The Dead Pixel Society

© 2026 Zoë Taylor

“Sure, as long as it’s not about my eye,” she shot back playfully. He turned to look at her. She smirked back at him. “It was a joke. What’s your question?”

When Lewis woke up at 7:23 AM it wasn’t to an alarm clock or even someone’s malfunctioning razor, it was to someone, ironically, blasting Metallica next door, and ‘next door’ meant ‘right by his wall’ as Tony had the window bed. He jolted upright. He was wearing his, now dusty, Metallica concert tee again, and it had otherwise survived a week unscathed despite Heather’s best efforts.

Lugging heavy XLR cables, scraping his knuckles replacing theater lights he was pretty sure didn’t actually need replaced, even hauling a costume trunk down the steel stairs from some forgotten corner of the tomb-like utility corridors, ‘Aria’ earned her stripes in the shadows, every stripe a literal scar on her body, and a lesson about backstage work, but, she was learning.

She was learning when to dodge a loose cable, how to secure a rusty pulley and how much WD-40 it needed to silence the squeak. The more time she spent in the catwalks, the more she dreaded returning to the light and the Lewis mask

It was absolutely worth it. When she stood on the observation deck, overlooking the stage above the theater seating, where even the ghost light looked like a speck down below, leaned on the railing, and sang to the literal rafters, her voice carried and filled the silence with a frequency that almost didn’t belong to her.

Of course that was at night, and Aria had to remain in the rafters, a proverbial Phantom in Lewis’ own mind. He had to hurry to get dressed, just so he could have time to get breakfast and not be late for his first classes.

He was surprised to find that the aches had another, small social benefit. When he walked into the student union, Heather called out to him.

“Yo Chambers!” She waved. She was sitting with Lyra and her own entourage of theater royalty. Today, Lewis didn’t even glance Madison’s direction. He just waved at Heather, went to get his Egg McMuffin, with a double shot mocha espresso from the Starbucks kiosk, and walked over to Heather to see what she wanted.

“Y’all, this is my new favorite stage hand.”

“Hey, you survived the other night?” Lyra giggled.

“”A week of them,” Lewis said, “And still coming back for more. I think I need to get my head examined.” That got a giggle from the crowd.

“Cop a squat,” Heather said, adding, “If you want, I mean. We don’t bite, while bathed in the light. It’s only in shade the heavy toll is paid. And you definitely paid yours in the cat walks lately.”

Lewis, exhausted and running on 6 1/2 hours of sleep and the first sips of a double mocha, just could not stop himself. "I'll take your seat, but this is no cute meet," he glanced at the others and suddenly wished he had just kept his mouth shut. "But I'll try and keep up with your rhyming scheme, Puck."

They stared. Heather stared. “I’ll... just show myself out,” Lewis said, but the black haired girl wearing red framed glasses, sitting next to Lyra spoke up.

“No wait, that was actually great. Your bar’s a bit off, but that’s not a scoff. Perfection is misdirection, and rhyming ‘up’ with ‘Puck’? That takes a lot of guts. Oh jeez, now you’ve got me half-rhyming. Damit Heather. You’re infectious.”

“I try,” Heather laughed, as Lewis sat down finally. “Sorry about this week though. I had to know you were legit for the long haul. I promise not to keep you up till ass crack o’clock anymore.”

“Until production night,” another girl said dryly. Heather shot her a look, sticking her tongue out at her.

Lewis only half-listened as the discussion shifted to the Abney Park concert in Centerville coming up in a few weeks. He had no plans to go, and no way to get there even if he wanted to. His mind was still in the literal rafters, thinking about that one, perfect moment where Aria lived rent free in the ‘voice of God’ room, and the imperfect, backbreaking labor it had cost him.

He drifted, rather than floated, to his first class of the day, not even noticing that he had been seated sharing a lab station with Madison of all people. The sharp smell of mint radiated off her, an almost tangible aura against the hints of dust from the computer fans, or possibly under his nails and on his collar. He wasn’t sure in his caffeinated haze. All he knew was that this damn JavaScript kept crashing with a NaN error.

“You’re looping,” Madison answered his unasked question.

“What?” Lewis said, blinking wearily at Madison.

“Your code. You’ve got an infinite while loop that never gets resolved because you forgot to set the bool.”

“Oh,” Lewis said. “Jeez, how did I miss that,” he sighed. “Thanks.”

“Whatever. Just be more careful. Michaels likes to collect broken things and try to put them back together again. She doesn’t always get it right.” She turned, her sharp emerald gaze suddenly and intensely focused on Lewis, rather than on her own, flawlessly running javascript app. “Everyone in this school wants something. No one does anything for free.”

“So what do you want for helping me?” Lewis shot back, too exhausted to be terrified just at the moment. Madison cracked the tiniest hint of a smirk, like the octopus on Mars had learned to juggle rocks, and then bonked itself on the head with one in the process.

“What I always want,” she answered bluntly.

“Are you going to tell me what that is?” Lewis asked.

“Nope,” Madison said, turning back to her terminal again and leaving Lewis even more bewildered. He couldn’t decide if that was good advice, or if she was just trolling him. She spoke again.

“I don’t give a fuck if you take my advice or not. You’re a train wreck I’ve seen before - nothing more, nothing less.” She hesitated for a moment before adding more softly, “But at least you’ve avoided shoving your hand in more ancient gum. I can’t believe maintenance hasn’t cleaned that crap off and just... lets it sit there under the surface. It’s vile.”

The scream of the ancient bell couldn’t come soon enough. Lewis didn’t look back to see if Madison was watching. He didn’t care anymore. He just wanted to be away from people trying to pull him in different directions for their own social politics. Whether or not he was a pawn to Heather, he could at least tell with Madison, he was cannon fodder, and he just needed to find a place to breathe, a neutral ground.

He disappeared into the library. The wi-fi dropped almost instantly. The redhead from before, now sitting in a different chair and without that letterman jacket, was reading her book of Poe again. She didn’t even look up at him.

He didn’t sit at her table, but noticed she, or someone else, had put another copy of the same book down at another table. He sank into the overstuffed chair and exhaled like he had just sunk into a hot bath.

“You too?” the girl said. Lewis realized she was staring at him now. He picked up the book.

“Yeah. This place...”

“Yeah,” she said. “I recommend The Telltale Heart, page 35, if you haven’t read it yet.”

“I’m partial to ‘The Angel of the Odd,” Lewis said, and she actually looked up at him over the rim of her book with a knowing, understanding smile and a small nod of agreement or approval. “But I like The Telltale Heart too. The idea of someone watching you, hating you over something as trivial as an eye is so messed up.”

“Yup,” she said, going back to reading. An old, analog clock on the wall ticked away, filling the silence with rhythmic clicks.

“Hey, can I ask you a stupid question?” he asked.

“Sure, as long as it’s not about my eye,” she shot back playfully. He turned to look at her. She smirked back at him. “It was a joke. What’s your question?”

“Do you think everyone in this school wants something, only does things so you’ll owe them a favor later?”

The girl snorted. “The only thing I want is to be left alone - present company excluded, unless you start hitting on me. Then I’ll break your nose.”

Lewis actually gave a small laugh at that. “No worries. I got enough crap to deal with already. Sorry for disturbing you, though, for what it’s worth.”

“Nah,” she said. “You’re good man.”

As he settled in to read, he glanced over at her again. The way she sat, as slumped and as war weary as he felt, he wondered if that’s what that knowing smile the other night, last week? His mind wandered. He didn’t see the letterman jacket this time. He wanted to ask about it, but, he’d already violated her privacy enough for one day.

It wasn’t the scream of the bell that woke him, but her hand on his shoulder. “Wakey wakey, it’s day breakey,” she said. He groaned, opening his eyes.

“Oh God, how long was I asleep?”

She laughed. “About 30 minutes. I’ve got art studies. Didn’t know if you’ve got class or not, so I thought I’d nudge you before I have to go, you know? Anyways, see you around, yeah?”

“Oh, yeah. Thank you,” Lewis yawned, sitting up. His curiosity got the better of him, so he peeked around the shelf at where she had been sitting the other day. The Letterman jacket was still sitting there, untouched. Now he came to look closer, he realized it had a thin layer of dust on it, like it had been sitting there almost as long as that old Jolt can up in the rafters.

“Okay,” he said softly. “Now that is weird.”

He shrugged it off, though. The power nap had given him just enough energy to maybe survive Biology class next hour. If ‘Regina’ - the name patch stitched into the sleeve, had abandoned her jacket here, she must’ve had a good reason. Sometimes a Letterman jacket was just a Letterman jacket. Probably.