She is wearing that green sweater again. The one that makes her amber eyes look like they’re on fire. She is quite possibly the most beautiful girl I’ve ever seen. Her shining dark hair tumbles down her back in elegant, bouncing tendrils. I have sat two seats behind her every day in this math class, and I’m fairly certain she still has no idea I exist. Someday I will have the courage, someday I will bravely tell her exactly how I feel. I will take her hands in mine and say, Alice, I love you. I always have and I always will. I will never let anything hurt you I will be here for you always and with my love, I will protect you. I continue to stare at the back of her head, praying that she might feel my eyes on her. That she might turn around, just for a second. After a few minutes of no luck, I doodle on my desk. Innocent vandalisms to keep my mind occupied, but I find myself drawing hearts and furiously erase them. I burn away all the rubber on my pencil and when the scraping metal hits my desk, I release it and watch it plummet to the ground.

I’m supposed to be learning something about triangles, but my focus is on the game tonight. We are playing our rivals, and if we win, we will go to sectionals and play basketball with the best teams in the region. If we don’t win, I don’t know what I’m going to do. Dad’s the coach, and I’d hate to disappoint him. I see the look on his face every time I miss a shot, every time I fail to guard an opponent. Our last game we won 57- 49, but that wasn’t good enough. He chewed me out in front of the entire team and wouldn’t talk to me the whole ride home. The silence reeked of disgust and it was excruciating. I know I can’t let him down again.
“Jared, could you please tell me why a bisector makes a right angle?” Mrs. Carmichael’s question pulls me back to reality. I start to panic and try to take in all the notes on the board at once, but fail miserably.
“Um, you know, ‘cause it just does,” I reply with a weak charismatic smile. I had no idea what else to do and my ears burn as I hear a snicker come from the back of the room.
“You need to focus, Jared, our unit test is tomorrow,” she says with disapproval. A symphony a groans resounds from the class at the forgotten exam. I sheepishly sink into my chair and do my best to become invisible.

I’ve never liked math. I hated it in school: the countless formulas that I never did need to know in real life. That is until budget cuts gave me an ultimatum. When they cut my position as a psychology teacher, my only option was to teach geometry, unless I wanted to be jobless. The benefit of teaching psychology was that it was an elective, so you knew the kids actually wanted to be there. Now, however, the class is mandatory and I feel just as punished as they do by teaching it. I feel absolutely hopeless. I might as well be teaching to an empty room as much as these kids are paying attention. I call on a particularly distracted one to get the class’s attention, and as predicted, he has no clue what I am talking about. I sigh and go back to my monotonous lesson after a weak threat of an exam. I babble on for a few more minutes, but I am about as excited as my students are. They say it’s hard to learn about something that you don’t want to, but it’s even harder to teach it.
Just as I am about to hand out tonight’s homework assignment, I hear the crackle of the intercom sound on the speakers. I am thankful for this, because then I won’t have to listen to my student’s rebuttal.
“We are in a lockdown. I repeat we are in a lockdown.” I hear our principle, Mr. Jones boom over the intercom. My heart sinks, because I realize that he did not say a drill, and the only reason we’d have a lockdown was if there was a shooter, or a bomb. At first the students don’t understand, they have smiles on their faces at the news of not having to do work, but they don’t understand the gravity of this situation. I shush the class into a synchronized silence.
I do my best to gather my composure as I speak to the students. “Kids, this is not a drill, you need to go into that corner and sit there without saying a word.”I say tightly as I point to a far corner, out of site from the door. I did my best to stay strong, but my quivering voice betrayed me. I watch as their innocent smiles fade into sober understanding. Panic leaps from their eyes and their faces reveal a flurry of emotions- panic and terror, but in one girl, I see regret and recognition, as if she knew this were going to happen.
I recite lock down protocol hastily in my mind. I have to lock the door. For safety reasons, and the thought of deceitful teenagers in mind, it has to be locked by a key. I lunge for my lanyard perched on a stack of books on my desk, and knock over a dangerously high pile of papers in the process. I fumble for the correct key as I sprint to the door. At a school board meeting a couple years ago, the janitorial staff petitioned for the locks to be on the outside of doors, for convenience reasons. Something that I had voted in favor for. In hindsight, I recognize this as a bad decision and feel a wave of nausea wash over me. I turn out the lights en route to the door knob. I fling open the door and freeze. There is Jimmy Moore, a student in my seventh period class. A very bright kid, but very quiet, always used to remind me of a turtle- isolated and stoic. In his right hand, he holds a small hand gun. Black and demonic. A small whimper escapes my lips and I rush my hand up to my mouth to try to push the noise back in, to erase it from Jimmy’s ears, but he hears me. He looks at me with his intense blue eyes contrasted with tears- they’re electric. Where I used to see potential and occasional boredom, it’s now replaced with revenge and flecks of rage. I stand paralyzed with fear as he raises his arm, and without breaking eye contact, he pulls the trigger.

People say they feel most alive when they’re in love and happy, but couldn’t that be easily mistaken for Heaven? I think you are most alive when you’re in the most pain. When you feel the raw emotions of grief, regret, and heartache. When you give in to depression and really let yourself feel. Isn’t it ironic how you can feel the most alive when you’re just an arm’s reach away from death?

Mrs. Carmichael falls to the floor with a sickening thud. On impact, a small bell that she used to keep on her desk to prevent students from falling asleep tumbles to the hard floor. When I was a young girl, my mother used to tell me that every time a bell rung an angel got its wings. I latch onto the fragile thread of hope that this is Mrs. Carmichael’s way of telling us she’s in a better place now. It’s hard because I can see her. When she fell the door didn’t shut, her foot landed just over the threshold and kept it propped open. We all stare in terror as the blood starts to pool around her body. We learn in biology class that there is about four to five liters of blood in the human body, but when you see it on the outside; you can’t imagine how someone could possibly hold that much. Petrified, we hold our breaths, not knowing Jimmy’s next move. We were all shocked discovering it was Jimmy with the gun. I mean, he was quiet and kind of creepy, but he didn’t strike me as the “serial killer type”. With all our eyes glued to Jimmy, we watch tentatively as he continues down the hall. Nobody knows why he didn’t come in the classroom, but we’re all thankful. Just as my body starts to relax the slightest bit, Carter bolts upright. We have been crouched in a corner, voided of any personal space, and his sudden movement disrupts all of us. It’s dark in the room, so I can’t make out Carter’s face. My whole body tenses up, as he slowly makes his way to the door.

All I can think about is Alice. There is a small sliver of light cascading from the open doorway and has bathed her in a cruel spotlight. The fear in her eyes makes me sick to my stomach, and I would do anything to make her feel safe again. I realize this is my moment. My moment to show her I am more than just some kid in her math class. I jump up from my spot on the floor, and creep towards the door. I hear gasps behind me and frightened whispers.
“Hey kid, there’s no reason to be a hero,” Jared remarks sarcastically. He has been a classmate of mine since the fourth grade, and he still doesn’t know my name. Probably because the only thing he’s capable of comprehending is self-image and sports. I shake my head to get his words to stop bouncing around in my thoughts and clench my fists to help me focus. As I reach the door, I slowly protrude my head out the opening. I look in both directions as if to cross the street, and see the coast is clear. I crouch down, and with every ounce of courage, will myself not to get dizzy because of all the blood. I have never seen so much of it before. I carefully lift Mrs. Carmichael’s leg and bend it at a slight angle, so the door will latch shut. With the feeling of safety, I walk with pride back to my spot on the floor. Before I sit, I loud bang radiates throughout the school. It sounds as if someone were lighting fireworks inside the class room. Two more follow quickly after the first and with them ringing in all of our ears, tears fall from my eyes.

I have no idea what Carter was thinking. It was so stupid, but I am rueful for not having the courage myself. I have to admit I feel a little safer. That is, until I heard the other gunshots. They might have well been penetrating me, with the heartache that I felt. Not knowing who the other victims could have been, I fight back tears. Just as the third shot echoed in the halls, a freshman girl had passed out. Her friend rushed to her side and brushed her hair away from her face while she cradled her friend’s head in her lap. In shock, I stare around the room for anything that might be helpful or of use. That’s when it hits me. No one has called nine-one-one yet, I eyeball the telephone, but my legs are unwilling to move. After a minute of trying to convince myself that I’ll be okay, I struggle to my feet.

“What are you doing?” asks Alice, a girl in my class. She’s always been nice to me, but I never really gave her a chance to be anything else.

“I am going to call the police” I reply with as much confidence as I can muster. I shuffle over to the phone when a girl I hadn’t noticed before, emerges from her refuge in the corner. From her backpack she pulls out a gun. I hear cries from my classmates as they realize their new fate. The look in her eyes is pure insanity, like a rabid animal. I see no more traces of humanity, and I feel bad because I don’t even know her well enough to know her name.

It wasn’t supposed to be like this Jimmy was never supposed to kill the teacher. He had given me a gun for protection, but I was never supposed to have to use it. I am frustrated because nothing is going as planned and these moron classmates of mine are doing everything wrong. It was simple, Jimmy was going to come in at 9:30 and get his vengeance on everyone who had done him wrong. He had a list and Mrs. Carmichael wasn’t on the list. Now this dumb jock thinks he’s going to save the day by calling the police? I think not. I step in front of him and point the gun right between his eyes.

“Sit down, right now, if you want to live” I command, and he obeys like a little puppy dog.

“Why are you doing this?” asks Jared, and I grow annoyed at his ignorance.

“Don’t you get it? There are people who have tortured Jimmy for years. He has never been able to walk to class without his books being knocked out of his hands and being pushed into a locker. School is supposed to be a safe, peaceful place, but you people make it impossible for us! Jimmy and I have been punished and judged everyday for no reason. You mock us and bully us to the point where we decided to take charge for once. For once, your fate is in our hands, and there is nothing you can do about it!” I scream, while pacing in front of their little huddle. The gun twitches at my side ready to explode at any moment; with my free hand I wipe the sweat from my brow furiously. I find it unbelievable that they don’t understand the pain they have been causing us. How I have to be physically forced to go to school in the morning and have no desire to live any more. Jimmy and I made a pact; we would avenge ourselves, and then decide if we want to live. I hadn’t had the guts to take out everyone on the list, so I had Jimmy do it, but I’d use this gun if I had to.

As Marie is screaming to us about her pain, I don’t necessarily understand, but I haven’t been going through what she has, and from this point forward I vow that I won’t judge another book by its cover. I sit on the floor, surrounded by classmates and feel their body heat radiating from their skin. I cry silently and think of some of the things I had wanted to do before I die. Visit the Great Wall of China, experience a hot air balloon ride, or share a kiss at the top of the Eiffel tower. My body begins to quiver as I cry harder, but doing my best to remain silent. Just as I think I might lose it, I feel someone’s hand in mine. I look up and see Carter with a weak smile on his face as he squeezes my hand. I squeeze back, and get myself together.

There were twelve people on my list, but I killed thirteen. Mrs. Carmichael was because I knew Marie was in her class and that she’d take care of everything if need be. For every person I murdered today, I felt remorse. I felt remorse and I felt guilt and grief for their families, but I also felt relief. I knew that it was finally over, that I could finally rest in peace knowing they were going down with me. I navigate my way back to Mrs. Carmichael’s room to retrieve Marie. I walk past pools of blood, and bodies from today’s massacre, but keep my eyes forward and focused. I stand outside the math room and gesture towards Marie. I know I don’t have much time; it’s inevitable that the police will barge in at any moment, and crash my little party. I catch Marie’s eye and she walks into the hall with me.

“Hello my dear,” I say with a smile. She blushes slightly and smiles back. She grabs my hand, and I bring hers to my lips for a final goodbye. She pulls back and stares into my eyes- strong and meaningful. “Are you ready?” I ask, and she nods. While staring into each other’s eyes, we raise the guns to our heads and on the count of three; we put an end to all our pain.