A cat floated embraced by an invisible force. Several of my friends and I watched it. We pocked and prodded the cat. “How long have we been here? I asked.
“Just only about five minutes, “someone answered in my head.
We were silent. There was no need to talk. I could hear their thoughts and they could hear mine. We had no bodies; we were spirits, only our minds pocked and prodded the cat.
It felt real, like were actually touching it. I could feel its sleek blond hair between my fingers. This felt so real. It was… right? Since we were one I felt what everyone else felt. Someone touched its tail, paw, and whiskers. We were all separate but at the same time we were one. We all felt, smelt, heard, saw, and tasted everything together and separately. Do you know what it feels like to eat a chocolate chip cookie, granola bar, apple, prune, vanilla cake, Caesar salad, and skittles all at once?
I do.
No.
We do.
We tried in vain to do things separately, but couldn’t succeed in feeling them separately. That was the classes’ task. We just failed. The teacher turned to us and waved his hands, we returned to our separate bodies.
Once again we were separate. Once again we thought, felt, smelt, saw, and heard separately. The bell rang. My ear drum felt like it was going to explode. Then I woke up. My body was drenched in cold sweat and I was breathing heavy. My alarm clock was ringing off the hook, so I slapped it silent.
My name is Nathan Stermer and I am 15, and I recurrently have dreams like this, always the same ones; over and over again. ‘I love playing soccer, kicking butt, and taking names.’ That was just something I thought while riding the bus to school. Our bus shrieked to a stop giving everyone a good head jerking.

Walking into School I saw Mr. Donahue and chocked on a laugh. He was our soccer coach and was just that kind of guy that every time you saw him walking anywhere, anytime you wanted to laugh for no tangible reason. He was funny what else can I say.

Our school by the way is most likely the smallest school in the world. I walked up the main stairs and headed to my room (218), which is really Ms. Keller’s room. As I opened the door and walked in she barked with her overenthusiastic personality: “GOOD MORNING!”

“Good morning,” I mumbled as I headed straight for my computer. I have never been very brisk in the morning. Twenty-five minutes later the bell rang…off to class. The day appeared to be perfectly archetypal initially.


I looked at Dan, my best friend, and mouthed, “WE DON’T DO ANYTHING IN HERE!” I ranted on for a little more, and then sat down. My working space was a rectangular table that I shared with Dan, Francis, and Vince.
Francis was quiet, moody, and very intelligent. Vince, on the other hand, was short tempered farm boy, who rarely finished his home-work.
The stool that I sat on was just large enough to hold me up. The stool was colored cherry with lilac speckles. Mostly everything in the art room is painted, and at times evens some of the kids. Art class used to be fun and exciting; now we have a new teacher and she is… extremely naive and boring.
Mrs. McAllister is extremely tall, and cranky. She always wore a pink scarf and had extensive eye-liner on.

I started reading Peoples Magazine and the Cosmopolitan; trying to find anything engaging to look at. I stopped on a beautiful woman’s face, and started to draw her.
Dan did the same and tried to draw a woman’s face, only he added enormous amounts of detail and the sketch looked repulsive. Mine by the way, seemed pretty good. I felt proud of my masterpiece.

It was constantly hot and stagnant in the art room, brewing many bad attitudes. I complained about the smell and temperature halfway through class, displaying my bad attitude.

“Okay class get to work,” ordered Ms. McAllister. She tried in vain to use the authority she had lost from me. Starting with the lame jocks she displays. You’re a teacher, not a kid, act like one!

“Common get started on your posters… you done yet Stermer?” She referred to me by my last name.

“Yeah I would be if Dan would do something. Dan what are you doing? You need to get something done! You do nothing! You idiot! Stop just moping around, common work on our poster!”

“What’s up Rutz? She asked Dan, leaning over him.

“My camera doesn’t connect to the schools programs,” he said in one of his timid voices,” I can’t transfer anything.”

“Okay then…Rutz…Stermer get something done.”

Well that’s obvious.
Next period had to be better than that.
It wasn’t.
Still, like any other day, I trudge though the monotonous misery of education.
Next I’m in Mr. Thingols class and he is extremely repetitive.

I sit down in my chair; position my seat, and get my books out onto my desk. That was right before I felt a fist drive into my back.

“RYAN, WHATS YOUR PROBLEM!”

“YOU, “he barked back, “I HATE YOU!” The brat snickered then turned away. Moron, he was a good for nothin loser. He was chubby has short blond hair, and sticks his tough out at anyone he wanted.
Class starts and then the notes begin. I descended into a daydream, like leaves delicately falling from a tree. Mr. Thingols voice permeated the air. He talked quickly, with well structured sentences, like a reporter. His voice boomed with enthusiasm, echoing throughout the room. He tried to burrow information into our obstinate minds.

“Clyde Sheldon… Clyde Sheldon came up with the idea of the cell theory. Okay… most of you guys with an education in biology know what the cell theory is. Okay… It’s the idea that all living things are made up of cells. It is the idea that all living things are made up of cells. Yeah, and he took it one step further and he said that these cells re-pro-duce. Okay… and that is what causes plants and animals to grow and mature, okay,
NEXT: Charles Darwin… Charles Darwin. Now does anyone know what Charles Darwin did? What did Charles Darwin say?” I was still daydreaming and I heard nothing, no answers. I was far away on a field playing soccer with my friends, defending our team title.
“He’s got one famous phrase that goes along with it?
‘Survival of the fittest’ ‘Survival of the fittest’. Okay so what exactly did Charles Darwin came up with, “he asked. No one answered.
Some kids began putting their heads on their desks starting to fall asleep.
“Now Charles Darwin was a biologist he often time would go on these long trips to these exotic lands around the world and he tried to figure out why one plant survives and why another one doesn’t. Why one animal survives and another one doesn’t.
Okay he came up with this thing called the survival of the fittest. He said that if you’re a strong plant or animal you will survive. Okay ...he also said that these strong plants or animals will evolve only allowing these strongest individuals to survive.”
Now someone was snoring and he was getting irritated. A bead of sweat coagulated on his forehead and a small network of veins grew on his temple.
“Okay he said the strong will survive and the stronger will evolve. Okay… this is why some animals become extinct because they lacked different, certain things. Okay…this is what he came up with. Now 1680 a guy by the name of Greg Mendel came up the idea of heredity and genes.” Three people now were snoring and every ones head was on the desk.”
He continued,” Now does anyone know who...PAY ATTENTION, “he boomed. Everybody stood on end. He pounded a desk with his fist. “HOW WILL YOU BE ABLE TO MAKE IT THROUGH A 2 HOUR REGENTS IN JUNE WHEN YOU CAN’T MAKE IT IN 3 MINUTES ON MY CLASS TODAY. OKAY!
I heard someone mumble: ‘I’ll get jacked on steroids.’
“GOT THAT STERMER?” His question I thought was gratuitous.
“YEAH,” I screamed back. Everybody snickered
“Okay.”
Just another day in school Great!

Everything was extraordinarily customary at first, so I thought. Next period I was in English class. This was a useless class where nothing was accomplished. The teacher professes to think about things trying to get us to express our divine ideas.
Mr. Rericks voice resounded throughout the class, slithering like a viper; trying to pry information out of our imprisoned heads.
The class was engulfed. Mainly books filled the shelves, if they didn’t they were stacked up the wall. Magazines papers manuscripts, essays, poems, and pencils, littered his desk, which was invisible among the clutter. Paintings decorated the walls, filling the class room with emotion. There were ones that made you feel grief, hate, sadness, joy, fear, and deep deep sorrow. A blind man without a soul could walk into that class room and he would feel something.
In regard to Mr. Rerick, he was a tall man with very lengthy slender legs. He always wore suspenders and hiked his plaid green pants high upon his waist, where he displayed a brilliant red belt. Everyone swore he wore the same one every day. His fingers were long like a pianist, and he has the stature of a frog. He pranced around the class hopping nimbly from desk to desk as he talked.
“I’ve got a friend whose older son is David but they call him Benny. Well what is his real name? And some say there is no such thing as a real name. You’re not nobody until somebody calls your something, it’s just a social contract god doesn’t say your name is Kaolin …it’s a social contract. Okay, um that thing that I was sitting on is nothing until you call it something, okay now same thing with identity…”
I snapped, out of my false reality, when my eyes saw someone and yelled: WAKE UP. Someone I had never seen before walked in. She had bright blue eyes, dark black shimmering hair and a mysterious stern face. If I had the choice of only one word to describe her if would have been perceptive.