October 27

      We had to turn in our theses and sources today, so I submitted them on Canvas before class started. I always felt like Fridays seemed a little rushed since all of my classes were only an hour long that day and we started thirty minutes late. Since my mother had to go to work at the same time everyday, I had to wait in the cafeteria until they let us out.

      Apparently, it was okay for us to roam the halls an hour before school started on any other day, but not on Fridays. No, Fridays meant we were stuck in the cafeteria until 15 minutes before class started. Odin said it was so teachers could hold conferences with each other, but I was pretty sure the staff just liked quarantining us in one part of the building.

      The cafeteria was always loud and chaotic on Fridays. We had enough people at our school that not everyone ate lunch at the same time and for good reason; the cafeteria employees would probably go on strike. There were only two adults to supervise the entire cafeteria: Heimdell was always one of them, but the other position was a rotating one. Today, it was Frigg, the Early Education Teacher, who supervised us. Valhalla High was one of the few high schools in Boston with a nursery and it was Frigg who ran it. Apparently, one of her sons had died in a tragic accident when he was just 19 and so she decided to spend her life caring for kids.

     The nursery was not just for staff (though I must say Siff's toddler was adorable). Students could also have their kids watched there as long as they had over 80% attendance and weren't failing any classes. It was a good set-up in my opinion.

    It was hard to find anyone in this chaos, so I was relieved when I found Jack sitting with his back to a wall. He didn't look as happy as usual, though. His shoulders were slumped and he wasn't wearing any heir gel; I was pretty sure he had not even brushed his hair today. "What's wrong?" I asked.

     He shrugged and didn't meet my eyes. "Is it something with Riptide?" I asked.

    He reluctantly nodded. "You can talk about it if you'd like."

   He shook his head. "Alright, would you like to talk about something else?"

    We talked about music until we were let out of the cafeteria. I closely watched Jack as we walked to English class. He didn't say much and he was sighing a lot. I was seriously concerned about him. What had happened to Riptide? My mind whirled with possibilities. Did they get into a fight? Had she broken up with him? I didn't know.

    In English class, Odin reminded us to turn in our assignments. "I've extended the due date until the end of class."

    There were murmurs of relief. Apparently, half the class had not turned it in yet. Odin gave us the period to work on the essay, so I went over my sources and highlighted portions to used as evidence (whether paraphrased or in quotes) later.

    When the bell rang, I hurried to my next class, which was gym. We changed out. Since it was Friday, Coach Thor let us play Capture the Flag after some stretching. It was a fun game. I like playing defense and though Sam managed to steal the flag from my side twice, I still had fun.

In Ceramics, Mallory and Halfborn started getting into an argument about the Haunted House. They asked me to play mediator, which meant I basically nodded and said things like "I can understand why you are feeling this way" and "that is valid." Honestly, I thought I would make a pretty good therapist, but I'd rather be a nurse.

In AP History, Odin said he wanted us to discuss a current event. "It's common knowledge that I'm a big Norse mythology nerd," he said. "I wear that badge very proudly."

A few students smiled, but Odom's next words chilled me to the bone. "These past few years, we've seen a rise in hate crimes. Racism and bigotry have become more palpable in the mainstream. Unfortunately, the rise of hate groups includes people who try to co-opt Norse traditions. Today, we're going to discuss them. I want you guys to sired the next ten minutes doing some research though on Neo-Volkisch groups."

I pulled out my Chromebook and did some research. What I found was frightening. "Man," I said. "It's like these guys are trying to out-Viking the Vikings."

"These guys are unworthy of calling themselves Vikings," Halfborn said with a snort.

Sam nodded. "They're very ethnocentric and racist."

"And sexist," Alex added. "I think they need some lessons on Norse culture because Viking women could beat them up easily."

Mallory nodded. "True. They take something and mutate it to fit their twisted ideology they're couching white supremacy under the guise of religion."

"That's not a new thing," TJ said. "Some people used the Bible as evidence to promote slavery."

"That's horrible," I said aloud.

"It's crazy when you think of it," Sam said. "It's like when people quote from the Quran to paint Muslims as violent without reading the whole thing. People will cherry-pick and read things out of context to uphold their own beliefs. They come in with lenses of hatred and so they see hatred."

Odin nodded. "That is a very good point, Sam. We call this confirmation bias. I just want every one of you to know that we at this school do not support but rather condemn these hate groups that try to appropriate our heritage for twisted reasons."

The bell rang for us to go to lunch. I was looking forward to eating my ham and cheese sandwich, but as I made my way to the cafeteria, all I could think of was how some people hosted for no other reason than hatred itself.