Infinite, Sometimes

5

This mental quest for answers that Ryan simply could not finish by himself lasted through the end of his math class. There was a chalkboard this time around and his nasal passage dusted over, leaving his throat dry and mouth longing for water. The school's obsession with tables instead of desks for students was really starting to grate on Ryan as he was seated next to a thin girl who had her hand hidden in her purse the entire time. She was unaware of the blue glow emanating from her bag while she assaulted her cell phone's buttons.

            The numbers on the chalkboard lost all meaning to Ryan as he kept studying the boy in his mind. Ryan felt something, and he was becoming increasingly agitated as he was unable to identify it. This feeling of helplessness brought his mind back to the previous school year when he seemed to have no control over himself. His small ego was collapsing under the pressure of the instability of his own emotions, and he hated the sensation of remembering what he used to feel like. He knew it would pass. He knew he would find a way to get his mind off everything, but Ryan was not about to start caring about any X-axis or equation. Y equals M X plus better, much better things to think about than slope intercept form. He started to look around the room as soon as he realized that he was starting to chew entirely too much skin off from around his fingernails. Ryan was slightly amused by the girl beside him and her blatant defiance of school policies. The man at the front of the room could not have been more oblivious to her messaging and lack of attention.

            He needed to get his mind off of the boy before he made himself sick with worry and unwarranted nervousness. His eyes were fixed on the teal tile floor, the same tile that every older room in the school was unfortunate enough to contain. His homeroom was made warm with the hard beige carpet that had been put in the newer parts of the building, but the carpet was far less interesting than this shiny teal surface. The tile was speckled with dashes of colors, brown to gray, making the squares look like they were lifted from a Munch painting. Ryan started to slip into the math class mentality by counting each individual dash of color in a single tile, a task that proved to be impossible due to the bending and fading of certain swirls. The ringing bell abruptly cut the teacher off in mid sentence, something about rise over run, a monotonous babble that made Ryan wonder why he was being taught things that he had learned two years earlier. He stood up and shot past the girl with the poorly hidden phone and exited the room, eyeing up the cafeteria with near tunnel vision while he made his way down the hall. His stomach growled in anticipation of two rectangles of 'pizza' that were sure to be crunchy on top, cold and stiff, but still delicious, by some magical stretch.

            Ryan claimed his food and scanned the cafeteria for any combination of one or three familiar faces, hoping for one in particular, but still feeling relief with the sight of Spencer's hand waving at him from an otherwise empty table. Ryan was glad to finally have someone to sit with during lunch. Spencer's mouth was already full of pizza when Ryan sat down. He nodded and Ryan smiled. "How'd you get here so quick? You're almost done eating, what did you do, just empty your tray into your mouth or something?" Ryan hypocritically shoved half a slice of pizza into his mouth while awaiting Spencer's reply.

            "Dude I have study hall in here right before this. I was like fifth in line or whatever once the bell rang. Where'd you come from?"

            "Math." Ryan spoke through the food in his mouth. "Wanted to kill the girl next to me. She was texting so goddamn much that I'm tempted to bring my computer for her to use next time. It'd be less annoying, that's for damn sure." He raised his hand to finish the last bite of his first slice of pizza.

            Spencer caught sight of his friend's mangled fingers. Spots of dark crimson dotted the skin around torn down fingernails and he recognized Ryan's stress-induced habit. "Sooo, what's goin' on with ya?"