"Elspeth n' O'Brien's Last Performance?" Elspeth Post was a little disappointed to see the few entries that had been submitted for the year's play and musical. She had no doubt gotten a response, but it was far from the overwhelming flood of scripts and ideas she expected. Looking at the meager contributions, she decided that if nobody else sent anything in, she would have to make do with what she had. She had gotten a more complex (and perhaps twisted) version of "Romeo and Juliet" from Ivory Tran; Gabrielle O'Shannon had sent in a silly story about pirates and treasure hunters; Usha Krishnan went for an odd take on an old Greek myth; Hero Love had written a peculiar version of The Magnificent Seven (or Seven Samurai); and May Tramble had sent in a tale about people going into other worlds. They were all unique and impressive, but not nearly enough to make sound judgment upon. Well, she could wait a bit longer. There were other jobs to take. One of her favorite class projects (and a great way to get everyone acquainted with each other) was to get everyone up in front of the class, in pairs, and improvise a scene together. However, there was a catch—someone from the class who was not participating could yell out "Freeze!", in which case the players would stop whatever they were doing and wait for somebody to replace them, in the same position, and do as they saw fit. Also, it was a Friday and she didn't have anything planned, so... Elspeth randomly picked out two girls, Alisha Fox and Jocelyn McKeough, to act out a scene in which they were driving to the hospital. Everything else was in their hands. "Don't worry, girl!" screamed Alisha as she mimed driving a car's wheel. "I'll get you to the hospital on time! You've been hurt real bad, but you're gonna make it!" "Tis' but a flesh wound!" insisted Jocelyn (or Joss). Alisha shook her head. "Don't give me that nonsense, woman! You were gunned down by an angry... ostrich! And by God, did he sure taste good after I hit him with my... flame thrower! But you're gonna make it!" Jocelyn pretended to lurch forward and groan; just then, Ana Lu yelled out "Freeze!" Not surprisingly, she dragged Rai with her and put her in the driver's seat. "Hunny, we're gonna be late!" she blurted suddenly, dashing over to give Rai a massive glomp. Rai coughed violently as the force of impact jarred her. "If you'd stop doing that, I wouldn't hit my head so often and we'd be there." Ana merely smiled and leaned back in the "car". "So what do you think we'll name the baby?" "Freeze!" shouted Rai. She quickly darted out of the scene amidst polite laughter and brought Janine in for her. Bautista, a lover of theater, quickly took charge. She whipped around to face Ana quickly, holding an invisible sword, and spoke in her lowest, most evil voice: "I see that your Schwartz is as big as mine!" "I'll never join you, Lord Helmet!" screamed Ana, barely able to control her laughter. The two of them mocked a "Schwartz-battle" for awhile before they were stopped. Blake quickly jumped in and assumed Ana's position, which was turned away from Janine. "It just won't work out between us, Janine!" she bawled loudly. "You're a girl and I'm a... centaur!" "But I love you so," whined Bautista, hugging her friend from behind. "You know how much I love horses, and you're the most beautiful I've ever seen." Blake quickly whipped around and took Janine's hands. "Just because I let you ride me day and night doesn't mean we should be lovers." "Did I mention you have a cute tail?" "Freeze!" "Thank you," sighed Janine. Blake was pulled out by May Tramble, who had become good friends with Janine and most of her troupe. She let the younger girl hold her hands as she scrambled for an idea. She quickly came up with "Patty Cake", which lasted for a few seconds before Janine was switched out by Farrah Kwong. The friendly young girl, who could actually boast of having a boyfriend, quickly changed her voice to that of one of her idols, Jerome Howard. "Oh, a wise guy, eh? Nyuk, nyuk, nyuk!" She and May pseudo-slapped and poked each other around for a bit, and were frozen—only briefly—by Hero Love, who just had to resume the Three Stooges bit. "Awright, youse eggheads! What's all this?" "Nuthin, Moe!" squeaked Farrah. May suddenly shouted and pulled on her hair as if she really were Larry Fine. Hero mock-slapped her and then the whole thing escalated to the delight of all the girls present. Somebody shouted Freeze, removed both May and Farrah, and stared at Hero. It was Vairocana Knox, and the game had lightened her mood considerably. Hero suddenly gave a snarl and wiggled her hands around her pockets, mouthing a few words. Then, oddly, she jerked to the side and spread her hands out, speaking: "Are you going to stand there all day staring, or are you going to draw... punk?" "What?" murmured Vai. Hero made a face. "It's a silent movie!" "Oh, oh! Uh, I guess I ruined the scene." "Oh well!" exclaimed Love, who quickly took Vai's elbow in hers and twirled her around like a square-dancer. They spun around for awhile before somebody ordered them to Freeze. "Somebody that hasn't been up," spoke Elspeth. Gabrielle ventured forth, her elbow hooking itself up to Vai's. "I can't... move! We're stuck together!" she screamed. "You just had to go to the superglue factory!" replied Vai. The two struggled against each other for awhile until Ayanna shouted Freeze and replaced Knox. They were hopelessly entangled and so several girls laughed and wiggled their eyebrows as they wondered how they were going to get out of it. Since most knew that "Gab" and "Aya" were a couple, they had some ideas. Elspeth wisely shouted "Freeze" before they had a chance to become too intimate. Amidst laughter, Mira gently removed Gabrielle from Ayanna's embrace and sent her to her seat sulking. She then kept Ayanna in her arms for a little while before resuming. "Yes, yes, this tree will stand up nicely here. Now I must water it and cover it with smelly dirt." "Nuuu, I'm still alive!" squealed Ayanna. Mira gasped. "Oh no, a talking tree! Do I get a wish?" "Just one!" sang the girl. Mira jumped up and squealed. "I wish I had a helicopter!" "Freeze!" X Walker moseyed up and took Ayanna out of the game, and resumed position as she tried not to chuckle at Mira's exceedingly happy face. "As you can see here," she said, "the species Grinnus toothus was an herbivore who lived sometime around the Smile-assic period. Our friend here, who I've dubbed 'Lucy', had very few enemies since all she did was run around grinning and making friends. Of course, there was Grumpus angrus to consider, but we'll get to that on our next study." "Freeze." Elspeth removed Mira and took her place, deciding to conclude the game while she still had the time. "I say, Alex, that suit of yours looks positively smashing!" "You like it?" said Walker, doing her best English accent. Post, a native of the U.K., could do it infinitely better. "Got it at the discount store, I did—that is, a regular store at a discount price!" "And how did you come about this?" "Eld' up the store, I did! This discount was a real steal, if you know what I mean—wink-wink, say no more!" "Awright!" barked Post suddenly, whipping out an invisible gun. "You're under arrest for robbery!" "But I was framed!" yelped X, sticking her hands up. Laughter and Post's clapping broke the scene, and finally everyone was seated and congratulated on a more-or-less good show. Since it was the weekend and Post was feeling sympathetic (and a little lazy), she didn't give her students any homework and told them to enjoy their free days. This did not alleviate some of their studies by much, but a bit was a bit and so they thanked her and went about talking with each other until the class was over. Blake and Mira were walking about with their arms around each other. Gab and Aya had snuck off to the bathroom to resume the "game" they had started in class. Ana Lu was clinging to Rai. May, Janine, and Farrah were probably off to call their boyfriends. Jocelyn and Hero were no doubt off to see their large assortment of friends. Alex Walker loitered around a little while, watching the couples, but even she looked able to find someone to share her time with. Vai sighed glumly. "Why me?" she had to wonder—she had to wonder it every day. "How is it that everyone else seems to have someone, even those people that don't deserve anybody? What do I have to do, quit being nice and start being a jerk? Dress up like a floozy? What does it take? I'm sick and tired of this." With nobody to talk to but herself, she grumbled and managed to walk away to her next class, her mood becoming worse in spite of the brief fun she had had in class. Vai had seriously contemplated suicide again earlier that day; her mood had been so dark and soul-crushingly miserable that death seemed a blessing; Vai actually had preferred to have not been introduced to life at all. Surely, she believed, it would've been better to not live rather than to be born into misery, to be a waste and an unknown, and pose as nothing better than God's whipping girl. She had tried and poured her heart into many things, but ultimately she always woke up the next day, still Vai and still lonely, and her heart sunk each time. Somehow she always managed to pick herself up and leave home, but for what? She had absolutely nothing to live for except her few obligations, and once those were over... She drank from a fountain. Vai knew she was going to be thirsty again very soon. ............ Samantha O'Brien almost felt just as bad. It was as if somebody had told her they were cutting off one of her limbs, and she only had a few months to enjoy it. Of course, it wasn't quite that bad: her beloved Latin class was scheduled to merge with Torvald's General Languages class, and she would still keep her job, except she would be an assistant teacher instead of an independent one. She was both frustrated and depressed at the same time, for she had been a beloved and respected teacher at Stanton for nearly a decade and felt she was losing her job. Her classes had gotten smaller and smaller as the years waned and waxed. She only had seven that year, her smallest to date, and very few of them took Latin seriously. Most had chosen it as an "easy" elective and had no intention of actually integrating the language and its uses in their lives. O'Brien loved proving them wrong and getting them involved, but with only seven in her class, it felt like a waste of time. There would indeed be a closer relationship between her and the students, and she would get to know all of them very well, but there was a certain electricity that passed over large crowds that she would miss. Practically speaking, she had very little to be sore about, but that didn't stop her from feeling it anyway. Samantha was odd as most people went, but she was really quite lovely and quaint when compared to other Stanton faculty (such as Torvald's aloofness, Raulson's gambling addiction, Abi's sexuality, and Em's... well, just Em). Her father had Irish roots and her mother had Russian/Romanian (hence her love of the Roman culture), thus leaving her with a good foreign mix albeit with odd habits in. She rarely shaved her legs and armpits, and wore earrings that made her look like a gypsy (her mother's influence). She was tall but quite stocky, although not unattractive, and had great huge spectacles that made her face look like an owl's. Oftentimes, her students found her bruised from bumping into things, because she read and walked at the same time and hardly looked where she was going (though she did not drink while walking, which would've been too foolish). She talked too much once one got to the right subject, and when it came to her passion, her poor students, even the good ones, could hardly keep up. She had a crush on Janet Keys (nobody blamed her or any of the other faculty that did), and presently, she was twirling a pencil around with her fingers. Avelina Rohani, the oldest girl in the class (after her teacher, of course), watched patiently as O'Brien taught. "Watched" was the correct word—one did not observe or listen to Samantha as she taught. Merely keeping one's eyes on her was work enough: she paced to and fro, she used wild gestures, her voice went up and down, and she rarely sat unless to hammer in a very serious point. Avelina fingered her most precious material possession and tried to keep up. Unlike the others, she was uninterested in looking around and seeing what everyone else was doing; she didn't get distracted, probably because she stared far too much. Stanton was unusual and uncomfortable for Avelina. So far, she had only made one friend, and only because that friend had been very sociable, very patient, and very careful with herself when she spoke. Her name was Farrah, as in the woman from "Charlie's Angels", and she had been (at the time) the only person in the whole school that had a boyfriend for sure. Not long after having met, Farrah had lamented over the girlish population. "My first day here, my Lesbian Senses started tingling. I got shivers and evil goosebumps everywhere. I knew I wasn't going to like it. Luckily, I discovered my best friend was sent here as well, so things went pretty well. If you can imagine it, I've been the object of flirtations six times since I've been here, twice by the same person. Each time I told them I was straight and taken, but apparently some people don't take a hint." "...Lesbian Senses?" Avelina had murmured (she had been polite enough to let Farrah speak all the way through). Kwong had nodded and smiled. "Yeah. They're like Spider Senses, except they flare up around gay girls. I don't call it a 'gay-dar' since apparently it never comes around guys. I wonder why!" She laughed at some joke, but it didn't affect Avelina, who had shrugged. "Anyway," continued the younger girl, "that's my sad tale. I got expelled from my last school along with Ivory, who I told you about, and I guess it's luck's decision I ended up here with her. The good thing is that we're both in it together and I can at least focus more on my study, but the bad news is that, well, in an all-girls school, you kinda meet a few... Sapphic influences." "Oh." Farrah had chuckled. "I like you! You really don't say much. People who talk too much annoy me. That's a self-depreciating joke." "Oh." Farrah chuckled again, and started squealing about something forgettable. Avelina also remembered noticing a few other straight or otherwise non-gay girls around (i.e., the Trambles, Janine Bautista, and many others she suspected). The school was not bad, and it did certainly keep her mind on her boyfriend more—not that there was any question that she would've strayed even in a coeducational facility. But she had a hard time adjusting anyway, being so new to the area. Farrah had warmed up to her, but she would probably need more friends, especially if this was going to be her permanent residence. She hoped it would be. "THIS!!!!" spat a voice suddenly. Avelina snapped out of her daze and noticed that her teacher had slapped the board with her hand, emphasizing something very strongly before continuing, "...Is one of the words that has passed down to nearly every language known. Everyone here should recognize and remember it; it's going to be on a test!" (Another good thing about O'Brien was that she always tried to alert her students of things that would be on tests. Not being prepared was not an excuse, she had said.) O'Brien then went over several other words rooted in Latin that had passed down through the languages, and passionately rounded off how the old Roman language and culture had so deeply influenced everything since its birth. She probably would've kept rambling on and on, going off onto tangents that had nothing to do with language, if she hadn't been stopped. "Ex...cuse me, Miss O'Brien?" murmured June Tramble. Samantha quickly wheeled around and became flush. "Oh, uh, I went off again. Sorry. I was talking about word origin, right?" "Yessum." "Uh, very good." She quickly got back on track and resumed her lesson, derailing now and then. O'Brien was very quick and polite about getting back on track—she believed in practicality and knew that speed and diplomacy were both integral parts of it, but still lost her senses now and then. If Avelina had been a different person, she would've found it amusing, but it really didn't have an affect on her. Olivia Johnson yawned. She was being dulled quicker than a plastic knife cutting sandpaper and wished to breathe in some fresh air. Good thing she only had one class left. ............ Later that day, Olivia curled deep into a bench at a park and watched mindlessly as life, it seemed, passed her by. Alone and nearly forgotten save by a handful of people, she sat and remained, looking bored out of her own soul and depressed, perhaps, beyond help. At such a dark time, it was dangerous of her to think—who knew upon how many tangents her thoughts would flow? Oftentimes, they landed in an even darker pit and kept getting sucked further in, spinning towards some bleak Hell until it landed in despair and ruin. Olivia was in such a foul, spiritless mood that all of this seemed a likely possibility. Where could she start? For that matter, why so depressed? Because of the painful break-up? No, she had gotten over that, or nearly. Being around her ex was still awkward, but it could've been worse. They had not gotten too far and knew where to stop, but it still seemed like a part of her had been ripped out and would never be put in again. Love seemed distant to her, foreign. She ached to be held, kissed, cooed over, needed. Olivia let out a groaning grumble. She was lovelorn and hated it. But that was not it; something else tugged at her soul. It was not loneliness, though she was beginning to feel more and more isolated from her cadre. It was not academic failure, nor dissatisfaction with her image, nor even her income, though she could do without her job. There was a hole within her, something that only... what? What could've filled it? She didn't know, and she didn't know anyone who would. Meanwhile, on the other side of the park, Vairocana Knox curled deeper into her bench and watched mindlessly as life, it seemed, passed her by...
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