Rising from her bed in quiet contemplation, reality hits like a brick wall. Remembering the deadline for her english paper was due last night she leaps for her chromebook. Flipping open the screen, “come on, come on” it must have shut down so the login page has to reboot itself. 

Her work is done but of course she forgot to submit it on time for proper credit. These miniscule mistakes reflect on her grade’s average. The simple notion of another docked point signals nausea for Mallory Pech. 

Her morning continues to unfold with bumpy progress per usual. A lukewarm shower since she’s the last to wake, a failed attempt to make pancake batter when she found out halfway through that she didn’t have eggs, and burning her last piece of toast. But the real victory was making it out the door on time with only a stomach in protest. 

Upon arrival, Mallory is buzzed into the school. She attempts to slip past the doorman unnoticed but breaks her eye contact with the floor. Her eyes are met with a genuine grin so she exchanges a less authentic smile back to him, “morning” each greet. 

“Ms. Pech, you’re late.” 

Mallory Pech secretly soaks up the attentive stares she receives as she stomps her way through a four-foot wide aisle of kicked over bookbags. She drops into her chair with an abrupt shriek as the metal legs scrape against the tile flooring. Immediately the room falls mute. Only the sound of slight shifting and stares can be heard until professor Jonathan Treder picks up his white chalk and walks over to the board. His slow, drawn-out, heavy steps grab the eyes of every student. His beige, yet faintly colorful classroom waits expectantly as Mr. Trader turns, pauses, then writes the words subatomic particles on the board. The class groans in harmony.

Rigorous classes have always been a forte for Mallory. The notion of homework terrifies some, yet she embraces the stress. Maybe not in the moment but as things progress she is grateful for her ability to tackle these types of academic challenges. So hearing Mr. Treder’s lesson plan gives Mallory a light buzz of enticement as her peers complain. The calculations and endless droning on of the professor is enough to make her partially forget that morning’s turmoil. But happiness is fleeting with her luck.

In class, Mallory fakes her respective listening, and shoves an unsuspecting hand into her half zipped bookbag, rummaging for her calculator and her hand brushes something miniscule yet fleshy. Pulling her hand back, she notices the crumpled fuzz clinging to her sweatshirt’s sleeve. With a quick flicking motion she throws it on the ground beside her. Then the thing begins to twitch and unfold its contorted body, revealing a three parted insect. Using its six legs, the creature scurries, wiggling its fat abdomen towards lab station three. It climbs the wooden peg leg before pushing itself into an unopened cabinet. An electric shiver shoots down her spine making her visibly shake from disgust. Taking a quick scan she does not assume blame for the unwelcome guest, but instead refocuses her attention on the chemistry professor. Each pause in his speech allows for Mallory’s mind to wander back to this morning’s mishaps. The simple picture of her freshly cold monster sweating on the sun-baked kitchen counter, or the hot sausage patty she accidentally chared while multitasking. She even wonders how things might have gone if she had woken on time to her alarm. Maybe she would have made her routine hot shower and gotten to wash her hair this morning instead of knotting it on top of her head. 

The high pitched chime of the bell reminds Mallory of her real life caffeine-free nightmare. The headache feels unbearable as more irritable pressure builds, pushing outwards on her skull and churning the insides of her stomach. 

Mallory books it for the door and fast walks towards english. Her calves burn from the slight muscle pull in each of her steps. She hooks it left into an empty stairwell then pitters her way to the bottom. Throwing her body weight into the closed door, it creaks open announcing her presence in the cafeteria. She marches towards the hopelessly long cafe line and prays her wallet wasn’t forgotten as well. Wait, step forward. Wait, step forward. Wait, continue. She just stands there, examining the cuticle on each of her finger nails. Using the thicker thumb nail, she pushes each of the malleable skin back, exposing more of her nail bone. While doing this a small pinch irritates her ankle. Believing it to be her attire, she lifts her pant leg and studies the area. Another fuzz appears but this one bites. It begins to leave small red bumps on her ankle. Fear sets in, locking her joints and leaving Mallory to stare blankly at her attacker. After a moment of sickening anxiety, she collects her composure and is able to brush the ant off of her. “What is happening?” The question of sanity further provokes her fleeting patience.

By the time the line is through enough for Mallory to order her energy drink, the ten minute grace period has passed. She is left with a heavy mental debate. She wants to go home. To say “screw this” and walk out those doors into sweet sunshine. To let herself be free of the suffocating brick walls that chain each person to their schedule. But instead she makes the trek to A-wing english. 

Arriving, she is forced to draw more attention to herself by knocking on the locked door. The interruption evokes giggles from across the room but she ignores it. No need to work herself up over mean girls. “Mallory, you’re late.” her teacher is short fused today and sends Mallory off to the office for her failure to come on time.  

She retraces her steps out the door then kicks herself all the way to the office, “now look what you’ve done!” she repremands herself. 

The office lady is outwardly kind enough but has a deeper loneliness behind her gaze. The cat pictures on her desk do not help.Mallory gets the sense that the lady keeps her job because it connects her with other human beings, not furbags. Mallory gives this lady the same forced smile she gave the doorman. She’s just not a genuine people’s person. Talking to people can be hard at times. The worries in speech and behavior threaten her ability to communicate effectively with the lady, so instead she is sat in a chair to wait on the principal. She soothes herself by rubbing sight circles against her temples. Attempting to subside the wicked headache that pounds more ferociously with each worrisome breath. The anxiety nearly sparks a panic attack, but the overreaction is trumped by a tiny, clench-jawed woman swinging open the principal’s door, “come in.” 

Mallory steps through the threshold into the office, her eyes scan over the miscellaneous decorations overcrowding the walls and she cringes. When she sits in the chair designated to her by Principle Schmitt, she lifts up and pulls back on her shoulder blades to appear more poised than she inwardly felt. She obliges to her punishment with polite countenance in hopes that the discussion is brief. “Why am I seeing you in my office today Mallory?”, The principal asks a question she already has the answer to. 

“I was late to class.”, I patronize for her sake. 

“Okay, why don’t we discuss the reasoning for this,” she is no longer asking. 

The discussion goes on with mutual understanding that both parties had better things to do with their time. Mallory is excused within the hour and is left to wait out the bell before she can leave the district office area. During her ten minute sentence, she reflects per the principal's request. “Why is missing more class the punishment for being tardy?”, Mallory's thoughts don’t quite line up with what the principal had wanted for her to think about. 

Mallory Pech left that office fuming. She was too mad to walk to pointless math class so instead she decided it would be best to just ditch for the last hour of the day. Mallory ditches the building out a fire escape door and books it to the parking lot where her car is located. As she runs, she gets the urge to push herself harder than normal. She pushes wanting to feel the pain in her glutes as a discretion to mask her pent up feelings. If she didn’t leave now then she’d probably end up acting out and unintentionally making a bad name of herself. It had happened the previous year when she had an attitude with her control-freak history teacher. The students she thought were chill ended up calling her “temper tantrum” for the remaining three months that school year had. At this point in her social life, Mallory can’t afford another nickname. She slows her sprint to a jog once the white paint on her camry is visible and sighs with intense relief.