Dream Journal

Oct 15 - School Shooting

It was a special school morning at where I locally attend college. A teacher of mine by the name of Ms. Henderson was giving away Chik-Fil-A chicken biscuit breakfasts before class began in her classroom. For some reason, we had normal desks instead of the usual two-to-a-table style schooldesks we usually had. The other teacher in the classroom was Mr. Harris, who doesn't even teach me nor attend that school. 

I sat down at my desk excitedly with my free biscuit, eager to eat it. As I began eating, the classroom filled up around me with students, most of whom I did not recognize. Shortly before class began, I, for some reason that I do not now remember, fell out of my seat onto the floor.

A boy who I recall thinking was physically attractive came and helped me up off the floor. I gratefully nodded before coming back to my seat as Ms. Henderson and Mr. Harris began the lesson. That's when I realized my glasses fell off and I couldn't find them. Rather than logically saying "Hey! Can everyone check under their seats for my glasses?" I just thought that "oh I should wait until after class to find them" and stood at the very front of the room to see and record notes.

The notes on the screen were all early 11th century ancient Hebrew texts, roughly translated into olden day English. I recorded the poems and writings on screen, being confused by their content but glad to be able to learn a new language.

Eventually, the PowerPoint on the board was having technical difficulties, so students all began laughing and talking to one another. Sometimes in dreams locations randomly change for no reason, so it was around this time that I noticed that our class was not in Ms. Henderson's classroom anymore but rather an old middle school-style classroom. Not that it changed anything: Ms. Henderson and Mr. Harris were still teaching.

I heard from the murmurs from the giggling students something about us being on lockdown. No one, even the teachers, seemed to be too worried though. I think that since the classroom door had no windows, whatever was causing us to be on lockdown couldn't detect us in the classroom whether we were scared or just resuming class. Plus, I think the door was locked anyway.

While the teachers fiddled with the PowerPoint and the students continued to laugh and shout, I was still standing in front of the room, pacing a bit. While standing a few feet away from the door, I heard something incredibly concerning: the sound of a doorknob jiggling and being cranked with. There was something -- no, someone, on the other side of that door. 

I yelled, turning away, "HE'S HERE!" and running and leaping for behind one of the desks near the back of the room. 

I never made it to the ground. Before I finished my leap, the sound of rapid-fire gun bullets clanged violently in my ears. I felt a burst of feeling, and then my body felt detached from everything. My body raised so that I was laying down but in the air, and my body could phase through objects. The jarring, numbing feeling was not of this world. I thought to myself, "So I am dead. I am glad it was not as painful as it could have been."

And then I regained consciousness.

I was back in the same classroom, but long, long, long after everything was over. The school had cleaned up the shooting and classes were back on schedule. I looked around the classroom. It was full of younger kids and, though Ms. Henderson was nowhere to be found, Mr. Harris was there at his same old desk at the back of the room. All of the students involved with the shooting were not there either; only middle school aged kids.

I looked around, quite confused. Mr. Harris barked at me, "They left your backpack for you. Grab it and get going!" I looked at my backpack, and it was exactly where I had left it. The back of it was covered in dark bloodstains. I felt a pang of aggravation, and my words came out easily.

"No. Way. I get caught up in a shooting, and they can't even clean off my backpack?! That's disgusting! I don't even want this, what the heck! MAN!" I started yelling at Mr. Harris, dramatically sighing and stomping. I was angry at all of this. Everything happens, and they can't even give me a clean backpack! They literally didn't even move it. 

The students around the room began giggling at how angry I was getting with their teacher. Their voices filled the room, laughing and talking at the opportunity to slack. I meanwhile continued to rant, and I looked back at Mr. Harris. He appeared to no longer be sitting up at the desk. I looked around the corner to see if he had bent down or something. Yes, he was most certainly bent down, head hunched over.

I saw a small gun right in front of him, inches from his lifeless hand.

Nobody should see this.

I stood up, yelling. "EVERYBODY GET OUT, NOW!" The authority and emotion in my voice was enough to easily spook the lowerclassmen to obey. All of them other than two left. The two left behind were two boys: one closer to my age and one around 4th gradish level. I could tell looking at them that they were brothers. I barely looked at them though.

I didn't bother to look more at Mr. Harris. It was obvious that for some reason, my yelling at him triggered him to the point where he desperately hated life. I felt pretty bad, thinking more about it-- unlike me, who became unconscious the second the killer started shooting, Mr. Harris was probably the only survivor and felt severe trauma because of it. I felt guilty for a moment, and then realized I didn't have time for feeling bad and had to keep going. I turned away from the desk where his body laid and stared at the backpack. 

Just moments before I had rejected the backpack, but my mind was beginning to form a plan. I needed to get out of here. I didn't know why I was here but my gut-- my gut kept yelling at me to get out of there. Something dangerous was going on and I didn't want to stick around long enough to find out. Anything could be potentially useful, so I grabbed my bloodied backpack, packing it with different items before zipping it up and hoisting it onto my back. 

The two boys still stood there, looking at me. There was something about them that made them stand out. The only distinguishable features about them were their white skin, light-brown hair, freckles. The younger one wore glasses. My gut was telling me they were teammates. I walked over to them, speaking much but little at the same time. "Let's get out of here." I linked pinkies with the younger one as the older one nodded in agreement.

We began running through the hallways, empty for unknown reasons, assumedly because everyone was in class. Where the other middle schoolers went, I had no idea. I didn't particularly care. Around this time, the younger one had disappeared from my dream, yet neither of us were quite worried about it. The older brother had it under control. The halls of the school resembled my local high school, but where the sunlight had an unpleasant green tint; everything felt post-apocalyptic for some strange reason. We needed to flee as soon as possible, though.

We ran into the swimmers area. The high school in my dream had an enormous poolroom for the athletes to practice in, and I knew we couldn't just walk out of there. We needed to distract the handful of students and multiple lifeguards in there.

As we raced through the water, diving in quickly, we'd knock over every person we passed as we swam. We were starting something, and it was working. For some strange reason, we knew that if we knocked over everyone, they'd water-wrestle the nearest person. It'd trigger other people to join in, too.

It didn't take long before everyone was water-wrestling. Wonderful-- me and the boy could get out of there without anyone noticing. As we began swimming to the edge, a very muscular man swam to us, obviously wanting to water-wrestle. We sped up but he grabbed me into a headlock. He didn't want to hurt me but just wanted to play-- even then, the guy was causing quite a bit of problems. He kept dunking my head underwater, but I'd rise up. The way our arms were locked around each other, it was that the other could breathe only if the other was underwater. He playfully purposely got a pattern going where he'd dunk his own head underwater so I could breathe and then dunk mine under. I fakely laughed, but I was struggling to get away.

My dreams often cut out at random moments. This was where mine was-- luckily, I did manage to get away, but as I waving goodbye to the overly friendly and thankfully friendly wrestler, I awoke at 3 AM, feeling  u n e a s y .