Your class is pretty big,

about twenty-something people.

It doesn’t sound very big,

but most of the seats are filled.

You sit behind a guy

who won’t shut up.

You sit next to a girl,

who’s really fuckin’ quiet.

There’s a girl to your upper-left,

who’s a bit bitchy.

The guy to your upper-right

is pretty quiet, too.

 

Everyone—if not, most of them—

are a grade below you,

and very fucking loud.

Like a group of five-year-olds,

always talking and laughing.

Drives you applefuck,

and sometimes you want to scream.

But you stay quiet,

and no one notices you.

 

You wouldn’t have it any other way.

Some of the faces are familiar,

from other classes and years past.

But they don’t know you,

they don’t know you at all.

 

And if they know anything about you,

it’s all just a mask.

Superficial things,

or bullshit fronts.

 

Most of these kids probably haven’t

seen anything ugly, and they’ve

probably been handed things

all their life.

 

But that doesn’t matter to you,

and you could care less.

Half these people could die,

and you probably wouldn’t blink.

 

Maybe that makes you cruel,

but like you said, you don’t care.

What have any of these people

ever done for you?

 

So you sit towards the back

of a twenty-something-kid class.

They call it “AP Biology,”

but you call it “Another Science Class.”

You’re one of the quiet students,

whom no one really notices.

 

It’s your last class of the day,

your least favorite of them all.

Not because of the noise,

but because of the isolation.

 

You hate this fucking class,

for the way it makes you feel.

You knew you should’ve signed up for Earth and Space Science.

 

So you sit down at your desk,

feeling so alone inside.

 

So alone you swear you could choke on the loneliness.