Blackout

Monday 19th July 2013, 07:15am

Nina could tell it was going to be a bad day from the start. She rolled out of bed with an aching headache and a groan. She did not feel like school today. Her mother never stopped blabbering on about how this was going to be their last year at school, because in the future there will be virtual schools. Nina hoped that would never happen. It seemed like the world was changing enough around her, without her losing the one constant thing in her life that was her education. That was the only thing she watched and read the news for. Nina nervously followed the possibility of virtual schools as people debated the pros and cons and the practicalities. Her one goal in life was to go to Cable, Media’s top university and the best in the world by her standards. It was the university her mum and dad had gone to, and their mothers and fathers too. Even now, looking at the many posters of the university and its magnificent grounds that filled her bedroom, made her smile.

Nina stretched, yawned and then began to go through her early morning routine. She did press ups, sit ups and a good half hour on the small treadmill in the corner of her room. And while she ran she recited the five ideal principals of a true Cable student.

“One,” she panted, “A Cable Student is devoted and diligent in everything they do at Cable. Two…” and Nina was interrupted by a sound that had recently become a new addition to her daily routine and was unbelievably disrupting. It was the sound of Nathan playing his electric guitar with great ferocity. With his new amplifier he could create an earsplitting racket that tore through his sound proofed room and reverberated through the walls of their house. Before it was his unique and twisted rhythmical melodies that had occasionally filled the house, but everything had changed now that he was deaf.

It wasn’t the gut wrenching explosion of sound that had Nina covering her ears; it was the fact that the sound was being fuelled by Nathan’s desperation and anger. The therapist had said that it would be like this, that it would take a while before Nathan would come to full terms with his prognosis. A teenage boy of his age suffering from hearing loss was rare and would be hard for the family to cope with as well as Nathan himself. Nina wished the therapist had just come out and said it straight to their faces; - it was a disaster, utterly hopeless. That way she would have been at least a little more prepared for Nathan’s self destructive attitude.

Without being able to hear, Nathan had just about lost everything. He had never been a high achiever, like herself. His grades had never been amazing and that had never bothered Nathan. For him, his life was music. Nina could still remember the day, years ago, when he had got his first guitar. Nina had never seen him so happy. Now, as far as she could see, that was all gone. No more music, nothing. Nina and Nathan obviously weren’t identical twins and they’d never been able to sense when the other one was in trouble or any of that paranormal stuff you watch in movies, but they were close. They’d always had each other’s back. Nina had lived her whole fifteen years with Nathan and now she was just supposed to sit back and watch him self-destruct?

“Two. Cable Students are open minded. They are academically observant, aware and open to all new learning concepts and…” Nina angrily stomped off the treadmill and headed for the shower. The racket had stopped now and there was a blissful three seconds of silence, before the sound of Nathan literally killing his guitar had her on her way to his room. Despite the hard exterior Nina always put on at school and in front of her friends, inside she was a lot more sensitive than people thought and Nathans’s helpless anger was tearing her apart inside.

Her mother beat her to his room and Nina only stood and watched as she tried to console and calm Nathan down. Eyes on the floor, Nina vanished back to her room. Her e-pad was already on, and she eagerly checked her Flitter page. Last night she had finally hit one thousand followers and that placed her way up on the hierarchy system of Media’s public secondary school. That was quite an accomplishment for a year nine student and Nina was immensely proud. Pushing her hair behind her ears, Nina calculated she had exactly ten minutes to fleet every tantalizing detail of her morning before she seriously had to start getting ready for school.
* * *

“Frown, much?” Nina raised a perfectly manicured eyebrow as she sat herself down beside Sara at lunch. “Why so serious Sara?” she asked with no hint of a smile on her own face. “The sun is up, there’s only a week of school left, and today we have that new mysterious teacher to look forwards to. You know the one who’s replacing Mr Kerry in Geo?”

“Riiight,” Sara nodded. She had completely forgotten about that. Getting annoyed by Mr. Kerry seemed ages ago now. Sara was tired and in a very prickly mood. She hadn’t slept much over the weekend after Jude’s sinister words on Saturday. Was he actually being serious? Did he really know the whereabouts of the rebels? If so why didn’t he speak up? Unless he was one of them! The questions swirled round and round in her head, remaining unanswered. She was dying to tell someone. Her house seemed scarily empty nowadays. Her younger brother was always in his bedroom messing around on his Suntendo SD, completely oblivious to the world around him. Her mother was either away or pacing her office chatting on endless phone calls. As for dad, Sara was lucky to catch him for a second let alone five minutes. Taylor had left school early on orders from her parents and Sara had no idea where Luther was.

“How’s Nathan?” Sara asked suddenly remembering how his day must be turning out.

“Fine,” Nina replied a little too forcefully as she stopped fanning herself before hastily continuing. Sara waited for her to say something more, but when she did it was of no cheering news of Nathan. “How’s Taylor?”

“Fine too, I guess. I think her parents are pretty hung up about her losing her voice, as they would be of course, only they’re acting as it if it’s Taylor’s fault and are considering all these scary and expensive methods to get it back. Taylor’s terrified. She just wants to be left in peace. Did you know that you can insert technical devices into someone’s throat to help amplify their voice?” Sara asked.

“Ew,” was Nina’s only reply as she flicked open her e-pod. Sara instantly missed Taylor and Nathan, though Nina and her weren’t alone. Nina was flanked with her posse of three girls who were all sitting in a neat row beside her on the bench, like little ducks following their mother.

“OMG!” one of them exclaimed suddenly as the girl’s head popped up from where it had been bent over her mobile. “Did any of you guys know that Derek and Samantha were actually hanging out?” The girl was practically jumping out of her seat.

“No way!” the second one gasped, her fingers hammering her mobile as if she would find the truth from there.

“It’s true,” Nina sighed, flicking her blonde hair back to emphasize her authority. “I saw it on Lifebook the other day. He posted on her wall that he had fun yesterday at the movies, at town, then at Michelle’s house with Samantha!” There were more gasps and exclamations

“Yeah, it’s really true.” The girl sitting closest to Nina added coolly, trying to mimic Nina’s hair move, but failing miserably due to the length of hers. “I heard that they even text!”

Suddenly Sara felt sick and not just sick but tired. She felt inexhaustibly tired. Something about Nina’s cool and laid back behavior was bothering her. Nina had been at her house on Saturday when they had heard that snippet about war on the radio. Who cared if Derek was hanging out with Samantha? Yes, it was pretty shocking, and coming to think about it about quite weird… but it was beside the point. There were more important things going on in their world. On Sunday, Sara had actually taken the time to look at the news and besides all the reports of the black outs and all the top ten safety rules of what to do when, ‘you’re left in the dark,’ there had been the articles on the going disputes and riots between cities. It seemed that an actual war was on the horizon. And in today’s day and age that had to mean a nuclear war right? When Sara asked her mum about it, she had simply smiled weakly and told her not to ‘worry her pretty little head’ about it.

The bell’s shrill ringing woke Sara sharply from her thoughts and she jumped.

“See what I mean Sara. Jumpy as a cat, you are. You need to take a chill pill Sara… and do something about your hair or I’m going to have to seriously reconsider the people I hang out with,” Nina said picking up her bag.

Sara was relieved to see that Nina was only teasing. Raking her hand nervously through her hair she made her way to Geography, curious to find out what their new teacher would be like. Sara didn’t know what she was expecting but it was definitely not the youngish, tall teacher standing before them. He had completely rearranged the classroom. There was a small, weak looking old fashioned white board in front of the interactive white board and there were no usual desk laptops at every table. As soon as they were all seated he began.

“Hello everyone. My name is Peter Ford, but you can all call me Mr. Ford,” and he smiled. Ford? Now where had Sara heard that name before? “I am as you may have figured out a replacement to Mr Kerry, who had to leave due to personal reasons.” There were sniggers. “However, despite his leaving, it’s unfortunately no relaxing time for you guys before the Summer holidays. Your Man vs. Nature essay is still due this Wednesday and due to the apparent lack of work this class has been doing this year we will be doing at least one in class essay or exam before next week. We start today with a little pop quiz.”

Sara sighed heavily. There went her futile hopes of freedom for the next couple of days. Next to her, Nina was frowning in her seat. She was a straight grade A student, something you had to be to be considered for Cable university. Now this man had her worrying with foreign words such as pop quizzes and in class assignments. Where were the laptops?

“Question Miss. Hackett?” the teacher asked innocently reading her name from off of a list. Had Nina said that out loud? “An in class essay assignment is done, obviously in class. You’ll have around an hour depending on the assignment given. Your work will be written on A4 lined paper and handed in at the end of the allotted time. It’s very simple, all you need and all you are allowed is a pen or pencil. No calculators are needed,” Mr. Ford explained cheerily, unperturbed by the shocked and horrified expressions of the students around him. “A bit like the pop quiz I’m giving you now. It’s just a little quiz to help me know how well everyone remembers the last topic you did with Mr. Kerry.”

Nina eyed the paper evilly that was placed on her desk. Okay, it’s just a pop quiz she told herself, she could do this. Ten minutes later Nina hadn’t written one full answer to any of the questions. Her hand ached from writing for so long when her fingers were so used to typing. Her paper was full of crosses and marks from where she would have normally been able to shift text or delete what she had written. The amount of times she had to mentally remind herself that there was no spell and grammar checker or no synonyms or dictionary options to improve her work. Nina had hardly written anything. The lesson stretched on forever, and afterwards Nina only felt like hitting a wall. That was undoubtedly the worst test she had ever written, completely not Cable worthy.

“Hey stranger,” Jude smiled appearing suddenly at Sara’s locker at the end of the day.

“You!” Sara frowned back, giving him the evils. “You have a lot of explaining to do! You know I’ve been contemplating whether to go to the police or tell my parents about what you said.”

“But you didn’t did you, besides what would you tell them exactly?” was Jude’s quick reply, and before she could say another word, “So what did you think of Mr. Ford?”

“Oh him? I don’t know who that man thinks he is assigning all that work before the holidays and messing up the classroom like that. It’s like having a new Mr. Kerry! And don’t think I didn’t notice you changing the subject,” Sara said.

“That man happens to be my dad,” Jude laughed.

Sara froze, looking away as she blushed. Great, just great, always letting her mouth run away from her. “Seriously, your parents, they must be some match in heaven with your mum as a talented doctor and your dad as a caring teacher. What dating site did they meet on?” Sara didn’t know why she was being cruel but she didn’t much like being laughed at. Jude was enjoying himself too much to be offended anyway.

“I wasn’t changing the subject,” he retaliated as they walked outside the school’s doors. “If you still want to go back to that island, we can go right now if you want?”

Sara put her hands on her hips, instantly cautious. “Right now? How will we even get there?”

“My dad can take us,” Jude replied watching her reaction with a very annoying patronizing smile on his face. “Because on that island happens to be my house.”