Work Text:
Sam stared at his screen. He had just come back from hanging out with the gang. Not violent gangs with knives in the traditional sense, but just some drinking buddies. Barely managing to remember the pin code to the apartment, and after dragging his gymnastic body up a few flights of stairs, he had fumbled for the right key.
So where was he now and what to do?
Bank card? Check. Leather Jacket? Check. Brain? Check.
Perhaps he should just lie in bed for a while. Or find some apprenticeship training. But what prerequisites were necessary to bring? Mrs Piano had always said that all you needed to bring to school was your brain. Why was that again?
To sell it for money? Or was that to cell it?
What a headache.
How about going out to the shops and looking for something to buy? Some accessories? A row of candles might look nice on the windowsill. Or a kitchen to put on the cat on the rug?
Best check the bank balance first. Everything seemed in order. A few percent of interest wouldn’t do much compared to inflation. Some scribbles! Perhaps he had a few notes somewhere comparing different bank accounts and their offers and which was better.
His arm moved to open his desk drawer. But no, it hardly mattered. It would be mixed up with lots of other junk, and there wasn’t much money in his bank account anyway. The priority should be to make some money first.
Brzrz!
The buzzing noise was just his phone. Some colour. Yes it would be sunny. Numbers of different sizes. No new emails. Or at least none of importance. It was just the usual spam emails that hadn’t gotten blocked by the spam filter.
Via the search engine Google, some clicks and the news was displayed on screen. Some far away countries were going to war. What would it be like to join the army? It was quite quiet outside.
Out of the window, yes, out window. He still remembered the mantra. “Look outside far away every now and then.” Why? “Or else your eyes will dry out from staring at the screen!” Green trees seemed nice and healthy. People looked smaller outside. Noone was trying to climb up the apartment walls and break in through the window at least. He probably wouldn’t have to fix the window bars again. They could probably still last another 30 years before they rusted and degraded away. It wasn’t as if there was anything of much value to steal in his room anyway.
It was quite a nice room. The pipes hadn’t leaked which was better than he could say for some of his buddies. The hot water rationing schedule was consistent enough and cold showers were sometimes more refreshing anyway, wink wink. His neighbours weren’t very loud.
With a few hours before bedtime what to do? The young man was still sitting still on his swivel chair. He got up and opened a packet of crisps without thought and plopped himself back down on the chair, wondering why there was something in his hand. Oh yes, food, something to eat and continue his existence.
There was still the matter of the CD. Perhaps he should give it back to his teacher. It had been many years already. It would probably be weird to return it now, what would they think of him? Bleh, even one crisp packet tasted quite salty now. It was a contrast to childhood when he was used to eating salty cooking.
He opened up his email to offer to return it before realising that the email would be invalid now. They probably wouldn’t be working at the same school. He licked his fingers and wiped them on a towel before continuing to type.
How would he find them anyway? Who would know their address? Was it awkward or rude to send an email out of the blue? Was he too busy for this anyway? Currently two thousand unread messages, mostly spam. It was irritating that the buffer page system meant he could only delete 50 emails at a time, so there was no point deleting them. How far back did his emails go anyway? He barely remembered being a young kid. Was that sad?
Sort by:
Select “Oldest first”
This put the oldest emails at the top. Back when he was a teenager. Emails about schoolwork. About fairs and events. Meetings between parents and teachers. Newsletters with warnings about roadworks, illnesses and the dangers of electric technology. And of course homework assignments.
He never did much book research for homework despite respecting the amount of knowledge available in libraries. It was just that online encyclopaedias were so much easier to use. The only problem was that you had to change the phrasing slightly to avoid being caught out, in order to prevent the whole class handing in the same assignment. And it looked lazy if you couldn’t reference some respectable books as source material.
What a time. The vocabulary was quite surprising, probably better and more polite than he could manage now. Some questions seemed idiotic. Discussions about the news seemed braver. Was he lonely as a kid? He seemed lonely now after reading the old emails.
What did he worry about back then? Was he grateful now about the hard work he had put in to study? Was it even hard work? Was he glad to be alive? Where were the other members of his class, his school? Did they think of him? What would happen tomorrow? What face and attitude should he put on? What information to tell? What exercises to prepare for a dangerous day?
No, he was getting too absorbed in this. He needed to keep active and focused on tasks in the present. He shut down the laptop, scribbling some thoughts on a pad. Checked his alarm. Did some final stretches. Looked around the room for anything out of the ordinary. Cleaned up some trash.
Time to sleep.