From Twisted Tails 3: Pure Fear

I can’t find my locker. Where the hell is it? Have I been away from here that long that I don’t remember where my locker is? But where have I been? And I don’t recognize any of the students in these halls. There’s nobody who knows me, nobody I can ask, “Where’s my locker?” I know this place, but I don’t know it. I know I have a locker here somewhere—a place where I store my crap—but why can’t I find it? And what am I doing here in the first place? I finished with this place years ago. I’m not supposed to be here. But I am. And I can’t find my locker.

The bell rings. The commotion swells. Hordes of students herd furiously to their next class, stampeding in step with their schedules. They all know where they’re going and move with the collective mind of a well-timed institution. Except me. I can’t find my locker. I know I have one by the sense that this is where I am and this is where everyone here has a locker.

Like magic or dream, I’m standing in front of my locker and the door is open and the halls are empty and I’m alone facing a pile of books and binders and I have no idea where I’m supposed to go next. I notice a red fire extinguisher on the wall, freestanding, no wooden case with glass. The panic builds on the emptiness of the hall. I need to be somewhere right now or I’ll be late. But where? I’m going to be the odd one out. They all moved to their classes, smiling, talking, certain. And I’m standing here wondering where I’m supposed to take these books and binders, which ones am I to take? There’s no schedule here, nothing posted. I’ve been away too long. Where have I been?

The fear is growing. It’s been there for how long? Just growing. Where am I supposed to be? Where are the signs? What class have I been missing all this time that I need to be in right now? What room? What subject? What teacher? I don’t know! I don’t have a clue. Nothing is familiar except the place, this hall, this locker, this moment in time. But even these seem strange in a way that sends bumps across my skin and strangles my stomach on the bile of its own fear. I look to my left, to my right, behind me, expecting some horrible truth to pounce suddenly and devour me in the chill of my own ignorance. My stomach is ice. My heart is mercury.

I’m fucked.