That Playground in 2098
We were smoldering on the parent funded blacktop, slick with sweat and standardized education. Everyone moved under phantom weights, their bodies heavy with the heat. My playground friends were sluggish in the game of four-square I had opted out of.
I excluded myself from the sun as well, or tried to. It easily found me under the sparse shade of the jungle gym.
I sprawled under the dome of metal and baked, my pony tail acting as a cushion. The shorts and t-shirt I was thrown into that morning did little to protect me. Already my arms and legs were painted a rosy red. My eyes were closed, but the sun permeated.
"Sun, sun, go away…" I wasn't inclined to finish, so I let my voice dissolve.
I pretended my way into the air conditioned bliss that was the cafeteria. My stomach ached for that chemically enriched tray. The food tasted like shit, sure. But afterward, when your synapses are firing like a battalion, taste is superficial.
An eclipse lured me back to the blacktop. My eyes opened to a childlike silhouette resting above me. Something wet dripped onto my cheek and I shot up, disgusted, wiping what ever it was from my face. Saliva was my first thought.
"The hell!" I looked up again, my face as hot at the ground.
His shoulders rocked as he laughed. "Rest up, it's a juice box."
A square of polyethylene and aluminum fell and bounced off my knee, empty.
"Gross." I muttered, kicking the box further away, "What do you w-" I stopped. My vision had adjusted and I could see the boy with clarity. Oversized shades masked his eyes and a fucking cigarette was snug between his lips, "Really? How old are you?"
He dragged and puffed, "What? Gonna say I'm too young?"
I stood up sneering, my upper half surrounded by a triangle of steel. "Not at all too young to start killing yourself, I guess. I was going to say you should know better."
He shrugged and plucked his vice from his mouth. "I like 'em." He looked me over from behind his glasses, "You're the top student here, huh? Your name is, like, Ali or something."
He carried 'I'm greater than thou' in his voice and I disliked him instantly. I started to clamor out of the jungle gym, the metal was burning, "The most studious maybe, the lot of this place are lazy," I paused, "And there's at least one idiot."
He laughed again and I turned on him, wedging myself upright in a triangle and ignoring the fire in my palms, "What's so funny, Shades?" I snapped and then glanced behind my shoulder. The teachers were gossiping in the shadow of the school. They had probably figured the heat would keep us in line that day.
Besides that, on the far side of the asphalt, they couldn't see us.
"This school is funny," He let his cigarette fall as he straightened into a sitting position, balancing like me, "Not that I don't like it, it's better than being enrolled at the AAS. Those jerks realized halfway into the year I was smarter than the entire student body."
I forgot about leaving; I enjoyed exploiting liars. "You were at the AAS? And they actually transferred you?" I didn't believe him. All children were tested and placed. And once you were placed, there was no other option. The only exception was no schooling at all.
He smiled with dirty, crooked teeth and, with an arrogance I hadn't encountered before, said, "You think I'm lying. That's rich," he chuckled and adjusted his sunglasses, "Is it…Annie?"
I gnawed on my lip, uncomfortable. Before him, I had never met anyone I wasn't sure of. And the thought of giving him my name felt wrong; like I was telling him a secret.
But I told him anyway, "It's Poppy."
"Oh. I was far off."
Apparently, he wasn't accustomed to the name exchange most every human knows. We waited in expectant silence for one another to speak. Or maybe I was the only one waiting.
Too many minutes of staring passed, I started to climb down the bars. He obviously wasn't too interested in conversation, and I wasn't interested enough in him to start one. He was too much work. I couldn't exploit him if he wouldn't tell more lies.
One sneaker was on the blacktop when he spoke.
"Ciao, Po, the bell's about to sound," He jumped off the jungle gym and ran toward the school, sparing a second to acknowledge me with a half assed wave.
I was…confused.
I didn't like him.
But, maybe, I was interested enough.
The bell sounded. Break was over. The bodies of students, still weighted, shuffled into a messy line. I stood last in it, bewildered for reasons I didn't know.
My initial impression of him was attention seeker. Remain mysterious and I shall seek you out.
That wasn't going to happen.
And yet, the next day when we were let out for break, I found myself looking for those stupidly big sunglasses.
The morale of the students was lower than the day before. Most all of them were slumped and piled against the school wall, like they had melted from it. We had all begged to be kept inside, but, unlike the AAS and the other lesser schools, our curriculum mandated daily physical stimulation. AKA break.
Someone on top in the education reform was passionate about exercise in the GnT kids. And that someone had figured we deserved a recess more than other children.
With so few wandering the blacktop, it was easy to spot a boy sitting atop the jungle gym.
"Hey, Po," he said as I approached him.
I stopped not too far from the base of the toy, my hands sunk in my pockets, "Hey…hey."
Before silence swallowed another break, I started asking questions.
I climbed into the jungle gym, beneath him again, and said, "Where's your cigarette today, cool kid?"
He dropped through a triangle and sat cross legged a few inches from me, "Pockets."
"Mhm," I scooted a little ways away from him, "I didn't get your name yesterday."
"Good, 'cause I didn't give it to you."