Quandary

Convulsion

The cicadas were chirping louder and louder. My mind ached under the restless sun. The air had fallen to a stagnant movement and lost its purpose. I looked down at my side. A fist had formed where my hand should be. I looked at the boy in the playground mulch. He wailed and sobbed. I had punched him? I had hit him. The other children looked at me nervously, backing away slowly. There was a face of anger on me. Pure, thick, hatred could be read from me. Had I really hit him? I guess so. That's what a bully should get. The principal of the school was furious with me. My mother and father were furious with me. The child's parents were furious with me. Everyone was mad. Why? The child was making fun of the others because of their weight. So I gave him what he deserved. I punched him. Yes, yes that's right. I gave him a good smacking. Right across the face. This is where it began. A convulsion of my emotions, the day I would forever regret all the mistakes I made. I then made sure that was the last time I'd let my anger bubble out. That was the day I would hide my true emotions. They'd come out every now and then, but it would only be for a moment. No one would ever see me come out of my shell for to long after that.

People, they're so... Confusing. They see bad things yet don't try to stop them. People are dumb. Most of them anyway. I focused my energy and views of society into my school work after that day. Instead of calling out people for being rude or an idiot, I kept silent. Everyone would get mad if I pointed out a mistake or flaw in them anyways. So instead, I put all of my effort into my grades. Every report card in the following years would gleam with excellency in my hands. It was either straight A's or nothing for me. Life was boring when I really thought about it. There weren't any adventures to go on. There weren't any monsters to slay. It was just a societal world. There was this missing piece to me, this thing that I ached for. Only one person could fill that void.

I jolted up in my bed. My skull bumped against the front of my desk lamp. Dammit, I kept forgetting to move that from my bedside. I rubbed the bulge on my head and slowly hoisted myself down to the carpeted floor of my room. I grabbed a towel from the familiar rack in my bathroom and walked into the depths of my desolate shower. My hands monotonously kneaded shampoo and conditioner into my hair. Let's see... An estuary is... The part of a river that flows into the ocean... I numbingly repeated facts and figures from my classes back to myself. Logy... That's the stem for the study of something... I repeated everything I had learned, but she kept digging into my head. I wanted her out of my thoughts. She was getting in the way of my grades. I stepped out of the shower and began drying myself off. Everything was dull, but it was a familiar sense of dullness. The kind of dull that you don't want to change. Because you wouldn't know what to do if it did change. But of course, that was just a lie I told myself. I applied deodorant to myself, fixed my hair, grabbed my lunch, and headed out the door. My parents were asleep upstairs the whole time, I hardly ever saw them. It was like we lived in separate worlds. The only time I interacted with them was when they made me meals or to check my report card. My feet clattered against the uneven cement of the sidewalk. I slouched my backpack over my shoulder and waited for the bus to come. My eyes glanced at the various puddles and muck around the road. They reminded me of when I would play in the rain with my grandfather. The kids next to me quietly buried their faces into their phones. I continued to stare at the ground fervently. A small gust of wind then blew past us. I didn't bother trying to say anything, we were all too shy to talk. The bus then came blundering down the street. It noisily skidded down beside the bus stop, it's doors cranking open for us to enter. I pressed my head against the window in my seat. My eyes softly followed the silent houses that flew by. I shivered in the coldness of the air and buried my hands into my pockets. I arrived at school, and began walking to my homeroom. It was the same as always. It was the same routine, the same life.

"You check out the new dragon quest game?" Called out Barry as he noticed me.

I slumped down next to him in a seat. I straightened my shoulders and flashed a smile for him.