Frozen Tears
"This was part of my today,"
It's not a pleasant feeling to realize that I've waken up in the middle of the night, knowing I will not be enveloped in the embrace of temporary death. Temporary death is a state of being that most call sleep. But I'm different from my often dispicable peers.
Today, the footsteps of my father return inside after he had headed outside. I assumed that he had forgotten something. The fact that my room is next to the front door of the house means that even if I still slumbering when my dad gets up his footsteps and opening of the front door will snap me out of my sanctuary of rest.
However, today for some as of yet unknown reason he hasn't left to work yet. The question of why he is still lingering about is answered when I hear my moms voice say that it's snowing outside.
I mentally correct my mother by replacing the word 'snow' with 'sleet' as true snow is something that hadn't happened in this town in over twenty years. During that time I hadn't even been conceived. I was none-existent, unaware of history's events.
Knowing that I wouldn't be able to go back to sleep I kicked out my feet to the right, jumping out of bed. The floor was exceptionally cool under my sock covered feet. Turning the dial of my electric blanket to off, I shrug of the tingling sensation of icy needles piercing the soles of my feet and go over to my computer. My infected computer. Darn viruses.
I then hear my mother tell me that she suspects that since there is snow descending upon town that school will be canceled. I believe her, considering 'sleet' not 'snow' makes driving a treacherous ordeal.
While I had remained healthy during the winter my computer had succumbed to a virus injected into it by an enemy that could be anywhere in the Earth's biosphere.
I press the computer's belly button, and then turn on the monitor, the sickened computer humming to life. It starts up with no problem. It's quicker load pace actually feeds to my suspicion. It usually takes a few seconds for everything to be loaded.
But upon logging on to the youngwriterssociety website I see that something is indeed not right. A number of times forums and threads that I click on take a considerably longer space of time to load. I see the familiar blue with the words “1 new message”. I smile.
It will be the only friendly words I hear for the day. It's a response to one of the messages I sent out during the night. I type a reply, wondering if it will receive a response in a moment.
For the next few minutes I search around the forums hoping that new randomness has been contributed, I am happy to see quite a few new posts in the randomness and lounge forum. A post in the lounge forum under my newly created topic of “Computer Viruses” makes me a sense of happiness radiate through me.
I love knowing that there are people out there who are not like those of my town. I could tell myself that schools across the world are the same, but I'd be lying to myself. A High School student shouldn't have to have five of his fellow adolescents perish. No, not perish, slaughtered by the hand of murder.
I get up off the seat in front of the monitor and navigate the length of my house to the restroom. I rinse my mouth. Upon getting out of the restroom my mother informs me that school is back on track. Subconsciously I am crying out to her. I've told her many times that I hate everything about the school that I go to, but she typically changes the subject, or tells me about how things aren't too bad. If only she knew.
My mood altered, I shuffle over to the large dresser in the furthest back room of the house. I like to think of it as the Living Room 2, like a movie sequel. Like in the sense of movies, the second living room is not as good as the original.
But, there is at least a wood based heater, and it's where my pet chinchilla is kept. Pulling open the lowest drawer where some of my school clothes is kept I grab a pair of generic clothes, one of the choices of clothing combinations that my schools uniform dress code allows.
With the clothes in hand, I walk back to my room and change into them. Because my room is so cold that if I exhale through my mouth vapor would fume out, I change like a cheetah going through spasms. That's why I once poked one of my eyes with my shirts collar while speed changing.
I go back over to my computer and again see the blue with the phrase, “1 new message” I click on it. Upon reading the message I am confused. I'm sick of confusion. I hate it so much that whenever I sense it hammering at my brain cells during my math or chemistry courses, I simply sprawl random pen strokes on my assignments hoping for the best. Up to this point, it's worked out for me.
The horn of my mother's car honks outside. I let out a sigh, time to go to a prison that I have been sentenced to for a crime never committed. But before I leave I type a quick reply, log off, and shut down my computer. I grab my backpack on the way out, stuffing a golden skeleton mask inside.
When I open the front door I am unable to comprehend what I am seeing. My mother was right, it was snowing! Walking to my mom's snow caked black car, already pulling out of the drive way, I can't help but admire each individual snow flake as it makes it's journey to the Earth's crust, or the clumps of white on trees.
As my mom drives me and my sister to school she explains how she never thought there would never be actual snow this year. I had the same opinion, for I hadn't seen actual snow since I lived out in the country. But that might have been just because I couldn't tell the difference between snow and sleet. If it was frozen and fell from the clouds, it was snow.
Throughout the journey to school I alternated from looking at the new white scenery every few heartbeats. The thing is, I was in the same town, it was just covered in a new coat of paint. Natures most beautiful paint, and no synthetic colors could ever replicate it.
As my mother drove me closer to school my ecstaticly happy mood gradually dwindled. My schools soccer field was a snowy desert, the coniferous trees around campus were capped in snow. Unlike the other trees, which were leafless and looked like grotesque zombie hands, reaching out from their frozen graves, the pine trees were a sight to behold.
I hopped out of my mother car, hearing the usual goodbye. A quick word and prayer. Like always, I look both ways before crossing the now snow covered road. Cars creep by, their exhaust fumes for some reason, arousing my anger, which had been lying dormant.
I ran across the road onto school ground. A battle ground, and I am a single soldier, going against a legion of corruption.
The day goes by rather well, as most of the kids are out in the football field having a never ending snowball fight. The head principal knows this and doesn't do anything about it. In fact, she joined in on the fight! And she was hit by plenty of snowballs. Or so they say.
During the first half of the day there is a performance in the performing arts center of my school. I don't like calling it that, I prefer to call it by theatre, as that is technically what it is. And it is also my last class of the day. the stage is my second home. I cherish it.
The performance at the theatre is entertaining, but lack of sleep has my eyes fluttering. The performers are only muffled singing voices in the deepest crevices of my mind. Occasionally, however, I open my eyelids and watch the performers stomp around on stage. The only performance I gave my full attention to were two mime brothers.
The last performance had at least sixty people on stage at once. It was absolutely insane how loud the house got. The singer on stage had the crowd moving. I, however, was in no mood for screaming, clapping, and raising the roof.
The assembly ended and I went to my third period B block day, finishing the time that remained in that period. The performance had reduced the one hundred minute block period into a mere thirty minutes.
When the bell for lunch ran I abandoned the room, practically running to the lunchroom. I noticed that the halls were emptier than they had ever been. When I reached the lunchroom I realized that here was no need for my rush. There was hardly anybody present. How big was the snowball fight in the football field?
In the lunch line I asked for a sandwich, scanned my ID badge under a scanner and sat at a table. When I finished eating I threw away the plastic container. Curiosity got the best of me and I headed outside. My destination, the football field.
Before I even reached it, I could already see the multitudes of kids running around on the hill that went up to the football field. Knowing no good would come from it I trudged up the hill anyway. From the looks of it the insane snowball fight with half the school had dwindled to a few hundred students.
It was still hectic, without a doubt, but not as overwhelming as I had expected. Remembering that I had brought a mask I unzipped my backpack, and put it on. Then I entered the field and made myself a snowball.
I hurled it at a big guy that sat at the table that I sat in at lunch. There just wasn't any choice for an empty table on a normal day. The big guy cussed and was about to throw the snowball he had in his hand before another one hit him. He seemed to not to notice and instead complimented my “cool” mask and laughed.
I took the opportunity to flee a good distance away, making another snowball, I hit him again with it, laughter escaping from the confinement of my depression. I loved teh feel of it. A rare joy for me.
The big guy shrugs it off and continues with his wandering around, probably looking for easier victims.
Kids run by me, some carrying exagerateingly huge slabs of snow, so big that they have to carry it with two hands. I bend down and gather a generous amount of snow. I mold it into a ball and scan the vicinity of the football field for a target.
I lock on a kid, who I estimate is ninety feet away, and toss the snowball into the air. I feel a surge of adrenaline as the wet splat confirms a direct hit. Before the kid turns around I focus my line of sight in another direction.
“Who threw that!?” I hear the kid bark.
Nobody answers him. I laugh inside.
Wandering through the football field kids ask me who I am. I respond with, “It's not me!”
They seem to be satisfied with that and just laugh as they run around having fun. But I know that most of them are just being truant. And today, they can get away with it. But, I wouldn't take advantage of it. I had gone to every one of my classes throughout the day.
Another kid who sits at the same table I do asks to borrow my mask. I reluctantly oblige. When he's done with it, he hands it back to me. I shove it in my pack.
After a hearing the bell ring in the distance I walked away from the war fought with frozen projectiles. Suddenly I felt a tremendous cold force slam into my face. My vision immediately vanished and all I could feel was pain in my eyes as I rubbed at them with numb hands.
“You alright, man?” a voice says. I recognize it as the big kid I repeatedly threw snowballs at. I tell him how I hadn't thrown any snowballs at his face. There is no time to discuss the the matter further because a bombardment of snowballs slam down around us.
I follow suit with him and several other kids as they run down the hill. I lose my footing under the snow, which had become a slick mush with the consistency of dissolved ice cream, sliding down the little hill.
I hear laughter behind me, and can't help but laugh at myself, too. My eyes are still throbbing painfully as I walk to class. My eyes always seem to be getting damaged. I was stabbed in the eye with a sharpened pencil by a baby in my right eye, and on another occasion by the same baby on my left eye with a blue ink pen. And during my seventh grade middle school year a kid flicked a rubber band in my eyes from only a few feet away. A kid who was a close friend of mine through out my life. But the times of darkness had gotten to him.
My vision was absolutely horrible. I can't even recognize a persons facial features if they are standing fifteen feet away from me. And, anything written on the board in class is a a blur to me. It also makes playing video games harder. I am in real need of glasses.
Entering my fourth period English class I am not surprised to find only a small fraction of the class present. The rest either stayed home or were out in the snowball fight. The teacher didn't care. She admitted to preferring it.
As crazy as she was I had to admire her fearlessness of mocking her students. Including me. She used me as an example of who not to write like, meaning down write long essays and stories. I hated her, because of how she stated that. Like she were addressing a misbehaved dog.
Tears are always frozne within me. I feel too much anguish to allow them to thaw and pour free.
