The Release

“Shut up,” their fearless leader hissed, his voice echoing up the aisles.

No one dared to breathe. The officer crossed his arms and glared back out at the students, now huddled like potato bugs against armrests and seatbacks, all curled up into balls of arms and legs and messy hair.

Principal Spencer cleared his throat into the microphone. His speech started in a soft voice, and despite the microphone, some auditorium congregants leaned in to hear. While he spoke, he paced up and down the length of the stage. The follow spot moved with him, bouncing slightly and catching the dust particles floating like snow across the auditorium.

“You will follow orders. You will follow orders the first time we ask. There is no room for argument, for disagreement. There is no protocol for this and we are not writing futile referrals. We ca

Someone raised a shaky hand, but Spencer didn’t notice.

Then a teacher called from the back, Lucy thought the same power tripping man with the whistle: “No questions.”

And the student lowered the hand with resignation.

Spencer continued. “As you are aware, lockdown is in effect. We will open the outside doors for no one. No one out. Absolutely no one in. Am I clear?” he asked rhetorically.

Pockets of protest erupted around the auditorium, but teachers began to move toward the noise—silencing people and demanding attention.

“The major threat is outside these walls. Until we know more, I will not needlessly endanger you,” he said.

“Himself,” a boy behind Lucy said in a quiet non-whisper. “He will not needlessly endanger himself.

Lucy turned and saw Grant Trotter sitting behind her; his sandy blonde hair a mess of tangles, with bangs falling into his eyes. He half-smiled at Lucy—the facial equivalent of a shrug. And she acknowledged him with a nod and a sad smile-like response.

As Spencer droned on about expectations and rule following during this “fragile moment in our lives,” Grant’s body fell forward and his head hit against the back of the seat where Lucy was sitting. She could feel the pressure against her back, the bump of flesh hitting plastic. She turned again, her arms going rubbery, as she braced herself for the worst. She peered down at him and resisted the urge to reach out and grab his shoulder while she looked intently for the rise and fall of breath.

“Hey,” she whispered, leaning toward him, but still keeping her distance. “Hey…are you okay?”

Grant’s head snapped up, his eyes red, bloodshot, but his cheeks pink. He smiled an actual smile, one small dimple forming in the center of his cheek. “That’s sweet,” he said to her. “You thought I died.”

“Yes,” Lucy replied. “Don’t say it like that. Don’t say it like it’s strange that I would think that.” She blushed out of embarrassment.

“I feel fine,” he said. Then he shook his head. “No. I don’t. I don’t feel fine. But I feel alive. Very much alive.”

Lucy wondered if she felt alive. Certainly she could feel her heart, her heavy limbs; her head ached right behind her eyes and her stomach growled. She exhibited all the signs of a living human being, but something wasn’t right. Were the crying kids in the corner more alive than she was? Because Lucy couldn’t bring herself to sob or yell—instead, she felt lost, trapped in perpetual murkiness. Fear hovered just below the surface, but it hadn’t created a stronghold yet, hadn’t clawed its way in and nested itself among the hunger and the hope.

“I guess I don’t feel alive,” she said. “I don’t feel real.” Lucy didn’t even know if that made sense, and after saying it out loud, she felt foolish. Grant didn’t respond, only looked at her with his dark brown eyes in an assessing way.

She turned away from his gaze.

“Numb,” he answered to the back of her head. “You feel numb.”

Lucy couldn’t even bring herself to nod.

Two rows in front of her, a boy leaned in to kiss his girlfriend on the cheek. A sudden sloppy decision, uncoordinated, and initially u

“I’m just…I’m a little queasy,” Lucy heard him mumble to the girl as she scrambled away, her head turning in every direction.

“Help him! Help him!” The girl shouted, scooting backward as he reached for her, on his knees now, stuck between the chair and the row in front of him, cupping his hands around his mouth and heaving into them. Her squealing interrupted Principal Spencer’s continuous droning about the consequences of insubordination.

It was the first time she had seen someone fall victim to the virus, and the instantaneous nature of this silent killer filled her with such dread that she buried her face in her hands—pleading with herself not to look. How could it work like that? One minute he was fine, just a teenage boy sitting next to his girlfriend, hoping, even among death and destruction, for a kiss, a sign of unwavering affection. And the next minute he was sucking for air, losing control of his bodily functions, spilling blood in pools like ink stains on the carpeted floor.

Teachers flew in from the corners and launched themselves over seats and into the row. Each one do

This had been their entire morning, and this student was just one of many. Already they had adjusted, adapted, and molded themselves into their new roles. Earlier their focus might have been mitosis-labs and Steinbeck-essays, parent-emails, and Special-Ed-meetings, but now they were body-collectors and lockout-supervisors. How easy it all became the new normal.

“Let’s move him back,” a large math teacher told the others, his belly exposed, bursting through bulging buttons. After some maneuvering around the row, a male teacher and a male counselor grabbed the lifeless boy and paraded down the aisle. Lucy only then noticed that someone in that madness had been generous enough to close his eyes. Or maybe he had closed his eyes in the end—she could only guess as she had kept her own eyes trained away from the boy in his final moments. Working together, the adults hoisted the body on the stage, and then carried him off behind the set. It was as if it were all a giant play and the boy was an actor, the charade nothing more than directions in a script.

“Where are they taking him?” Lucy asked to Grant, not bothering to turn around, just leaning her head back.

“They’ve been taking everyone to the dressing rooms, I think,” he replied. “Confining the bodies for the uprising.”

Lucy swiftly turned. “What?”

“Zombies? When everyone comes back as zombies?”

“This can’t possibly be a joke to you. Is this a joke to you?” Lucy asked. “That boy died. I just watched that boy die!”

Grant ran his right hand through his hair, mussing it up near the crown. “First time you’ve watched someone...” he made a face as he trailed off. “Yeah, well, you’ll get used to it. Watching it all morning will make you…what did we say? Numb. Right.”