Winter Week

OPENING DAY

Two days ago I hung like a frayed out of style coat, stuck in a narrow locker for an entire period of a ninth grade school day in the dark, except for the three blades of light that poked through the vent holes. Locker 119 quickly earned it's reputation as a prop for practical jokes; it has been my assigned cubby since school started and in part an intraday domicile for me ever since high school began. At least my feet rested on the ground. It was an improvement from the first day of school this year, hung on the outerside of my locker by the pants introduced to everyone with a sign taped to my head that read "Welcome to high school My name is Tom".





"BANGGG!"





"What the world?", the need for a bathroom just increased as my nerve endings all said hello to me at one time.





I shook the ring out of my ears and with the spare time I had thought about how the year started.





Homeroom wasn't in the middle grade west wing hallway anymore now that I moved up to 9th grade. The basic routine stayed the same, more freedom now one for example. while I stared out the peep holes of the locker the hall omitted any trace of a hall monitor. We moved into upper school and were awarded more independence and freedom, no need for hall passes ended.





"Hey, Mr. Helphurt, In here! In Here!" I hoped my voice, that changed octives between vowels, squirmed out enough to make it to the my teachers ears.





Head up, with a grinn ear to ear, Mr. Helphurt bobbled his head, dragging his incognito black sneakers in a shuffled mannor by the surge of students who passed from the opposite direction. In a kind mannor, the students recepricated with smiles of their own, wider in size. They turned their heads and witnessed mr helpurns incredible achievement of a big and tall body packed into an average size lab jacket. The buttons pulled and he showed off the red wool sweater where it poked through the jacket in a neck tie to belt patterned row.





Drowned by the clanking sound of lockers my voice feigned by the beat of the rythm of clasped locks, Mr Helphert continued on after he spun his head in nearly one hundred and eighty degrees rotated in each way and then back when he replied, "Tommy can't stop to talk now, late to class, see you in there." Again he scoped around to find me as he continued.





"No wait, Mr Helphurt, In the locker!" Tom kicked the locker as much as he could leverage his foot in the small place crowded with library books and the crackling of the tin metal vibrated a sound that whispered in the hall but amplified backwards into the storage place that Tommy stood squashed.





Bang, this time the hit to the locker came from the hall, "Is that you in there Tommy Wommy, need your Mommy?" The brute spit the words right into the locker vent.





"Nice Breath, Brutus!" Tommy was certain the remark could hardly be retaliated, there was the protection of an 1/8th peice of metal wall that seperated the noses of Brutus and Tommy.





Bang, the sound drummed into the concealed space that still enveloped Tommy. "See you chump", the pack otherwise known as wolves, school's mascott and common name for the footbal players ran off to their classes.