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Tick-tock, little mouse, I think, smiling around the tip of my pencil.
Your time has just run out.
5
VALE
I’m over it.
This day.
This year.
High school.
Seth.
All of it.
The rest of the day passes as dreadfully mundane as any other day. I flit from class to class, giving my teachers and peers just enough attention to keep up with the status quo. I might be the quarterback, but I’m in no way the star of this little show called High School, despite what others might think.
It’s like those public service announcement commercials that play on TV late at night when I’m trying to sleep. All those bright-eyed, dimple-faced kids showing off their mediocre science fair projects to the soundtrack of whatever empowering song is currently topping the charts. And then some message will scroll across the screen about hope and dreams and community and blah blah blah, as parents and teachers cheer them on, big fat tears rolling down their cheeks.
Gag.
As if childhood dreams ever actually amount to anything purposeful.
“Can I have the bathroom pass?” I blurt out loudly, interrupting my teacher mid-lecture. Her smile flickers with uncertainty, and something sizzles in my chest at the sight. But she’s quick to shake it off. Too quick.
I sigh.
“Sure, Vale,” she says, nodding toward the little table off to the side of her desk. I feel several pairs of eyes on me, but it’s nothing new.
I quickly sign out and grab the thin red rectangle of wood that says PASS in big, bold, black letters across the front. I loop the frayed rope attached to it around my wrist and head out into the hall.
Flyers for the Harvest Carnival are already posted along the walls, in the gaps between lockers, and hanging over the doorways peppered down the hall. It’s not for another two weeks, but it’s another one of those traditions the school goes gaga for every year.
I pass the first set of bathrooms, and aim for the stairwell instead, jogging up the two flights it takes to get to the top floor. I’m currently on the west end of the school, and it’s unspoken knowledge that the west bathroom on the third floor is where you go for a smoke, or a line, or a fuck, or whatever it is you want to do that requires a bit of privacy. It’s the creakiest of creaky rooms in the entire monstrosity that is Grady Preparatory Academy, so anything short of screaming bloody murder wouldn’t be heard beyond the thick, heavy door.
Some say it’s haunted. That some poor schmuck hanged himself from the exposed pipes back in the ’70s.
When in truth, it’s just old as fuck. Old and outdated, with a sewer system that’s probably older than Mr. Laurant, my English teacher who’s gotta be pushing hundred.
It’s the only bathroom in the entire school that was never upgraded, and since Grady Prep used to be split in half—boys in the west, girls in the east—unlike the other wings, there’s still only one bathroom in 3W.
Unsurprisingly, there’s yellow tape crisscrossed over the door and an OUT OF ORDER sign taped over the opaque window. Ignoring it, I push the door open and easily duck through the rows of tape, making my way inside.
Oh, right, did I mention that it’s always under construction too? You’d think people would know better than to flush contraband down toilets older than their grandma.
“Well, well, well,” a voice says smoothly from across the room, echoing in the cavernous space. “If it isn’t Grady Prep’s very own Cinderella. Here to revisit your roots in the slums, are we?”
I freeze, eyes widening ever so faintly when I register that not only is someone already in here, but it’s none other than Aston St. James.
His floppy light brown hair looks darker in the dim lighting, all the gold the light would normally highlight looking washed out. It’s a dreary day, and the high floor-to-ceiling windows he sits back against are the same opaque, bumpy glass that fills the window on the door. They hardly let in any light.
What he just said finally registers and I feel my nose flare. Defensiveness rocketing up my spine and holding me rigid.
Aston’s mouth ticks up, and it’s only then that I notice the red tint there. Only this time it’s not from a lollipop, but from the chocolate-covered strawberry he currently has impaled on a pocket knife.
