Floors left beaten down by armies of trampling shoes groan beneath the final stampede. The bell’s 2:32 P.M. ring signals their surge. Boys and girls sling backpacks over their shoulders and slam shut their blue lockers — colored so to imitate the school’s mascot. They all are uniformly joyous, yet beat-down much like the floor, tired and overburdened. Bags dig at their shoulders.

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Shane pops his airpods into his big ears — Dumbo-esque as he likes to call them. Don’t Be So Serious by Low Roar pulses through his ear canals. All about him his classmates flow to the doors like the ebbing tide. The guys and girls wear their Friday casual clothes, many of which bear the mascot knight’s glorious steel. Lowering his black jacket’s zipper, Shane’s heart pounds. He bats his medium-length greased red hair out of his freckled face. His weight shifts. Books vibrate and his water bottle sloshes. His earrings jingle.

One inch lower goes his zipper.

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The Irish boy pivots down a short, dark hallway. He goes against the grain. High schoolers desperate to get to the buses brush his shoulders.

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Two inches lower.

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Shane cannot swallow. Before him, a little robot figurine rests within an indent beside an open door. He itches the thin scruff patch fanning out from his philtrum. Above that door, a neon sign flashes the letters R.O.O.F..

Three inches lower. A multicolored t-shirt pokes out of Shane’s jacket.

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Robotic Operators of Our Future: the place where Tate lives; the lab in which he toils day after day. Shane peeks his head in. He scans the array of toolboxes and scrap; the welding masks and stray laptops; the dirty tarps coated in metal filings. Tate isn’t here.

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“Hi.” A girl approaches him, head cocked to the side.

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Shane jumps. “Oh, sorry.”

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“Looking for someone?”

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“Yes, I mean, no. Have a good night!” Before he can see her reaction, he twirls back out the door.

 

Tate. Where are you? Are you taking the bus today? Please tell me that’s true.