A Town Called Prairie: Chapter Two

Chapter Two: Garage Drama Class

I walked into school, like I had been doing for seeming a hundred years, through the same gates my dad and grandparents walked through when they were my age, going to high school. It felt like any other day, walk into school, go to class, learn stuff and head home to work on homework, eat, sleep, wake up and do it all over again, but supposedly it was ‘something new’ just because it had a different name.
My first class was English with Mr. Martin, who happened to be my old kindergarten teacher. Guess there’s not that many little kids this year.

Our school is run in a way that each grade has two teachers, one main teacher and a second who, if there isn’t enough for the second class, teaches a different class that has more kids. So there’s the main kindergarten teacher, Ms. Lilly, and the second who is Mr. Martin, and since there is only enough kindergarteners for one class, Mr. Martin teaches 9th grade English. We used to have a teacher for each grade, but since there is such a small group of kids, we had to cut back on teachers and organize it in a way that would be effective, from what the mayor told us. He also told us that if the class sizes keep shrinking like they are, the school is going to have to be shut down and everyone will have to go to George’s Creek for school. My grandpa jumped up out of the crowd and yelled “When that happens I’ll be dead!”
I’ll just say the Sheriff and my grandfather are very close friends.

The performing arts part of our school is actually gone. The old stage in the multipurpose room was lat repaired in the 1970’s, by the graduating class. The costume room for the drama class is still intact, but many of the costumes are old and dusty, with holes and spider webs. The sets from the last play the school had are still on the stage behind the curtain in the same spots they would be for opening night of a show. 
And with this in mind, it’s easy to see why the performing arts aspect of school is essentially gone and is now run out of the garage of Ms. Riley.

After the first day of school, I walked to Ms. Riley’s house where a line of about 15 kids were waiting. Most were around 7 to 9, with a few my age that I remembered from the numerous years we all went to school together. No one made an effort to talk to me, but I didn’t mind, I was used to existing in my own mind.
The line moved forward to a desk where Ms. Riley was sitting having everyone sign in. she looked overly happy, as usual, thanking everyone for coming and how exciting this show was going to be. When I got to the table to sign, she gave me a shocked look.
“Florentine!” she gasped. “How great it is to see you!”
“Its Lauren thanks.” I signed in and walked away from the table.
It’s not that I don’t like my name, it’s just that people expect me to be like my helpful caring grandmother whom I’ve never met and it just seems to disappoint people when they see me compared to her. That and Florentine is such a strange name compared to everyone else here, so I prefer it when people call me Lauren.

When everyone had signed in, Ms. Riley invited everyone inside for a snack and her introduction to what she called “drama unlimited.”
We all settled on the couch and the big pillows on the floor and Ms. Riley sat in an oversized armchair straight out of ‘The Godfather”.
“Welcome everyone! It’s nice to see you all again!” she looked straight at me. “And some new faces! First what we are going to do is introduce ourselves and say something unique about yourself.” I was ready to book it out the door, but I kept myself on the couch, remembering that I promised myself I would do this.
The first kid, a tall and skinny one with messed up reddish hair was first.
“hi.” He sniffed, adjusting his glasses. “I’m Louis, and I just moved here from Pennsylvania.” He sat back down and a kid next to him stood up. It was a small girl, with the same colored hair as the boy, but with beautiful green eyes unframed by glasses. She spoke in a near whisper “my name’s Natalie, I’m from Pennsylvania.” And quickly say down. The introductions went around the room, with people who said their favorite thing was to sing, watch movies, act, read, listen to music, stare out windows, and other things. Finally the introductions got around to me.
“Hi, my name is Florentine, but I like to be called Lauren.” I quickly sat back down.
         Luckily no one questioned what I liked to do in my free time and soon enough, we got back to Ms. Riley.
         “So first off, we are going to practice improvs!”
A few kids cheered, some moaned in opposition and a few, including myself stared at Ms. Riley with a strange look on our faces. She replied to that with a crisp answer. “It's where a scene is presented and you have to make up what you say and keep the scene going until I say to switch where new people go to the front of the room and continue the scene. Improvs is short for improvisation, by the way.” I nodded in dumb response and felt my shoulders drop. Make up stuff about a scene to keep it going?
Oh the trials of one who wants to be an actress.

By the time ‘Drama Unlimited’ was over, I dragged my feet getting home with exhaustion. I ended up getting dragged to the stage four times by the munchkins that sat around me and was forced to do absurd things. I have never been so humiliated in my life.