Salutations chaps,
He slugs his way into the classroom, but not like a boxer. Like a gastropod, and fittingly, he's always late. If I've been careful, there are no empty spaces beside me. He falls into the nearest seat like a ziplocTM filled with liquid, and a slight belch escapes as the seal breaks. Once settled, he removes his coat. But this is not a coat of cloth or leather, this is a coat of mucus that lines his throat. He sounds like a distant vacuum stuck on a curtain and carries the same sickly pitch until finally devouring the curtain with a hollow thud. Removing his glasses, he rubs the bridge of his nose. Then he squints. Hard. The force of the action pushes his head forward slowly. His tensed muscles shake his tocsin head while his mouth gapes under the ferocity of his squint. He spends the remainder of the lecture plugging various holes with his fingers, desperate to keep his insides in, breathing laboriously from the effort. Periodically, he will notice other curtains and start his hungry vacuum again. His pitiful neighbors become progressively sallow, and lean at uncomfortable angles. I have spared you some details.
Nothing else in my experience has so vividly evoked the primal liquidity of the human being. Not 90-year-old ladies with transparent rice-paper skin. Not science class discussions. Not televised surgeries. This poor, leaky sack of oozing meat who can hardly drag himself from his seat. I want to believe that if you pricked him he would rupture and vanish in a mist of humors, not bleed. But, there's no escape. So brush your teeth, kiddies, trim your nails, keep an equilibrium.
Valedictions,
walter