Claire was struggling to stay awake. The sounds around her blended with one another, and the air felt like a warm heavy blanket. She was desperately trying to keep her eyes open, but she was slowly losing the battle. As she drifted off to sleep, she caught a snippet of her teacher’s lecture.

“Laugh at the world’s foolishness, you will regret it; weep over it, you will regret that too…”

Just as Claire’s field of vision faded to black, Mrs. Donald, noticed the drowsy student and abruptly called her name.

“Claire,” Mrs. Donald said in an overly polite and somewhat mocking tone. There was no response from Claire.

“Claire Woodward!” Mrs. Donald raised her voice the second time, achieving her desired outcome.

Startled back into consciousness Claire responded with a, “Yes, Mrs. Donald?” as she rubbed her eyes. The rest of the students in the class chuckled.

“Welcome back. What exactly do you think Kierkegaard meant in his passage I was just reading?” Mrs. Donald asked leering at Claire.

Claire glanced over at her friend Miranda sitting next to her in a vain attempt to get the answer. Miranda with a half smile just shrugged. “What a great friend,” Claire sarcastically thought to herself. Claire returned her gaze to the teacher and thought for a moment.

“Well? We're waiting.” Mrs. Donald said impatiently to Claire.

“Damned if you do, damned if you don’t?” Claire responded sheepishly.

The class laughed at Claire’s answer, but the teacher wasn’t as amused.

“See me after class,” Mrs. Donald said to Claire after the class settled down. A couple of sarcastic “oooohhhhs” were heard around the classroom as the bell rang. The students shuffled out of their seats and moved quickly towards the exit. Miranda turned to Claire and said, “Sorry Claire, unfortunately I didn’t know the answer, otherwise I would have told you!”

“Don’t worry about it too much. I knew you didn’t deliberately not tell me.” Claire responded.

“Are you going to be free to play video games this weekend?” Miranda asked excitably. It was Friday after all.

“Yeah, but we need to find a new game to play. I’m getting tired of the FPS genre to be honest.” Claire responded.

“Well alright, let me know if you find anything! I’ll see you online later tonight!”

Miranda said as she waved goodbye to Claire with a smile, and exited with the rest of the class.

It was just Claire and Mrs. Donald left in the classroom. Claire was not happy with this outcome of events. Introduction to Philosophy was her last class of the day, and she was eager to get home to enjoy the start of the weekend. Mrs. Donald stood silent behind her lecture podium for what seemed like hours. There were various philosophy posters behind her, one of Kant that, of course, included a Kant/can’t pun and another poster beside it outlining Hegel’s philosophy. Mrs. Donald was middle aged, with long brown hair and wore tortoise shell glasses. She definitely had been a hippy in the past and had never really let go of the outdated look. Mrs. Donald finally sighed deeply and began to talk to Claire.

“Did you know your friend Miranda came to me after class last weekend?” Mrs. Donald said.

“No” Claire replied.

“I didn’t think so, I shouldn’t be telling you this, I could even get in trouble, but it is for the greater good. This could be a very important conversation that we are about to have. This is a philosophy class after all, it would be a shame if you didn’t learn anything.” Mrs. Donald paused for a second, fixed her glasses and continued “Miranda came to me because she is failing the class. Did you know she is failing?”

“No I didn’t.” Miranda had mentioned to Claire she was having trouble with the class, but Claire had no idea that she was failing. “Why hadn’t Miranda told me?” Claire wondered as she made a mental note to ask Miranda later.

“Well she is. Even though she studies constantly, maybe more than any student in this class, even though she pays attention and always asks questions, always takes notes, she is still failing. Do you think that that is fair?”

“Not really, no.”

“On the other hand we have you. That is the second time this week I have caught you napping in my class, you rarely take notes, you don’t participate in class discussions, I doubt you study, and yet you have one of, if not the highest grade in this class. Is that fair?”

After a bit of thinking Claire responded “That doesn’t seem fair.”

“And yet, here we are.” Mrs. Donald replied coldly.

Mrs. Donald took off her glasses to wipe them on her shirt, after putting them back on her face she continued the lecture. “Let me give you a wake up call, you have a gift, use it. It’s not fair to others if you don’t. They were not as lucky as you were, they weren’t born with your intelligence. It doesn’t quite matter what you use it on, as long as you share the end result with the world. Let me paraphrase a quote from G.K. Chesterton “We are all in the same boat in a stormy sea, and we owe each other a terrible loyalty.” It’s a cold and unforgiving universe, but together we can make it more tolerable for each-other. As cliche as all of that sounds, it’s the truth.” Mrs. Donald’s glare had not left Claire’s face since the beginning of their talk.

Claire was stunned, she really didn’t know how to respond. She just sat quietly for a moment until Mrs. Donald continued to speak.

“Why are you always so tired in my class anyways? Is this stuff boring to you?” Mrs. Donald asked.

“Umm… I was up last night playing video games.”

Mrs. Donald laughed out loud. “As expected. Well I think I have said what I needed to say, I wish you would pay more attention in my class, a lot of these philosophers have a lot of wisdom to impart. You are dismissed, but if I catch you sleeping in my class again, there will be real consequences. Have a nice weekend.”

Claire quickly gathered her things and left the class making sure not to make eye contact with the upset teacher. As she walked to her car she began to think about what had happened. No one had ever attacked her lethargic nature so directly before, and she didn’t know what she should be feeling. “Anger? What did Mrs. Donald know? She was only a high school teacher. What had she done with her life? Besides, a large reason as to why I don’t participate in the class discussions is because I’m kind of shy, not because I put my self on a pedestal above others!” Claire stopped to think about what she had just thought. “That’s not fair, Mrs. Donald is one of my favorite teachers and she has been nationally recognized as one of the best in the country. But at the same time what exactly did Mrs. Donald think I was capable of? I’m only seventeen and still in high school, I’m not going to be able to do much right now. Even when I get older there is no guarantee I’ll be able to help my fellow man in anyway. What if I spend all my effort and my entire life trying to do something and in the end I fail? Why even bother? I don’t know how I should be feeling right now, I need to chew on the situation a little bit longer.” Claire settled on that thought and reached her car.

Claire’s car was a silver Corolla that her dad had bought for her 16th birthday last year. “Well I do admit I was lucky to be born into a well to do family.” Claire thought. Her family was decently wealthy. Not quite 1%, more like top 3%, but still very comfortable. Claire also knew she was lucky in the looks department too. Again, not extremely lucky, but lucky enough. She was above average height and slightly below average weight. She had black curly hair, light skin and many freckles dotted her face. She readily received attention from the boys at school, but never really responded to it. In a way, she knew she was good looking, but didn’t believe it when people told her. For some reason she thought they were lying. Besides, she had never really been into the dating scene. She had had a “boyfriend” in first grade but that was about it. She was more into video games than anything else. She liked the competition of it, the thrill of beating someone and standing over their dead body whispering smugly, “I’m better than you.” That feeling was something you really couldn't find anywhere else. Claire had stayed up last night playing an FPS, but she really didn’t want to play that again today. She was ready to find a new game to play.