An Aftermath Of Many Years (CrankGameplays)

7

14th November 2016

The trajectory of a paper aeroplane across the lecture hall was the first disruptant. It was thrown from one oversized boy sitting two seats Infront of me, to another oversized boy, sitting on the opposite side of the room. The professor wisely chose to ignore it. It was an 8 am lecture on a Monday and already he was done with life. His dwindling voice just kept talking, constantly and left me wondering whether or not his friends found his voice as draining as I did.

A phone was the second thing to pull people's focus away. Specifically my phone. It was either Mark, Kiara or Ethan texting. My two other friends were in this class and as I looked around, saw one to be sleeping and the other looking at our professor, who was looking at me. I sighed and muted my phone before sliding it into my jacket pocket. I didn't understand why the air-con had to be so low that it was actually freezing of my theoretical balls.

When people were no longer looking my way, because of the audible disruption, I pulled out my phone to check the message.

You busy?
-Ethan Nestor

I unlocked my phone and turned down the brightness before messaging back.

Kinda...
-Kiara Fischbach

Doing what?
-Ethan Nestor

I'm in class...
-Kiara Fischbach

Oh.
-Ethan Nestor

"Miss Fisk-batch." The mispronunciation of my name rang around the heads of the other people my age. A few were younger. Still eighteen and off-putting my ideas with the fact that at least half of them were on drugs. None of my friends were, despite their chilled out white person personas. My head popped up from behind my HP laptop that was propped open, but the screen was turned off.

"It's Fischbach," I corrected, brushing my dark brown hair from my face. I had not showered and was pretty much rocking pyjamas. My uber driver gave a thumbs up in appreciation for the dark grey hood and red sweatpants I was wearing.

"Kiara, you know the rules about phones."

"No I don't." He just sighed in response and held out his hand, making it distinct that he wanted me to hand off the phone. I made sure to be a nuisance and walk down to him as slowly as possible, just to keep the attention on me for as long as possible. I could hear my friends snickering under their breath. The other had been shoved awake.

"Today, Jr." His tone was dead, but with a smile, I walked up to him and rather forcefully slapped the Google Pixel into his hands. "See me after class."

When class ended, I stayed in my seat, staring at the blank screen of my laptop. Throughout the class, I had contemplated turning it on and editing a video for Mark, but never ended up doing so. I was already on some kind of daily watchlist that was written on the whiteboard. My name was the only name and every time I saw it, I smiled, despite that I shouldn't be. Most likely, I'd be written up for acting out and would have to make up for it in some way. Detentions weren't a thing, and I wasn't one for stretching things enough just to see where things end up.

My professor - who did just casually go by his first name with us - Josh sat down in a seat near me and I looked over, tired from my regretful decision to not make coffee this morning. He handed me my phone but held my shoulder down to stop me from getting up and leaving. I took a quick glance down to see five new messages, all from Ethan. I made a mental note to ask him to stop next time I saw him. He had told me he didn't text back much, but I was vaguely regretting giving him my number.

"I got forwarded your documents this morning before class started and I just want to run through a few things." I sighed. I did not want to run through some things with anyone but my psychiatrist and my doctor. And not even them at times. He took notice of my disinterest. "I understand that you probably don't want to talk about this, but as your professor, I just want to get an idea of how things work for you."

I had been attending since September, and he only wanted to understand now?

I didn't respond.

"I want to ask why you don't take an online course instead."

"Because this is an on-campus one."

"We have an online one that's very similar. I teach it as well."

"Yeah. And it's shit."

"Ok. Well, that's up to you, I guess." He took a long pause and looked at his own reflection in my laptop screen. "I just want you to do well in this class, and if there's a medical condition causing a disruption, I'd hate for that to be the reason you have to retake this class."

"I've only missed two lessons. And besides, my friends send me audio recordings and their notes when I don't make it, and they stop off by my apartment often enough that I don't fall behind. There's no real reason to worry about it." I started to pack up my laptop, shoving it into the carry bag of the same brand.

"I'll try and pull some strings. Just stay off your phone in class, no matter who is texting you." I smiled and stood up. Both of us did.

"You don't know Ethan."

"Don't I?" The shortness in his tone put me off, but I tried to push it away that Ethan was a YouTuber and there was the tiniest possibility that Josh (I mildly disliked calling him that) had enough time to watch his videos, despite that he had 50,000 subscribers. Sometimes I doubted they even knew who he was.

"You don't."

Outside, Jenny was leaning against st the wall in a deep conversation with Aaron. The two of them knew each other from high-school and he had introduced me to her when I mentioned that I was still looking for an apartment. I had tragically met him first day when first sat down. We had a short interaction before class started, but he ended up being moved to the front because he couldn't see. His prescription glasses were constantly sliding off his face. Even though I'd seen him without the glasses, I could never imagine him without them.

"Have fun?" He sang with a mimicking voice. I groaned and shoved him as we walked away.