Human Canvas :: a.i [slow updates]

Chapter 10

The eraser standing in the end of my pencil is getting worn off from all the times I've dragged it across the sheet of paper rested against the classroom's desk.

I look over at Audrey, trying to take a glimpse at what she's writing, but her handwriting is too small, in contrast to mine, which is big, bold, and ugly.

I sigh, rubbing my tempers. I look around the classroom, and everyone's heads are buried in the paper, they're writing quickly and excitedly, trying not to take longer than the ten minutes Ms Pickett gave us to write the two hundred worded essay.

Ms Pickett brought a small piece of text to class, written by an unknown author, in which he compared love to driving on a rainy winter night.

I don't think any of the students really understood what he meant, and that outraged our English teacher, and so, she made us pick up a pencil and write our own definitions of love.

I don't know what I'm supposed to write. I don't know what love is or what it means or what is it good for. Love, to me, is a big load of crap; an excuse that people use to make it living in this tremendously awful world, a little bit easier to cope with.

I pick up my pencil again and decide that it's better if I just write the first thing that comes to my mind. Ms Pickett never said she would collect the essays and grade them, so I might as well bullshit all of it.

I look around, searching for a spike of inspiration, and my eyes lock with a distressed Ashton, running his hands through is hair as if the words that he needs so badly to write are hidden in his beautiful locks.

As if he feels me staring, he lifts his head slightly and his eyes meet mine. I smile, not knowing exactly what else to do and suddenly, in the middle of his growing smile, his head snaps back down and he furiously starts writing again, quickly and almost excitedly.

I groan loudly and my teacher shots her typical death glare in my direction, but I just ignore it, turning my gaze to the clock on the wall, noticing I only have eight minutes left to write two hundred words about a subject I barely know anything about.

"Love is..." I mumble to myself, completely oblivious to what the next words should be. "Fuck!"

Desperation and a complete lack of motivation hit me all at once, and I look back at the eight grade, when essays as stupid as this one were frequent.

Anger builds up inside me and I drag the pencil across the white sheet of paper, writing what could be a big fuck you to our English teacher and whoever said love is like driving in the rain.

Once I start, the ideas and words start forming and sliding off the tip of my pencil a lot easier and smoother, and I wonder where all of this came from, if all I did was examine my lack of experience in the field of love.

After a few minutes, I place the pencil down and count the words, there's only three words that weren't supposed to be there, so I let them be and prepare to proof read the mess that are these two hundred and three words, and how none of them have absolutely nothing to do with what my teacher was expecting us all to write.

"To write about love should not be-" I start running my gaze across my rushed handwriting, but am interrupted right away by Ms Pickett, whose voice echoes loudly throughout the whole room.

"Class," she begins abruptly, "you may put your pencils down and not touch what you've written. I'm going to collect your short essays and read them at home."

"Are we gonna get grades?" Someone in the back of the class asked the question we were all internally asking ourselves.

Ms Pickett smiled, nodding, "Maybe. This wasn't planned so I'm not exactly sure, but everything is an opportunity to evaluate your competences."