Just Don't Die

Back to School

"Here," Blaine said in response to Mrs. Myers reading his name.

Blaine sat in a chair he knew was his, even though he couldn't place exactly how he was so sure. He looked around the room at the tired faces of teenagers who regretted taking such a mentally intensive class at 7:00 in the morning. He scanned the room, looking for a familiar face.

"Morning," said a cheerful voice from behind him.

Blaine turned to the smiling face of a red-haired girl, who he immediately recognized as Alexis. Alexis used to be one of his closest friends. They were both inherently sarcastic and witty, and they quickly became friends when she moved here in the eighth grade. They stayed in touch through the years after graduation and even grabbed a coffee a few times when they both happened to be in town. Their friendship, however, had dwindled with the years and distance to a quick text or Facebook message each year around the holidays.

Alexis had a bad habit of attracting and dating hateful men. She had a naturally trusting heart, an outgoing personality, and a pretty face that constantly put her in situations with guys that tended to end poorly for her. She got married right out of high school, had a kid, and then went through a very messy divorce when she realized she had married the epitome of narcissism. Blaine still felt guilt for not trying harder to warn her beforehand and for not being there for her when she went through her divorce.

"Hi," Blaine said as he smiled. His elation at finally seeing someone familiar that didn't trigger tears pushed the last tinges of his headache from his consciousness.

"Did you do the homework?" She asked.

"I have no idea," Blaine replied, suddenly remembering the backpack he had grabbed from his truck. He was thankful for once, for his teenage laziness. If he had been a better student, his backpack would have been in his room, not his truck. The thought crossed his mind as he looked through his bag, and if he had not brought it to his house, then it was very likely he had not done the homework.

"What do you mean you don't know?" She asked, giggling and raising an eyebrow.

"I'm going to go with; no, I did not do my homework," Blaine said, pulling his physics textbook from his bag and setting it on the desk.

"Here, just copy mine; it was just the one problem anyhow," she said, holding out a half sheet of notebook paper.

Blaine quickly looked up to see Mrs. Myers writing today's problem set on the board. He looked at the paper Alexis was holding and, copied the equation and answer down in his notebook, tore out the sheet, and wrote his name on the top.

Blaine looked up, patted his left pants pocket where his cell phone would have been, and then smiled at himself. He had no clue what the date was and still had no cell phone to tell him.

"What day is it?"

"It's the fifth," she said.

"Month?" He asked without breaking eye contact.

"October," she said, raising her eyebrow again.

"Last weird question for you," he said smiling, "what year?"

"Whatever," she responded, rolling her eyes and laughing again.

Blaine looked up at the board and scanned it for a date as Mrs. Myers started her lesson. Written on the top right-hand side of the blackboard was Tuesday, October 5th, 1999. Blaine's stomach turned again—more proof of when and where he was. Blaine spent the rest of the class looking through his planner and thinking about what to do. He had a free hour from 8:00 to 9:05 and figured he would be able to mentally sort everything out once he got some coffee and breakfast. All he had to do was make it through this class. The fact that Blaine likely had more education than his teacher at this point made the class much less stressful than he had remembered.