A long but hopefully rewarding day

And there they both are, ready to start their day. I make sure nobody notices me, as it’d be easier for me to come in shortly after the class has started.

Ophelia is in the back, with headphones on her ears, ignoring all the other girls. It seems like her rejection of conformity also extends to rejecting the social construct of “having friends”.

As to Cyndi, I can’t see her from my angle, but that doesn’t stop me from knowing she’s right on the other side of the wall I’m leaning on.

“He couldn’t even get me something nice. We’ve been dating for two weeks and all he does is send me a text? It’s not like I’m asking him to get me a Vuitton bag, I would’ve totally settled for Gucci.”

She’s not hard to locate.

Ah, there’s Julian! She looks about as exhausted and depressed as I was until yesterday. Hang in there Julian, I’ll make sure those girls come to respect you, and I’ll make sure you get to have fun with them. You may not even be into girls yet, but that can always be arranged.

She opens the door to her class and leads them in. I wait a handful of minutes and knock on her door before opening it ajar.

“Hi, Ms. Calpurnia?” Never call a teacher by their given name in front of the students, you won’t hear the end of it. “Can I come in and check on your computer? It looks like there may have been a problem with our infrastructure and I need to check some files.”

“Oh, of course, it’s right here, I haven’t turned it on yet,” she answers, surprised but not doubtful.

“Thanks.” I say as I make my way to her desk in the corner of her room.

Only the IT room has computers for everyone, but most other classrooms still have one for the teacher, in case they need to show some videos. The best computers in the school are sent to my class, so needless to say the ones in the rest of the school need a lot of maintenance to keep running. I’m actually going to try and fix it up as much as I can while I’m waiting for my presence to spread its effect, to thank her for helping me in my plans, and because I actually do feel bad for her.

Considering how crappy our equipment is, sometimes I wonder where those rich parents’ money goes to, but then I see the statues on the quad, the fancy uniforms that are tailor made for the students on a regular basis, the all organic food served to the girls every day (the staff gets the leftovers the following day), and I remember that this school just has a weird sense of priorities.

It’s all about the semblance of a quality establishment, but nothing behind it. A fancy façade to a crumbling house.

As I wait for the computer to boot up, I quickly look around the room. Ophelia’s still towards the back of the room, but on the window side, the same side I’m sitting on. Considering Julian’s desk is pretty forward, right against the first row of desks, it means I’m not that far from her. Cyndi is another story though, as she’s on the other side of the room, right next to the door. Probably so she can be the first one out of the room when the bell rings.

Julian quickly gets back into her lecture, something about Geoffrey Chaucer. She seems really interested in what she’s saying, and she’s putting as much life and energy into her teaching as could be asked of someone as tired as she is.

It’s sad that most of it falls on deaf ears. Neither Isabel nor Rachel are in this class, and I think the students that signed up only did so because Julian has a reputation as a good grader.

I spend a good chunk of the hour listening to her as I remove some useless apps and change some config files to extract what little performance I can out of her glorified abacus of a computer. Turns out it’s... kind of fascinating. After a while, I forget my original goal and just listen to her class, without even pretending to work on her computer, but it doesn’t look like anyone notices or cares. English literature is actually a fairly interesting subject when someone passionate talks about it. If I liked being even more underpaid than I currently am, I could’ve seen myself making a career into it.

Eventually, the bell rings an end to the class. Of course it’s a fancy bell that plays a soothing tune, rich girls are too good to just get tinnitus like the rest of us mortals.

Although for once I do approve of the choice.

I quickly check the list of affected people in the app, aaaand…

✓ Ophelia Pedersen

Cyndi Dufort

Crap. Still one short. I guess I’ll have to wait another day before I can start exacting my ****.

Oh well, what’s one more day of normality before a life of earthly pleasures?

I turn to my colleague.

“Hey Julian. I hope you don’t mind that I stayed a bit longer than expected. I ended up really liking your lecture!”

“Aw, I’m glad to hear that. That makes a grand total of one person who cared. I didn’t take you for the literary type.”

I’m not. I wish I were, but as interesting as books may be, I struggle to actually stick to any in the long run.

“Well, what can I say? I’m full of secrets, aren’t I?”

She actually chuckles at this!

I can’t help but quickly glance down at her.

She may not be the most traditionally beautiful woman around (I think some of the students had their first plastic surgery around the onset of puberty, which gives them a bit of an unfair advantage) but she has a certain je ne sais quoi. She’s got a somewhat darker skin tone than most people around here (I think she’s mixed race? I never found a way to ask without sounding weird), which looks beautiful against her Persian blue skirt suit. And there’s something about her mouth. It’s just a tiny bit asymmetric, which doesn’t sound like it’d be attractive, but it makes her look like she’s got this constant knowing smile that I could gaze at for hours. And the way her eyes reflect the light. They’re black, about as dark as they can get, and yet shine so bright...

Okay, fine, I admit it. I have a bit of a crush on her. Are you happy? The guy with the mind control app who’s about to try and corrupt the values of over 200 people into overly sexual parodies of themselves has a crush on his cute coworker.

I wish you could see her. You’d get it.

“Anyways, my next class is in just a bit and I left something in my room, I’m gonna have to get going. Did you find the problem with the computer?” She asks, doing a little finger gun gesture towards the dorm building she stays at (sadly not the same as mine).

“Oh, yep! It should be a lot faster than before, not that that’s saying much.”

“Thanks Adam! See you around!” She waves as she leaves the room.

And she said my name!

I leave behind her and see Cyndi in the corridor, sitting on a windowsill and complaining about her boyfriend.

Apparently she dumped her boyfriend of an hour ago and got a new one during class, somehow.

It’s a bit of a shame I couldn’t get her to be affected by the belief in time. I wonder how close I was. Maybe there’s a way to see a percentage by clicking on their name somewhere? Let me check the app.

✓ Ophelia Pedersen

✓ Cyndi Dufort