Cory woke up with a start, feeling as if this was going to be a very bad day. He got out of bed and sheathed his katana, already wearing his clothing. He walked out of the closet and ran right into the president, who, as usual, was drinking absinthe.

"Cory, what did I say about looking where you are going?!"

"Nothing, you've never said anything about that to me…" Cory covered his face in shame.

"Well, you should know by now, you're like 12." With that, the president stalked off to some unknown place, drinking the green liquid lustfully.

Cory decided that today was going to be a normal day, nothing weird was going to happen. He ate his bread rations and walked outside, taking a deep breath and enjoying the fall breeze. His katana glowed in the autumn light, reflecting the multicolored leaves of the white house garden. Cory then began walking down the white house sidewalk, unknowingly walking right into a trap.

A bus slowly approached, stopping right in front of Cory. The door opened and the bus driver jumped out.

"Hey, you're that guy who almost hit me!" Cory shouted, recoiling in horror.

"That's right, and I think it's about time you learned a lesson, eh?" the driver exploded, exposing his Canadian accent.

He grabbed Cory and threw him on the bus, driving away at an insanely fast speed. 20 hours later, Cory was violently thrown out of the bus in a small field next to a small town in the middle of Iowa. The bus driver laughed and drove away, leaving Cory alone in a state full of corn.

He walked to the town, realizing he may need to spend the rest of his life here. Soon enough, he found someone who would take him in: an old lady who lived with her 30 year old grandson, or more accurately a 30 year old man living with his grandmother. The house was small, but Cory was used to small spaces and didn't mind.

"As long as you don't mess with my computer or interrupt my chat-rooms, you can stay, but I won't like it," Tim, the 30 year old son, said in a high pitched voice, adjusting his glasses. He then walked over to his computer and began chatting once again.

"You're gonna have to attend school if you wanna live here," the grandma said, "unless you wanna be one of those hooligans who ride quads in the dunes."

Not knowing what she was talking about, Cory walked to his new room, which was bigger than the one he had at the white house. All it contained was a bed, a bookshelf, and a small notebook, which had a pencil in it. Noticing it was a drawing book, Cory took it and began drawing Japanese symbols and warriors in the blank pages, making himself a new hobby in the process.

Eventually, Cory got hungry and moved out of his room to the kitchen, where he grabbed a quesadilla (kay- sah- dil- la). He could hear Tim quietly talking to himself while he typed at his computer, talking to people he would never meet through a chat room.

"What exactly are you doing?' Cory asked, having never seen a computer before.

"If you must know, Cory, I'm talking to girls through the internet, it's getting pretty serious."

"Oh, lucky. I can't get girls because I'm too short…"

Letting out a nasally snicker, Tim turned and adjusted his glasses, "That's a myth, if you want girls you just gotta be yourself." He then turned back to his computer, leaving Cory to think.

Cory now knew three qualities to getting girls, be confident, be tall, and be yourself. He was learning, slowly but surely. He walked out to the porch with his new outfit: sweat pants with a Siberian tiger printed tee shirt tucked into them. Cory sat on the porch and waited for the bus, looking over the corn field across the road. Eventually the bus came, Cory walked slowly up the stairs and past the third graders, going to the back of the bus where Greg, a 4th grader, sat.

"What are you going to do today, Cory?" Greg asked, looking severely depressed.

"Gosh, I just got up so shut up, kid." Cory turned away and began throwing stuff out the bus window to see if it would make the bus go faster due to there being less weight.

Cory arrived at school and walked up the stairs, entering the building. He found his locker and put all his stuff into it, katana included. Apparently weapons weren't allowed in the classrooms because they were "dangerous." Out of nowhere, Jim, the school jock, walked up to Cory, pushing him into the lockers.

"Heh, nothing personal, kid," he said, laughing.

Cory ran from Jim, arms behind his back, and eventually made it to his classroom. He sat down on his desk and took out his notebook, drawing some more samurais. Eventually, the teacher began to call names for presentations on the articles they had to do reports on. Cory stood up as his name was called and walked up to the chalkboard, standing awkwardly in front of the class.

"Over the weekend, French scientists shot a missile at the wilderness of Canada t-to try to kill bigfoot, who lives there. After searching the forest ruins, many people seem to think that bigfoot still lives and didn't die," Cory took a deep breath, closing his eyes, "some people think witches came from Toronto to save bigfoot and stop others from eating him, and saved him in the process."

Cory ran back to his seat with his arms behind his back, frowning. Nobody clapped, and no one said anything. Cory began shading his picture of a katana as the bell rang, causing Cory to shout out in frustration.

Cory now went to gym class, where he sat on the tire swing on the elementary playground, staring at girls hoping they'd talk to him. None of them did. Jim walked over and threw a stick at Cory, causing Cory to shout "gosh" and run away.

He approached the office and stood there, waiting for the secretaries to talk to him. One of them turned to him, and gave him a questioning look. They stared at each other for about 30 seconds, the secretary's eyes slowly narrowing and Cory's face unchanging.

"How can I help you?" the secretary asked, breaking the silence.

"I need to use your phone, it's an emergency."

Reluctantly, she gave up the phone and handed it to Cory. But he couldn't remember any of the numbers of anyone. He was stuck at school for now…

Walking to lunch, Cory ran into the principal, who handed him a note that said the grandma he was living with went off to Las Vegas to get away from depressing Iowa. Everything was looking bad for Cory now. He was stuck alone in a school full of bullies and people who hated him, and now some old guy was coming over to watch him and Tim.

Cory got to lunch and sat alone, eating his chicken tenders in peace. A short kid walked up and sat across from him, eating a salad. His face was unreadable, and he showed no emotion. They sat in silence and ate, grabbing their food, putting it into their mouths, chewing it with their teeth, and swallowing it, making the leftovers of the food go into their digestive system.

Cory got on the bus home, avoiding everyone. He arrived home to find Tim at his computer, talking to "girls."

"Get out of my light, Cory!' Tim shouted as Cory walked in sulking.

Cory sat on the porch outside, staring at a cow in the field next to the house. A loud noise began to form as a semi truck drove up, parking in front of the house. A guy with a long, handlebar mustache and long hair came out of the truck, adjusting his shades. This would be the guy watching the boys. He grabbed a piece of thinly sliced ham from the glove compartment and walked up to the house, chewing with his mouth open.

"Cory, get in the house and put this in the cassette player," the man said, handing Cory a DVD.

He ran inside and put the DVD into the cassette player, surprised to find out it worked. He sat down next to Tim on the couch, and all three of them began watching the home film. It was a half hour piece of footage that showcased Mack, the new guy, throwing Frisbee at a tree.

"So, what do you think of my home movie?"

"I like it, we should sell stuff like this to commoners," Tim replied.

"Ah commoners, is that some new type of pig?"

"This is the worst movie i've ever seen," Cory exploded.

"Hey, don't talk about my movie like that, kid. I've dealt with people younger than you and it ain't pretty!"

Cory ran off, not feeling welcome, and walked into town. Everyone was talking about the school dance and how they were going to it, but Cory couldn't find a date. And now that the grandma was gone, he couldn't even take her to the dance. He walked into his favorite store in town: the clothing store. Inside, he could find almost anything related to clothing such as fanny packs and ammo bags.

Cory went over to the 'new' section, where they showcased second hand goods that were just donated. A nice blood-red fedora had come in, it was made out of sheepskin and only cost 5 dollars. Cory wanted to buy it to impress the ladies, but he realized he had already bought a fanny pack with his allowance, and didn't have any money left. This led to him getting the idea to get a job.

He walked over to the park and began searching for jobs. The job market in Iowa was the greatest in the world, but there was only farming jobs. He decided to go for a more industrial job and went into the pig whipping business. For 8 hours straight, Cory whipped pigs back into their cage because the farm owner couldn't afford a gate and didn't think Cory was strong enough to handle pigs bare handed. And he was right.

Cory came home with 25 cents, a fraction of the cost of the fedora. Tim was once again talking to Jay, his girlfriend over the internet.

"We just really connect, y'know? I can just feel her here…" As he said that, he closed his eyes and breathed out slowly, hugging the air next to him intimately.

Cory retreated to his room, trying to figure out a plan to get money so he could get that fedora so he could impress the ladies so he could get a date for the dance. It was then that he recalled Tim's suggestion to sell Mack's DVD to commoners. Looking outside, Cory made sure Mack was still asleep in the flowerbed, he was. Cory then snuck past Tim, who was now kissing the air next to him, and grabbed the DVD from the cassette player.

Cory ran downtown and sold the DVD, which he told the man at the pawn shop was empty, and got his 5 bucks. He walked over to the clothing store and bought the blood-red fedora, proudly releasing his plan had worked, he could now get a date for the dance.

The next day at school, he wore the hat all day. It attracted a lot of attention to him, and he knew that his plan had worked. Growing in courage, he decided to ask out a girl he had seen before, Maylene. He walked up to her and began to talk.

"Maylene, want to go to the dance with me?"

She got a disgusted look on her face and walked away. Cory knew she had only gotten nervous and didn't blame her. He would meet her at the dance.

Getting back to his house, Cory found Mack was tearing apart the house to find his DVD. As he caught sight of Cory, he knew that Cory had stolen his precious home film. Mack grabbed Cory and slammed him onto the table, telling him not to move. Tim continued to type loudly and talk to himself as he ignored, or maybe didn't hear, the commotion.

Mack came back with a piece of cloth and a jug of water. He put the cloth onto Cory's head and started pouring water onto it.

"What did you do to my DVD?" Mack yelled, holding the cloth down tightly.

Cory began to feel a drowning sensation and screamed, telling Mack to stop.

"Tell me what you did to my film!"

"I-I sol… sold it….. T-t-to the pawn… shop…." Cory began coughing and wheezing.

"You did what?"

"I sold it for five bucks so I could buy this hat!"

Mack pushed Cory outside and they began to fight, lightly slapping each other every few seconds. Eventually Mack pulled out a lighter and grabbed Cory's fedora, lighting it on fire. Cory watched his dreams of getting a girl burn away with the hat.

Instead of getting angry, Cory felt emptiness as he walked back to his bedroom, crying softly.

As he arrived to the dance the next day, Cory saw that everyone else had a date. He looked around for Maylene, trying to see if she still wanted to be with him. Suddenly the doors opened and in came Maylene with Jim, the jock. Cory left the dance that night very sad.

Tim had started talking to Jay over the phone, but she didn't speak english so they couldn't even talk.

"Non mi piace tu," she said, desperately trying to get her point out.

"I don't know anything about nuns, sorry," Tim was much happier now.

The time had come for final exams, and Mack had finally left. Things were looking better. Naturally Cory failed all his exams, having never done a single assignment or done anything in school other than draw. Maylene had become school president and made taking weapons on school property against the school rules. Life was getting horrible, Cory couldn't take it anymore.

While eating his quesadilla, he realised Tim was nowhere to be found. Cory looked around the house and couldn't find him anywhere. He walked outside, only to find himself in the middle of the SWAT team taking Tim and his grandmother into custody, and with them was the president.

"Cory! I'm glad we finally found you and saved you from those kidnappers."

"Kidnappers..?"

"Yeah, they kidnapped you, brought you to Iowa, and made you go to school."

Cory felt he deserved a break from all of this, so he decided not to tell the president about the bus driver and how these were just normal people. The team took Cory and the president back to DC, where Cory fell into his tiny bed and laid awake all night, unable to sleep on such a cheap mattress after months of sleeping in a bed. Life was better in Iowa, no matter how many corn fields there were.