I saw her in the reflection of my dead cell screen. Teachers normally kept their emotions behind a mask of indifference and stoicism. To see such a vulnerable expression was strange.
Here was a human being. Funny to realize it only now, at the age of seventeen. The moment passed, and her reflection moved beyond the little rectangle on my lap.
I continued resting my forehead against the edge of the desk, willing my phone to power up. Without music being fed to my earbuds, I could hear the thrum of the furnace against the wall, and something else…
At first, I thought the kid next to me, also on his phone and intentionally deaf with seriously chunky headphones, was licking the interior of his dry mouth. When I snuck a glance, however, his lips were pressed together while he concentrated intensely on some sniper game.
The noise changed anyway, getting louder before punctuating with a crack like snapping branches. Somebody across the room moaned, “guhhhh…” A chair scraped and an impact caused a vibration in the floor.
Normally, I wouldn’t bother to respond to any stimulus because I’d be on my phone and listening to music. Tuning out sensations was the point.
This time, however, I reluctantly snuck a peak, weirdly afraid of inviting interaction from a teacher. Let the keeners and the nerds have that, right?
But no one else in the room had their heads up. Everyone posed exactly the same, bent over, staring at the screen in their lap. I can’t remember the last time I actually observed other students in a classroom setting.
Vaguely, I can sort of remember elementary and all the kids together, singing with a happy teacher. That was a long time ago, when I liked school.
The licking, slobbering noise resumed below the horizon of graffitied desktops. A bloodied hand stuck up into view, holding something I couldn’t immediately understand.
The teacher’s face followed and didn’t appear sad anymore. She looked sated.
With the back of her hand, she wiped the vitae dripping from her mouth. “Yes?” She’d caught my glance.
I didn’t know what to say. Quick as fuck, I stared at my lap again, at the dead phone. What the hell had Ms. What’s-her-name done to some kid I never saw?
“Yes?” the teacher queried again with greater emphasis. I knew I was in some deep shit when she walked over.
“Can I go to the bathroom?” I blurted. The trembling in my chin could not be suppressed. Her shirt and cardigan were splashed with blood. A trail of red dots went from her high heels to the kid she’d just murdered, whose body I couldn’t see.
Her perfume mixed with sweat. Killing that kid had been taxing. She exhaled sharply, close enough that her breath teased my hair.
What do I do? What do I do?!
Screaming wouldn’t do shit with everyone ensconced in their cushy technical addictions, the very place I wished I’d never left.
At best, someone else’s phone would die and they’d look up and maybe see a hand, the top of the teacher’s head as she brutally tore me to pieces.
This couldn’t be real. Head bent over, I begged the universe for an escape.
“What’s that? A cell phone charger?” The teacher laughed. “You kids with your phones. Here.” The end of a chromebook charging cable appeared under my nose. “This ought to work.”
Too scared to remove my hands from my thighs, I whimpered, “I really just need to go to the bathroom, Ms…”
I’d been in her class for months. I still don’t know her name. I’m sure she gave it the first day. Or maybe not. Maybe she saw us all listening to music and staring at our phones and smiled.
“Go on,” she said, “take it. That’s it. Go back to praying, praying for dopamine from the doom scroll.” I hurriedly did as she suggested.
I could feel her presence as the phone lit up.
“Don’t you dare stop praying,” she whispered. “Or I’ll have to call home and tell your parents the sad news: You never showed up today. In fact, there were a few kids missing. It was weird.”
“T-the c-cameras,” I defended. I needed to do something. I knew. I knew. She couldn’t let me walk away, knowing what I know.
She laughed again, a disturbingly normal titter. “I’ve a feeling they won’t record anything amiss. The footage is regularly deleted. The quality is so poor, it’s a joke, and-“
The phone restarted my music and it was loud. I didn’t catch the rest of what she said. By the time I ripped out my earbuds, she’d already moved away.
“Yes?” she asked severely, the fatal implication clear.
“N-nothing.”
She nodded slowly and crossed her lips with a long index finger.
I put my earbuds back in, bowed over, and drifted away into social media as god intended for this generation.
What if I had an iphone? I’d be dead.
At first, it was kind of shocking she didn’t care about letting me keep my phone. I could put something on social media, but who would see? How could anyone help before it was too late?
I saw the stunned face of the murdered boy for a second as she dragged his body past my feet to somewhere. Then I understood the object that had been in her hand before: A human heart. The cracking bones had been his ribcage.
She’d had the time and space to do surgery on the kid without anyone objecting whatsoever.
The blood from her mouth suggested she’d done more than remove it.
When the thrum of the bell burrowed through my audio, I got up and walked to the door without looking at anyone. That’s why I almost bumped into the teacher.
She gestured for me to remove my earbuds.
“You had a good day,” she said, and handed me a cheap looking lollipop. “See you tomorrow.”
I tried to go around her. She stepped into my path. “Hold on. Aren’t you going to open it?”
Nobody else but us remained in the classroom. No sign of foul play except for a dot of red on the floor. There’d been time to clean up the crime.
The teacher watched as I struggled with the lollipop wrapper and finally put it in my mouth; it tasted bland, sugarless. In the process, I dropped an earbud on the floor.
She beat me to picking it up. “You feel safe in there?” she said, gesturing around her head, indicating the virtual world, I suppose.
“Yes,” I squeaked.
She examined the bud between thumb and forefinger. “Maybe because it is.”
“Yeah,” I agreed, anything to get away. Cold sweat had collected around my tailbone. She must have noticed how much I trembled.
Yet she only smiled. “Best to stay safe. Right?”
I nodded, and she finally let me go.
“You want to know why?” she asked as I stepped through the threshold.
I froze. “No. Look, I won’t tell. Who’d believe me? I won’t tell.” Dozens of students were in the hall. None of them could hear. They were experts at walking and watching content on their phones.
“I know you won’t tell,” she said plainly, “because I’ll fucking kill you if you do. I know your name. I know where you live. I know about your allergy to mosquitoes. Teachers have access to a lot of personal information. Not just about you either. How’s your sister doing? She has allergies too. A lot more severe than yours.”
“Why? What did we do to you?” I started to cry and she patted my shoulder, appearing easily as the caring teacher. I had no friends. I hadn’t needed any.
“Only curious when your life is threatened, but what for? What’s the point of you? Piglets, sitting around and consuming,” she said bitterly. Her vibrant smile spread, a mask to scarcely contain her deep hatred.
“Run along now. Science next, right? I’ll allow you one look at your teacher there. Try not to let him see. Then you’ll understand. You’d better understand. By the end of the period, you’d better understand. Now off you go.”
In the next class, I completed the “extra credit” assignment. Every student remained in a state of “prayer” once more. Who knew how many of them had just been in the previous class with me?
The science teacher stood behind a lab table and stared out over our heads. He looked so lost and broken.
Immediately, I turned up the volume on my music while I scrolled for something to make it all better.
I understood. I understand.
What I don’t know, however, is how to cope with the stress of understanding without using the very thing that causes the problem.
Probably, for sure, I’ll pray about it.
Turn up the music louder.
And consume a little more.