The Smartest

I rush to school in a uniform that consists of a deep blue vest over a tight white polo shirt and a deep blue plaid skirt. I go to the most prestigious school in Gentem so my uniform is of velvet and silk. I was running along the pathway having left home 2 minutes later than usual my mom said I would be fine because I am always early. I rushed along the smooth cement pathway as I see an old man sitting on the sidewalk across the road in Pauper. Pauper is a fraction of our city that goes to the poor. Instead of silken pavement, they have gravel. Instead of mansions who wait on your every move, they have huts that smell of rotten milk and cat litter. I speed up a bit because I am scared of him and all of Them. That is what they are entitled in our city, Them.

A paper suddenly flies in front of me as I am looking at the strange man and slashes me across the face. My hands fly to my face to assess the damage. Just this warm sticky substance that is... deep red? I have never seen such a thing in my life. Luckily, I stop at a washroom to assess the damage. I pull up my skirt to see if I can wipe the substance away. The skirt feels soft and familiar on my face because at home Momma supplies us with velvet cloths every time we are dirty. I suddenly realize I am still holding that poster I look down to read it while I am massaging my face absentmindedly with the skirt. The edge is tipped with my red substance. It reads; ‘School test today. High stakes. Do not come prepared.’ Well, why wouldn’t we and how could’ve we? We got the poster the day of and if we had any notice, I know people in my school care about themselves enough where they would act studiously on the announcement. I would never skip school for a… papercut? I think that’s what they called it a long time ago in the 2000s. We are in the 36th century so really our terms and safety habits have changed for the better. It is a lot safer with everything so perfect and the people that are unsafe are basically thrown out so no harm may come to us.

Don’t come prepared? My thoughts completely veer off their thought tracks. With high stake quoted directly on there? I walk to school with the poster in a ball tossing between each hand looking out at the devastating wastelands that are Pauper. I toss the poster to the other hand and accidentally drop it and as I look down and notice something across the freshly paved road; a man. I don’t know why but I am seemingly drawn across the street into the forbidden land. I cross the road in a trance, luckily cars are never on this road or anywhere near Pauper at all so I cross without fear. Until I stop in the middle worried that someone might see me and send me here. At least I have clothes. Some aren’t lucky enough to have anything on them. Some in the bath, sleeping, or even on their deathbed. They were taken and a couple even died on the way there. I continue to walk cautiously towards the man. He appears sleeping. Very deeply. I walk up to the man to feel his forehead. Cold. Like ice. A piece of that ice forms in my chest forever standing.

. . . . . .

I arrive at school after feeling the man trying to put him out of my mind. I have decided that I will not tell anyone about the substance. I will probably tell Katon, Pyre, and Obis about the man though. My mind drifts off to the test as I stride into the school. As soon as my flats hit the marble, all of my thoughts and fears drift away. This is the reason I wake up in the morning. I love it here at Impetus. It is my favorite place in the whole world. I am sanctioned here.

“Harper!” Katon sees me. “What is this test all about?”

“How am I supposed to know?” I asked. “It’s not like I get special treatment!”

I am now close enough to hear her mumble. “Yeah, you kind of do.”

“Hey,” I quickly change the subject. “Where’s Peat and Pyre? You’re like always with them.” I rarely relax my grammar especially in school, but it’s Katon and she gets that I have to let down my guard sometimes. I feel so weird without 3 people to talk to.

“Pyre hasn’t gotten here yet and Peat went out to find Obis.” She answers flipping her extremely long blonde braid over her shoulder.

“You Got any of them yet?” I ask raising my eyebrows. Getting someone is how the government says we should talk about romance. We don’t say have you gone out on a date, kissed or anything they said in the 21st century. We are more sophisticated than that.

“Nope,” Katon said, fiercely; but in her eyes, I see a softness, a longing to be in Peat’s arms. You could tell Pyre wanted her though and she was caught between a rock and a hard place.

The first bell sounded and me a Katon looked in each other’s eyes as though to say: Let’s do this. We race down the hallway, trying to beat each other. So far this year I have beaten her twice. I am not too athletic but I can run. Granted, there has been only two days of school... I want to see if she has improved at all. I race past her before she even gets out of the hallway, even though we are in 9th grade we all stay in one class. The class is the whole grade though. I regain my composure before walking into class.

“So close!” Katon screams as she jumps on my back.

“Yet so far!” I say shoving her off me.

We make it inside serious because no one could have forgotten about the test and it is bad etiquette to come in childish at such a mature age. Mrs. Gryling is sitting at her desk head in her hands.

“Are you okay?” I walk up to her and rub her arm.

“I...uh…” She stutters. “I…don’t know yet.”

“Let me know if you need anything.” She was Lyra’s mother and they lived in Pauper. I was so scared because they had next to nothing except for their jobs here at school. She nearly means the world to me even though her daughter completely ignores me. I turn to the classroom and the tiers of desks and that somehow calms me. It is basically like giant stairs and then there are normal sized stairs running up to the top. The desks are all united and the seats are what divide the desks. I am second out of 63 rows up. I started out in the top back and then was moved because I always raised my hand and the teacher couldn’t see me all the way back there, I was moved up as far as possible.

Mrs. Gryling claps her hand rhythmically and calls the class to order, "Class, please calm down and come to order.” She never speaks this shakily, something is up. “We… we will be taking a test today, so please settle in. This specific test is very important to uh this specific uh school, so um you must uh try your very hardest.” She gulps. “This test will be covering everything you have learned so someone will be here to... oh! She is here. She will run you over to check you over. We will call in alphabetical order. Is that all, Ms. Dunvar?” She says the name, Ms. Dunvar, icily, suddenly steady as a rock, as though they have a past.

“I would think so.” Ms. Dunvar responded, professionally as if she was above us all. I already did not like her. She was irritating Mrs. Gryling, I could tell.

I raise my hand as professionally as possible and look Ms. Dunvar in the eye. She nods in my direction.

“What exactly will you be “looking over” as you say?” I try the best not to put the ice I felt into my voice but it escapes, small as a snowflake. She glares at me noticing it.

“If you studied.” She responds blatantly as though it was obvious.

“Well, how…” I trail off subconsciously. The look seems to bore into me screaming ‘STOP!’

I catch Katon’s eyes and she looks worried. Did she study? I smile and turn towards Ms. Dunvar. She smirks and nods towards the door. It is weird. She has been looking at me this whole time. Her eyes boring into my soul. I shudder and know immediately who she is going to call.

“Ahbis Aytone?” She wrinkled her nose in disgust. I can see her thinking 'what were his parents thinking.'

“Obis Atone.” He responds, steadily as he descends the stairs. I smirk as he rolls his eyes at me. This is going to be a long while. We go through (and I zone out completely) until I hear my name. I was in the middle of planning my next invention.

“Harper Cahgeer.” I roll my eyes. I stayed in real life enough to hear each and every person in my class correct her on their names.

“Harper Cager,” I respond trying to keep the annoyance out of my voice. I stand up and walk promptly down the mere four stairs to get to the ground level. I give a small smile to Mrs. Gryling and walk towards Ms. Dunvar. I give a mocking smile at her and she leads me to a char in the hallway.

Everyone before me returned to the room with over-enthusiastic smiles and every time they waved they grimaced. I noticed Obis the most. Obis does not smile a lot but when he does, they are small smiles with more emotion. This time he smiled hugely without emotion under the surface. No one but me would notice. On the outside, he was over-enthusiastically happy, inside a void. I could not read him which is nearly impossible.

She comes towards me and I do not flinch. She moves her sleeve and reveals a needle. I flinch, I am terrified of needles. I swore I saw the corners of her lips turn upward at my flinch. She shakes it and deep orange particles start appearing in the neon orange liquid. I close my eyes as she inches towards me, I feel the needle stick into my skin and I don’t know if I passed out from fear, or because of the liquid in the syringe.