itscirce - Tumblr blog

itscirce · 4 years

Text

Coastal Florida High School Gothic

There are tourists covering the streets. Their bodies are lying there, but they do not decompose. They never decompose. Not until summer comes. Then they vanish. You are late to class because you ran over one. Your teacher yells at you, but makes no sound.

You are sitting in algebra. There is a faint humming coming from..somewhere. you ignore it. You always ignore it. You turn to page 394 in your textbook and pretend to pay attention. You don’t want to learn about slope again. You have learned about slope seven times in the past three years.

You say the pledge of allegiance every morning. You salute the flag outside the window. There is no flag inside in your homeroom. You do not meet the eyes of the thing on top of the flagpole.

The air conditioning isn’t working. It’s 97 degrees. Your friend says she’s cold. You hand her your jacket and wonder if anything is real.

People are giving presentations again. They are always giving presentations. You never give presentations, though. Not after you accidentally cut your hand in Engineering and bled on the table. There is another presentation tomorrow. You nod. Tomorrow looks like it will be the same as today.

Your friends are all the same people. They look different, but inside they are the same. You wonder if you too are the same.

You vaguely remember middle school. You were different back then, you think. But it is better now. It has to be better. Everyone knows that 7th grade is the worst year. Were you ever in seventh grade? You don’t remember. You feel like you should remember.

The snowbirds are back. You ignore them and their bleating calls. They are liars and should never be heeded. The bright feathers sticking out of their hats do not entice you. You know not to go near them. You have been told this by person after person. They will go away when May comes. They always leave by May.

There is a girl in your Government class that you do not like. She is always around. She sits by you and your friends at lunch. You secretly believe that they all think a different friend likes her. You don’t believe any of them actually likes her. You will never tell her to go away because you will feel bad. She is always near you even though you only have two classes with her, Government and that weird in-between space that happens precisely at 11:48 am on Tuesdays.

You and your friends screw around on the school iPads’ cameras. You never look at the pictures. You know they are not what they seem.

The window in your History class is fake. You do not know how you know, but it is definitely fake. You wonder what would happen if you opened it and stuck you head through. You never do.

You can’t go to the bathroom until the first person comes back. The first person never came back. Neither did the third or fourth or fifth or so on. But whoever went last is always the first. You do not believe anyone other than you remembers the others. You sit patiently, tapping away at your keyboard as you write meaningless gibberish.

You go to the beach one day. There is an essay due again. There is always an essay due. You sit looking at the waves stained by red tide and wonder what would happen if you dared to enter into their foaming depths. You turn back to the computer sitting on your laps. It is gone. In its place is a drink with an umbrella in it. You do not want the drink. You feel compelled to take a sip. It’s orange juice mixed with sea spray. You drink the whole glass.

720 notes · View notes