TBF exams (part 1)

Glands don't possess eyes. And a good thing, too! Innocent situations, to the eye, are readily distinguished by more primitive systems to be anything but.

"I'm studying for my TBF exams." The words cannoned from my mouth. Had my faculties not been employed on myriad other defenses, I may have concentrated more on the pace of my speech.

It's an everyday occurance: a teacher takes his ceremonial spot in front of the class. Students--some lazily, others furioulsy--take out pen and paper. A mundane, stereotypical event. My autopilot certainly interpreted otherwise:I was crouched amongst razor-tipped elephant grass, makeshift brothers' brains splattering my camoflauged clothing. Death behind me, around me, an invisible and hostile enemy surrounding me. It might as well have been, all the signals my autonomic nervous system was giving.

Palms moist, a sprinting heart, I held the regarded post at the front of the room. The role of student I held for years, and understood its obligations well. Safely seated in desk, this perspective offered sufficient view of what the instructor saw. Or so I thought.

My body was right! I was in hostile territory. My brain reached for social convention, which taught otherwise. Here is a civilized situation, years of upbringing said. Reality, as so often the case, was hostile. Freed from seated, wooden confines, the view from the front was a new reality, much less perspective. Young minds, shackled to inpurportionate seats, impatiently regarded what I might have to say.

My saving grace: these would-be hecklers felt the tension too. A stale, musty odor hung heavy in the crusty room. Browning, yellowish sandstone walls spoke of times past. Vibrancy, in this room, had left. A third-story cellar, the room latently informed that what passed between these walls was irrelevant.