step into the sun ☼ deh

ix

chapter nine
ten books
mia pov

trigger warnings: none

Obviously that day, I had school. It was a boring day, as usual, but Chris got some more comments on his post.

pierres_pizzaze_645: I found out from a good source that the original website has been deleted, but there's a way to access it... you'll probably get a bunch of viruses, because it's kind of sketchy, so I don't recommend it

l3t.1t.g0_: i mean i'm sure there's a way to find it but it might be weird and hard to find

bathb0mb.qu33n.: i did some digging, and I guess that the owners got into some type of argument? idk what it was, but something happened with one of them, and they all got mad at each other, and they ended The Connor Project... That's what I found out. I went digging in some of my dad's old stuff...

"This bath bomb chick knows a lot about the demise of The Connor Project..." I said, going through the comments. She's pretty given us most of the information we needed.

"Well, she did say that her dad was involved with it. I think her dad was the Jared kid..." Chris said, scrolling through.

"Well, knowing the git of what happened is pretty good news. I mean, you know that they all got into a fight... It would be nice to know what it was about..." Susan interjected.

"They probably keep that information off the internet, though..." I told her.

"True... That's kind of weird about accessing the old website..." Susan replied.

"Yeah, I'm not risking getting a virus. I try to stay off of those parts of the Internet," Chris said.

"I wouldn't. Do you know of any other way to access the website?" I asked.

"Unfortunately, no. I'm seriously thinking about asking one of the underclassmen tech-nerds if they know anything..." Chris groaned. Chris wasn't super close with the underclassmen tech-nerds. They kind of took the tech-nerd position as a huge responsibility that only they could do, though it kind of was important. I don't know if age had anything to do with it, but Chris was a lot more calm than the underclassmen, especially in a stressful situation. Tech-nerds have to go through some pretty stressful stuff. Almost every year, someone's mic doesn't work in the school musical. It's a different mic every year, so you never know who's going to get screwed over at the time of the show. You also don't know what this person's reactions could be. It could be a girl who's crying hysterically, a "Mama Bear" who wants their kid's performance to be perfect, someone who's nice about it (but is secretly ticked), or someone who literally could not care less. Usually, the reaction isn't good, and the teachers get upset about it, no matter what. If Chris gets upset, then everyone else will get upset. Chris is a chill person, and it takes a lot to get him provoked.

"Please don't... They'll probably mess it up!" I told him, half-jokingly.

"The freshman nerd will... Have you met him? He is a nervous-twit. I don't know how he got on the nerd-team, but he did..." Chris complained.

"Chris, you told us they're all nervous twits..." Susan retorted.

"Yeah, but this one is even more of a nervous twit. I think it's part of being a freshman and all, but still..."Chris told her.

"And somehow you manage to say that every year," I replied.

"Hey, even as a freshman, I was chill..." Chris said, and I instantly started laughing. Freshman year, Chris was the definition of nerdy and awkward, and I'm sure he fit some of the "nervous twit" requirements. The upperclassmen liked him, though, because he was good at what he did, but I'm sure he was still annoying to them.

"Yeah, sure..." I sarcastically said.

☼☼☼

Dad came home from work with a Barnes and Noble bag. He was a little later than normal time, but I didn't mind. I had just finished up some homework when he walked in.

"Hi, Dad..." I said.

"Hey Mia..." he replied, placing the bag on the kitchen counter. He took out the books that he had in the bag. Ten Books, each of them were considered "classics" at one point or another, from what I've heard. They were all kind of old.

Animal Farm

To Kill A Mockingbird

The Outsiders

The Giver

Bridge To Terabitha

The Hunger Games

Les Miserables

Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone

Ten Days in a Madhouse

Cat's Cradle

Although I hadn't heard of some of them, I knew that they were somehow important, but I didn't know why.

"What are these for?" I asked.

"Oh... uh, nothing in particular. I just felt like picking up some books. You can read them, if you want..." my father said.

I nodded and looked through the stack. I pulled out The Giver, and decided that I would read it later that night. I flipped though it a little bit. I remember this book being on the extra credit list in middle school, where you would read the book and get extra credit in English. I never read it, though, mostly because the old man on the cover kind of creeped out 12-year-old me, and the fact that there were other books on the list that I was interested in.

Later that night, I brought the book to my room and set it on the nightstand. I remembered that I had seen the movie a while back, but I never really read the book. The storyline was pretty interesting, but a little weird to me. Dad said when he was younger, everyone was interested in dystopian book-to-movie adaptations. I found this a little odd. Why would people find the possible future or almost-ending-world entertaining? Was it a PSA to make people realize what could come? Did people find it funny? I didn't get what people saw in dystopian dramas. I figured it was the romance "against the odds" that people enjoyed, though that wasn't the point. I honestly could go on about it for ages.

I opened the book and started to read, hoping it wouldn't be like all the other dystopian books I was forced to read in school...