Authors Note: High school sucks, Applying to college sucks, I'm fairly certain college sucks, And I don't own static shock. I think the universe hates me.
12/10
December tenth is the worst day in the history of history. No year. Just that one day. And it's terrible how one single little word can affect a person's entire future.
Throughout Dakota High not a single senior could pay attention all day. Teachers all but gave up on teaching, everyone just watched the clock and its incessantly slow minute hand. Last period the seconds took on years of their own, parading around the clock in an anguished fashion. Two fifty nine, three, three ten; and still another half an hour to go. And it was half an hour until what? Until the entire senior class was crowded around their computers, crying uncontrollably-or euphoric- but most likely sobbing. It was unfair. It was cruel. It was early decision. And they could do nothing about it.
In the back of the Physics classroom a boys blonde head continually pounded on his desk. Drolly marking each second with a thud.
Thud-I didn't get in
Thud-I didn't get in
Thud-I didn't get in
Until finally his lab partner held his head erect.
"Richie cool it" muttered in an unusually harsh tone before, with glazed eyes, the boy glanced at his companion.
"V, five minutes until we find out" the other boy, for his part, grasped one of his dread locks and anxiously twisted around his finger, refusing to meet Richie's eyes. He knew that in five minutes they'd know everything that would ever matter, five minutes and he was doomed. Having been through so much worse, having fought people so much tougher, this was what scared him. A simple one word phrase.
As a freshmen, a sophomore, even a junior, no one understands the true evil of this day, mercifully a Friday. Always the seniors would spend the day huddled in corners praying to whatever idols of admission they could find, walking into lockers and crying in corners. And always the younger students would comfort them. Its only one college, there are millions out there. So one doesn't want you, they don't need you. There are so many others. Amazing how in one summer you discover that of the millions of colleges only one exists. Only one matters.
The bell finally rang and, unsurprisingly, the entire class rushed out, almost jamming in the door. Somehow they all got through. The two boys, formerly in the rooms posterior, shared a nervous glance before running to the gas station they called a hang out. Sure Richie could have checked earlier. Richie could have hacked into the office with backpack and changed it. Taken out all of the chance. But that would have been wrong. And they were supposed to be the good guys.
They were panting when they reached the gas station, painfully exhaling long tendrils of steam; but they didn't care. Richie jumped from foot to foot nervously, nearly slipping on the ice, as he waited for his friend to open the door.
"C'mon Virgil hurry up" he cried impatiently, receiving a shivering glare in response.
"I'm working on it, I'm working on it," he said, feverously turning the key. Finally he gave up and, alighting his finger with a static spark, forced his way in. Richie barreled past him into the dark confines of the abandoned room, with an enthusiasm he never possessed after patrols. "Chill Richie" Virgil said, in what was fast becoming a clichéd phrase. The blonde boy ignored him, having already discovered the computer.
Fingers rapidly sweeping a keyboard that had seen better days, clicking noises filled the dark room. It was small, confining, and musty, but it had always felt home to the two. Not that they cared at this point.
Click
Click
Click
"What's taking so long Rich?"
"Everyone and their mother is on right now V"
"So kick some of them off Rich"
"Can't do that if I'm not ON V"
"So get On Rich"
"I'm Tr-on?"
"And?"
"And…fuck"
"What?" Richie walked away from the computer, turning his back on the now evil device that he never wanted to see again, pointing a shaking finger at the screen he managed a 'see for yourself' before giving into to the sobs. Virgil, unable to console him, glanced at the monitor and met with a similar fate. There, directly under the Gotham University heading, was the one word no senior ever wanted to see. Rejected. Richard Foley, super genius of his generation, wasn't accepted into a state university. A STATE UNIVERSITY.
Panic quickly building, Virgil piled into the computer chair. His heart pounded and fingers could not move fast enough as he typed in his account name, his password, everything the screen asked for. He would have given it his sister's life if it asked, well if that had mattered to him. Galaxies exploded into shining nebulae, and ice ages passed, before the screen loaded. And there, right under that same Gotham U heading, was the same one word phrase.
Virgil managed to stagger to the couch before collapsing, scratching his face on the rough burlap. He grabbed a pillow and screamed into it, loud echoing screams that made his throat raw and escaped the barrier of the cloth. Angrily he punched the pillow, even forceful motions, each time backed with an increasing electricity, before he blew it to pieces, coating the room in fluffy, cottony, anger.
Richie sneezed as it fell, disrupting hysterical sobs with wracking allergies. He grew light headed as air stopped making it to his lungs, between the sneezing and the sobs there was no room. Even through his anger, Virgil could hear his sidekick hyperventilating and, quieting, looked down at the floor. The Blonde boy was wheezing, nearly thrashing about as he gasped for breath. He had nearly stopped crying in the now, more important, quest for air.
Virgil shook his head, fighting back hysterical, sobbing, laughter, and picked up the suffering boy in a swift motion. Though Richie wasn't a large boy, he wasn't slight either. Still two years of facing off against people easily twice his size had made Virgil able to lift, at the very least, his friend. Sighing he deposited the sobbing boy on the rough couch and fell beside him.
"You okay?" he asked, anger forgotten in the face of his friends welfare.
"I'll live" Richie responded hoarsely, choking back tears. "But it's not fair… our grades are definitely good enough for that school…My SAT's are perfect… I mean…why?"
" 'Cause college sucks, man" he clenched his fists, cracking his knuckles into the almost silence " I dunno" And he too broke into sobs.
For several moments the two of them crying was the only sound in the small room, the echoing of violent sobs and occasional pounding of fists a symphony into itself. It was unfair, they couldn't really stray too far from Dakota because of the superhero stuff. They couldn't stay in Dakota because that would mean giving up too much of life. Gotham U had seemed perfect. Their grades would have gotten them in, should have gotten them in. what was wrong. The random cry of 'unfair' joined the growing trio, singing out pained notes. And then suddenly it stopped, everything, and there were only tears. Tears that slid tacitly down their miserable faces.
"So" Virgil murmured into the new silence "so"
"Now what?"
"We apply somewhere else"
"Where else"
"I dunno"
"We are so screwed bro" and more tears, rapidly drenching his already soaked face. "So screwed" and he dived into the confines of the scratchy couch once more. Dumbstruck Virgil watched with horror Richie's reaction.
This was Richie, usually confident, forever a genius, capable of sleeping through full classes and acing tests. And this was Richie, reduced to tears in a gas station while his supposed best friend stared dumbly on. Silently Virgil tapped him on the shoulder, and then shook him, until he sat up and stared back at him, tears etching marks in salt lined tracks. Awkwardly the superhero, savior of the city of Dakota, bane of all bang baby sludge, placed his arms around his best friend and hugged him. And confusedly Richie hugged back. And they sat there, in the dark, on a rough couch, in an abandoned gas station, in a frigid city, crying together as though they were five year olds whose favorite toy had been broken.
Throughout the city of Dakota that night went up a cry such that was never heard before. As one the senior class of Dakota High drew into their homes, corners, and beds and wailed. Gallons of salt water were shed in the space of an hour, enough to save nations in drought when purified. Movie theaters, Pizza places, Skating rinks, Malls; all were devoid of teenagers. Even the villains seemed to understand the dark mood of the town, leaving crime be for a fleeting weekend of shame. Even the internet was devoid of the senior class, save for the entries in one chat room.
Send our seniors soaringVirgil Hawkins- Gotham University rejected
Richard Foley-Gotham University rejected
Daisy Watkins- Yale University rejectedFreida Goren – New York University rejected
Joey Bombura- Metropolis Community College rejected
Tina Todd- Brown University rejected
Shanice Vale- Massachusetts institute of Technology rejected
Nina Crocker – Lehman College rejected
Nick Conner- Binghamton University rejected
All right, I feel much better now…kinda… so anyway… December tenth is the worst day in the history of history but December fifteenth is black Wednesday; a day so evil it should never be spoken of… surprisingly those kids are actually in their class… I found them. Aren't I Special… oh I'm depressed again
Brownie points if you can figure out which school hates me, it's on the list…but doesn't really matter …
…I think I got their High School name wrong…
… And I care why?… review please