Good For Trash

[François Laffont]

Franck sighed heavily at the sight of this. Someone tossed trash on the bench. There were even remnants of food, complete with the flies and everything. It was disgusting and Franck considered they had no excuse as there were enough trash bins around the school for one not to do that. Didn't they know it was their own space they were littering like this? No one else used it other than the students of Bellefonte. Some people really had no respect.

He kneeled to pick the bottle that rolled down underneath the bench. As he looked down to reach it, he put his other hand on the bench only to remove it quickly with a groan. He looked at it. The content of the bottle, some sort of energy drink, must have dropped on the bench first for it was sticky and smelly and now partially on his hand. Truly disgusting. Watching where he was putting his hand now, he grabbed the bottle before standing up. Now it was time to clean the rest of it and it quite frankly did not please him. No one enjoyed touching rotting food, even more so when you had no idea who left it there. They sure didn’t care about attracting flies and ants to make this bench unusable, it made him wonder what else he could find in there.

Still, Franck could not leave the bench in this state so he took a deep breath before working on grabbing most of it while trying to avoid touching the worst parts. As he had most of it in his hands, he could not get everything without risking dropping half of it as he walked, he looked around. Maybe he should have looked for the garbage can before grabbing the trash.

[Nolan MacKenzie]

Nolan was in the zone.

He was flipping through his calculus textbook like a machine. He would watch the page as his fingers whizzed over the paper, taking notes as neatly as possible but at a remarkably quick pace. He'd just eaten an apple and a glass of juice, and the fructose was sending his brain whirring.

Of course, like any sugar high, there came a low. Thankfully, he'd long ago learned that fruit was the best way to energize. Or it was during the day, anyway. He was no stranger to coffee-fueled nights by any means, but the drink sent his brain into an overdrive, and with it, his hearing. He could handle it during the night, which was by nature rather quieter, but a cup of coffee during the day would leave him a distracted, jittery mess two hours later. So now, post-fruit high, he was actually feeling pretty okay. It was more of a study break than an all-time low.

So Nolan leaned back, content with his half hour of productivity so far. He'd take a ten minute break - no, fifteen, he decided. He'd earned it. Then, he would go back to working, and enjoy the sun as he did so. It was a good thing he had a plan.

His plan flew out the window when Francois whatever-his-last-name-was bent over across the courtyard. He appeared to be fetching a bottle of some kind. Picking up trash? Nolan couldn't really tell, because he was too busy trying to discretely check out his butt.

Unfortunately, what Nolan didn't realize was that he was sitting right next to the only trash can on their side of the courtyard.

[François Laffont]

Franck finally spotted the trash can, not too far from a bench where someone was already sitting on. Sure, he didn’t mean to disturb the boy but he would still have to get there to toss away what he just grabbed. He was not going to leave it there, no way. He didn't consider himself a neat freak but it was their living space and this had been left on purpose. It was gross.

It was too bad he had no tissue in his bag. It would have been useful to pick up the trash without touching anything he’d rather not get his hands on. Because he had none, he dared not grab everything at once. It would have been faster and preferred but he would still favour having relatively clean hands over walking less.

He arrived by the trash can and tossed what was in his hands, clearly disgusted by it and the fact he had to do this. “Can you believe them? It’s our courtyard, why would they trash it like this?” Franck let out. Sure, he was addressing to Nolan but, at the same time, he was not really. He just needed someone, anyone, to hear how he disapproved of this. Because, quite frankly, if he had the culprit in front of him, he wouldn’t be able to be mad as he’d try to explain the situation to them and how important it was to keep this if not clean at least in a state we could use the bench afterwards. This clearly did not happen here. Still, Franck was not likely to go complain to a staff member and have them clean the bench. There were more chances that the rain would clean it up for them, eventually. Or another student, because Franck did enough of his part by cleaning it up.