mini-essay one: narrative.

While the teacher lectured, I stared out the window, failing to realize that there were no windows in the lecture hall. Mentally slapping myself, I tried harder than usual to pay attention to what the professor was saying. Something about the vernal equinox, but I wasn‘t aware that I had enrolled in any sort of science course for the semester. In fact, registering for all of the classes that I mechanically attended was a bit of a blur, but I wasn’t about to try and recall the process. There were more pressing issues at hand, like the fact that I was about ready to pass out on the table, professor and lecture-mates be damned. Allowing my head to dip once, I tried to remember how long this class was. Fifty minutes? Two hours? Then again, it didn’t really matter because either way I was still sitting in the lecture hall, still doing my best to not embarrass myself by falling asleep. Glancing around once, I couldn’t help but let my eyes close once. When I opened them again, everything was as I left it, the professor still droning on, the students still doing whatever they were doing, the zombies breaking in through the door. Wait, zombies? I jumped up, trying to think of another exit. At the top of the hall was the fire exit, but when I turned to make a break for it, I was horrified to see more zombies slowly yet surely clawing their way into the room., their putrid grey-green flesh stretched over skeletal frames. I could already smell their spine-chilling scent of dirt and rot. Why was no one else panicking? I looked around for a competent being, someone else who’d noticed our plight, hopefully someone to help me fight off these brain-munching bastards. Much to my horror, I found myself surrounded by the living dead. All of my classmates, now zombies. Stifling a scream, I tried in vain to escape the hordes, but their shuffling steps and eerie moans drowning out any coherent thought. The shuffling was becoming overbearing, louder and louder… Until I realized that the shuffling was not of feet, but of papers and backpacks. I‘m almost sure I made one of those ‘snnrk’ noises one typically makes when waking up, and I lazily looked around. People seemed anxious, their eyes still trained on the professor, but their hands slowly and carefully packing notebooks and textbooks into backpacks. Sighing with relief at the prospect of being able to go home and get some actual sleep and the fact that there really wasn‘t a massive zombie attack to worry about, I joined the rest of my lecture-mates in their quiet endeavor to pack up their belongings. I was pleased with myself, for the most part. I had managed to not sleep for too long, so no one probably noticed, I avoid being asked to answer a question, and I evaded any sort of actual work for the day. I smiled to myself, one of those obnoxiously cocky smiles.
“Alright everyone, I’ll see you on Wednesday. Don’t forget to type up your notes on today’s lecture and send them to your group. Failure to do so will probably result in difficulty with your final project.”
My obnoxiously cocky smile vanished. Notes? On this lecture? Final project?
I’d rather take the zombies.