GRAVE FOR THE SOLITUDE, theodore laurence

02| an excruciating physics crisis

CHAPTER TWO
an excruciating
physics crisis

When people get terribly bored out of their eye sockets during a school lesson, they'd tend to confide their boredom with their friends around them— hoping to muse the hour by. Perhaps even squeeze fun targets towards the professor with the tease and please game. Unfortunately, that was never the case for Eleanor Rigby being tutored by her strict loving mother. Study lessons would take place from the fresh early 8 AM in the morning, where the numbing air would spite anyone who was foolish enough to not wear a coat, and to the peak of noon at 1 PM. Eleanor scrawled through the pages of the astronomy book which she had borrowed from the Laurence household a week ago, hoping to find her saviour in there.

          If physics was a person and Eleanor had the chance to tell it to go screw itself, jump in a ditch and die, she admittedly wouldn't hesitate but perform a more gruesome homicide to the field of study. Perhaps a slit on the neck and let the thick trickling blood choke itself to its merry grave.

          Sofia Rigby scribbled away on a small cracked-up slate, unaware of Eleanor's undivided attention. Eleanor proceeded to endure herself on the safe island of the astronomy book, keeping her well away from the dangers of boredom and a possible brain aneurysm over Newton's three laws. Maybe a little too well away, that when Sofia whipped her attention back to Eleanor after writing out her equation, she meets Eleanor completely shredded over the book which laid on the table. Eleanor's fingers were thrust in her hair and her head was levitated directly atop the thick study book— vaguely aware of the lesson anymore. Sofia flicked her wrist, her stomach boiled and her head couldn't comprehend such behaviour.

          Sofia dropped her arm and rested her hands on her waist, eyes flashing with daggers. 'Elle.'

          Eleanor didn't respond, unbeknownst to Sofia's frustration.

           Sofia's ears steamed and her knuckles turned blistering white. 'Elle, pay attention.'

          Eleanor proceeded to read, too entranced within the lines of her book. A little escape in her own little world.

          Sofia heavily dumped the slate on the table with a silence-breaking thud cracking the thicket of ice. 'Eleanor Rigby get rid of that damn book!' She snarled, scathing her knuckles a sickening pink.

          Eleanor snapped from her bubble and simply blinked at Sofia as her heart drummed against her rib cage. They stared at each other, Sofia's eyes closed into slits and Eleanor completely dazed. Sofia inhaled a low breath of air and snatched the slate from the table. Eleanor flinched from the acid piping through Sofia's tone, knowing she's in deep ice. She shut the book after sliding a dead leaf bookmark between the thin pages and obeyed, shifting it to the edge of the table. Sofia continued to teach as the hour lulled by, the boredom and aching of studying taking a particular toll on Eleanor that day.

          When the sun reached the mid-West and the noon soon came into view, Sofia flipped the slate on the table. Eleanor lifted her head from her textbook with a star-filled hope, recognising the action. 'Ok, I need to start cooking for dinner,' Sofia started. She paced towards a basket and dumped it on the table in front of Eleanor. 'Mind dropping this off to the Hummel family since the crops are certainly out for Winter? I visited them the other day and they don't have any food . . . I have leftovers from the corn for us to eat.'

          Eleanor pulled an irritated frown and shut the textbook, quietly moving along. She lifted herself from her seat and slipped the astronomy book from Laurie into her front dress pouch. Figuring that she needed to return the book, might as well suck it up and go to the Hummel's. Sofia kept a lingering eye on Eleanor as she began to gather her kitchen supplies, not pleased with Eleanor's behaviour but too exhausted to point it out as a slap in her face.