Current Issue 2026

9:03am. Pearl walls, a dirty floor, hollow lights, a messy whiteboard, scrambled papers stacked on—oh wait, the board. Right. I aimed my eyes in the general direction of Mrs. Collins scribbling her runes with a faded black marker. Where the hell are we now, what the hell is THAT symbol? Maybe she’ll mention it if I wait long enough. I, once again, opened my ears to her ramblings with a strained focus.

“Now, the most important point on this curve is the vertex—the very top or bottom of the parabola, depending on how it opens. And we can find the x-coordinate of the vertex using this lovely little formula,” Mrs Collins explained while writing out some sort of recipe.

Shit, she’s on the complete other side of the board now. Well, I guess I lost this one. Not much else to do here besides wait… I’ll keep an ear out just in case she says anything worthwhile.

“The — ——— —— so if we ——— — if x equals 100, then —— – — —”

 While I listened to her with great, perfect clarity, I began to spin my pencil around my fingers like a drumstick—an easy hack for some sanity. I gave an eye to the clock just to see how much time I had conquered. 9:05am. Two minutes. Cool. No, yeah, that’s fine, that’s whatever. I can tough it out like usual.

As I waited for something to happen, I simply trailed my thoughts like a stroll through the park: I should go to the beach with Billie today, that’d be fun. Ooo, maybe I can hit a ball or two with her later.

In my attempts to not go insane, I flew too close to the sun and accidentally let the pencil slip from my fingers, firing the torpedo into the edge of a nearby desk. I scurried like a roach over to the floor between a couple tables and retrieved my pencil. Maybe if I’m quick, she won’t say anything—

“Harkin,” she halted.

My last name too? I popped my head up from the floor like a weasel.

“Hello,” I replied, hoping my nonchalant charm would amuse her.

“What is a?”

I looked at the board with squinted eyes. Scanning through all the sigils and runes, I did eventually find a on the board.

a = ?

Well that’s not exactly helpful. I resorted to plan B: be funny. It was one of my greatest and only assets. I looked at her with a sly grin.

“… What is a what-now?” I joked. She did not reciprocate, to say the least. All I got was a feigned snort from across the classroom—classy.

“Do you wanna start writing some notes?” she scolded.

I finally got up from the floor onto my feet and returned to my seat. I didn’t bother even answering, I just nodded. To get myself off the hook, I pretended to be capable of perfect retention: hands on the desk, knees locked together, back straightened, eyes on the teacher, all that jazz. It didn’t actually help me, obviously, but it was a good way to stall until her focus moved back to the board. Meanwhile, my thoughts decided to take a stroll through the park again: I wonder if mom could help me with my heritage project later. We don’t really have much culture to work off of though… Whatever, we’ll throw something together.

I promptly began to drift back into spinning my pencil—WAIT NO DON’T DO THAT. I floored the brakes on my pencil and pointed the graphite tip to my empty paper. I had no idea how to start my notes, especially when half the context was now in the past, so I thought I could listen in and doodle until I heard something worth writing down.

“When the — – —— —– ——— — you ——— — – — so the vertex is — —— –.”

At first, I just scribbled some random shapes without any particular intent. Ooh, that kinda looks like a car. How the hell do you draw a car? Time to find out. I began going off of pure muscle memory trying to figure out the general shape of a car. I was mainly going for a sedan, but it was inbred with vague details of a SUV and a hatchback. How far up are the front wheels? Are they aligned with the engine or the driver seat? Shit, is it in-between them both??

“How you — this – — —— so there’s —— — – —  when — – ———— — ”

After many desperate attempts, I yielded. Forget the damn car. I’m going back to what I know how to do best. I dressed my paper with two curling lines going upward, parallel to each other. In-between the two I planted a v shape and began to scribble faint half-oval lines around the top of the structure, forming the leaves of an oak tree. That’s better. Anyway, what’s Mrs. Collin’s on now—

RIIING!! RIIING!! What the WHAT?! That’s not right! What time is it—how the HELL is it 9:45am already?? Dazed by the time, I cleaned up my supplies along with everybody else. While my head was tucked under the desk with my backpack, someone approached close-by and placed something on my table before walking off. Once I zipped up my bag, I popped my head up and saw a yellow note.

Peter, please see me during lunch today. — Mrs. Collins

An icy chill washed over me. I knew the drill: I would come in, she would remind me that I’m not what I could be, and I would go home. She always meant well, but god is it tiring to hear “you have so much potential” for the umpteenth time. The only thing I ever got from lunch detention was the opportunity to disappoint my mom once more.

I blew some air out my lips and threw my backpack over my shoulder. Guess I’m not eating today. I was too embarrassed to even look at her before walking out the door. I don’t think she ever quite liked dealing with me, but I couldn’t blame her. If I had to guess, she was probably a swell person outside of class—or outside of me. I wouldn’t wanna deal with Peter Harkin either.I walked down the cold steel ramp leading out to the dull grass. I exited in silence, listening only to my own footsteps and the chitter chatter of everyone else’s cliques. As painful as this was, I knew I couldn’t let it stop me. I had to get through this no matter what—even if it kills me. Maybe tomorrow will be easier.