Finding a parking spot near a school on a school day was practically impossible. Maybe this was a sign, a sign that meant he wasn't meant to take the placement test. Curses flourished from his mouth as road rage crept from his fingers to his toes. With the rate he was going, and if his body could mutate any more, he was certain his middle fingers would grow in size and perhaps start flickering like a neon sign. The weight of today's importance was greatly falling with each moron he encountered on the street. Sure they had their diplomas and all, but they were to stupid to do the simple task of driving a car. Seriously, stupid idiotic people were surrounding him.
"Education my ***."
Slamming on his breaks, a double fist flip flung in the air. From the way people were driving, he could swear they didn't know the difference between colors or what the arrows said. Rather frustrated at this point, he didn't care where he parked right now. Cutting someone off, he was soon claiming the only free spot left.
Tossing the few belongings he had in his car in the trunk, he was soon locking up and against his will trudging back towards the school where he would have to take the placement test. The cold winter air slapped his face like a crazed hormonal woman. Mother Nature was a cold heartless dog. Slouched over, his hood was drawn over his head. The dreadlocks against his ears offered some warmth. Each step closer to the school was one step further away from his freedom.
Fists formed inside his pockets as his footsteps grew heavier and heavier. Walking through cement would be more enjoyable and have a better outcome then what he knew laid ahead. Sure he should have busted his butt studying like some nerd, but why? Didn't just taking this whole test shove him back into the boxed in government run life again? Freedom, ha, that was a dying concept of the past.
A metallic taste lingered in his mouth as memories of his previous
real school flickered like a neon light on the side of an abandoned hotel. Sure this school was inside a much larger city, but it didn't change the past. Sure this could be a fresh start, but how fresh could anything be if the meat was still raw?
Damn you Travis. There it was, the main entrance...the opening to a new hell he would have to live in. Distasteful curl of his lips and knitting of his eyebrows brought a more intense blue gaze stare with his squinted eyes. With a churn of his stomach, there was a brief moment of wishing to be in the mansion dealing with just one class and having to put up with Ms Taylor. Stalled, he just stood there staring at the local public school.
"Hokee, we'll be here after school is over to take you home."
"You promise?"
"Of course, why wouldn't we?"
"Both of you?"
"Yes."
"You promise?"
The conversation went in circles over and over again as the flow of kids dwindled. Eyes peered from inside the building at the trio caught in a standstill. Older kids snickered as mockery fluttered through the halls.
"But what if you're not here?"
"Hokee we will be, I promise."
"I don't want to go in."
"You have to."
"Can't I just stay home?"
"No, you have to go."
"And then you leave me."
"Yes...no. Hokee." With an exasperated sigh the elderly women could feel the hand of her sturdy spouse on her shoulder. "We'll be back to pick you up."
"Don't leave me here alone."
"Listen boy, you don't want us sitting in your class all day."
"Yes I do."
"Hokee, just go in there. Your grandmother and I will be here to pick you up when school is over." With a shiver, his glare turned away from the school. Placement test, he had to take it and hopefully do well enough that he could at least be placed in the grade appropriate to his age and hopefully scoot ahead a few grades so he might squeak his way out of high school early. It didn't matter where the brick and mortar stood, they were all the same confining cells of education brainwashing.
"You'll forget me, You'll leave me!"
Old worn out hands wrapped around his abdominal and back as the kindergartner was heist up in the air and carried to the doors. Pleading eyes fought a silent battle against the heart broken elderly woman watching her beloved husband carrying her grandchild.
"No, I don't want to go. You'll leave me, you'll leave me here forever."
"Enough Hokee."With a shake of his head, a few dreadlocks tangled with each other causing the hood of his coat to slide a bit. Part of him wished he had a can of spray paint so he could erase away the sight of the school building while another part wanted to rebel further by striking the cool guy look of a burning cigarette hanging from his lip. Not that he was a smoker, but he couldn't just stand there without feeling a sort of resentment. If Travis wasn't his boss, the guy might have to worry about slashed tires with this forced predicament he was in.
A grumble a curse muttered from his mouth as water vapors from is lips rose in the air. Sucking in the cold air, his feet pushed forward. The crunching sound of salt under his weight might be keeping his body from falling on any possible ice, but it certainly didn't help his pace to move any faster.
From the window he could see car after car pulling in towards the school. Still the sight of the pickup truck was far from his sight. They lied to him, they were going to leave him at the school forever, leave him just like how she left him.The cold metal of the door stung his bare hand. Of all times of the year to enter an unknown school, he had to do this in the dead of winter. Next time he left home, he'd have to make sure to do it in the spring or just avoid the conversations that would result in him having to enter a school building ever again. Having to give the door a heavy tug, he could already smell the lingering threats hanging over his head. Barely even making it through the door a very heavy set man yelled at him.
What the hell, I didn't even do a damn thing. Dumbfounded the teen stood there quizzically.
"Kid you're late, go to the office."It wasn't to late, he could just turn around and leave the school, blow off the test and see how long he could avoid Travis before he found out he never took it. He couldn't get fired from his job for not taking a placement test....Travis wouldn't do that, would he?
The clicking of heals down the empty halls made his stomach churn even more. "Hokee Chogan?"
How the hell does she know my name? The slightest of nods moved his cold stiff neck. "Come this way, we were starting to wonder if you were going to show up or not."
Should have never come in, there has to be other jobs out there. This is not worth it. So not worth it.***
The test sat there mocking him as his eyes glossed over. How long had he been sitting there staring at the same words over and over again. The only part he had managed to fill out was his name, and even that was pure torture. His fingers flipped through the endless pages over and over again. There was to much to do, to many questions to answer and way to many symbols and such that looked like an ancient civilization's language.
He could feel the eyes staring at him, the same set of eyes that seemed to be analyzing each and every movement he made. It was almost like he was some strange caged animal being documented for the first time in captivity. He had to do everything in his body to resist chewing them out.
Just do the test and Travis will get off your back. Get it done and over with. The pencil in his hand tilted back and forth bobbing about mercilessly. Not even the simplest of answers would come to him and the things he should know seemed so far out of reach that there was no point in even dusting away the parts of his brain where they laid in a permanent hibernation.
The graphite against the paper soon started making marks as the test began to fill with anything but the answers to what was asked. Instead he found himself just drawing one set of legs across one page, while another was a sketch of broken ice. Symbols and graphite soon hid the questions asked as his brain emptied itself upon the paper.
Who was the first president to live in the White House? The words wrote themselves, or maybe it really was his subconscious snark retort.
" ur mom".
