End of Class

A history professor confides in his students

     The history professor had oval glasses and hair that grew brown and slicked backwards. He had a square, union man face with a downturned mouth. He was a white man with rough, sun worn skin from working construction until the minimum age of retirement. He speaks of Germany and is quick to resort to a germanic farce of an accent, “Lieberhausen, ein schnitzel.” He says for cheap laughs and some indication that the blank faces he tries to teach still circulate blood with a heartbeat. Some laugh, but most have checked out of their minds. 
     The History teacher is a man who has traveled. He speaks of his time in Germany and even his German girlfriends, this of course is coupled with the German accent. He tells the class of his summer in South America with his son, and he pauses, feeling up the energy of the class like one of his lieber loving German girlfriends. “I’ve been to Cuba. America doesn’t want us going to Cuba and you can’t fly to Cuba from the states, there aren’t any flights.”
     He sweeps his gaze from one side of the class to the other, his eyes squinted behind the glasses. The smooth skinned, lanky armed asian girl sitting at the back corner desk pokes from her notes like a gopher on dew to the sun rise. Her hand, attached to her arm by bone and some skin lifts above her straight black hair. Behind his classroom podium, the history professor calls on the hand. The asian girl, her head lowered back into her notes and her other hand writing onto the paper knows he called on her, “How did you get to Cuba if there aren’t any flights?”
     “I probably shouldn’t be talking about it,” He said. A look of disappointment sunk into the faces of the students he had lost. “Alright, Alright. It wasn’t hard. I was with my son and we were, you know, on a trip in south America, and we get to Mexico city and I decide hey, you know, I want to see Cuba. So I caught a connecting flight from Mexico City to Cuba, they didn’t even stamp my passport because they knew I could get int trouble for it, you know. You can’t fly to Cuba from America, you know, Cuba is one of the last communist nations and Congress really doesn’t want us seeing how a communist nation holds up you know.”
     The asian girl writes in her notebook, her profile is symmetric and a mask of focus. “How are they holding up?
     “It is a clean country believe it or not, a well kept country. It is probably one of the cleanest countries in all of South America. And their communist. There can be a lot worse than communism let me tell you. I had to fly out from Mexico City. I love Mexico, but it is a nest of slums and poverty, and Mexico is a Constitutional republic. Yes, there are worse things than communism, but I’m only the messenger, you don’t have to believe me.” 
     Students nodded in their seats, none had any questions. Some looked to the clock and invested a couple seconds in following the red tail of the seconds hand. The red tail whipped to the top and licked the twelve. There were a only a few minutes left in the room, the teeth of backpack zippers gnawed together as students prepared to leave the class. The last person signed the attendance sheet the history professor had handed out and now he held it in his hands, “Alright, nobody’s got any questions. You’re all so quiet.”
     The asian girl closed her notebook and opened her back pack, “Sorry, I just have one more question. Can you, PUT YOUR F*****G HANDS UP!” She drew a black handgun from the darkness inside of her backpack. She moved to her feet from the desk, the handle of the gun gripped by her white knuckles. “On your f*****g knees, hands up!” 
     The history teacher fell out of sight behind the podium. Gunshots sounded from behind the podium and the asian girl fell to the floor pushing an open palm to the blood pouring from her popped calve.  
   Students watched the clock, the red tail rose again to the twelve. They sat up and tossed their backpacks behind them. Looking to their phones, they exited through the doorway.
    

Reviews

[Chadvonswan]

I like how the students are so uninterested in the whole thing. Pretty accurate

[Marie]

Zach I don't quite get this story. Is it meant to show how indifferent students are? Or is there something about Cuba and the Aisian girl I should know?

It's pretty well written and entertaining, but the end isn't clear.

[ZackOfBridge]

I think it is meant to show how indifferent students are, it was just a scene from my classroom that I embellished a bit