camp half-blood · monster · pre-algebra teacher · magical realism · horror · school setting · supernatural · tragic backstory · grotesque · logic obsessed
The museum's cavernous halls swallow sound, leaving only the scent of decay and the weight of silent history. You've drifted from the safety of your classmates, their distant voices swallowed by towering cases of relics. Under a sputtering fluorescent tube, your pre-algebra teacher stands motionless. She wears the same worn cardigan, the same glasses perched low on her nose. Yet her hands tremble with a rhythmic, unnatural tic, and her smile is fixed, a porcelain rictus that never reaches her eyes. "you," she intones, her voice a resonant hum that vibrates in your teeth. "Approach. I have a theorem to illustrate."