I am awoken by a kick to the side. I groan and look up, vision blurry from sleep. It's Mrs. Mayorlon, the school's vice principal. 

"No sleeping on school grounds," she tells me harshly. Her face is caked in makeup and she has a colourful dress of pleated chiffon dyed in many patterns. She looks down at me with squinted eyes. 

"Yes, ma'am," I reply. I get up and make my way through the doors to my first class. Chemistry. I can barely concentrate in it though. My mind is throbbing and entirely out of it. I get called out by the teacher and told to concentrate. I apologize to him and try my best. 

And it works. A tiny bit. I am able to catch some of his words here and there before they go to join the swirling mass inside my mind. I feel embarrassed. I feel like a failure. 

But I don't care. Somewhere deep inside me, is something telling me to be strong. And I listen to it. 

After class I walk down the wide, wide halls. Most students scooter their way across the school. It's really the only way to get to places on time. But I don't care. I like walking. I don't mind if I'm late. 

The halls are decorated with all manners of fine sculptures thrown haphazardously here and there. Though I guess it's not really haphazardously. The interior designers spend a lot of time carefully rearranging everything every two months. But still. It feels haphazardous to me. There are many plush seats covered in fine, patterned fabric also strewn about, with swirling, carved metal trimmings. The high walls are carved in many swirls and blossoms. And translucent, light holograms shine over everything, students flowing through them as they make their way through the halls. Strings of incredibly tiny, crystal-like lights fall in webs from the ceiling. They form so many patterns. Coloured, blown-glass vases filled with flowers line the walls. 

It's all too much. I keep my gaze on the floor. 

And I bump into a few things as I go to my next class.

Math. It's especially important to pay attention now. For some reason that make it even harder to pay attention. My screaming inner world pulls me down, pulls me down, pulls me down until I'm once again drowning in the whirlwind. The teacher stares at me with hard, cold eyes. But I'm too wrapped up in my inner thoughts. 

After math is English. I hate English most of all. It's so ... I can't describe how it is. It's just, they act like truth and meaning is stored in the colour of lipstick a character wears. And like that truth is the ultimate truth. I can't stand it. 

But I sit through it and occasionally I answer questions. The teacher likes me. For some strange reason. The teacher is kind to me. But not kind enough. 

She still insists that I try to be a normal person. As if being normal wasn't slowly killing me inside. As if normal is who I am. 

Nobody really knows who I am. They only know who they want me to be. Even I don't really know who I am. And I don't know who I want myself to be. I only know that I'm not this, this perfect cookie-cutter, smiles and rainbows girl that everyone wants me to be. That's not who I want to be. 

English class ends and I breathe a sigh of relief. It's time to go for lunch. 

I walk over the tiled floors and silently make my way to the spiralling crystal staircases that surround the wide crystal elevator. I go up the stairs to the very top floor, a floor that is really more of a scaffolding hugging the wall tight with a narrow strip of stone. Nobody sits here. I'm not entirely certain why. But in the stillness of the solitude I feel at least a little bit free. 

I don't touch my lunch. I simply lean back against the wall, fold my legs underneath me, and close my eyes. 

The whole school smells like the floral soaps the robots use to keep it all meticulously clean. It's a cloying smell, though I've heard that the others like it. Here with my eyes closed, the artificial fragrant garden flowers assault my senses head-on. 

But still, I'd rather be here with my eyes closed rather than having to face everything in the terrifying fullness of it all. 

Laughter echoes faintly over the walls and into my ears. This laughter makes me feel lonely almost. All the other students have their groups of friends who they laugh and talk with. Who they go visit. Who they go out doing fun activities with. It's only me who's all by myself. It's only me who's alone. 

But I'd rather be alone than with them. I did try talking and being friends with other kids. I tried it for a long while. But those relationships always felt so empty and hollow. They always felt so unreal. 

It was all always about entertainment. The whole relationship was about entertainment. About being entertained. And about entertaining each other. I didn't feel like a person in those relationships. I didn't feel wanted for who I was. Wanted for who I wanted to be. I only felt wanted for the laughter, the jokes, and the interest I could bring to the group. 

It was subtly degrading in such a cutting way. It made me feel lonelier than ever. It made me feel more alienated than ever. So much more alienated than when I was alone just with myself and I could just be myself. 

And so I stopped those relationships. I decided that it is better to just be by myself until I find another soul who I can relate to. Someone who can really see me for who I am. 

I doubt that I will ever find anyone like that. It's a thought that brings me cold, wet, falling melancholy. Like I'm drowning in the freezing rain. Like I'm inhaling dark purple poison fumes, sharp and acidic. 

But I've learned to make peace with it anyways. As much as it hurts. Because I have to live with it whether I want to or not. 

I think about all the things my friends talked about when we were spending time together. Clothes and shoes and makeup and jewelry and posters and immersive shows and immersive games and holo-books and the theatre and food and their dream homes and their shiny new things and their dream cars and stuff like that. I never really got to know my friends. I only got to know them from the outside. Or at least that's what it always felt like. 

Emotions, besides the emotion of lazy interest and shallow elation, were all locked away beyond us. 

Now at least I can feel my emotions even if I don't know what they are. Now at least I can be some sort of semblance of myself instead of keeping myself hidden. Instead of keeping my emotions hidden.

Because I have no-one, I have no-one to hide from. Because I have no-one, I have no-one to show myself to. But even if I didn't have no-one, I would have no-one to show myself to. Even if I didn't have no-one, I would still have no-one anyways. 

I wonder if I'm just existing for myself. I really, really don't want to do that, exist for myself. It seems like the most horrible existence there could be. 

But everyone lives for themselves. They live to make more money. They live to spend more money. They live to buy more things. They live to buy more experiences. They live to hear more stories written by artificial intelligence programs and hear more songs sung by synthetic vocaloids. 

Even when they're in a group, be it a family or a friend group, they don't care about anyone beyond the group. And even within the group, it's about what the group can do for them. What status or security or emotional labour or entertainment their people can give them. It's not ever about true togetherness. 

We are all isolated in these insular little groups and we do not care at all for people outside the groups. It's a lonely existence no matter what. 

[scene continued in next part]