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DAY 30: TOTAL CONFIRMED DEATHS 119,686 WORLDWIDE


First day of virtual school.

She was staring again, this time into the void of her screen, waiting for students to join.

She knew they wouldn’t. If she were them, she wouldn’t.

She kept her video telescreen chat open for the duration of an hour, then made breakfast.

By second period three students appeared, in name only. She realized these kids would never turn their cameras on, so it would be just voices floating in and out of the meeting. She didn’t mind, her camera wasn’t on either.

The adults all had their cameras on when they did a virtual meet. Waving, changing the background, being all-around dorks.

But teenagers- self-conscious kids who spend hours putting on make-up? No way. Not without a filter (there actually was a filter but it wasn’t that good).

She did her little spiel, and showed them her little virtual classroom, and explained what the next few weeks would look like.


Someone shouted, “Yo! What’s your Discord?!” and then she was aware that while she was “teaching” these kids were playing video games.

Typical.

All those hours she put into her course, and these kids would probably just glance at a few assignments, write a few lines, and ignore the rest.

Could she blame them?

No. It was hard enough to get them to work when she was in their face for over an hour. And that was without the tens of thousands of people dying worldwide.

She needed to stop caring so much. It was what it was.

The world was in survival mode now.

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