7:00 AM

Alarm rings.

Wake up.

Don't smash the clock.

You smashed the clock.

Oh well. It doesn't matter.

Brush your teeth.

Walk into the kitchen where Mom is making pancakes.

"Yeah, I slept well."

You didn't, but it doesn't matter.

Notice she left the TV on in the living room.

Hear about how awful Supergirl is.

You remind yourself of when you blew out a burning building full of men, women and children; the news complained you had caused the building "severe frost damage".

Ignore it, it doesn't matter.

Eat breakfast.

Change your clothes.

Pack your backpack.

Walk out the door before realizing you almost forgot your biology textbook.

TV is still on, still talking about how you caused a sinkhole in Central Avenue, stopping traffic there for several days, ruining local businesses.

They mean that time you flew out of the sewers holding ten dozen bombs set to blow.

Mom says no super-speed in the house, but nobody's there to see it, so it really doesn't matter.

Let Mom give you a ride to school where you walk around with your head to the ground and everyone is definitely not looking straight at you because Mom called you "sugar-boo" and then told you not to go breaking anything again.

It doesn't matter.

7:29 AM

Super-hearing picks up something about the news and how horrible Supergirl is and how she doesn't help anybody and all she does is make everything so much worse and how she should go bother some other planet, just so long as Earth doesn't have to deal with her.

They say it like you don't constantly put yourself in situations that would kill anybody else, all so that less people die.

Ignore it. Tell yourself it doesn't matter.

'Then what does?' you think to yourself.

'Them,' you answer. 'They're alive. That's what Clark would say.'

'Does Clark matter?'

'Of course!'

'If he were gone, what would happen?'

'I'd be sad... I think. I know I wouldn't have a cousin. And I'd have less help in saving the world.'

'And what would you do if the world was gone?'

'I wouldn't have a home. Everyone I know would be gone, too. I would... be sad.'

'But what would it do? What would it mean outside of that? What greater plan that you know of would be so devastated that the universe could not continue?'

You try to search for an answer.

7:30 AM

The bell rings.

Remember to walk at a normal pace, don't use super-speed where people can see it.

A student bumps into you, shouting "move it, already!"

And then another.

And another.

Slow down, you're too angry, you can't risk it.

And another.

7:35 AM

The bell rings again.

You're late.

Open the door.

Don't squeeze it. You know you're angry, but just don't squeeze it.

You squeeze it, reducing the doorknob to a piece of modern art.

Ask yourself if you can somehow fix it, maybe use your heat vision to melt it down and shape it back into its original–

You hear the teacher on the other side of the door practically yelling at you to come in already.

Look in through the window.

He looks angry.

You leave the doorknob in the shape it's in.

It doesn't matter.

Come in.

Put your head down.

Everyone is definitely looking at you now.

It doesn't matter.

Sit down.

Right there, the seat next to the door.

Take out your algebra textbook.

You forgot your algebra textbook.

It doesn't matter.

Cross your arms and cross your legs and stare ahead and act like it matters.

Teacher asks why you don't have your textbook out.

Tell him, "it doesn't matter."

He scoffs, does a double take, flips his lid. He flies off the handle with 'respect' this and 'vital education' that. Every disdained word sends you closer and closer to the edge of boiling over. Don't. Don't. You know you shouldn't. Not with your powers.

And then he says those magic words: "something tells me you don't care about anything."

And there you are, right where you know you should never go: over that fucking edge.

Stand up.

Look him in the eye.

"I... don't care?"

"Yes," he repeats.

Crack a smile.

Laugh.

And laugh.

And laugh some more.

You haven't laughed this long since you can remember.

Everyone else in the class is on the edge of their seats. Many are leaning in, interested in what's about to go down. Some are leaning back, scared of what's about to happen.

Try to get some words in between breaths of air and adrenaline-fueled chuckles.

"You... you think... I don't care!? Well, whoop-dee-fuckin'-doo!"

"Miss Danvers!" he snaps. "I do not appreciate this language and behavior in my classroom!"

"Oh yeah?"

Walk out from your seat, get closer to him.

You're still smiling. You don't know why. Maybe it's because your brain's snapping back, maybe you're losing your mind, or maybe – just maybe – it's just that you're finally getting what you wanted this whole time.

"You know what I don't 'appreciate'?"

He's crossing his arms now.

"And what would that be?" he asks.

"I don't appreciate that nobody thinks I care – I mean, everything I do, I do for other people! Nobody thinks I do anything, but still, I'm the one that ends up doing everything! I don't appreciate that I don't get appreciated! And why shouldn't I!? Can't I just do a good job and get told I did a good job like everybody else, like a normal person, is that too much to ask!?"

"Miss Danvers, maybe you should go see the counselor about th–"

He would have finished that sentence. You would have had to listen to the exact response you knew you were going to hear from the very start of walking up to the teacher and telling him you're tired of his and everyone's shit, that you knew was never going to help because because no one is ever meant to know. But he didn't finish it. Instead, with all your might, you sent your desk flying into the opposite wall, crashing through the window, the bricks, the pipes, and being reduced to a mess of splinter and steel on the school's front lawn. Now you stand with your shoulders squared beside your head, breathing heavy, eye twitching, and every student clinging to the back of their seats in absolute terror.

This is the end.

Everyone saw you.

Everyone knows.

'Good.'

7:36

The teacher is snapping his fingers in front of your nose, bringing you back to reality.

Look up at him through rapidly blinking eyes.

He keeps snapping, just for a second, just to really take the piss out of you.

"Miss Danvers!"

"Yes?"

"Am I boring you?"

"Yes," you don't say. Shake your head 'no.'

"Next time, make sure..."

He really likes that word, 'sure,' saying it louder than anyone else would say it, even putting his oily, grubby little finger down on your desk. Like you're an idiot.

"...you bring your textbook to school. Okay?"

'Okay.' God, just him saying it makes you hate that word with every fiber of your being. But there's no way to come out of this easily without absolutely agreeing to everything he says, which just makes you hate it even more.

Give him a quick nod. Nothing more.

"Good." He takes time to look around the classroom. You dread he's about to make an example of you.

His mouth opens. Why did it have to be there on his head in the first place?

"And I hope everyone else takes note of this as well..."

Shit.

Pull up your collar. Bury your face in your jacket. Slide your body further down beneath the desk. Don't put yourself out there, you're in your civvies, you shouldn't put yourself out there, that's what Clark taught you.

They're looking at you. You can't see them, but you can hear the joints in their necks grind in your direction, and the sliding of their eyes inside their sockets as they laser-focus themselves on you without turning their heads and looking suspicious.

It doesn't matter.

Just like it doesn't matter when Good Ol' Teach slaps the back of your chair and tells you sit up straight, and in that jolt of surprise while you're already so very, very anxious, you do.

Just like it doesn't matter that the man you want to punch into oblivion, even though you know it would kill him but you still want to do it so badly, is walking down to his desk and his chalkboard to carry on with something you don't give one shit about.

And just like everybody hates that you do your best to be like them and take out their trash and move their mountains and reverse tornadoes and fly head-first into pants-pissing prehistoric alien rage-monsters just to save their goddamn fucking lives every fucking minute of every fucking day, and every fucking day nothing you do means anything to these people because they're so fucking absorbed into their ignorant fucking lives that they can't begin to comprehend that the person who is the very reason they're even alive gives a single shit about what they're saying.

But it's okay.

Because it doesn't matter.

None of it matters.