Maze

The bell goes off, to mark the end of second lesson. I flick through my folder, quickly stuff my work into the correct section, put my mask on and escape to the corridor. And it’s time to play the game. How do I waste fifteen minutes? In my head I begin to map the route. My eyes dart towards a building in the distance, and I appear as if I know exactly where I’m going. I watched a video a few years ago that said if you did that, people would believe that you were walking with purpose. Slowly, I make my way past all of the children in the younger years. I’m one of the only people on my own, but I think to younger kids I probably just look more independent. I tone down my naturally fast walking pace to a relatively slow shuffle. It still only takes me a few minutes before I reach the intimidating blue doors. I hold them open for anyone who is approaching. The doors lead to this small cube-shaped room with a computer suite attached on the left, another set of doors infront and a wall to the right. If there’s no one on the other side of each set of doors sometimes I walk around in a circle a few times. A good way to spend sixty seconds. Usually, my phone says it’s about 11:06am by this point. I push through the set of doors ahead of me, and emerge into the next corridor. This is when I start to hear the noises from the common room. Chairs scraping across the beige tiled floor, people whispering about something tiny but massive, the exasperated sighs of someone who realises that they have finance next with the teacher that they hate. Another set of doors shields me from the common room. 

My hand reaches out for the handle, and I clench it in frustration. Because I can’t go in. I check behind me to ensure that no one has observed my inability to walk through a door, I spin 180 degrees and head out a different way to the way I came in. This corridor is often more congested with people that I know, so I deliver a few slight nods and smiles on my way to nowhere. My brain begins calculating the next part of the journey. It’s 11:08. I have to make up seven more minutes without crossing any of the paths I’ve already been down. Eventually, I’m outside. There is a really long (in terms of a school) path, which is pretty empty. It’s typically okay to pick the pace up a bit here. At the end of the path, I take a right. This is one of the riskiest parts of the walk. A lot of people tend to congregate in an area that sits at the end of the path I’m on. Given that I take the same (pointless) course everyday, someone may clock on that I’m actually just walking around in circles and think that it’s slightly odd. That does rely on 16-17 year olds taking an interest in my walking patterns, however, so I think I’m good. 

There’s another right I can take which means I avoid journeying straight into the crowd, so I take it. The path here is quite uneven, and I am ridiculously clumsy so my eyes are pretty much fixed to the ground the whole time. This is the hardest bit of the walk to decide where to go next. Sometimes I check my phone to see the time. 11:11. Lessons start at 11:15, so that’s good enough. I arrive at most of my lessons early, which most people attribute to my studious personality. I wish that it was being a nerd which lead to me getting there early, rather than mental illness but if other people find that easier to swallow, then it’s fine by me. People trickle into the classroom, the teacher arrives, and the lesson starts. I’m safe. 

Until lunch.