7:15 AM and Alice wake up as she does every morning to the sound of MTC Saga blasting out of her phone's speakers. Alice opens her eyes and reaches for her phone on her bedside table and turns it off before throwing off her blue blanket and stepping onto the faded pink carpet that stretches across her floor.
7:45 AM, Alice has finally changed from her pyjamas to her school uniform and makes her way downstairs with her school and laptop bags that she slung over her rightsholder. She makes herself a light breakfast which consists of toast with chocolate spread and orange juice with no pulp. *Good thing I didn't go back to sleep after my alarm, we're out of cereal bars.*
8 AM and Alice is out the door with her headphones plugged in and starts to walk to school under a grey sky. *Ah crap I forgot my coat. Sky, please stay as you are for today.* After an uneventful 20 minutes, the front gates of the school come into view as Alice joins the rest of the swarm of people uniformed teens making their morning commutes to school supposedly to learn.
8:20 AM, Alice made her way to her tutor room which was in one of the rooms used for Religious Education. As Alice walks up to the room, the sign on the wood veneer door reads, "R4V3." *I just love how our room lines up perfectly to be called that of all things.*
A few of Alice's classmates are already in and sat around talking at the back of the classroom sat on some of the tables. The walls are a faded blue colour covered in 'inspirational' posters and work from the classes that come in here.
Alice takes her seat near the teacher's desk and goes for her heavy laptop and plugs her headphones in. *I got some time.* Alice proceeds to open a DAW on her computer and busts out a small MIDI pad and starts finger drumming with it. By this point no one in the room even acknowledges her.
8:30 AM, the school has officially started and the class tutour has still yet to arrive. The rest of the class are sat around talking. Alice sits alone continuing to finger drum.
8:40 AM and the classroom door swings open reviling a woman in her early forties with her blond hair tied back in a neat ponytail, wearing a blue sweater, black suit trousers and a pair of oval-shaped glasses.
"Good morning lovelies," her high pitched voice fills the room with her presence as the once chatty class dies down with only the sound of chairs clattering is heard as everyone takes to there seats.
After a while, the bell rings and just like that the class empties as everyone heads to their first class of the day. The hallways fill rapidly with students shoving one another out the way to get to class. Always a fight to move forward. Always crushed between the crowd and the grey walls. Step by step. Slowly getting closer to classes.
The first class of the day starts and the minute's tick by. Ticking by slowly as seconds turn to minutes, minutes turn to an hour. The bell rings. Time for the next class. Time to trudge through the grey halls one again. *What are they talking about?*
Next class starts and the teacher drones on about something. Words are lost to the tick-tock tick-tock tick-tock of the seconds gone by. Another hour goes and thus ends another class. The bell goes off for break time. Students rushing out of classes even more aggressively than before. *I don't care*
At break time, Alice sits alone in the library. It's quite as most people go to the computer suite. *Finally alone. Just the way it's meant to be. Now I can focus on my stuff.* Alice pulls out a drawing tablet and plugs it in while opening a plant canvas on her laptop. *No wonder this bag is so heavy.* She stares at the blank canvas, stylus in hand. Tick-tock tick-tock tick-tock. The bell rings for the start of the next class. Alice stares at the blank canvas before packing up and leaving.
Another class, another hour of blank looks at the teacher. *Why should I care in the first place?* Another bell. Lunchtime. And just like that, the class empties in a mad rush.
Alice sits alone in her tutor room after grabbing lunch. *Bland pasta as per usual. They couldn't even fill the tiny pot.* Alice sits there with the blank canvas staring back at her. The rest of her classmates are either sitting around chatting or are hanging out elsewhere. *Why do they all have to be so loud? Whatever I'll just play something instead of trying to do this.* Alice loads up a game on her laptop and starts to click circles very intensely.
After a while a couple of Alice's classmates find themselves standing behind Alice just watching. Circle after circle being clicked faster and faster. It's hard to miss the sound of the keys as Alice stricks them. Alice doesn't notice them. She keeps playing level after level. After a few the bell signifying the end of the lunch break goes off and Alice starts to pack her things before her tutor arrives to take the afternoon register.
One last class of the day. *One last hour until I can leave.* This last hour feels longer than the rest but finally, the endless drool of the teacher and students end with one last bell of the day.
Alice walks home alone with her headphones in. *Another wasted day.*
After getting home she takes her shoes off at the door and heads upstairs to her room and shuts the door. Up against the wall on the left sits a desk with a monitor and a laptop stand sat on it. She plugs in her laptop and sits back on her office chair. *I wish this thing had a headrest, and padding for that matter.*
She sits there watching videos online. Video after video plays and she just leans back as she starts to hear voices.
"Why don't you ever go out with your friends."
*Don't have any. Don't need any.*
"Don't worry about talking to that lonely little shit."
*Good. I don't want to talk to anyone anyway. I don't.*
"What are you doing with your life."
*I don't know.*
"Why do you just sit there."
*This is good enough.*
"What do you plan to do with your life."
*I don't care anymore. How long ago did I care?*
"You are nothing."
*You're right.*
"With these grades, you'll go nowhere"
*Grades this and grades that. Who even cares by this point. I lost the ability to.*
"You'll go nowhere."
*You're right.*
"You'll go nowhere."
*I know.*
"You'll go nowhere."
*STOP SAYING IT!*
The clock reaches 7:15 in the morning and Alice wakes up as she does every morning to the sound of MTC Saga blasting out of her phone's speakers. Alice opens her tearful eyes in her room at the Gotwald estate.
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