Dom's Perspective.
I remember it like it was yesterday...
February 28th. The day it all began.
It was a cloudy morning on a school day. All the kids are on their way to school. You see that boy amongst the crowd with the blue hat? Yeah, that's me; Dominic Aaron Lanes, but most people just call me Dom.
While I was on my way to school, I was pondering to myself about how horrible my day was gonna be. "Here we go again! Another traumatizing day at my crappy school! Let's just hope this day is even SLIGHTLY better than the ones before." I said in my mind. Hoping that at least one good thing would happen today.
As soon as I opened the door, I was greeted with a warm, welcoming "Oh great! It's Dom!" And everyone groaning. Me, trying not to bring attention to myself, I held the tip of my cap and pushed it to the front of my face while looking down.
When I get to my class, my teacher, in a soft and friendly tone, said to the class "Alright! Settle down class! Before we start, let's all bring out our homework assignments!" Everyone in my class pulls out their work. Every one except me, who forgot.
The teacher noticed this and immediately turned to me; requesting that I bring out my homework. "Dominic. Where is your assignment?"
I then responded with "Oh, um, my... assignment?" My teacher was already visibly annoyed with me, so she said, in low, deadpan voice "yes, where is it?" I started getting a little anxious while searching in my bag, only to find that I left my homework at home.
"Forgetting your homework again Dom?" My teacher said in a menacing voice. "I did do it this time I promise! I-I really did! I'll bring it tomorrow!!" I exclaimed to the teacher.
"pfft ...What an idiot....are you seriously that lazy and irresponsible, that you forget the assignment that you were given a whole weekend to do? Looks like someone needs to try harder..." Said Drew. Then the whole class laughed at me.
Then, one of my classmates, Rachel, responded with "y'know, if I was the teacher, I'd already be done with you by the second day of the semester." "Yeah, why are you always the one that forgot everything? Like, is it really that hard?" Another classmate, Mason said.
By the way, that jerk who called me an idiot for forgetting my homework is Drew Hanson, my bully and mortal rival since middle school, if you couldn't tell by his dialogue, he is an egotistical, obnoxious prick. He is an overly aggressive jock who is also extremely booksmart and almost always the top student, with that being said he is also clueless and lacks street smarts.
For years, he has mentally and physically tormented me, I also happen to be his biggest target, since I struggle a lot in school.
So anyways, the teacher got pissed and scolded me saying "Dominic Aaron Lanes!! How come everyone except you excels while all you do fail!!" I then responded with a very quiet "I don't know..." "You don't know? YOU DON'T KNOW!?!! Are you stupid!? You don't have a SINGLE cell in your simple little brain THAT MOTIVATES YOU TO STUDY!?!?!"
I was taken a back by her words, and even a bit hurt by them; but I didn't respond, all I did was give a somber look and put my head down. "I'M TIRED OF HAVING TO PUT UP WITH YOU ALL THE TIME!! I'VE HAD ENOUGH WITH YOU!! GO SIT IN THE HALLWAY!" I responded with a quiet "yes ma'am." And walked away from the classroom.
After I exited the classroom, I walked in the hallway and sat in a desk. When I sat in that desk, I thought to myself "Well, this couldn't possibly get worse." It got worse.
During lunch period I was sitting on a bench alone by myself until Drew(The teacher's pet from earlier)walked up to me. I looked up and saw him walking towards me and with a hostile expression on my face, I stood up and said "What do want."
"Dom! I know it was you!!" Drew yelled. "What did I do!?" I questioned. "YOU stole my homework!! I was gonna get a straight A streak! Now my grades are gonna drop because of you!!"
I don't know what this guy was on about, but I know for a FACT I didn't do what he's accusing me of doing. He probably forgot his work in his locker; I guess he was too dense to even look so since we're mortal rivals, he assumed it was me.
So anyways, I then said to him "dude. I did NOT steal your homework; what gave you that absolute asinine idea!?"
"SHUT UP!! Let's fight this out!" Drew angrily shouted. I said back to him "So you're gonna start a fight with me over such minor inconvenience!? Just how petty are yo-" WHAM He punched me right in the stomach! That punk.
I then said to him, while in pain "so that's how you're gonna play it huh?" Then, I ran head first towards him and punched him right in the stomach back. In fact, I punched him so hard that he burst right into a tree. Everyone there stood up after they witnessed what just happened and they all started to chant "fight! fight! fight!" Over and over again.
Once I had done that, I thought to myself "this is definitely a moment I will not regret." He immediately got up and with an expression on his face that looks like it wants to kill me said "why....YOU!!!!" Came over towards me and started punching me repeatedly. Me, as feisty and stubborn as I was, started to fight back.
The teacher was walking past the window when she saw me and Drew all bloody and bruised fighting in the school yard.
She was shocked and immediately ran out the door and yelled "Hanson!! Lanes!! Office! NOW!!!" Everyone paused, and remained silent. Me and Drew stopped fighting and also remained silent.
Once we had stopped fighting, Me, Drew, and the teacher were walking down the hallway. The teacher was scolding us saying "What where you two thinking!? Picking fights in the 10th grade! You know darn well this is a high school!! Not a-a a A JUNGLE GYM!!!! You should know better than this.."
After a visit to the principals office, me and Drew were tasked with cleaning the whole school after school.
As me and Drew where mopping the gymnasium, I said to Drew "You know this is all your fault." "You were involved in the fight too! Shut the hell up!!" Drew responded. "You know, maybe! If you just REMEMBERED where your stupid assignment was, we wouldn't be in this mess!" I snapped back.
"Well maybe if you had just admitted that it was you, maybe I wouldn't have hit you!" Drew shouted. "You STILL think it was ME!?!! are you braindead!? I've told you already that I. Didn't. Steal. Anything!!" I angrily responded.
As I was talking, Drew got more and more pissed. "You know what!? Let's fight!!" Drew demanded. I was astonished by Drew's lack of impulse control and said "Hell no I'm not gonna fight you! Do you want us to get into more trouble!?"
When I said that, I remembered something, I was late for orchestra!! "Oh crap I totally forgot!" I exclaimed.
"You totally forgot what!?" Drew asked. I dropped my mop and headed straight to the classroom to get my bag. Drew was confused by this and said "Wha- SO YOU'RE JUST GONNA LEAVE ME HERE!?!!
I rushed out of the school and as the sunset went down, I ran off to my orchestra practice. At orchestra, all the other band members (this is an all boys orchestra band) are confused as to why I'm not there.
"It's already past 4:30,and Dom still isn't here." Isaiah said "I'm getting kinda worried about him... lately, he hasn't been acting like himself." Said Aiden. "Yeah..ever since his mom died and his brother-" Austin said until I opened the door.
Once they had said that, I just stood there with a concerned look on my face, staring directly at them. My coworkers looked over to me with a look of shock on their faces.
My music conductor broke the silence and said to me "You're late, Dominic." I responded with a "I know.". My conductor said to me "Dominic, I know it's been very hard for you lately. However, you're late, and the problem with that is this is not the first time you've been late. This has become a repeating pattern and I've also known for a while that you've been seeming a lot more....aloof? Lately. It seems you don't really care anymore and if this keeps up, I might have to kick you out of the band!"
I did not really like hearing him say that he would potentially kick me out. I may not always look like it, but I'll let you know that I do, In fact, care about orchestra. It's just that, I've been having a really hard time getting motivated to do anything really.
After the conductor lectured me, we began practicing. Everything went well, I suppose. After orchestra, everyone went home. So in the dead of the dark night, like everyone else, I went home.
When I got to the house, my Dad was already home from work. When I noticed him, I glanced at him, and he glanced at me. I then said to him "Hey Dad." After I said that, he said to me "Oh, hey." About my Dad, he is...well...to put it simply, he doesn't really care about me. at least, I don't think he does.
Most of the time he's at work, and when he's home, he's usually drinking or smoking and going on his computer. So we don't spend a lot of time together.
So after that, I went upstairs to my room. I hung my backpack up, took my blue baseball cap off, took off by black jacket and hung it up, and fell onto my bed. On my bed, I thought to myself "sigh...I can't take this anymore...everyday just feels like a pain to go through. I wonder if everyone would be happier if I just....disappeared. I mean... there's not really any need for me to be here...I wish mom was still here...wait.I know what to do."
So I got up, waited till my Dad was long asleep, then put on my black jacket and my blue cap, packed my backpack with some stuff, then sat down at my desk and wrote a letter to my Dad.
"Dear Dad, I'm running away, and I don't think I'll ever come back. Things have not been going great for me lately, and I think you'd be better off without me. I don't know where I'm gonna end up, but I think it's best that I leave.
- Dom"
when I finished my letter, I stuck it to my door and went out the back door.
"Here I go." I said to myself as I stood out in dark, cold rainy night. I then ventured out into the forest. As I walked through the tall trees and muddy grass, I eventually happened to come across an old shed. "This seems like a nice place to spend the night."
I said to myself. For some reason, the door was unlocked "weird..." I said quietly. But I went inside anyway.
And when I opened the door, I found a blue, glowing key. I was confused as to why someone would have a shed in the middle of the woods and have the door unlocked and leave the key in there open for ANYONE TO STEAL.
but that's not the point. So when I saw that key, I grabbed it to take a closer look, but the key shined really bright and suddenly, everything went dark. When I opened my eyes, I found myself in a cold, snowy, space-like place. "Where. . .am I?.... What is this place..?"
AND THAT'S WHERE MY LIFE CHANGED FOREVER.