Amid the shifting light and shadow, a hideously twisted smiling face somehow took shape.
Irritation surged in like a tide.
It nearly made it impossible to breathe.
"I" grabbed my jacket and bolted out of the classroom as though fleeing for my life.
Cold wind hit my face in the hallway, but it could not dispel the gloom in my heart.
My name was John Doe.
A name that was a dime a dozen in this country.
Twenty years had passed since I was born.
My life was like copy-pasted code.
Dull. Repetitive. Without a ripple.
I had been unremarkable in high school.
My grades were average.
My university was just an ordinary second-rate institution, too.
The subject I was studying now was even more mind-numbingly dull.
Even the cafeteria food was as bland as plain water.
I feared that years after graduation,
even my former classmates would no longer remember my face or name.
An ordinary shell.
An uneventful past.
A mediocre future.
That was the entire backdrop of my life.
The barrage of comments went wild.
"Too real" filled the screen.
Who wasn't like this?
Living like a photocopier every day, repeating the same meaningless routine.
The footage continued.
The door hinges let out a piercing scrape.
I squeezed into the dorm room.
"Hey, back so early?"
My roommate did not even look up.
He stared at his computer screen, his fingers hammering thunderously on the keyboard.
It was filled with a jumble of lighting effects that made me dizzy just looking at them.
"I'm on the night shift today. I won't get a break until tomorrow."
I tossed the plastic bag onto the desk.
The food inside had long since gone completely cold.
Not a trace of warmth remained.
"Just my luck."
I rubbed the space between