Chapter 2: It's the Small Details that Count
Today was a cloudy day.
Matches my mood all too perfectly.
The summer I had complained about seemed so far away. Now, all the leaves had fallen from the trees, leaving branches naked and cold. I would've felt really bad for the trees if I weren't dealing with problems of my own. What did the trees understand about life! They just stood there year after year, getting taller and fatter until the day they get struck by lightning!
I took a deep breath and apologized to the tree for fat-shaming it. Yes, I shouldn't be taking out my anger on the tree. The tree did nothing to deserve this sort of verbal abuse.
"Ready to go?" mom asked impatiently, staring at me from inside the car in annoyance. I snapped out of my trance after hearing her voice snap at me. How long had I been staring at that tree? Probably too long.
"Oh oops, sorry," I said sheepishly, laughing nervously before getting on the car after her.
After mom dropped me off at the bus stop, everything seemed to be leading to my inevitable "demise". I use the term demise here because I know exactly what will happen today, what will happen after said event, and what will be the result of it. I will go to school, go through the school day, live through more trauma, leave school, go home, do homework, and sleep. Repeat.
This sort of cycle made me sick.
But what was I supposed to do about it?
I'm sure I'm not the only one who feels like this either. And I definitely won't be the last. To put it simply, society was a little too good at making itself run 24/7. Wouldn't it be great if we could have some sort of "you time" week? Where you could just take an entire week off? Sure, breaks from work and stuff are nice too but that doesn't mean you get a break from your family and friends! "You Time" week would feature absolutely ZERO human contact (unless you want it) where you can just recharge and thrive!
Sadly the world isn't perfect.
"Thank you!" I said to the bus driver, in the most not-dead voice that I could muster at 7 A.M. in the morning (mind you, it's hard). I plopped my bag on the security check table before quickly stepping through the metal detector. Just a typical morning.
"Thank you!" I said to the bag check lady, with another one of my not-dead voice variations. I hope it sounds at least slightly convincing.
Angela was walking next to me, looking just as dead as I was. Ahhh...isn't the life of a student just wonderful? We get to wake up every day at 5 A.M. (sometimes even earlier if you have swim practice), go to school when your brain isn't even functioning right, and just end up staying up late again when you can't do your homework properly from the tiredness. So you end up sleeping late again.
Another loop.
"How's life?" I sleepily asked her, not bothering with the not-dead voice.
"I'm tired," she replied casually. My conversations with Angela in the morning usually went like this. I'd ask her how her morning was and she'd reply that she was tired or absolutely dead. Of course, I felt exactly the same way, but the optimist within me wouldn't allow me to say that so bluntly.
It was usually within these twenty minutes of spare time (before class started) that I'd switch from dead mode to cheerful optimistic mode (can't say it was 100% truthful but hey, it worked). I'd accompany Angela to Earth-Space since one of my favorite teachers taught that class.
"Hey guys! How was your weekend?" Mr. Turner would ask, and every single time, I'd say:
"Huh. I don't remember what I did this weekend."
This wasn't exactly a lie you see. Every weekend, I'd sit in front of my laptop, socializing with my online friends and some IRL friends. The rest of the time would be spent belting out kpop, jpop, and occasionally cpop. Homework was barely, if at all, touched. It didn't make too much sense to me. Why would teachers assign homework over the weekend when the point of weekends is to let students take a break and rest their minds?
After chatting with Mr. Turner and Angela, I'd head promptly head downstairs at 7:20, giving myself 5 minutes before class started.
And that is when the real torture began.
CREATORS' THOUGHTS 
LightningBug
LightningBug I tried to make this chapter more interesting but also describe the day-to-day morning routine. Hope it's not too boring >_<
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