Life Set out for Me

Life set out for Me

So, normally I don’t write much. I never found the time or the interest. I was just a normal dude going through high school like everyone else. I had homework, and spent my free time with my buds. It was either basketball, or video games. The weather made our choice for us, most days. But that was all when my life was normal. I never thought I’d be writing this, just like I never thought something so drastic could change my life.

It was the middle of fall; school had been in session for about a month and a half. It was nearing the end of September. I was at my table in art class, zoning everyone out while I worked on my project. I was working on the prism from Led Zeppelin.

My teacher, Mrs. Collins was talking loudly in that annoying voice of hers that sounded like Leana from Singing in the Rain. Yeah, I’ve seen it. It’s one of my mom’s favorite movies. She watches them all the time, so of course I’ve seen it. Mrs. Collins was talking to the group of girls on the far side of the room from me. They were talking about homecoming. The theme this year was shapes. Figures. The student council comes up with the dumbest ideas. Shapes? Where did they get that idea?

I tried for the third time now to get the triangle prism right. I needed a straight edge. I dropped my pencil on the desk and thumped back in my seat. It was then Mrs. Collins came up to my table to ask me what I was doing. “A triangle?” she asked in that high pitched annoying voice. “Is that for homecoming?”

I took the paper, crumbled it up and tossed it into the trash can. “No.” I said.

“What did yuh throw it away for?”

Her words went right in my ear like the sound of a screeching microphone which sent a burning hate in my heart. “I need a ruler, do you have a ruler?” I asked.

“Well… let me see…” she said, making her way to the art supplies closet. “Here we go!” she skipped back to my table. “Just make sure you return it to me after class.” she smiled with her ugly red lipstick.

I shook my head. I sat there for a moment after she left to grab another piece of paper. I then brought it back to my desk, sat the ruler on it and began making the first line, when John bumped into me. I glared at him, letting him know I was about to blow.

“Sorry, Toby.” He said. He then went back to being a loud idiot with Zach. They were playing paper football with a triangle shaped piece of paper. I was surprised Mrs. Collins didn’t yell at them. But then again, she never paid attention to anything that went on during class.

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The class bell rang. I made sure Mrs. Collins had her ruler back and took my paper with me to my locker, locker number 333, right beside the teacher’s lounge. The one I was now regretting not checking out before I signed up for it. The teacher’s had personal restrooms before their dining room. And Mr. Jacobson always laid a smelly duce after lunch. Nothing he ate ever agreed with him.

After the long school day, I walked home. I put my earbuds in and turned up my Zeppelin music high, drowning out any noise. I walked across the football field, and walked by the Kindergarten school to pick up my little sister Emily.

“Toby!” I heard her yell from the rest of her class. She came running towards me and hugged my leg. I waved at the teacher to tell her she was safe to leave with me.

“Guess what I learned in school today, Toby!!”

“What?” I asked. But when she started talking, I zoned her out. Kids at this age always ask a thousand questions. As long as you pretend to be interested, that’s all that matters.

“…And then they gave us these prisms so we can make our own rainbows at home!” she said with a wide smile, putting the prism up into the sun.

I looked down at her, and the prism she was holding. How ironic was it that I was drawing a prism today to find out the kindergarteners were talking about them today. I didn’t think too much about it.

It was about a ten minute walk from the kindergarten school to home. I opened the door for Emily and she came in yelling to mom about the prism she got at school today. I dropped my book bag off beside the door and went into the kitchen to find a snack to eat. I opened the fridge. Emily came running in the kitchen. “Koolade, Koolade!!” she bounced.

I took the koolade jug out of the fridge and poured her a small cup, and then continued looking through the fridge. Nothing. I took a granola bar out of the cabinet and walked into the living room to sit on the couch and watch some TV.

Mom was watching the news. “Remote, mom?” I asked.

“Just a minute, I’m watching the news.” She replied. She was on her ipad and watching TV at the same time. I found that annoying. You can’t be on two things at once. You have to be paying attention to one more than the other.

When mom wasn’t paying attention I took the remote off the end table and changed the channel.

“Young man, what did I just say?”

I rolled my eyes and flicked the channel back to the news. I ended up watching it myself.

“In other news, 747 passengers went missing Thursday on American Airlines. Superstitious spectators believe the plane disappeared over the Bermuda Triangle……”

“Triangles.” I said to myself.

“What was that, Toby?”

“Nothing…”

Later I watched my own shows on TV. And now that I was thinking about triangles, I was starting to see them everywhere. In one of the shows I watched, they were making fun of pie graphs, in another show, they were talking about pie and everyone had their triangle shaped piece. It was everywhere! Was this some celebration for triangles today? I wondered. But it had nothing to do with the news talking about the Bermuda Triangle, that was Thursday, today was Monday.

I was just being crazy. I got my superstition from my dad. He was always talking about how things weren’t just ironic and how the government was trying to keep us from knowing about the aliens. He believed in aliens, by the way. He said day-ja-vus were just warnings. He said that aliens had taken us and erased our memories and that we really did live that moment in time. And then he always went on about him being the third child of his mother, and how mom was the only one that survived out of the triplets her mother was going to have. And before mom had Emily he said I was the third son. Mom had twins before me, but there were compilations and neither of them made it.

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I went to bed that night dreaming about triangles and aliens. The next morning I woke up to my mom making eggs and toast. She set a plate in front of me; the toast was cut into two triangles. “Why did you cut my toast in half?” I asked.

“I wasn’t thinking about it. I usually cut Emily’s toast that way, but I forgot I already made hers.”

It was already a weird morning. I went to school that day, like always. After lunch there was a college table set up that was giving out triangle shaped highlighters with different colored tips. Went I picked up my sister that afternoon from school she was dressed in her letter outfit. She was V, but the V on her shirt had fallen upside down, a triangle.

I arrived home to play video games with my buds on the old Nintendo 64 and noticed the C-buttons were round with triangles indented on them. After my friends left I noticed that there were many triangle shapes on my Led Zeppelin album cover on my ipod.

“Mom.” I said.

“Yes, Toby?” she asked.

“What’s the name of the mental hospital dad’s at?” I asked.

“What makes you asked that?” she asked.

“I just want to know.”

“The Tristate Angel Care.”

“Tri-state? You ever notice that angel always looks like angle. You ever make that typo? I kept doing that in my math class today.”

Mom raised an eyebrow. “Alright then…”

Emily came running in the room with a picture she made. “Mom, mom!! Look what I drew, a peace sign!”

My eyes followed the paper, 3 triangles. Just then the regular broadcasting was interrupted by the news saying a boat had just been lost in the Bermuda Triangle. There was footage from a military jet flying out that way. Everyone’s eyes were focused on the TV screen. Emily was confused.

The ship was sailing its normal course when the water suddenly started churning in a circle around the ship and suddenly it sunk in the water like it was pulled in by something. The recorder kept saying, 3, 3, 3 Tria, tria, tria…” his finger started drawing triangles in the air. Then there was a high pitched screech over the TV and the TV turned off. Emily screamed.

The room suddenly became dark. The sun from outside was gone. I jumped up to the door and ran outside. I looked to the sky. It was like midnight out there. And then I saw purple lightning form in the sky, making one line, then another line, and one final line. A triangle. A large triangle.

“Toby, get back inside!!” I heard mom yell over the zapping sounds of the lightning above.

“No, mom, I want to see what’s going on!”

A light beamed down from the triangle lightning and sucked me up, I screamed. The next thing I knew, I was on a ship. There were aliens everywhere. They had big oval eyes that looked like galaxies, their skin was purple and they were shaped like triangles.

“3, 3, 3, tria, tria, tria…” it said.

“What do you want with me?!” I asked.

It pointed at me, “3, 3, 3, tria, tria, tria..” it touched my head.

Suddenly, my life I could see fast forward through my eyes. Triangles, triangles, triangles! They were everywhere, all throughout my life. My homecoming theme was shapes, triangles, my favorite band—triangles. My favorite shape, triangles, my favorite number 3, everything I ever knew, triangles. And then it told me, I am the third and only son of my father, Toby senior. Emily was my half sister.

“You are ours.” They said. Then they zapped me with a gun and I looked just like them. I screamed, and I screamed! No! This couldn’t be, wouldn’t I have known?! It made no sense!

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And then I found myself, sleeping. I woke up with a jump. I was in the same room I woke up in every morning. The same music played on my radio by Zeppelin. I closed my eyes again and took in a deep breath. “What a nightmare.” I said. And then my door opened. “I don’t feel good, mom, I don’t want to go to school today.” I said, my eyes still closed.

“No school, come with me.”

My eyes jerked open, and I saw one of them, I looked at my hands, purple! I jumped out of bed and opened my closet, in the mirror I saw, I was one of them! It wasn’t a dream at all!!!!