Richemont Peak University

The graduation video is filmed in June but is shown at the end of August on the only public access channel Dashing Springs has. The program always thanks the Art Department of Richemont Peak University, with a special thanks to Mrs. Darcy Logan, Head of the Department. There is always a little video about Lake Tahoe and the founding members of the university, Mr. Brigham Peters and James Gordon.

A monotone voice will give some facts about the university. When it was founded [1856], where it was located [near Lake Tahoe, CA], and how many students attend [always 240, never more, never less.]

“Thanks to a generous donation from our alumni, RPU allows each student to live on campus, in their own dorm, with a generous meal plan.”

RPU is hard to find, though most people in the area know the University exists. They see the trail of cars coming up the road, past the Walmart, heading into the mountains. Yet, when they try to find it on a bored Saturday night, they always seem to end up near the lake, smoking and drinking. No one ever really goes looking for the university after a certain age, it just exists. If students wonder into town, in their maroon Panther sweatshirts, they often seem to just… meander away. They have a beer, maybe dinner, and then a dark car picks them up before midnight and takes them back up the Hill.

It is just the way things are.

Yet every year, on August 28th, the Graduation Speech is played over the TV. Locals will gather around the public access channel hoping for some information about the university itself.

Some years the reception goes out and the speech is heard in pieces. Some years the speech is so clear it rings through their heads for weeks, inspires some change in the little community. But mostly, RPU remains part of the local lore, but a boring little mystery no one gives a shit about after the age of 17. Especially because no locals have ever been accepted into RPU. No alumni live in the area. No one from the university rents from the town. It is just there, hidden somewhere up the mountain, a little Brigadoon in the mist.

This year, the connection is crisp but not overly bright. The camera pans the forgettable faces of 66 students, all wearing the Panther maroon and gold. They are for the most part female, with hair that seems almost the same shade of brown.

The valedictorian is a redhead with overly large eyes, a small mouth, and a handsome nose. Her robes were a strange navy color that didn’t translate well on screen, turning blue and grey when the cameras changed angles. Glossy.

She spoke with a soft voice, almost monotone. “My name is… Allison…”

The microphone crackled. Allison seemed to pause, longer than most people would have tolerated. A minute, maybe five. The people watching in the town didn’t look away from the screen. The pause was magnetic.

“I would like to talk to you about being a loser.”

Another strange pause.

“I would like to talk to you about being a loser. I have always been different, flawed, fundamentally different than everyone around me. I am not sure if it was my hair or my eyes or my personality. I was not like my siblings, with their sports and their trophies and their fucking beautiful jawlines. Their beautiful. Beautiful. Beautiful. Butterflies. Their butterflies. Their beautiful butterflies.”

Another pause.

This time Allison seemed to speak without sound. Her mouth moved, slowly, as if the words themselves were made of glass.

Then the microphone hissed, and the sound returned. She was whispering butterflies so fast it was impossible to distinguish the words themselves.

Bflybuflybull.

The words seemed to catch in her throat. She stopped, looked at the crowd, and proceeded to begin to scream. She clawed at her throat. There was almost blood, welts rising up where her blunt nails tore at the skin.

Music began to play, and the audience stood up, clapping. Allison stopped, looked at the crowd, and bowed. The audience sat down. Allison did not move. She looked into the camera with her wide eyes and smiled.

“I would like to talk to you about being a loser. I was a loser. I am a loser. I am. And that is…”

The connection cut out.

The people of the town stood up from the television and went back to their lives. Some of the girls in the town would write I AM A LOSER on the toes of their sneakers. Sometimes the word butterfly would be whispered when a girl didn’t do what she was supposed to. It was always met with a stern glare from a teacher.

It was just how things were. How they had always been.

Submitted September 03, 2019 at 02:51PM by KyotoSkateShop https://ift.tt/30V4jkm