October was perhaps one of the worst times of the year, if you had a schedule like Coach Brodie's. She paused on the street corner, peering down at her phone and the calender on the screen. Hockey was starting up, with tryouts already underway for this season's team. Soccer was finishing up, just a few more games to go if she kept getting alternate locations lined up--the weather had not always been on their side that season, but she was hopeful her ability to get them on reserved lists for other venues, with roofs, would hold out just a little longer.
She flicked to another app with all the tests, quizes, and homework assignments she still had to grade from the week's worth of classes in the various grades. Another app with the work in progress class notes and Power Points she still had to finish putting together for classes in two weeks. Including assignments for over the Thanksgiving break--she was trying to not make it unfair to them, she really was, but she wasn't in charge of the curriculum.
The young woman let out a puff of air and squinted into the night, tapping her bright sneakers against the ground as she waited for the walk sign to finally light up for her to cross the street. She'd gone for another jog, dressed in her usual Medowview Coach jacket and simple yoga pants, black and pink sneakers a bit of a contrast with the bright orange jacket. But hey. Least it meant no driver could say they didn't see her running. Not that there were many people out tonight, she noted with a glance around as the light finally changed.
People were gearing up for Halloween, but every now and then the news would spring to life with even more stories of disappearances and deaths than usual, and it was usually around the time of those news reports that she would notice a distinct lack of foot traffic in the city. It was a sad thing to notice a trend in, but she couldn't exactly blame anyone. There was a reason she took self-defense classes, and why she tried to sneak some into her classes for her students.
She jogged across the nearly empty street to the opposite sidewalk, taking off at an easy pace down the sidewalks. It was a route she knew like the back of her hand, just a simple round a few blocks to get some steam out and get her pulse going. But even she wasn't foolish enough to let her guard down, attention up as she kept moving. The city was a mess if you ran into the wrong block without realizing it.
And unfortunately, if you listened closely to the news reports, which blocks those were changed on a daily, sometimes hourly it seemed, basis. No one had any real control over what was safe and what wasn't any more.
Orangeish Sherbert
