Chapter 18: Nature

Another offering for my faithful readers. I feel like I need to sleep more before I write, but when will I find that time?

Chapter 1: Nature
Chapter 2: Nurture
Chapter 3: Nurture
Chapter 4: Nurture
Chapter 5: Nature
Chapter 6: Nurture
Chapter 7: Nurture
Chapter 8: Nurture
Chapter 9: Nurture
Chapter 10: Nature
Chapter 11: Nature
Chapter 12: Nurture
Chapter 13: Nurture
Chapter 14: Nature
Chapter 15: Nurture
Chapter 16: Nurture
Chapter 17: Nature

How could the second day of school compare to the first? Nerves have settled. Connections have been renewed. New friendships might even have seeds planted in young hearts. And even so early in the year, some lucky kids already had something to look forward to each day. For some it was the chance to see friends. Others can’t wait to learn. Then there’s me, looking for my sister who wasn’t my sister though I felt I had known her since before she was born.

Maggie found me outside the school, so I could walk her to class. She declared this the best part of her day before we parted with a hug that reassured me she would feel exactly the same excitement on the last day of school. I returned her hug and offered a grin that mirrored her own. With one last backward glance, she disappeared into her classroom. I turned toward my own, ruminating on the expectations of a second day some more.

Teachers had been assessed. Seats had been claimed. A certain order had fallen into our young lives that summer never seemed able to offer. Of course, we weren’t orderly enough to already know the new schedule and expectations of a new classroom and a new teacher. 

Ms. Compton smiled at us from under her tight, dark curls as she gently rapped on her desk to attract our attention. Her sharp, dark eyes focused on those who didn’t immediately look up until she claimed the attention of even the most wandering minds.

“Silent reading time has ended. Not that you were as quiet as you could be, please focus on me now.”

As our minds followed our eyes to concentrate on her, a solid knock resounds from the open door. A tall slender figure stands just inside the doorframe with a smaller figure hiding in his shadow. A well-worn, dark suit hangs from his shoulders with folds of cloth speaking of weight lost since its purchase. He glanced around the room, smiling at the familiar faces that have now turned to us.

“If I may, Ms. Compton,” he gestured with his hand for an invitation to enter.

“Of course, Principal Johnson,” she smiled up at him.

He shambled into the room with his shadow slowly following in his wake. Even from my vantage toward the back of the room, his blue eyes startled me with their light shade. Shaggy golden hair fell like a fine mop over his forehead and covered them for a moment. He threw his head back to reveal those eyes once more, but he quickly tilted his gaze back toward the floor to avoid making eye contact with any of us.

The principal leaned in to whisper quietly to our teacher. She nodded understanding and turned back to the class. “We have a new student this year. Please get to know him and make him feel welcome. His name is…” she paused to look at him as her lip quirked upward, “Doll Lindquist.”

He frowned at her and turned pale, rebellious eyes toward the classroom as snickers erupted around me.

“You may sit in the empty seat next to Opera,” our teacher waved her hand magnanimously in my direction. “Raise your hand, Opera.”

I raised my hand reluctantly. Doll bobbed his head and shuffled toward me with whispered voices for theme music. The teacher turned her eyes back to the principal as he leaned in to say something more. I turned to whisper to my new neighbor.

“Your name is Doll?” I blinked as I met his unflinching gaze.

“It’s short for Rudolph. What of it?” He glared at me so severely that the chuckle in my throat stifled and faded away.

I cleared my throat and extended my hand, hoping to distract him from the shame coloring my cheeks. He grinned at me and took my hand in a firm handshake. I sighed at the implied acceptance of my unspoken apology.

“So your name is Opera?”

Now I tried not bristle at his teasing tone. “Yes, it is. What of it?”

“I like it,” he offered a shy smile.

As the teacher and principal continued their whispered discourse, other students found bravery.

“All the girls want to play with their doll,” the other boys chanted, “Especially Opera.”

 

“Cover your ears before she sings.” One of the boys chortled but no one joined in his gaiety, too dense to get it or too smart to laugh at such a poor insult.

I rolled my eyes at them and turned back to our conversation with a raised voice, “They’re just jealous.”

Ms. Compton cleared her throat. Then we realized the principal had stepped back out of the room. As if we practiced synchronicity, every student turned to face her, folding our hands in front of us on our desks.

She shook her head at us, “That was very rude of you. It is time to return to learning, but first I will remind you that we practice kindness in our classroom.”

Chapter 17: Nature

Sorry this is so short. My muses keep trying to direct me to other tales to tell, so I have been struggling to tell this particular story. I hoping to get them back on board with completing this one soon. Feel free to send inspiring treats ;)

Chapter 1: Nature
Chapter 2: Nurture
Chapter 3: Nurture
Chapter 4: Nurture
Chapter 5: Nature
Chapter 6: Nurture
Chapter 7: Nurture
Chapter 8: Nurture
Chapter 9: Nurture
Chapter 10: Nature
Chapter 11: Nature
Chapter 12: Nurture
Chapter 13: Nurture
Chapter 14: Nature
Chapter 15: Nurture
Chapter 16: Nurture

Second grade awaited.  I nervously held my mother’s hand as we left the house. By the time we reached the school, I’d calmed my butterflies enough to quickly exit the car and blow her a kiss before waving goodbye. She waved goodbye and then bowed her head a little. As she slowly pulled away in response to a chorus of honks from the other parents in carline, I swear I saw her raise her right hand to flick something from her cheek. I didn’t give it much thought as they were diverted before they could form. 

“Opera!” An excited voice greeted me seconds before a tiny figure slammed into my body with such force that we barely managed to stay on our feet.

Enveloped in a rib-crushing hug, I gasped out my own greeting, “Maggie.”

“Our school,” she exclaimed happily, gesturing toward the brick edifice as she grabbed my hand and pulled me toward the bank of double doors.

A tall man with salt and pepper hair nodded at me in recognition as he opened the door for us, “Have a great first day girls.”

“We will! We will!” Maggie exclaimed excitedly, squeezing my hand with surprising strength.

“You know we’re not in the same class, right?” I try to stem the tide of her enthusiasm.

“But we’re in the same school, so I get to see you.”

I smiled and squeezed back, “In the mornings, at least. I can walk you to class.”

“It’s this way,” she enthusiastically agreed by dragging me down the hall to a doorway in which a familiar face stood smiling at us.

“Opera, I didn’t know you had a baby sister. I should have guessed though,” my former kindergarten teacher, Ms. Madison beamed down at us, taking in our clasped hands and excited smiles.

“She’s not my sister,” I looked down at my shiny new shoes.

“But I should be,” Maggie assured her.

“Sometimes friends become the sisters we pick,” Ms. Madison says sagely, “It was nice to see you again, Opera.”

I hugged them both and then hurried down the hallway toward my own classroom.

School Strife [FICTION]

 With the school year barely started, a strange tension filled the halls. The town’s famed architect Walton Walters himself would have never foreseen what would unfold in the high school bearing his name. For the first couple of weeks, settling into a new routine, new classes, and newly forced associations kept the building animosity from boiling over. Then the first pep rally of the year pulled the pin from the grenade.

“Our team captain and quarterback who will lead the Wizards to victory this season, Jason Lucas.”

Jason Lucas stepped to the center of the gymnasium floor to loud applause as the senior class president offered this introduction. He threw both arms up in the air like a goal post. Then he waved his hands upward and the student body obliged with louder cheers and a few whistles. Before he could tune them up again, a teacher stepped forward and claimed the microphone with a squeal. The overhead lights gleamed off of his bald dome as he wetted thin lips and placed them closer to the microphone.

“Sadly, Mr. Lucas will be riding the bench until he brings up his history grade.”

The last of the cheers and burgeoning excitement died at these words. The entire school stared at Mr. Lawrence. Most didn’t realize their mouths gaped open with shock. The majority of the teachers nodded agreement and understanding. The principal looked stricken. Jason’s face flushed red and he swallowed hard against a lump in his throat.

The crowd erupted in jeers. Items flew through the air, causing teachers and students to dive for cover. Mr. Lawrence didn’t dive fast enough to avoid an apple and a bottle of soda. The former promised him a black eye by the morning while the second exploded all over him. He frowned and looked around for the guilty parties, but too many angry faces glared back at him and he fled for safety.

Police arrived quickly since half the local force attended most pep rallies to support family members. The other half were just down the street at the station, since their small town usually resisted excitement. Today resistance gave way to chaos and the beanbag guns and tasers came out to calm down irate students and defensive school staff. Thankfully, the pep rally closed the Friday school day before game weekend, so most of the students were easily diverted to their buses and thus became the responsibility of their parents. A couple, who refused to be calmed down, got to sit in interrogation at the police station, so the police officers could let them sweat enough to reconsider a life of crime or subversive protest.

~

The next day found the whole town gathered at an impromptu Saturday school board meeting. The superintendent wiped sweat from him brow though the air conditioning pushed a harsh chill into the room and most other attendees shivered or pulled cardigans and jackets tighter around their shoulders. With every speaker that approached the podium to express their opinion for or against keeping their star player from leading the team to victory, more perspiration coursed down his face. He thanked each speaker politely, regardless of their stance, and then raised his water glass to his lips to perpetuate the cycle of fluids through him. Finally, the last speakers stepped forward.

Coach Tanner joined Mr. Lawrence at the podium. They nodded politely to each other and then began a discourse while people nodded along with the stance they most agreed with.

“We must uphold the educational standards of our fine school. Sadly, Jason failed his first test, so he didn’t even come close to those standards,” Mr. Lawrence explained with an apologetic glance toward the Lucas family at revealing this information.

“But the first game is tomorrow. We need Jason to play,” the coach implored. “Perhaps if you gave him extra credit?”

“You think I have time to come up with and grade extra credit for every student?"

“No,” confusion marred the larger man’s face. “Why would you?”

Mr. Lawrence’s lips raspberried as he forced a sigh past them. “Because if he gets extra credit, I have to make it available to everyone.”

No light dawned in the coach’s eyes, “That will help them all succeed, won’t it?”

“It will help them succeed at not bothering to learn it the first time.”

A roar of defiance erupted from some of the gathered students. Both the coach and history teacher looked up in surprise and fear. Then the spitballs started flying. The superintendent slid under the table on a trail of his own perspiration. Parents tried to restrain their children and teachers raced for the exits. 

The school librarian raced for the microphone. Her normally serene voice rose as she shouted for peace and quiet and a show of good faith by allowing Jason Lucas to lead his team to victory in a few short hours. No one heard, or at least they didn’t acknowledge her.

As more spitballs rained down all around her, she gave up ground and joined her coworkers as they fled to the safety of the halls of Walton Waters High where they ruled supreme and children cowered at the threat of homework, suspension, and being held back a year. The art teacher pulled out rulers and clay-shaping tools to use as weapons. The shop teacher went to work refitting a potato gun to shoot larger ammunition—used textbooks. 

They worked into the night, sleeping in shifts on the mats in the gymnasium as students took their own shifts of heckling and declaring the school no longer in charge of them. When Monday morning dawned, the students arrived, unsatisfied with their forfeiture of the first game of the season on Saturday night. They arrived with backpacks loaded with heavy items that made their shoulders sag just as much as the miserable start to football season. As these two warring factions meet at the gates of learning, who will emerge victorious?

~~~

So this post is so very very late because my children brought a virus back from school. As I am still expected to fulfill all my cleaning and cooking obligations, I did not bounce back as quickly as my little cuties but I have found time to proofread and post at last. Let the peasants rejoice!

First Day Villainy [FICTION]

Tales of a million first days tumbled through my mind. These tumbleweeds only increased my anxiety as I followed the orderly line of initiates taking measured, careful steps toward the double doors offering admittance to the most prestigious school for villains. 

As I passed through the ivy-covered gates, my new school unveiled itself. My nervousness mingled with confusion as I took my first look at this edifice. Despite the throng anxiously marching toward it, the building looked beyond deserted. It gave all appearances of a derelict structure left to molder. In fact, one of the front doors with weathered paint and rusted hinges hung askew.

This served to make the newest recruits aware of each other as our steps slowed, our jaws went slack, and our worried eyes sought answers in the gazes of those nearest to us. When the first bell sounded with surprising clarity, a dozen of us stood on the broken pavement, trying to decide if following those who bravely stepped through those doors would bring us the riches and recognition promised by our call to oppose law-abiding citizens and heroes everywhere.

“Ah. My class awaits me,” a voice crackled behind us.

I jumped and turned toward the speaker. My companions reacted the same for the most part. One didn’t react at all. Probably because giant headphones consumed his ears  and denied admittance to outside sounds. A girl tossed long, brassy locks of hair as she acknowledged the sound with half a wry grin before focusing her attention on the doors once more.

Those of us who turned found ourselves transfixed. I wondered if I had just been turned to stone. The woman before us stood close to six feet tall with long dreads cascading past her shoulders so that a first glance left one thinking Medusa had stepped out of ancient myths. Then she smiled and one pictured a coyote about to take down its prey as she tossed back the long green cloak on her shoulders to raise her hands.

“Come on class. It is time to start learning,” her voice rumbled like distant thunder as she shooed us toward the broken doorway.

More than one set of eyes rolled in silent protest as heavy feet stepped slowly toward the door. I fell in with my peers as our teacher marched us forward. She called out directions from behind until we finally found our way into a classroom devoid of all seating except a long bench against one window.

“Please sit down.”

We obeyed, compelled more by something in her voice than her fierce appearance. As we sat, somehow we all came to attention. I exchanged glances with the people on either side of me. One shrugged slightly as if such things should be expected. The other’s eyes widened almost to the point of hysteria. I decided not to seek reassurance from that quarter anymore. As the rustling of situating ourselves died down, the teacher spoke again.

“Every year, we get a new crop of the worst and baddest up and coming villains. Each year, we also find a new location for our school. In fact, it is not unusual to seek out a new venue more than once during the course of a school year. Thus your school greeted you with one door off its hinges and very little furnishing to make your educational experience easy.”

She paused to take a deep breath and offered a sneer that made my heart stop.

“Well, get used to it. You have embarked on the most difficult career of all because no one really wants you to succeed. But if you succeed, think of the wealth, the notoriety, the satisfaction.”

“And the lair.” Someone whispered to my left.

Our teacher graced them with a withering look. “But some of you will never get any higher than I have. As one of my high school teachers told us, ‘Those who can, do. Those who can’t, teach.’

“Finding out he was right has made me very irritable, so don’t tempt me to practice my villainy on you.”

We all nodded understanding and then the lessons began. As a villain, I would never share our secrets, but within the first half hour, it became apparent that the school required half-demolished buildings and it had nothing to do with secrecy.

~~~

I feel like you might want to know more. I do, but my brain hasn’t committed to digging deeper. Maybe someday I will get real sleep and write more and make excuses less?