I had not studied at all for my history test and I knew that I could not afford to fail it, or get a bad grade, so I devised a ploy. Little did I know that, having been suffering from exhaustion and chronic migraines for almost an entire week, I was not lying when I meekly told the substitute teacher “I’m feeling really crappy. Can I go to the nurse?” She nodded, possibly expecting me to return to class at some point. She was sadly mistaken.
I did as planned and asked the nurse if I could lie down for a while as my head was still hurting- again, I really was not lying. I went into the dark little room with a single bed (the kind that they have in the doctors office with crinkly paper on it) and a stretcher propped against the wall. I set down my bag, took of my shoes, plugged in my headphones and tucked myself in.
What could have been two minutes or an hour later (I lost all sense of time once I lay down in that bed) I awoke almost screaming to the sound of ‘Vanilla Twilight’ by Owl City playing over my headphones. It is not an obtrusive song, in fact it is a lovely song, and the volume was not high so I have no idea why as soon as the song started playing I was terrified. Maybe that should have been my first clue. I checked the time, still half an hour before break time, turned off my iPod and went back to sleep. By this time I was noticing that I was rather uncomfortable. No matter how I covered myself I still felt as though there was a draft creeping in and I was shivering under the thick fleece blanket. My feeble school uniform (small khaki skirt and loose blue button up) was doing nothing to protect me from the wintry breeze. Nevertheless, I soon fell back into a deep slumber.
After some time I had the feeling that I really should wake up. I got out of the bed and crossed the small space to the long mirror propped against the wall. Turning on the light I checked myself to make sure my hair was not too unruly, upon deciding that it was I tied it up. At this point I checked my watch and realised that I still had half an hour before the end of the class I was so aptly avoiding so I decided to lie back down. As soon as my head hit the pillow however, I woke up to find that I had never gotten out of bed in the first place. My hair was strewn over my face, I was still cold, and there was no mirror in the room. I was confused, and dazed. I checked the time to find that I only had three minutes left of my little escape. Yet, I rolled over and went back to sleep. This is when things got really weird.
I seem to recall hearing my history teacher’s voice outside the door, only for it to be confirmed when him and the nurse burst into the room. He was livid, accusing me of feigning ill to avoid his test. Naturally, I pretended to still be asleep. The poor nurse was defending my honour, saying she thought I should rest and that they shouldn’t wake me. He insisted, however on getting a ‘real doctor’ to look at me, which he conveniently had on hand. I could not help but wonder how this must have offended the sweet nurse. Shortly after their fight the door was shut and I opened my eye to find a familiar man examining me as if under medical pretences. I recognised the man, however, as one of the school security guards. He assured me that he had no medical training whatsoever and that he was only there to appease my history teacher. Bewildered, and still tired I disregarded the entire fiasco and returned, once more, to my fitful slumber.
After what felt like two minutes I awoke to two of my friends frantically trying to get me up and out of bed. They informed me that there was a nurse (not my sweet nurse but another one altogether) right outside brandishing a knife and that they had to save me before she stabbed me. They bundled me up between themselves, covered my face, and got me out of there as quickly as possible. Straight out of the nurse’s office who should I run into but my history teacher, furious that I was all together cured as soon as his class had ended.
Immediately after this I awoke once more, still in the confines of the bed. My friend (not either of the ones who had come to save me from the knife brandishing nurse) was standing in the doorway declaring that I was late for chemistry class. As we walked to the lab she informed me that I had been sleeping, undisturbed, for two hours and that my history teacher wasn’t even in school. I can only assume that there was no homicidal nurse incident either.
