June Song Vignette: Phalanx

[Dr Archeville]

It was a pleasant Saturday most of the students were off on the town, hitting up the mall or the beach. Those who remained were lured by the clement weather into the quad and gardens to study or just goof off as the whim of the day took them. Mike winced slightly as he stepped out of the dormitory and began to hurry through the gardens looking for a secluded corner to brood in.

He didn't get far however before he started humming quietly to himself, nothing unusual really, he blamed Alex and her Disney marathon of the previous night, he would get one of those incipit songs stuck in his head now.

Then he jumped and grasped a low fence running around the zen garden and his voice spilled forth despite his minds protest,

((To the tune of 'Out There' from Disneys Hunchback of Notre Dame))

"I hide in fear of what I know I could become

Watching young heroes grow around me

Frightened I stand silent and still as a stone

They solve mysteries I'll never see

Surrounded perhaps but always I'm alone

Knowing they could never accept me

All my life I wish I could be just for a day

Not among them

But one of them"

Throughout he jumps and whirls completing the stanza with arms outraised to the sky and continues at the top of his lungs, to his horror.

"And Up there

Flying in the sky

Heroes soaring up there

And I sit and sigh

For I could never

Up there

Where they answer any scare

I can't risk

I don't dare

Justice given form up there"

He alights on one of the statues that were scattered throughout the garden and reaches for the sky as his song continues.

"Up there among all of the citys' Heroes saving lives

Stopping crimes in battle we rejoice them

Ev'ry one of them a power taking to the skys

Controlling the danger deep inside them

If I just had control

I'd be there in an instant"

Mike slips loose the bonds of gravity taking a slow turn spiraling up over the gardens as he reaches the crescendo.

"Up there

Free of all my sins

every morning up there

extraordinary men

I could join them there

Fly away and then

But I'm not competent

With my shame

Can't resent

Can't lay blame

Must repent

I don't dare

The brave ascent

To fly

Up there"

He completes the song hovering a few feet over the center of the garden in a slow aerial pirouette arms outstretched as the last of the song echoes away. As the final note fades Mike drops like a stone leaving a small dent in the soil of the garden where he impacts and curses under his breath his face a brilliant red. "Great now I'm not only the moody new kid but also a fan of musical theatre." He mumbles under his breath as he leaves the garden at speed to mope in his room hopefully never having to emerge and face any of the witnesses of this humiliation. Perhaps if he had been less self absorbed he would have caught the other songs echoing throughout the campus as it was he merely hurried to his room.