Forward
Before I started writing the Brain School, I didn’t think of the beginning chapters of the book. In my head, I would recreate the scenes that you will read in Chapter 5. I had even written it in short story form a year before I began the book. Chapters 1-4 were necessary evils, somewhat boring exposition which justified the later rising action.
The first four chapters of my first draft spanned 51 single-spaced pages, over 30,000 words. I’m amazed at my patience. I can also see how certain plot points conveniently but unrealistically pushed the story forward. Warren realizes all too quickly how he is being brainwashed. His investigations move along quickly, and his teacher coincidentally has an unexpected outburst. All the pieces fall into place too easily.
Now, we all have to suspend our disbelief to an extent, but young Solomon’s ramblings asked a little much of the reader. If current Solomon had to revise the chapter, I would make the students at the Brain School more complacent and less ignorant. They would be aware that they were being brainwashed, but they would be too sedated to really care. This, in turn, would lead them to be more forgetful. Warren, then, would not have a sudden realization of what was happening but would instead have to make a concerted effort to start caring.
Apart from pacing, I can see my writing improve compared to the previous chapters. Around this time, I was entering in high school, and I had discovered a love for flashy – but unnecessary – adjectives and adverbs. I will note I am disappointed in how I characterized Tommy. I had intended him to be a complex character, one who was aware that something was going wrong but who also didn’t want to believe it. He maintained an outward appearance of cheerfulness which masked his spite and impatience. Instead, this chapter depicts him only as a jerk, an unreasonable one which clashes with his initial characterization in past chapters.
That said, I’m having fun meeting these characters again, and I look forward to seeing how my younger self handled his first “action” scene.
*
Chapter 4 – Realization
I awoke disheveled and grumpy. As I sat up in my bed, a sharp pang of hunger attacked my ever-rounding belly. I glanced at my watch. A fuzzy “6:15 am” glared at me.
Silas and Robert were still sleeping soundly, but Tommy’s bed was empty. He was a morning person, but he was usually still asleep this time. I glanced under the study and bathroom doors. No lights were on so I guessed he wasn’t in those rooms. He must’ve left, but why? Maybe it had something to do with last night…
Last night…for some reason, I felt as if I had forgotten some important thought. My drowsy mind fumbled to recall what it was. It seemed fog dimmed my thinking, causing any type of thought require a great deal of work. Then—like a beam of light—the answer penetrated the miasma.
I groaned. I had to stop forgetting! But how? How could I solve the problem when I couldn’t even remember it in the first place? I began to rhythmically thump my head against the frame of my bed, hoping that it would somehow help my memory.
Why was I so forgetful? Just a couple of weeks ago my memory was great, but now I could barely recall anything from the night before. Something was wrong. Hunger hurt my stomach as I concentrated, distracting me. If only I had eaten last night, I wouldn’t be as depressed. I hated my-
I was hungry. Damn it, I was hungry.
There was a possibility! Something might have been wrong with the food! How could I have been as dumb as to not have thought of this earlier? Without last night’s meal in my system, I was able to think better!
I had a hypothesis; now I needed to test it. Brain-washing foods! I laughed quietly.
Cocky, I barged out of the room and headed toward the cafeteria. I would eat only half of my meal at breakfast, and if I thought more clearly then, I would have proven my hypothesis.
Despite it being early, when I entered the cafeteria several kids were already eating their breakfasts. I wanted to stop them and tell them my idea about the food, but I doubted it would do any good. Even if I had evidence, they probably wouldn’t believe me. Hell, I still needed evidence to fully convince myself.
Choosing a restaurant at random, I moved to a Mexican-themed eatery. A skeletal woman waited lifelessly behind the counter, blankly watching me with her pale, sunken eyes. Those eyes were ghastly, so vacant I couldn’t keep eye contact. As my gaze fell, an object caught my eye.
A necklace was strung tightly about her neck. The chain looked like it was only some cheap metal, but the single large, blue gem it held was magnificent. Hexagonal in shape, the sapphire was about the size of a quarter, framed by a thin trim of gold. The stone was so beautiful one would think it would be very rare, but it seemed very familiar to me. While the feeling was mysterious, my mind already began to piece together answers.
Avoiding eye contact, I ordered my food. As I took my food away, I noticed my breakfast burrito seemed to dwarf any other burrito I had ever eaten. Bigger was better, and in this case, it meant it might hold more brainwashing goodness. Eager to solve more, I cruised around the cafeteria to verify another curiosity.
It seemed my suspicion was true. As I approached each eatery, I glanced at the workers and noticed each of them wore a similar stone. Apart from their sickly statures, nothing was similar between them except that single gem suspended about their necks. I couldn’t be certain the sapphires were all exactly alike, but I was certain it wouldn’t be absurd to think so.
Was it school policy for all the cafeteria workers to wear these stones or was this some cafeteria cult? This seemed strange either way.
I wanted to study these workers longer to answer my questions, but my meandering soon attracted attention. The other students kept glancing at me as they carried hushed conversations at their tables, and even the catatonic staff began shuffling and staring at me uncomfortably.
“Warren, what the hell are you doing?” yelled a kid somewhere in the cafeteria. I looked and found Tommy, smiling and waving to me. It seemed he had forgotten our fight the night before. Plastering a smile on my face, I strolled over to his table.
“Thank God you got here,” he said as I seated myself by him. “Absolutely nobody else I know is awake this early, and I would be an outcast if you didn’t show up. Imagine that, me, all alone!”
“Yeah, whatever—” I started before I grasped the situation. On my friend’s plate, a pound of food lay potentially festering with brain-washing agents. We may have had a fight and I may have had no evidence, but I wasn’t going to let him eat all his meal without telling him what I thought.
“Tommy, don’t eat that!” I blurted just as he shoved a piece of bacon in his mouth. With his mouth closed around the meat, he watched me, irritated. “You can’t eat that,” I whispered. “There may be something wrong with the food.”
“Huh?” he replied skeptically, spitting out the bacon. “What’s wrong with my food? It looks perfectly fine to me.”
“Uh…” I fumbled, my mind trying to create a reasonable explanation. “This is just a hypothesis, Tommy, and it may sound ridiculous, but trust me on this one. I…I think there is something in the food that is brain-washing us. I mean, we’ve all been acting strange around here. There has to be something in the food because last night I didn’t eat anything and now I can almost think perfectly. You get what I’m saying?”
Tommy stared at me as he chewed the bacon in his mouth slowly. He said nothing. I could almost see the cogs running inside his head. I just hoped they turned in my favor.
“Yes, I understand and agree with some of the things you said,” Tommy finally said, carefully selecting his words. A sigh rushed through my lips in relief. “Your theory is ridiculous and you have been acting differently, Warren.” The breath of air came back with a sour flavor.
“I have to say, I have heard nothing more ridiculous than what you just said,” he continued, visibly disappointed. “Why would the school want to brainwash us? It’s stupid! That stuff happens in horror movies, not in real life, Warren.
“Just because Wayne was called away doesn’t mean the school is conspiring against us. We don’t know why he’s gone, but you don’t see the rest of us creating idiotic stories about drugged food.”
He stared at me condescendingly as I tried to keep my fist from punching him. The idiot didn’t believe me! He had actually insulted me! I should have thrown away his food before all of this, so that way, in the end he’d see what I was talking about. I was tempted to still do it, but eventually my reason came through. Tommy wouldn’t tattle on me, but there would be hell to pay if I tossed away his food.
“Perhaps you’re right, Tommy,” I sighed, changing tactics, deciding to compromise rather than fight. “Maybe I’m still shocked from last night, but I still think there may be something wrong here.”
“Whatever your worry is, Warren, don’t bother with it,” he grumbled.
I nodded casually. Even if I couldn’t convince Tommy, I would test my hypothesis. I had to know for myself. I brought my monstrous breakfast burrito to my face and ripped off a chunk. Hesitantly, I chewed and swallowed.
“I thought you said the food was contaminated,” Tommy sneered through a mouthful of eggs. “Aren’t you afraid you’ll forget everything?”
“I am,” I stated bluntly, tearing off another piece of my burrito. “That doesn’t mean I won’t enjoy my breakfast.” I winked at him, this time taking joy from infuriating him. It amazed me how spiteful a fun-loving and carefree friend could get in a day.
The rest of breakfast was spent in silence. Neither one of us granted the other the pleasure of his gaze.
I managed to choke down half of the burrito and a quarter of my OJ, leaving only digestion to prove or disprove my hypothesis. A major portion of my food was still on my platter but if my suspicions were correct, a full meal could strike me with sudden memory loss. I didn’t want to live through another month of ignorance.
“Are you going to eat the rest of that?” Tommy asked quietly as I got up from the table. He didn’t bother to look at me.
I looked down at my plate and then at the back of Tommy’s head. I opened my mouth, paused, and thought better. I needed to say something beneficial, not snide.
“Tommy, have you been able to contact your family?”
I left before he could respond, yet I sensed his reaction. His silence seemed to indicate that his brain was finally starting to rotate its rusted cogs for the first time in a long time.
Despite my modesty, a smug grin spread across my face. I couldn’t have delivered it more perfectly. I had reached a receptacle encased in a fog of arrogance. The thought of watching my surroundings never came to mind as I threw away my food.
“Hey kid, how come you’re wasting all that food?” barked the sickly skeleton of a cafeteria clerk, suddenly animate. His shout didn’t match his twiggy body, but he was intimidating.
“I just wasn’t hungry, sir,” I replied sheepishly.
“Well, you better be hungrier the next time you come here, kid,” the man ordered gruffly. “The staff at this school works hard to make the food you eat. You can leave a few scraps on your platter, but kid, you threw out an entire breakfast!”
“Okay, okay, sir,” I pleaded. “I’ll never waste another meal, I promise!”
I fled from the cafeteria. In the past, I might have stood up to the guy and argued for my rights, but I now lacked the ability to both fight and defend. The man’s words contained more than a simple scolding. They seemed to threaten with more than just janitorial duty.
I picked a good time to run. In a few minutes, Mr. Drake’s class would start. I raced to my dorm, retrieved my homework and some other materials, and started back. I headed past the gym and down the staircase leading to the classrooms.
A woozy, light-headed feeling swept over me as I entered the classroom. Grimacing, I stumbled to a desk near the door. My stomach should have been digesting the food now. If I was correct, brain-washing agents were already wreaking havoc on my body. If havoc was the right word, that meant I’d also be feeling some pain soon.
“Good morning, class,” Mr. Drake boomed as he entered the room with the ring of the bell. The class mumbled something back. “Yes, today is a good day,” he replied jokingly. “So what was I working on with you guys last class, hmm? Oh right, the Pitcairn Island incident, whether the mutinous crew of the Bounty could establish a new government on a deserted island. First, please pass up the essays I had assigned last class period.”
From my desk, I passed my assignment forward, cringing as I did so. Something was definitely happening in my stomach. Pain was eating away at its lining, something worse than indigestion. Even if my imagination was exaggerating the pain, I was certain now that the school was brain-washing us. I couldn’t ignore this pain.
Fidgeting uncomfortably, I focused my attention away from my pain and to my teacher. As papers piled in stacks in front of the class, Drake moved from desk to desk to retrieve them. As he bent down to retrieve one stack, the light caught something on his chest. As I squinted to see the glimmering object, the image burned with striking familiarity.
A gigantic sapphire adorned his necklace. There was no mistaking it. It was exactly like those that the cafeteria crew wore. Forget school policy, this coincidence reeked of more sinister matters. I suspected I’d be recognizing a lot more blue rocks from now on.
“…making the island seem almost like a paradise!” cried Drake, breaking into my thoughts as he continued his lecture. “The mutinous crew flung themselves upon the island and tried to live on it peacefully, but their stupidity and arrogance led them to their near destruction.” Drake paused for a while, allowing us to savor the information.
“Amazingly, the crew didn’t totally completely eradicate themselves,” Drake continued, his voice becoming more tense. His body twitched strangely as he spoke. Even for a guy that gestured wildly, this was surprising. “One of the last survivors of the original crew rose up to command the new generation of scoundrels on the island and led them to a new, prosperous life. Today, the ancestors of Pitcairn Island are numerous and flourishing.” Drake ended his lecture abruptly and his hands dropped to his sides.
“The human race’s stupidity has always puzzled me,” he mumbled loudly, a hand moving to his mouth in thought. “They—We have always exhibited ignorant behavior throughout the span of our lifetime.” Something dark moved subtly behind those cheery eyes. “Man has been on the brink of destroying himself countless times, yet every single time, he has managed to survive.” Drake’s gestures now mimicked the jerky, stiff movements of a puppet’s. A few kids around the classroom began squirming uncomfortably as we became aware of his growing anger.
“Why do we deserve to live?” Drake questioned contemptuously. “What makes the human race worthy enough to live above all other animals? Absolutely nothing!” Drake slammed his hand against his desk causing a wave of surprise to soak the class. Sweat dripped off his face as he continued, “We destroy our land without thought, pollute the environment uncaringly, and make humanity a hell for all other creatures. One can only wonder why man deserves the intelligence given to him. It seems the world would be a better place if we had never existed.”
Mr. Drake stood soaked in sweat, his hands suspended in one last sweeping motion. His chest heaved as he stared out at his students. We gaped back, awed and frightened. As seconds limped by, the chaotic fog in his eyes drifted away. Realizing his stance and behavior, Mr. Drake straightened himself.
“Sorry, guys,” he laughed, immediately cheery again. “I must’ve woken on the wrong side of the bed. You know how it feels when you smack into a wall that early; it’s an unnerving way to begin the day.”
The class chuckled quickly, relieved with this change. After a few more jokes, Drake went on with the lesson, and the students forgot the speech. I remained unmoved.
To me, his tirade was strange even if he was secretly cynical. He randomly took a history lesson and transformed it into the damnation of humanity! He may have woken on the wrong side of his bed, but would a bad start cause that rant?
I liked Mr. Drake as a teacher, but in my current circumstances, I had to keep an eye on him. His words might be the final evidence I needed to understand this school’s mystery. Nonetheless, I couldn’t trust him or anyone else; everything had to be viewed with suspicion. I’d mend friendships after I figured out what was going wrong.
Once class ended, I headed to the library to mull over my collected data. On some scrap of paper, I tried fruitlessly to list ideas to explain these weird coincidences. Despite my small breakfast, it seemed I had taken in enough toxic agents to scramble my brain. I could think, but it was difficult to keep focus, and my hunger only served to annoy me more. With these factors against me, I could barely keep a thought.
Considering my discomfort, I could assume a brain-washing ingredient was in the school’s food. That meant consuming anything would numb my mind, but I obviously couldn’t go without food. I had to eat sometime. So far, I had proved I could live off half a meal; it would probably be best if I continued eating only half of all my meals. Hopefully, that would provide sufficient nourishment and a functioning brain. As for the cafeteria staff, to avoid their attention, I’d donate my uneaten food to my unknowing cohorts. I would get an empty platter while they would get more food. It seemed suitable to me.
As my day scraped by, I focused my waning attention on my teachers. I registered both idiotic and probable ideas in my memory. The sapphire-wearing fad seemed to be popular; every teacher and staff member I saw wore the necklace. Some of the necklaces were partially concealed, yet I doubted they sported anything but a blue gem. I even caught an eyeful of a student wearing a similar necklace. I was hesitant to make assumptions, but if kids were also in on whatever this was, it didn’t look to good for me.
That night, I collapsed into my bed, exhausted. The stress of starving myself and concentrating sucked me dry of energy. I never realized how shoddy my brain and body were until I stretched their capacity. My stomach grumbled for food but struggled with what was in it. My brain had strained to solve the questions in my head while doing my homework and other activities. Even with less brain-washing agents, my brain had fought to stay on task and remember what it needed to do.