retrograde.

;one

chapter one: remind myself in the smudged glass that pretty isn't everything, you punk ass.

2 0 1 3 ~ B E F O R E

        "In the year 1939, what deadly conflict began?" The history teacher known as Mr. Felix asked his class.

Around the room, students were either asleep, on their phones, or just simply in a completely different dimension in their minds. And I was one of those students. When Felix's question goes unanswered for too long, his eyebrows knitted into a frown as he scoured the room for a target to pick at random to test them to see if they were paying attention, when ten times out of ten, the person chosen wasn't paying attention to begin with.

"Casper Clark." Felix called.

Immediately, my eyes tore away from the back of the chair in front of me where I had spent the past five minutes daydreaming about God knows what, up to Felix's, whose eyes bore into mine with such intensity, it was like I was his arch-nemesis, who keyed his car while looking him dead in the face. Honestly, I think the guy has it out for me. He's said something positive about all the other students in this class except me. Now, I'm not sure if it's because I have a solid F in his class, or just because something about me shoves him in the wrong way.

"Yes, sir?" I say, removing my hand from my face and sitting up straight to make it seem like I was interested.

He lets out a sigh, not pleased that he was to repeat himself. "Mister Clark, can you tell me what deadly conflict began in the year 1939?"

I have no fucking idea.

There was a soft "psst" sound a few seats ahead of me. I looked up, my best friend Elias, who everyone refers to as Eli, was looking directly at me, his lips moved but no sound came out. He was mouthing the answer. But given that I'm the world's shittiest lip reader, I couldn't make out whether he said "cold war" or "world war". So I go with my best guess.

"The Cold War." I affirmed, nodding my head, as I was confident in my answer.

"No, dumbass." Eli's voice speaks loud enough for me to hear.

Felix let out another sigh before he turned around to the board, grabbing a black marker and scribbled the words "World War II". His handwriting is sloppy and almost difficult to read, but if you looked hard enough, you could tell what he was trying to say.

"World War II began September 3rd 1939, also known as the deadliest war known to man. It is estimated that over sixty million people lost their lives in the war, which was three percent of the world's population at the time." Felix went on to explain. "The World War II came about when Hitler invaded Poland and began to seize other countries."

He focused his attention on me once more. "Understand now, Mister Clark?"

I saluted him, just to piss him off, "Sir, yes, sir."

He rolled his eyes and set the marker down before speaking to the class. "Alright, students. The bell will be ringing shortly, so you may begin packing. Tonight's homework is to read pages four twenty through four twenty two and write a summary on what you've read. Is that too difficult for you all to do?"

Wannabe stoners and other immature individuals giggled and whispered at the mention of four twenty as they put their stuff away in their bags.

I stood up and slung my bag over my shoulder, and just as I did, the bell rang. Eli then approached me, a look of confusion on his face. "How did you get 'cold' out of 'world'?"