"Tough Rocks" - Mr. Rollolazo
Calculus.Mrs. Nishimoto turned from the chalk board after drawing the graph of two lines growing closer together and began her lecture. Jon sat in the middle of the class, thankfully behind Claudia Fugazy, the big haired 6 foot volleyball team captain. Mrs. Nishimoto couldn't see him alternating between dozing off and zoning out.
"Asymptotes is limit on graph," Mrs. Nishimoto said and banged her chalk on the Y axis.
He was exhausted but it was that kind of sleep deprivation that left a person in almost a state of shock. He was too tired to even think about sleep. He was extremely light-headed. His eyes would close but his temples ached and if he kept his eyes closed for long, his head would explode with pulsing pain. Besides that, closing his eyes brought him back to the darkness.
"Is 3 type Asymptotes. Is horizontal. That mean on Y axis. Go this way." She put her right hand out in front of her, palm down and moved it back and forth, left to right, right to left."
His mind kept wandering to the events of the morning (but not the night, right Johnny? Never going back there again are we?). The sunlight began cracking through the blinds around 5:30. Jon had not moved an inch from the couch for 3 hours. But as soon as there was light, the shadows dissapeared and he moved quickly to open every curtain, every blind, turn on every light. He made his way up to his room and it was beautifully bright. The bay window without curtains or blinds faced the east and the beautiful orange early morning sun was beaming into every corner of his room. (the corners, Johnny? Why do you care about the corners so much? Chik-chik-chik.) He grabbed jeans out of the hamper and found a clean t-shirt and went to the bathroom to get ready for school trying desperately to have a normal morning to not think about the night before.
"Is Oblique asymptote." She said, although it sounded like 'Obli-kay,' "it have formula, y equals mx plus b. B constant." She put her left hand out in front of her in the shape of a fist. She slowly moved it up and down in a straight line. "M is slope." She put her right hand out, palm faced down and brought it towards her left hand in a curved motion, getting close to the fist but never touching it.
Justin, up in the front row, eagerly raised his hand. His buddies were already chuckling, "Mrs. Nishimoto, is it true that the Oblique Asymptote is more commonly known today as the Theory of Spanking the Monkey?"
Jon looked at his bare chest in the bathroom mirror and thought that the bruise looked smaller than the day before. It had faded in color considerably as well. At least something good was starting the day. He started the shower and took off his sweatpants. He groaned as he saw the mishapen bruises on the tops of his thighs. He must've hit his legs a lot harder than he thought trying to make the blood flow.
But what was that on the right side of his thigh? A round purprle bruise about the size of a silver dollar. And 2 inches down from there another one. And another. The complete right side of his leg, from his hip to his ankle was lined with them. It looked like some kind of macabre pair of bedazzled pants. Perfectly shaped marks, exactly the same distance apart with a tiny dark dot in the center of each one. Like something had been poking at him, prodding him. (attached to ya? Working on ya? Pokin' atcha, poki'n atcha?) Then he saw the exact same thing on his left leg. It was perfect symmetry.
And then he let out a yelp.
"And finally is Vertical asymptote. It go up and down." Mrs. Nishimoto was careful not to make any hand gestures this time. "Who can tell me why is important to know that asymptote mean it limit?"
His mother knocked on the door. "You alright, dear?" she asked, "I heard a noise."
"I'm fine, mom." He couldn't show her this. What would he say? How could he explain. He didn't know what the hell it was. What was happening to him. He simply sat on the toilet cover as the shower ran. He put on his jeans so that he wouldn't have to look at his legs and steadied himself. As soon as he wasn't looking at the marks, he could start to pretend things were normal again. He'd go to school, have a good day and everything would be alright. Hell, the other bruise was already gone these wouldn't be around for long either.
And so here he sat in Calculus, having nightmares with his eyes open.
"Limit is important because it mean that there are two lines." She braved hand motions again, this time putting both her right and left hand out in front of her, palms facing. She started moving them closer together. "What asymptote mean is that two things get closer and closer, they get so close look like one thing. They get," and she paused making sure she said the english correctly, "infinitely closer but never touch. So close look like one thing but no matter how small still space between them."
Jon snapped back into the real world when he heard that. He started looking at the corners of the room and began to remember (Get in the corner, boy! Just stand there.) and wonder.
To Be Continued