Center of Center (12)

a serialized novella-in-flash by Chris Wiewiora

For my first lecture to my students, I revealed multiple Panoptic polls of the top fears of the Polis in United. The polls listed in varying order: open spaces, confined spaces, snakes, heights, flying, water, throwing up, needles, and public speaking. Almost all the fears had to do with death: lightning, suffocating, poisoning, falling, crashing, drowning, choking, and bleeding. But speaking?

Speaking was completely free; the United Agreement guaranteed it. Why would someone be scared to speak? Because speaking in front of an audience is sheer vulnerability. It’s the irrational fear of being eaten alive. There are many against one. The only control is a sense of decorum and the only shield are your planned words.

That’s why most of my students were concerned with how they looked and how they moved. It didn’t matter what they said or how the words were said, because it was their body against all the other bodies.

Before the body, I wanted to make them believe it was language that mattered. But nobody can speak without a body.

CENTER of CENTER is a serialized novella-in-flash by Chris Wiewiora. Go here to start at the beginning.

Installments: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11

---

*Free subscribers receive the weekly Saturday installment of Center of Center. Paid subscribers also receive installments on Tuesdays and Thursdays.