As Katie walked toward the campus, she sighed deeply. The morning. A new day. “New”, “tomorrow”, and “ future” are the words that she most loathe. Another insipid twenty-four hours.

Beep. Beep. Beep. Katie’s iPhone beeped, and she yanked it out from her windbreaker pocket. The screen read, “a new message from Erica S.,” so she unlocked the passcode: 1216. It was her birthday date, and people tell her to change the passcode because it was such an obvious and easy one. But Katie didn’t have anything embarrassing on her phone (she didn’t even have a selfie on her phone!), and there had been a paradox (in her mind) that people were unlikely to figure out easy passcodes because they all expected passcodes be such complicated, implicit, and unique combinations of four numbers. In fact, Katie had never had anyone finding out her passcode. She scammed the message from Erica, her best friend and teammate on cross country team, and shutted it out. Now, her irritated nerves are exacerbated even more.

“Hey, you!” a shrill voice echoed in Katie’s ear. Oh, no. “Where’s your ID?” a woman custodian yelled, and she had to stop in order to take her ID out of the brown Abercrombie and Fitch handbag. She wasn’t even wearing it at school, like the majority of upperclassmen wasn’t, but those school facilities just kept demanding school IDs. Pulling out her Vera Bradley lanyard, Katie passed by the woman. All of a sudden, she heard something heavy collapsing on the floor. Bam!

Katie looked behind instinctively, and there was the woman custodian being convulsed on the cold tile. A tall, muscular boy just entered the entrance. His brown hair was fully covered by pure white snow, and he was panting intensely. The boy rushed into the entrance hall, and swung his head like a dog to get rid of the snow as he tried to walk up to the hallway as coolly as he could. During the process, though, he almost kicked her in the face but shunned it by an inch, ruining all his poor efforts. Katie could see his eyes widening from astonishment as her face becomes wanner and wanner. Her face was now turning into blue. What do I do? Katie took health class during the summer sophomore year, but it was no use. The summer school teacher from another high school only went through how to use an AED merely a quarter an hour. She was in a panic state and feared that the middle aged lady would be dead in a couple of minutes if she didn’t do anything, like her grandmother. “Ambulance! Call the ambulance now!” She ordered the freshman-looking boy, but he was just standing there, dumbfounded. “Now!” Katie shouted frantically as she searched for the pulse around the poor lady’s neck, and the boy finally took out his phone. What took him so long? Is he dumb? She looked around, but no one was there as if the whole drama had been conspired. Usually, there are waves of crowds that attempt to get into the warm building. But not today. Katie found her pulse and sighed in relief this time; there was still a powerful heart pounding in a constant rate, so she would not be dying even in the worst case. Katie wasn’t not a medical expertise or anything, but she still could tell that from my volunteering experience at a local senior center.

Katie dashed out of the auditorium entrance area, leaving the young boy alone and flummoxed. He was still trying to explain the situation, but the words his lips get out were such nonsenses. She sprinted with all her might, perhaps much faster than at any meet or conference---a person’s life depended on how fast she got to tell someone--- Katie finally reached the English office and jumped into the snug room. she glanced around, but no one seemed to be present. Then, she remembered---TODAY WAS A LATE START DAY! Why had I forgotten it? The teachers must be at a morning conference now, but she didn’t know where it was held. She rummaged through the handbag for her own phone and recalled that she had left it at the entrance. She cursed Erica who caused her to pull her phone from the bag three minutes ago and sprinted again. She headed to the attendance office without knowing---there must be someone at the office, she thought.
As Katie had expected, there was one bald man who was yawning in a green cozy sofa. She opened the door, deliberately making her entry to the office as uproarious as possible so he would realize. Despite of this little effort she’d made, he didn’t seem to have realized---he was listening to a late 80’s in such a volume that even it could be heard 30 feet away, humming the lyric along--- “Excuse me?” Katie shouted as loud as she could manage. No response. “Excuse me, sir!” Katie bawled again and kicked a counter, trying to get his attention. He finally glanced at Katie’s direction and put his Beats headphone down. “Good morning, lady,” the round eyes almost became a couple of narrow lines as he smiled amiably at Katie. Even the smile was getting on her nerves now. Maybe having felt the irritation, the man made somewhat serious face and was about to ask what’s the matter. Katie cut him off, though, and explained what brought her to the office.
He still had no response, though. Katie was worried that he might not have heard what she jabbered about, but he started dialing 911. Finally, she thought. How long it took? Is she alright? Or--- Katie affronted the man in front of her and the useless boy in her mind. Had they reacted better, she might be on the ambulance by now! Yet, she knew that it was her fault as well as theirs. She didn’t know how to use an AED, left her phone and took so much time to find someone. “Me, on the varsity cross country? What a joke!” Katie muttered so low that no one would have heard it even if he or she was right beside her. The name tag on the counter marked the bald man’s position and name---


Robert McClein


attendance office

She was in a fret. At this moment, she might be dying. If she died...she stopped contemplating. “I gotta do what I can do,” she muttered again. The man raised his face. “Can you take me to where she is?” he asked.
Katie nodded, but she was rather petrified. What if she’s already dead, not moving an inch? What if she’s now just a cold corpse? Then, she wouldn’t forgive herself forever. Mr. McClein hurried to the door, leaving Katie. “The auditorium entrance, right?” looking back, he asked. She was brought back to the reality from the imagination of the woman being a corpse and ran to him. “I’ll take you there,” she said fiercely, without looking at his direction, but ahead.
Sensing their arrival, the sophomore boy seemed to be relieved. Katie felt bad for leaving this poor kid behind, so she covered her face with her long blonde hair. McClain knelt by the collapsed woman’s side and pressed his finger on her upper neck.
“Looks like she still has some pulse, but it’s so weak. Can you bring me the AED?” McClain asked the boy so casually as if he was asking for just a pen or something. “I just wanna make sure her heart doesn’t stop completely,” he murmured.
“Did you call 911?” Katie asked the boy.
“Yeah,” he replied impertinently, which exasperated Katie a bit. The way he answered reminded her of her ex-boyfriend, Anthony Cartson. She glanced at her watch, which marked a half hour to the eight. It was about the time for students to get to school and hang around before the first period on a late start day.
A few minutes later, the three heard sirens in distance and relieved. Even though the custodian wasn’t moving, she certainly had her heart pulsing, indicating she’s still alive. Katie was also relieved that she would be freed from this awkward silence in the freezing entrance.
“Let’s get her out,” McClain said, and the two teenagers and one middle-aged man, together, attempted to lift her body up. The obese body didn’t go up in the air, though. No matter how hard they tried, the body would remain touched to earth. After three attempts, McClain finally gave up and said, “I think the ambulance men will take care of this.” It was the second time of the day when Katie felt guilty for not doing anything, being useless. She knew no one would blame the sixteen-year-old girl for not being helpful, but she couldn’t help herself wish if she could have done better.
What felt like an hour later, three firefighters arrived at the entrance and took care of the custodian, as McClain said, and the two were dismissed. McClain headed for his warm room in order to call the principal, and the boy for his locker. Katie was left alone, reflecting what just have happened. She felt very old, very tired.
A phone beeped again, and she picked it up from the cold tile. The screen said, “a new message from Erica S.,” again, and this time, Katie had to work very hard to contain her emanating anger within herself. Even though Erica has been Katie’s “bff” since the first grade, she hated Erica’s addictivity to texting or chatting. Or, the Instagram or twitter. The messages Erica have been sending since six O’clock in the morning were: “Hey, do u wanna go shoppin today? i need new soks lol” Every word was as same as it had been sended earlier today.
Can she, at least, change some of the words in the text? Katie thought. But she knew very well that she wouldn’t alter her habit in the phone usage, unless she’s getting a cool boyfriend. Katie slightly snickered at herself. Well, she almost killed her boyfriend when he jokingly took it away from her---After all, no matter who Erica’s boyfriend is, Katie wouldn’t be bothered if he would date and have conversations with her appropriately, whether he was a narcissist or had a little problem in his attitude. If not, she had to be bothered greatly because Erica would come into her house, invading much of her private, relaxing time at night.
Katie sent a reply quickly to her, “No,I huv to go volunteer today, sorry!” as she did two and a half hours ago. She loved Erica and always had been a good friend of her, but couldn’t deny the best friend had incorrigible egoisticism. To be honest, everyone but Katie sort of avoided the poor girl; Erica once broke into Katie’s house at two O’clock in the midnight to complain about the phenomena. But Katie liked her anyway, not because they have been raised together, but because Katie knew that she was very generous at her heart; her innocent smile always melted Katie’s vexation, chagrin,or indignation throughout her seventeen years of life. Plus, Erica was the only one who could understand Katie the best. Even though they didn’t talk as much as they did in the elementary school or middle school, Katie always regarded their friendship as such a rigid, indestructible bond.
Boo. The buzzer that informs the start of a new day overwhelmed the school. Katie entered her first-period class, which was AP Calculus BC. Every morning, Katie was forced to make her eyes and brain fully open and functioning, no matter how exhausted she is. Now, it is 8:57. and all she does is integrating functions such as 25 ln(e7x+e2)+8xdx and 212(3x+csc(8x))dx. The teacher was so vigorous about getting all his students fives on AP exams next May, (which was about five months later from now) so he made the whole insomniac class do five integration every day without a calculator, literally sending them to death. Usually, she was rather a compliant and “good girl”, but even she was feeling a bit of rebellious against the “Integration Morning!” as the entire class did. In addition to the accident that happened this morning, math and the fact that she stayed up late last night was definitely enervating her. Katie felt sweat coming down her neck despite of the cold in the Windy City.

She was supposed to attend NHS this evening and had to head for a hospital after NHS to explain what had happened to the custodian. It’s gonna be a long day. To make matters worse, she had three tests (AP Physics, AP Psychology, and AP Spanish) and an English essay due tomorrow. She took a glimpse from a window. As she was planning what to do this evening, Katie couldn’t stop cursing all the teachers and weather; teachers were giving multiple tests on the same day, and snow was keeping falling only ephemerally that it was far away from a snow day. She thought how it would be nice to just go outside and care nothing; Katie didn't want to be confined anymore at any place, especially at school. She originally liked going to school up to the eighth grade. However, it all changed when some girls started to bully her, just because she started to date with a boy someone in the group liked. Ha. She scorned at herself for even remembering such a trivial thing, but the memory was still stinging her heart. In fact, the scars she had gotten from bullying, bruises and cuts, were not completely cured yet. She saw all the scars every day, every time she took a shower.
The day was, as she had expected, so tedious and tiresome. Katie didn’t even spell a laughter at her Economics teacher’s joke(even though he had looked at her direction with eyes full of hope that at least Katie would be laughing), and her face didn’t loosen muscles a minute. Everything just felt so boring, meaningless, and an impetus to quit school assailed her mind. If she was to fall like the woman this morning, maybe to die, doe it matter what grade I get? Does it really matter what college I went, and how I was a good student, a good runner, or a good girl? But she knew she wasn't dauntless enough to just skip classes and get truancy. She knew she can't allow herself for falling, because being a good girl is how she has been living for seventeen years. She didn't understand how people can fake being sick and just not attend school, and she didn't comprehend how people didn't make an effort to improve themselves. People said that she was an extraordinary good student and a hard-worker, but she was just following her policy and standard.
Katie's parents, Mr. and Mrs.Schmit, were concerned that Katie was doing too much, having seven AP classes and joining the harshest activity in the school. But to her, it was within her reach and wasn’t that hard to keep up; in fact, she had some friends who’d done it. Natalie Granger was one of them, and she got accepted at Columbia, one of Katie’s dream schools. The only difference between the two girls was, well, Katie was getting three B’s this quarter while Natalie had been a straight-A student all her years at elementary school, junior high, and high school. Along with Katie, Natalie had been on varsity cross country and track team, making her the best student-athlete in the school. The two girls had been, or maybe are still now, best friends until this summer. Natalie seemed to be too busy replying to Katie’s text messages, being in an Ivy League school. The two intelligent, former ‘BFF’ girls hadn’t been exchanging a word since last June, when Natalie had departed for New York. Katie felt terrible for even thinking about it because she was pretty sure she wouldn’t reply to any of younger girls’ texts when she was in college.
However, she couldn’t stop contemplating about it; to be honest, she had been feeling they had more than just mere a friendship. In fact, the two had been growing up right next door, making them so close. They had known each other over sixteen years, had been on the same regional soccer league since the age of six, and the two had the closest relationship in the team as well. So isn’t it natural that I feel like I have the right to ask for a text from her? Katie often came back to this thought, but refrained herself from texting Natalie again. She knew very well, just as Katie herself hated persistence, so did Natalie.
Katie stood up. Now, it was a passing period between the third and fourth period. According to her original schedule, it was supposed to be lunch, but she repelled it because she hated lunch. Yes, she hated lunch because she regarded social interaction as the worst part of a school life. She didn’t want to be bothered by random people, detested being in such a clamorous cafeteria, and despised lining up in the long lines for foods. This was one of the abnormal characteristics of her that no one else in the school would have shared. So, Katie was walking the hallways when Erica came up and tapped her shoulder, so excitedly that Katie thought she must have had gotten a new car or something. But it wasn’t a car or a laptop. It was a boyfriend.
“Kate! You know what happened yesterday? I coulda texted you about it, but I was soooo excited and wanted to tell you face to face!” Erica exclaimed in the excitement.
“What happened?” almost annoyed, but patient, Katie asked.
“You go guess! If you’re right, I’ll tell ya!” Erica’s shriek voice echoed in her ear.
“A car?” Katie sluggishly replied, to Erica’s depression.
“No! Do you think I’d be so excited by a car? Plus, I already own a car!” Erica screamed again, in the middle of the hallway.
“Um...well...I really want my own car so bad. Is it a laptop or something?” It looked like her guess failed this time as well, and Erica’s face was getting more and more crimson.
“I’ll tell you, Katie Schmit. What I really want right now is a pup! And, what I got yesterday is a boyfriend!” Erica howled.
“Oh! Okay, congrats! I always wanted you to have the better one than Sean Gorton. Who is it?” Katie inquired, trying to be excited as much as she could manage to, but she got no response from Erica for five seconds.
“Who is it?” Katie asked again. By now, Katie was really fascinated by her best friend’s secret.
“It’s...um…George Sherburn,” Erica whispered so quietly that Katie barely could hear the “burn” part. But it was a name she never thought would be coming from Erica’s mouth, and it was Katie’s turn to be taciturn for a moment.
“So...You are going out with George Sherburn, did you say?”
“Yes! I said it. And I know it’s weird, but I’ve had a crush on him since last month! Just shut it up and leave us alone!”
“I’m not saying anything about it. It’s just...I didn’t expect it, you know? He’s totally different from the guys you’ve been dating,” Katie defended herself.It really was a surprise. George Sherburn was known as the weirdest kid in the school; he’s a geek, nerd, and bony boy. George was so smart and was the only guy who could beat Katie in academic, but definitely wasn’t a cool guy, as Erica had been going out in the past. Erica’s boyfriend history was filled with football or soccer players, who would easily fall in the list of “cool kids in the school.” And George Sherburn was, as you see, opposite of the boys in the list. Katie never saw him being surrounded by people, even though he was sometimes accompanied by teachers.

“Are you...Wait… You’re trying to trick me, aren’t you? I mean, no offence,” Katie quickly realized that she had made such a stupid mistake, and added the last sentence, but it was too late and no use.

“What do you mean by ‘trick’? Have I ever, ever tricked you?” The answer was, of course, “Yes, multiple times,” but Katie remained silent.

“I just wanted to make sure! Calm down. So...congrats! I think it’s really cool, and wish you guys good luck,” as she finished the sentence, she hurriedly took refuge in her psychology classroom which was filled with colorful posters and miniature figures. Some of them were extremely sickening, but the majority of them were really childish; for example, there was one postor beside her seat that said, “No Bullying. We are Watching” with a picture of a creepy, eyeless, zombie policeman staring at her, and on the other wall was a giant poster that said, “Due Date is for Due!” with an image of a bunny teacher frowning. Seriously? This is high school, and we’re either sixteen or seventeen. Or maybe, eighteen!

“Hey, Kate. Sup?” a boy’s hoarse voice penetrated Katie’s body as she was spacing out. It was Sam Chang, an Asian guy she really gets along with very well.

“Nothing, you?”

Instead of replying, Sam just shrugged and sat in front of her. The two enjoyed a conversation by vituperating the most hated teacher, Mr. Dowak until the bell rang. Three seconds after the bell rang, though, Katie figured out she had to go over with one, maybe two, obstacles to the get the winter break; she took a glimpse at the white board just to know that she has one more writing(How is rhetorics used in Into the Wild---MLA format!) due this Friday, and Sam asked her out to the movie for the first day of the winter break. It wasn’t going to be a date or anything, but it was a group-movie. However, because her parents were such restrictive parents, she had to ask their permissions whenever he wants to hang out with someone. Especially when it gets to involve a guy, Katie had to be very careful not to mention something that would sound very awkward or weird.. If she were to say, “you know, dad, I’m going to movies with Sam this weekend,” they would doubt that they are alone. Plus, Katie’s parents were pretty skeptical to their children’s behaviors since their first daughter, Mary, went to go out with one of the gangs and ended up being arrested in a senior year at college. Katie didn’t know why Mary did such a thing, but anyway, she did. Therefore, Katie has to be even more heedful not to mention any guy’s name than average teenager girl.

She took a pass, heading for the restroom. Because the closest restroom was out of order, she had to go all the way up to the opposite hallways. She quietly sighed. What a day! Everything just doesn’t go well today. She knew what was coming the next period. She probably would’ve gotten B- on a psychology test, and she knew the fact because she didn’t---well, she couldn’t---study for the test. But it wasn’t my fault, she thought. I mean, how many people would study for psychology when you have four other tests? She yawned. She checked her phone, making sure that it is only fourth period. And is this only Tuesday yet?

She went back to the classroom, spacing out, reflecting what has happened in front of her this morning. She probably would’ve looked stupid, since her mouth was falling open, her eyes and face completely blank. Katie was somewhat feeling deja vu in this situation. Actually, when Schimit daughters’ grandmother had fallen from a heart attack, Mary considered not going to college, saying, “It would cost a lot enough to pay for grandma’s medicine, and I have other options but she doesn’t. Plus, Katie has to go to college more than I do!”And here Katie was, thinking about not going to college after a woman fell on the floor.

Gym, Spanish, and Physics classes went by incredible speed. Maybe because Katie was just imagining how her parents would react if she said a similar thing as Mary did. Now, she can leave the campus, literally running away from the jail. Running was Katie’s only favorite activity because she can forget everything else while she’s running, breathing out. All the concerns go away, and what’s left are only joy or hard work unless her teammates start talking about how they did on today’s AP problems or tests. She always felt obnoxious whenever her teammates started the topic, because running was the only oasis without academics to her. Katie hated the teammates talking about the grades and finals, but didn’t say anything, trying to concentrate on her running forms. After the long speech of her favorite social studies teacher and cross country coach, Mr. Pollin, she headed out to the hospital.

At the hospital, there lied a fragile woman who had demanded the ID out to Katie. She was irritated with the custodian just until this morning, but all she felt now was a relief that she was alive. The custodian moved her finger an inch, and Katie didn’t recognize that she was conscious until she called for water.

“Here,” Katie said.

“Thank you,” the custodian whispered,staring at Katie’s blue eyes. “Thank you for saving my life, and coming visit me to here. I know you must’ve been tired with all the efforts you put into your life, and I appreciate that you come visit me despite of your exhaustion,” She continued talking.

“Umm...No problem,” Katie said, not knowing what else to say.

She left the room without saying good-bye to her, smiling. Katie was recalling what the custodian had said as she was leaving for room.

“I’ll see you around by the next week, honey.”
Did it mean she’ll be back by next week? She wasn’t sure, but she knew she had found a sunlight among all the dark clouds in the dark sky.