Fifth Period Massacre
1/1
Glass. It was just like broken, splintered glass. And it was like all the noises had forced themselves down into his eardrums. He swallowed and it felt like sand paper, thick and rough and dry. He wanted some water and some quiet.
Just like glass was cutting at his skull, exposing all his thoughts and dreams and fears into the gymnasium. Flies buzzed and the fluorescent lights buzzed and the crowds buzzed and his ears, well, they buzzed too. His heart buzzed and echoed all the sounds in wide room.
There was cold metal lodged deep in his jeans pocket.
There are countless people in the bleachers. They’re poking and prodding at his confidence. At his sanity. There’s a closet to his right that is filled with all high school physical education necessities. He’s leaning up against a dusty window. A couple mislead flies lie dead and wingless on the ledge.
There’s a pack of bullets in his left back pocket.
Like glass. Broken plates. Broken windows. Broken bowls. Broken glasses. Broken marriages. Like glass grating on his mind. All his seams and hems come loose. Like nails on a casket lid. Bloody, discarded. He feels as if all his gears are off track. There is a minor malfunction and the maintenance crew will be right on it.
He’ll only use them if he needs too.
The crowd erupts for some reason he is ignorant of. It feels like someone is shoving a hot sword down his throat. His chest heaves. He closes his eyes. His ears sear and blister like a fresh burn wound. His legs go weak at the joints. He covers his ears with his hands.
This is exactly what he’s afraid of.
All the words and the laughing and the glass and the…noise. He can’t take it and he can’t take the pills and the pills don’t work but the bullets do. The noise fills his chest with a sickly liquid. He coughs and sputters and utters a horrendous scream that bounces off the beams in the ceiling.
Only if he needs them.
And it all goes quiet. Until someone in the bleachers stutters and snorts. And then they laugh. And laugh.
And laugh. And laugh. From the bleachers its quite a humorous event. A boy with his ears covered, like a toddler having a tantrum, and screaming into the full gym. What a riot this kid must be, right?
Right?
It’s like claws scratching away his judgment. Scratching away his sanity. It feels like a little beetle of pain is wriggling underneath his skin. An opaque sheath of terror is laced over his eyes and he can’t see the rights or the wrongs. It’s pure torture. And he brought the bullets for a reason, didn’t he?
He turned his back on all their laughing faces and filled the barrel full.
The first one to go was a girl with a mouse brown pony tail and blue jeans. She had blue eyes and a prom king boyfriend that really kisses boys behind her back. The second one dead was a blonde beauty boy dressed in blue. He had a mother dying with cancer in a hospital bed a mile away.
A mile away, shots could be heard.
The gym teacher had glasses and thick, muscular arms. He had a wife and two children. A boy with no friends and a crooked nose had his baby sister to look after once school was over. A girl with short, highlighted hair was really, secretly pregnant with her ex-boyfriend’s baby. Her best friend just broke her arm in a car accident down the road and missed school that day.
There was blood on the walls and blood dripping from the empty bleachers.
The girl in his science class who once called him a freak, had loving parents and a bright future in front of her. She also had a devious, drug filled past. She’d just gotten over her addiction. Her boyfriend was going to tell her he loved her today. The tall girl who lived across the street from him watched her best friend die. She was then shot in the chest.
It was deafeningly quiet.
Then there was a boy. A poor boy with no money for new clothes and lived off food stamps his whole life. Daddy, jaded after a lost marriage, kept a gun in his closet for God know what. The poor boy was laughed at day in and day out. He had a nervous stutter and stance. He was scared. He was only fifteen and killed thirty-seven before he was reprimanded by police.
But at least it was quiet.
Just like glass was cutting at his skull, exposing all his thoughts and dreams and fears into the gymnasium. Flies buzzed and the fluorescent lights buzzed and the crowds buzzed and his ears, well, they buzzed too. His heart buzzed and echoed all the sounds in wide room.
There was cold metal lodged deep in his jeans pocket.
There are countless people in the bleachers. They’re poking and prodding at his confidence. At his sanity. There’s a closet to his right that is filled with all high school physical education necessities. He’s leaning up against a dusty window. A couple mislead flies lie dead and wingless on the ledge.
There’s a pack of bullets in his left back pocket.
Like glass. Broken plates. Broken windows. Broken bowls. Broken glasses. Broken marriages. Like glass grating on his mind. All his seams and hems come loose. Like nails on a casket lid. Bloody, discarded. He feels as if all his gears are off track. There is a minor malfunction and the maintenance crew will be right on it.
He’ll only use them if he needs too.
The crowd erupts for some reason he is ignorant of. It feels like someone is shoving a hot sword down his throat. His chest heaves. He closes his eyes. His ears sear and blister like a fresh burn wound. His legs go weak at the joints. He covers his ears with his hands.
This is exactly what he’s afraid of.
All the words and the laughing and the glass and the…noise. He can’t take it and he can’t take the pills and the pills don’t work but the bullets do. The noise fills his chest with a sickly liquid. He coughs and sputters and utters a horrendous scream that bounces off the beams in the ceiling.
Only if he needs them.
And it all goes quiet. Until someone in the bleachers stutters and snorts. And then they laugh. And laugh.
And laugh. And laugh. From the bleachers its quite a humorous event. A boy with his ears covered, like a toddler having a tantrum, and screaming into the full gym. What a riot this kid must be, right?
Right?
It’s like claws scratching away his judgment. Scratching away his sanity. It feels like a little beetle of pain is wriggling underneath his skin. An opaque sheath of terror is laced over his eyes and he can’t see the rights or the wrongs. It’s pure torture. And he brought the bullets for a reason, didn’t he?
He turned his back on all their laughing faces and filled the barrel full.
The first one to go was a girl with a mouse brown pony tail and blue jeans. She had blue eyes and a prom king boyfriend that really kisses boys behind her back. The second one dead was a blonde beauty boy dressed in blue. He had a mother dying with cancer in a hospital bed a mile away.
A mile away, shots could be heard.
The gym teacher had glasses and thick, muscular arms. He had a wife and two children. A boy with no friends and a crooked nose had his baby sister to look after once school was over. A girl with short, highlighted hair was really, secretly pregnant with her ex-boyfriend’s baby. Her best friend just broke her arm in a car accident down the road and missed school that day.
There was blood on the walls and blood dripping from the empty bleachers.
The girl in his science class who once called him a freak, had loving parents and a bright future in front of her. She also had a devious, drug filled past. She’d just gotten over her addiction. Her boyfriend was going to tell her he loved her today. The tall girl who lived across the street from him watched her best friend die. She was then shot in the chest.
It was deafeningly quiet.
Then there was a boy. A poor boy with no money for new clothes and lived off food stamps his whole life. Daddy, jaded after a lost marriage, kept a gun in his closet for God know what. The poor boy was laughed at day in and day out. He had a nervous stutter and stance. He was scared. He was only fifteen and killed thirty-seven before he was reprimanded by police.
But at least it was quiet.