!

In reality, there were thirty one days of vacation.

Summer as a season lasted anywhere between two and six months depending on the location on the globe. In regions closer to the equator and general droughts, the in-between seasons weren't felt that much. But in the more radical edges of the world – closer to the poles, Russia, Argentine – the seasons were distinctive. Even then, there wasn't a sharp transition from one to the next. It was a gradual shift, like descending an escalator from the fifth floor to its negative counterpart parking garage.

In the relevant island nation I resided, the seasons were deftly defined thanks to the ecosystem as well. In winter, it snowed, and snowed, and snowed. In Spring, the animals became all lovey-dovey and an influx of dubious messages flooded my chat. In Summer, the sun was trying to give me skin cancer.

Nothing a little sunscreen couldn't fix. Oh, how I loved the modern world.

And just as it was at the start of the school year, when leaves bled and pussed, Autumn announced its arrival so the worms wouldn't Fall.

But that season didn't matter – I had a whole month before my second year would begin.

Instead of needlessly vexing myself with the trials and tribulations to come, I did what I do best; game, stream, and meme.

I couldn't put music in the same category as it was on another level. Plus, disrespecting one's passion was ill-advised if they ever wanted to save some face. I just loved it too much to belittle it.

Not that the other three were bad, mind you!

Memes were memes. An eternal form of art and jesting that was in the beginning and would embrace us in the end. The ultimate form of encrypted humor paraded in plain sight. A picture speaks a thousand words, no? Usually, it's a top text and a bottom text, who has the energy to babble more than that?

Gaming was also a classic. Games existed since the beginning of history; Grug and Blurg placed a bet on who could catch the antelope, the winner would get the good parts. See? I just made up a game that probably happened and resulted in one angry caveman bashing the skull of his brother!

Fortunately, sports satisfied a majority of our violent outlets and the computer was a marvelous invention. Personally, I didn't support bad sportsmanship in the Olympics – whatever their equivalent was called.

But when it came to the online world? Ha! What rules? There was no honor amongst faceless skins! Anything was fair on the newbie beaches and the helicopter that mowed down anyone wielding a weapon, be it a glorious machinegun looted off the heavy scientists or a pathetic bone dagger.

Every naked deserves an arrow but not every arrow deserves a naked.

I sighed despondently, clicking the respawn button.

Having just died in a failed counter-raid sent the chat into a frenzy of mockery and baby-talking me, the image of a motherly panther licking the wounds of a man raised by gorillas came to my mind. This outcome was expected and even welcomed in this sort of game; dying was an inseparable part of the natural process, getting mad was pointless.

When I woke up on the beach once again, I got to hit a nearby tree with a rock thrice before a crossbow's string went off, gracing my ears with the crispy crunch of a potato chip.