School's Out!

Maya was first in class, as usual, and the Literature teacher’s desk was neater than usual. She credited the Summer break and assumed it had inspired new ‘within-the-year’ resolutions for the middle-aged educator. Maya walked to her seat in the back row and began to unpack her green and yellow bag pack. The spacious bag had earned her a funny nickname and presumably could fit a mini library. She wasn’t much bothered by her schoolmates’ remarks and often found their ignorance repulsive.

Class was meant to begin in a just ten minutes, as Maya watched her wristwatch and the dramatic clock at the top of the wall, above the teacher’s desk. Her eighteen classmates would begin to populate the classroom well into the lesson. She was enjoying the content of this class, and spending more time in the library, reading on ancient literature and the different authors, in different eras, who’d contributed passionately to the discipline. She was nearing the end of her fifth year in high school and already knew she would be Literature lecturer and a published author. The goal was set and she was ready for the challenge.

Maya whipped out her thriller novel and dove right back into a not-so-perfect romantic scene between a nerd and his hot cop girlfriend. She beamed with anticipation as she read his love profession to the cop in her sound-proofed office. Maya’s enjoyment was continually interrupted by her internal rebuke whenever she read anything acutely blasphemous to the principles in the holy bible.

The school bell rang too audibly outside the classroom and scared Maya out of her enchantment with the fictitious tale. It was time for the Literature lesson to begin, but her teacher still wasn’t in. Maya looked at her teacher’s neat desk again as she rose and walked toward it. She knew that her inner nerd was making her feel worried over potentially not having a lesson today, and now she couldn’t shake the urge to snoop around the woman’s desk; trying to figure out why she’d be absent, if so. Perhaps there was a note or letter that’d reveal she’d taken leave or was absent for other reasons. But usually the school administrator would make such an announcement well before the clock hit 9 o’clock. More than that, her teacher usually told her class before dismissing them, that she’d be absent.

Maya thought back to her arrival on the school premises over an hour ago and couldn’t recall any such announcement.

She opened the top drawer and met assorted chalk sticks and dust cloths. Ms. Lincoln had allowed them to install a whiteboard along with a projector in her classroom but she preferred to teach using the chalkboard. She only indulged the new equipment when her teaching examiner was around or during PTA meetings.

“We, Literature freaks, are Tech haters, but on the low”, she spoke under her breath as she moved the chalk sticks and looked for anything out of the ordinary.

Nothing.

She shut that drawer and moved to the second one, being the last. She took a deep breath and hoped something would give her an answer. She browsed through it, letting her hand push Ms. Lincoln’s pens and attendance sheets around. Nothing odd popped up. She pulled one of the attendance sheets out and chuckled at her name written at the top of the nineteen slots. What a nerd, she thought. Maya tossed the piece of paper back in the drawer and closed it, sighing out her disappointment.

It was a typical morning…about three hours ago.

Maya rebuked her own thoughts and loudly denounced the one suggesting that her beautiful, qualified Literature teacher had been involved in a car wreck that she’d only see the headlines of during her lunch break in the school cafeteria.

One hour in, the much-anticipated lesson had still not begun and Maya was too anxious to read her novel as a distraction any further, so she resorted to stepping out of class to find out about Ms. Lincoln. It was also interesting that none of her classmates were in even now, but she didn’t bother that thought as much. She found that aspect of this solitude refreshing.

But something's not right, she thought.

There was still another hour of Literature to go and she wasn’t loving the idea that she might be idle for its duration.

She got to the classroom door which she intentionally closed behind her each time she walked into this classroom. Maya did that because she liked the creaking sound it made when she’d push it closed, for reasons she didn’t care to explore nor explain.

The doorknob wouldn’t turn.

Maya’s heart began to throb like a dying person’s pulse in movies right after they’d been shot. She grabbed her cross necklace that hung loosely around her neck and felt the coldness of the chain against her skin.

“Okay, don’t panic Maya. Relax. Let’s call…oh! The janitor. Victor. Oh, thank you God, I knew taking his number last year was prophetic!” she exclaimed to herself.

The echo of her voice and the ringing in her ear made her more anxious, but she waited patiently for Victor to pick up. Were janitors even allowed to have their phones on them during working hours? Maya decided she’d fight against whatever penalty he’d get for taking her call. She’d become fast friends with the school grounds man after he’d been the first responder to her fall on the premises, during her second year at the school. She’d been walking, nose-deep in a book and tripped over a pipeline, falling on her knees on concrete. He’d blamed himself for it but she’d insisted between sobs that it served her right for not being patient enough to walk to the bus stop and then read her book.

Victor had admired her vigor for knowledge and had started reading a book Maya raved about just two weeks back. Now, the man’s phone rang out. No answer.

What was going on? Still fighting not to panic, Maya decided to breach her ‘no phone during class time’ code and undid the ‘do not disturb’ setting on it before dialing her mother’s number.

It rang while she tried the doorknob again. Still wouldn’t budge. Her mother picked on the eighth ring.

“Maya. Baby, are you alright? It’s class time isn’t it?”

Maya nearly smiled at that but her dilemma formed her face into a frown instead.

“Mom. I’m stuck in my classroom and Ms. Lincoln didn’t show up today. No one else is here and I’m getting scared. I can’t hear footsteps outside the door. No voices. It’s library quiet and you and I know these people aren’t capable of silence this loud. Can you come get me? I’ve been trying to stay cool but this isn’t a funny joke and I’m suing if it’s supposed to be”, the scholar pleaded.

Silence.

“Hello? Mom?” Maya called out.

She could hear that her mother was handling something in the background and could’ve sworn she heard her cuss but a distance away, like she didn’t want Maya to hear her. Then she answered her daughter.

“Maya. Is this one of your crazy scenarios you’re acting out? I have a client coming in in an hour, honey”, Mrs. Roberts resisted.

“Mom, I’m serious. I-

“Mom. Mom! Oh m…. mom!”

Maya felt the hairs on the back of her neck stand up. She assumed her heart rate was officially abnormal and paced back to her desk. Still with her phone in hand, she tapped the phone icon and called her mother again.

“The number you have dialed is not available at the moment….”

Maya dropped before the automated response completed.

“Okay, Lord. I don’t like this joke. What’s going on? Is this a dream?” she whispered the question. She took her seat and her legs immediately shook below her desk.

She tried her mother’s cell again.

This time, her screen just signaled that the call had ended. No automated voice. Nothing.

Maya rubbed her cheeks to wipe the tears she hadn’t felt falling out of her eyelids, and walked back to the door. At this point, she was contemplating knocking it down. Her headmaster would understand her explanation. It was beginning to feel like a life or death situation unfolding.

She tried the doorknob one more time and turned it.

Her heart dropped along with her hand when the door lock clicked open.

Maya walked out slowly, ready to expel angry rants to whomever was responsible for this escapade. She tried to slow her breathing while she walked along the quiet corridor, peeping through classroom after classroom.

Empty.

She was starting to believe that this was all a dream; a re-enactment of all the thrillers and police novels she’d read in the past.

Where was everyone? For the first time ever, silence was not golden. She wanted out of this game.

She stood at the end of the hallway and thought of the headmaster’s office.

“Of course!” she exclaimed.

“No way Mr. Ferlin would approve of this. Everyone’s in tr- “

Maya stepped onto what was the remainder of her headmaster’s office. It looked like something humongous had come running and ravaged the building, taking all of Mr. Ferlin’s office with it.

Maya fell to her knees. She didn’t know what to think. Was she even awake? What was this…the rapture?

She laughed at that thought, and frowned because it was no longer an improbability.

“Jesus, I’m just a teenager. You haven’t given me time to do what you said. I don’t want to be alone. Please. Where’s my mom!”

“Maya!”

Mrs. Roberts limped over to her child from a car that definitely wasn’t her mother’s.

“Moom!” Maya tried to stand and failed.

“What’s happening? I don’t know where everyone is. Why are you limping? Did something hurt you? Where’s dad?”

Mrs. Roberts put her ashy hand over Maya’s mouth and kneeled, looking right at her daughter.

“I’ll explain when we get to the stronghold site. Everything. But right now, we have to go honey. Let’s go”.

Maya felt her knees weaken but her mother’s grip on her hand helped her stand and run with Mrs. Roberts, toward the unfamiliar car, to a place her mother apparently knew.