7) Awakening

Part Seven
(This is chapter seven of my personal accounts, "-Liking-: Refractions and Infractions" )

Things were finally back to normal. In fact they became a sort of super-normal, for I was full of confidence and even glimmers of optimism.

I had taken account of things, and it turned out that I was still an A student and I had some friends -pretty good despite how bad I had felt through the winter. Meanwhile, the snow had started to melt and green things were threatening to sprout from the ground at any moment.

March

My first and most important move had been to my old spot in the lunchroom, far removed from that location I had briefly populated recently. With this return home, I also started doodling potatoes again, that lonely but familiar lunchtime routine.

I eased myself out of Chess club, for some obvious reasons and some less obvious reasons like not being any good at it. Nevertheless, I was still participating in a great many extracurricular activities.

Quizbowl was coming to its conclusion, and we had a new member: none other than my friend David. Also, we had our infamous TV match. Every team got to do a TV match at least once a season. As you might guess, that Quizbowl match is televised on some impossible to find public access cable channel at an unknown time. The most important part of the TV match, other than winning, was coming up with a clever thing to say during your 15 second introduction. Brian was usually the best at that. Most of the nervous pre-match energy concerned coming up with that sample of shining wit in the greenroom. The details of that year's particular match, much like every single other match I can think of, remain hazy at best. All that matters is that we didn't make it to the finals this particular year.

And then there was LitMag. It was growing and growing as a weekly gathering that made me feel good all over. It was great having conversations, little writing exercises like magnetic poetry, and going over each other's work. I hadn't produced anything much since my debut short short stuff. Submissions were lacking, and we were largely dependent on work produced by members of the staff.

One day, Ms. Stammers came to the meeting with a gargantuan pile of papers. This, she explained, was the output of some creative writing class. From that day forward, our task was to sift through The Pile and pull out work that was worthy. As this was the result of assigned creativity, there was a large amount of it that left much to be desired. So coming across the hidden gems was fun, as was reading aloud the real stinkers.

I was coming to be somewhat of a Big Dog at the literary magazine. Vu and I were seniority, and we were also the most outspoken people at the meetings because it was full of quiet types. Vu didn't seem to have a very big interest in leading, however, and Ms. Stammers gradually assigned me the tasks necessary to keep the meetings focused. I pretty much assumed control of the operation —not that we had a whole lot of work to do.

Classes were moving along with standard velocity. Being suddenly relieved of my month-long reason for stress, I found that classes were now much easier. Boy were classes a piece of cake when I didn't have to think about people.

There was Japanese class, and I was still the only junior, but had the highest grades. There was English where, along with my class comrades Vu and Dave, I sat in the corner as we read Oedipus, the classic mother-marrying eye-gouging play. Then there was a history class filled with people I didn't know well, and I sat by the window as the Civil War unfolded. Biology class involved memorizing twisted mnemonic devices for ingesting information, and also getting in a group with Dave and a quiet Asian girl named You Moua for lab experiments. Math class was turning chaotic with cross-room socialization, but I spent class time doing homework with the people in my immediate vicinity. Finally, there was Spanish class which was a series of inconvenient assignments and awkward learning activities and group assignments with the same few people I always work with. It was all easy, but pretty drab when I didn't talk with people.

Survey

I did, however, devote a certain measure of anxiety to how my peers felt about me after my ill-fated involvement with the yucky girl. I was embarrassed, and I wasn't sure if I had lost what little respect I had with these familiar people around me. So, I decided to do what any savvy popular personality would do: take an opinion poll. I wrote out on a piece of notebook paper a fairly simple survey. "TOPIC: Charlie. What's with him anyways?" Below this I made two columns, "Name(optional)" and "Criticisms, comments, questions". In order that I get results I wanted but also to inject more fun into the thing, I wrote some examples, scattered throughout the three pages of empty columns:

example_____Charlie sucks. He should grow a beard.
BOB_____I don't get him. What the heck does he stand for anyways? He is one fat bastard -lay off the grease, man.
JOEBOB____Charlie sucks like my donkey does. he no talk and he dumb.
Billy Ray____ everyone should give charlie MONEY. And gurls shood give him hugz cuz he iz cool.
CORN NOG____I beat charlie up once and he cried.

Call it convoluted, call it goofy, call it a desperate grasp for attention -but it was what I needed. So in each of my classes I discreetly asked my neighbors to pass it around the room for input.

I got a range of responses. Most people played along with being funny, but even the majority of the responses showed that people thought I was kind of 'cool' but that I was also 'weird' and 'too quiet'. Some girly handwriting and signatures I couldn't make out also called me 'charming' and said that they just learned I existed. Probably the most representative remark I found in this ridiculous stunt was from Eric, who put it quite elegantly: "Do you got craw daddys in yo patty. Your a cool guy just stay away from that DIKE Joey and I'll respect you. POOPIES"

My interpretation of the results: I was just fine. Most people didn't really know or care about my indiscretion, and those that did (Eric) were fine with me as long as I moved on.
Thank goodness.

Writing On

I had started writing at lunch. It was writing for no purpose other than the act of writing itself, and it came out of me with the semi-liquid consistency of ketchup from the lunchroom dispenser. The contents of the something like 25 pages I produced in this way are not important (it involved a kid who gets accidentally kidnapped and then a murderer named Dorf with a furry face and a gruesome encounter in a McDonalds Restaurant and then a bizarre scheme of tunneling to Canada, at which point this tale fizzled out). However, the important thing was that I devoted my lunchtime to writing, and I became comfortable with it. It wasn't the best stuff, but it was coming from ME.

And as I was training myself in that way during my lunch hours, I started to have grand ideas of a 'qualified' story to write more carefully. I had great ideas one day when I bussed home and decided to take a walk on the ol' railroad tracks.

I still had a considerable amount of emotional capital devoted to my 'year of Kelley'. Most of it manifested itself as regret, regret that I had not taken a chance when it was offered. In order to control this I decided I could write a story about it. It should also be noted my fantasy of publishing it in the lit mag and using the story to somehow communicate to Kelley how I felt. It would be a story of similar circumstances. However, in my story, there would be an ending, an ending that I wished I had received. Rather than a sappy ending, though, this ending was more real: the main character comes to terms and gets over it.

So I went to work on my first draft that spring. Through a series of segments, I broke down this character's meetings with the girl, and focused on the mistake he made, and then the regret he had, and finally his escape. I wrote most of this story during Spanish class. My hazy and exhausted state of mind during that, my last class of the day, strangely allowed for a better focus on my thoughts.

There was a problem with my story. Getting close to the end of it, I was faced with the prospect that it really wasn't good. Who cares about a guy not getting the girl? How could I make an entertaining story while retaining my original intent? This train of thought very quickly provided an answer: what if this guy sees something indescribable, something that serves as both a metaphor and delusion? And the next step rolled on: what if this image brought a more pronounced obsession to this man? Finally, the bells rang in my creative fibers and the idea finalized with an explosion: this guy is driven to do the creepiest thing in the world that I can possibly think of. With a knife.

It was simple, really. The brainstorming for this story overhaul came like a flash, and upon this original image foundation the rest of it came alive and forged its own momentum. Something. I had a story that was something. Something that I was proud of.

Nice girl

Accompanying the seasonal change into spring, I could not help but become drawn to...
Girls.
It was that very inexplicable aura that the new year's natural growth spews forth. Even after so recently going through an unpleasant travesty of a relationship, I was primed and ready for some quality female company. The fortunate result of my recent test had given me focus: what I really needed was a Nice Girl. In addition to focus, a kind of confidence never known to me before was growing inside, something I couldn't explain. It was likely just an adjustment to having shared space with my classmates for years, but it was quite surprisingly now present, at least in my mind.

Not long after I initiated my search for the Nice Girl, a prime candidate was found. I thought immediately to myself: Duh.
So I focused my interest on this girl, and over a few weeks grew myself a nice crush. The target of my intention was none other than You Moua, the smart, quiet asian girl I did labs with in Biology class who, as I was starting to notice, was also quite pretty. She had been in close proximity for pretty much the entire school year. From my first day of Biology, she sat in a position one desk up and one desk to the left of my rear corner window seat. And, since nobody occupied the desk in front of me, her hair was that which I saw most throughout a given lecture.

I was completely new to whatever it was I thought I was doing. I didn't know her, I didn't talk to her, but I was going to take a chance. My plan was to somehow gain her friendship in a timely manner, something at which I'm not generally good. Also, I didn't really have anything else to do. But I was playing to win, I was pumped —and whenever I was close to her my body was flushing strange chemicals into my brain that made me very nervous and excited and terrified but still happy. I was glad that I had chosen to fall for a quiet girl, because it decreased my intimidation to a level that I could very nearly deal with.

We were having a lab one day, and we were studying the sexual organs of a flower. Once again, the familiar group of three was formed of me and Dave and You. I remember quite clearly my childish act of occupying the opposite end of our lab table and, under the guise of staring pretty intently at the flower in the middle, sneaking prolonged gazes at her sitting behind the flower writing in her lab notebook. It sounds contrived, but there I was, looking at her intently through the petals of a flower and basking in every gorgeous second of it.

I tried saying at least a couple things to You every time we had a lab, stupid things, work things. And then there was Goal Number One: complimenting her. This mission had to be aborted at the last second -numerous times- on account of bad material and timing issues. Sometimes I would think of something nice to say, about her clothes maybe, at the beginning of the hour and it would stay in my mind, this mantra, repeating itself over and over again. And so often I would look for the perfect time to say it, and my head would swell and I could feel my brain aching with each heartbeat, and then the chance to let it fly wouldn't come up. Dead compliments.

Spring break was approaching, and I used that as a chance to re-evaluate my strategy. I had to make it a deadline: now or never. But I downgraded Goal Number One from giving her a complement to 'saying something nice'. Maybe, just maybe, I thought, I could succeed in doing that. As patterns would predict, I didn't find the chance all class period on that Friday before break, and I started thinking about how I would deal with that failure. Then the bell rang releasing us all to lunch, and a mass of people bottlenecked at the door. Drawing from some imaginary courage and a very palpable sack of desperation, I approached her and said, "Hey, You." She turned back to me, and I followed it up with, "Have a nice break," and a smile. The whole class had been in close proximity, but I didn't care. And they probably didn't either. But there I was, sticking my neck out, kind of, and the girl —she smiled back and said "You too," turned slightly red and made it out into the hall.

It was the most mundane of human interactions, the most overused, ineffectual phrase ever. And I had put forth so much effort into saying it, and she replied very simply. Normal, everyday speech. But all I was thinking was "MISSION SUCCESS!" And with those two wonderful words 'you too', I went home and had a relaxing and hopeful spring break.
Maybe, just maybe, things can work out well in this world. Outside, the melting snow continued its fascinating journey back to the netherworld.

Fronts

It was now only mostly cold outside, and I decided it was time to get back to my lunchtime tree. So once again I trunched out to my old friend by the school's back entrance, threw my furry folder down on the ground next to him and relaxed. Sometimes I would nap, sometimes I would look at the sky and the neighborhood, and sometimes I would just imagine, turn all thoughts positive. And the sun would shine down through the branches of the tree above, a random image filter that never stopped inspiring contemplation. Since the weather was still actually pretty cold, my decision to go outside was perhaps a bit premature. I was resolute though, and shivered through my lunch hour despite the alternative. It was probably a good indicator of how much I had come to despise the lunch room, running out to that tree two months early.

In other classes, I was generally getting more comfortable with classmates. I made more claymation videos for an Oedipus project in English and a Civil War project in history class, and people liked them. I also got together and did a group project with people turning Oedipus Rex into a talk show, which was ridiculous and embarrasing and fun. We held debates in history class. In pre-calc, everyone in the class got together well, and I joked with neighbors, and this girl Renee brought nasty cartoons from the internet to joke about. And in Spanish, I warmed up to Nate, and we worked enthusiastically on a Salvador Dalí presentation. Nate had made a very close friend, a Mormon Hmong girl named Vorn. They always seemed to be together, and they playfully wore each other's IDs sometimes in Spanish class. A lot of the time Nate's ulterior motive shined through, and he persistently referred to Mormonism as a cult. Anyways, my assigned seat for spring was next to Vorn, and she was a fantastically nice person to joke with. One day we had an assignment based on the art of Frida Kahlo: self-portraits, and we egged each other on for making our zany ones. I made mine a picture of my head ripping in two and bugs flying out of it, and Vorn did a very funny rendition of herself screaming.

All of this social interaction, education, literary magazine, and my now not-so-crazy scheme of wooing a nice girl got to my head: the world seemed to be one gigantic possibility.

Pumping my ego a bit were surprising compliments from females that sent shockwaves straight to my brain's stupidity center.

In biology I got a random compliment from Veda -a girl with her own unique brand of style and an 'upper-tier' coolness- and there she was quite blatantly calling me very cool one day. And she didn't stop at once, she repeated it. I was left dumbfounded and wishing I could think of a cool response, but I did my usual silently slinking back. However, this prompted an ass-headedness to appear in me for a short period of time. Why, I thought with this new wave of complimenture, should I settle for a quiet girl when I could try for 'more'?

Another such occurrence fell after my oral commentary in English class. I had chosen to analyze the chain of abuse found in Toni Morrison's The Bluest Eye, a book I had utterly despised until I started ripping it up for commentary content. So I went up in front of English class and found myself a nice seat on top of a desk (so that I wouldn't shake enough to drop my paper, and also to disguise my serious nervousness), and I let loose this beastly essay that I had written. I had, as usual, tried to make the piece humorous and entertaining in addition to being analytically appropriate. But this had been one of the first times that I'd really read one of my papers out loud to a class, and some people even laughed when they were supposed to. In the following History class, Clarissa, another cool girl I never really considered talking to, outrightly said "thank you, Charlie, for making English class not boring." Once again, complete surprise and unresponsiveness on my part, and then silent 'what-if' ponderings. Having just made this first communication with her, I learned, that day I think, that she was going to study in Brazil starting soon and for the rest of High School. Figures.

Fortunately, I came to my pondering senses rather quickly, recalling some important lessons that I had learned. Not to mention, I noticed that I was using it to procrastinate on what really was important, and what I had invested myself in: my very simple MISSION. So I shook off these stupid fancies and focused back on my goal.

On the You Mission front, I was ridiculously happy to have made progress, however miniscule it actually was. After returning from break, I continued my program of courting her. I was still at the very premature stages of 'complimenting'. However, it was starting to come more naturally. I managed to call her new haircut 'cute', and tell her she looked nice. Also, she responded in kind by smiling and blushing and everything else wholesome. The signs were good.

This was complemented by my sneaky and almost creepy habit of stretching my legs out towards her nearby desk during class. It seems weird thinking about it now, but reaching my feet out closer to hers provided several things for me. First, I usually liked to stretch my legs anyways, and it wasn't such a crazy thing sending them a couple degrees more to the left. Second, there was the chance that somehow she would accidentally move her legs and bump into mine -not exactly smooth- coy enough to be seen as unintentional, but still calling attention to my presence. Finally, there was the slightly crazed notion that I could somehow, getting close enough to her, WILL some sort of contact, even if it was just getting her to remember I was there. It was a pretty strange trick, but it helped me to focus and use imagination to get through the painful lectures that left me facing the back of her head and telling myself not to screw this one up.

One day a thought came to me and I asked You where she goes for lunch. We had the same scheduled lunch hour, but I had never seen her in the lunch room (and hopefully assumed she was not there to witness my recent boneheaded exploits), and she didn't go outside. She spent her lunch time in Mrs. Nelson's room, which struck me immediately as appropriate, even though it was unexpected. How about me? I told her that I usually just go out and sit by my tree. Yes, it is cold, I said. I first passed on her offer to join her in Mrs. Nelson's room for lunch, but very soon realized how great an invitation it was. Progress. So I started following her there, and so it went. She would sometimes talk to me and Mrs. Nelson, or she would write Hmong phrases on the blackboard in a very girl-like way, and I would usually talk back to them while drawing potatoes in my planner. It was just like lunch, except that it was more private and comfortable. Sometimes we would have special meals of exotic food: one day You brought in a Hmong meal, and another day Mrs. Nelson brought Lebananese food. Fun, geeky stuff.

The large Hmong population at my school should be explained at this point. It turns out that Minneapolis has a very big Hmong population, especially in the northside ghetto where my high school was located. A large number of Hmong had gathered in the area upon arrival, while some of them had come from the California clans. Many of these Hmong students had been born back in Vietnam, while some were American-born. The chances were that each of them also had cousins at the same school as well. So the Hmong were quite the prevalent group. In fact, many formed something called the Asian Culture club, and it had hundreds of members, which smothered all other clubs' membership counts.

With that background in mind, the sight of You Moua scrawling mysterious Hmong messages on the blackboard one day was not surprising. But I did start wondering what exactly she was writing. It was in Roman letters, so I could make attempts at pronouncing it, but the meaning was completely beyond. When I asked her what it meant, she shrugged and said 'nothing' and kind of played shy about them, these girly-cuteness type never-to-be-seen messages. Who knows what they said. But seeing her writing them was intriguing.

April 17th. Issues Day. Annually, our high school took one day to present alternative education for all students. Regular class schedules would be replaced by a helping of different seminars run by special guests from the community. While probably well-intended, the day was widely regarded as a joke and thought of by many as a scheduled skip day. When we signed up for classes, in history class, I attempted to choose some that You, who conveniently now sat nearer to me, would be attending. Unfortunately when the day came, she didn't attend the first one. When I went to the lunchroom to eat, however, I found her sitting with some friends and joined in. You had turned out to be volunteering behind the scenes of Issues Day, and hence did not go to any sessions. Khom, the girl sitting with her, was a bit talkative and somewhat curious about me and You's friendship. The bell rang, and the three of us made our way up one of the stairwells, me to class and they to volunteering. Khom remarked about how I seemed to be heading in the same direction (up?) as them, and let loose,"You're just coming with us because you like her," referring of course to You. She had tossed it right up into the air, and my adrenaline floodgates opened. At once, I was thanking her dearly for giving the opportunity and wanting to strangle her brutally for the same. I could not help but concede:
"Yeah, well..." I allowed. Blatantly and enthusiastically. However, we had to part ways momentarily, and I'm not quite sure what I had said reached its target. Several hours of pondering later, my adrenaline lowered to manageable levels, and I had to go about organizing the next plan of attack.

As the case may be, I decided to postpone any attacks, but rather apply a consistent amount of pressure... A fancy way of deciding to not do much of anything. The possibility that I was wrong popped up in my brain, the thought that whatever it was I was thinking about her was completely false, that I was only seeing the good things, and I was missing all of the warning signs she was giving off. What if she just wanted to be friends? Like all of the rest, right? Why ruin a perfectly good friendship by creeping her out? If she felt the same way, she would follow ME around for a little bit.

Outside

It was warmer outside. Warm enough to lie down for a length of time without shivering to death. So I told her one day in biology class that I would be returning to my tree for lunch. My old friend, the tree. When I came outside, I saw it was right where I left it. I dropped my folder down in the pillow position, and then thought for a few moments about how stubborn this may be. Was I giving her a chance, or was I just running away, back to my own loneliness? Back to my tree.

These thoughts became obsolete, for You soon approached and sat down next to me in the struggling spring grass.
And we sat. And we were quiet. And then we talked. And it started.

So much comfort. Substantiation... What can be better in this world than being chosen, being validated in such a way? This friendship, this invitation. And the light shined down through the branches above, and the grass below tickled my legs, and everything was wonderful. All was hopeful. All was springtime.

This became routine. We would leave biology class, she would go to her locker and I would go straight outside. I would sit by my tree for a few minutes, and then a Little Debbie snack cake would fall in my lap out of nowhere. And then I would look up and see You, and I would thank her for the food (because I was scrawny and didn't eat lunch). Everyone with cars would walk by us and our tree on their way to the parking lot and fast food. But we were left alone for a nice chunk of time. Us time, for fifteen minutes a day.

We were both the silent types, so we were definitely prone to pauses. But they were comfortable pauses. I knew she was there next to me, and she was here with me alone. I was hers, she was mine. She taught me how to eat grass, that you pluck the sprig and nibble the tiny white portion at the root for a slightly sweet taste. This we did, even though the school grounds were treated with God knows what chemicals.

We talked about our teachers. We talked about our schoolwork. We were both A students, so give us a break! In time we talked about our families. I learned many fascinating things about this girl. She didn't get along with her mother —okay, that wasn't so huge. She grew up in a refugee camp in Laos —whoa, that's interesting. Her father was poisoned and killed by a group of people that stole goods being offered to the refugees, and nothing could be done about it —absolutely mindblowing.

She talked at length about what a fun time she had at the refugee camp, running around outside and playing games. The simple life. I was more and more inclined to agree with her, that getting back to less complicated times would be fun. Then she would talk about people stealing their food, and I would snap out of it and jump back to the more complicated world of reality. What really got me sometimes was when she alluded to her coming to America. She said that she didn't want to come, but her father had wanted it for the family. Looking into those eyes, those beautiful cat-like eyes, I got the impression sometimes that she'd rather have stayed and run around in the refugee camp forever, rather than come here.

Talking to You was such a challenging experience for me. Here was a bright person, who had come to this country at the age of twelve and become an A student in an honor program in high school. And yet, she still had this longing for simplicity; it was a problem, a riddle that I pondered in my head for some time, taunting me, and causing me to ask more. We carried on like this for a while, me interviewing her, trying to find out her basest hopes and dreams, trying to unravel her. And then I would tell her mine. We were always smiling, even if sometimes I was so awestruck by certain cultural chasms that I could hardly hold my wonderment in. You was absolute fascination.

My birthday came, but I didn't tell her. It seemed like too much of a lever maybe. Or maybe it was fear again. I really wanted our relationship to extend beyond our fifteen minutes at lunch. No matter how close I had managed to get, I was still a wuss.

The Test

Letters went to a select group of us juniors that got good grades. They were invitations to enter the National Honor Society. The only real requirement was getting two teachers to write letters of recommendation, which was basically just to filter out the uninterested. At the introduction meeting, everyone who was anyone -most everyone that I knew from IB classes- was there, including You. We were instructed to 'give our blood to senior members' at the next opportunity (there was a blood drive). At that point we elected our representatives, the vice president etc. We actually weren't required to do much of anything until next year, except for attending the initiation ceremony. The event was a bit funny, involving candles and robes and whatnot, and the families were invited to witness our glory. But hey, whatever makes us smart kids feel special, right? Following this, there was a room with cakes and refreshments, but I remember that all that was on my mind was You, and the very small possibility of talking to her. Even though we were still in the school, it felt different because it was after hours and it would be that much closer to a functional non-school relationship. In any case, I wanted to see what her family looked like. Unfortunately, I only caught a glimpse of her, and no peek at the family.

In early May, it was time to take my first (and only, this year) International Baccalaureate examination. Biology class had been carefully preparing us with nuggets of information, and now it was the moment of truth, the time to regurgitate it all, organize a random selection of lessons back onto a blank form. I remember on the day before the test I was studying, actually studying, something I rarely ever do before tests. I came up with all manner of mnemonic devices to remember what exactly the inside of the heart looks like, what goes on in your brain when you need to pee, how the process of glycolysis works.

There is something particularly cool about the IB tests, which is that they all take place outside of school at churches within walking distance. So all of the smart, hip, test-taking IB kids were excused from their classes an hour before and an hour after the tests were scheduled. And then everyone gathered outside the church, sitting on the steps, socializing in groups, focusing all of their worries with each other. And then You and I walked off to the side and talked about spring flowers, the test, and her mother. In this exchange I found out that they didn't live together. There was no time to dwell on this, because it was time to start. A couple of 'good luck's later, and I was writing as quickly as possible about ecologies and feedback systems.

After this section of the test was over, everyone regrouped outside of the church. I had a few brief exchanges with people I knew, but I was really waiting for You. It was a walk of about eight blocks back to the school, and this we started.

I'd thought in my mind many times about how to say a very specific thing to You. I felt that it was getting close to time, that I had to make clear my intentions before it was too late. So I had, in the previous weeks, spent just about all of my time -in the shower, on the bus, during math homework- rearranging words in my mind, those perfect words that would so naturally and accurately convey my strong feelings without sounding like I was a creep. I never neared perfection. And whenever I got close to her all of the words seemed to scramble out of my head leaving me only with the useless 'umm'.

So on this walk back to school, I was doing very complicated math in my mind about when exactly I should start saying what it is I was going to say. I wanted to time it perfectly, because I knew full well that nothing else about it would be perfect. I figured that I should leave four blocks of walking to say it. But as that distance got closer and closer, my brain was doing cartwheels thinking of a reason that two blocks might actually be more nominal. Just when I was getting up the guts to say something, You looked back behind us. There was Vorn, huffing and puffing to catch up with us two. You suggested we wait for her. "Sure."

Us three talked about how the test went, of course. We got to the spot two blocks from school, a location across the street from a large cemetery. I suggested to both of them that, since we were excused for an additional amount of time, I wanted to walk around the graveyard before returning to school. They both agreed, and my attempt to remove Vorn from the field of play was unsuccessful. She was such a nice girl, that Vorn. But I really wanted her to be gone at that second.

So we made our way around the graveyard. Vorn talked to us, but You pretty much was silent. More than ever, I tried to convey telepathically to You how I felt, in some imaginary way. We finally got back to the school, and there were twenty minutes until classes were done for the day. Vorn made her way into the building, and You was going to do the same. We had the same class, and I told You that maybe we could just stay outside until school was over. She said yes, and I thanked everything in the whole wide world for making her agree.

We walked out to the corner of the school's block near the student parking lot. We stood and talked, much like we did at lunch. My need for expression started turning sour, though. I just couldn't spit it out, in any form. I just looked at You, and she was so cute in her jeans and her shirt, and her hair was so pretty, and her eyes were so brown, brown and dark. And I was absolutely terrified. So I balanced like a flamingo on one foot, and we talked about nothing in particular. She talked about how she had never skipped a class before, and then I tried to convince her we were not doing any such thing because we were excused. And then, then someone walked by who had gotten out of class a few minutes early.

This person walked down the sidewalk toward us and was accompanied by another. One was skinny-ish and had a shaved head, and the other was larger and had a pierced chin and tons of gothy makeup. The one with the shaved head seemed to recognize me, to my dismay. As she walked closer, I started to recognize this person, but I just couldn't fit the puzzle together. Then, I realized it was a girl. And she called my name. I completely ignored her. It was Joey. Straight from the crazy-house, perhaps? She walked by, and pulled out a cigarette, and fortunately did not take notice of me ignoring her so blatantly. And then she was gone. And I was filling with so much embarrassment. There was the bad girl that I had so cowardly agreed to be used by, and right next to me was the essence of purity, my greatest hope for nice girls. It was so transparent which was the better choice. If only I had not wasted so much time on the one, I might not still have been so severely struggling with the other. I might have already been successful.

You remarked that she liked the bald girl's hair, which prompted some lively debate. Obviously, I didn't like that girl's new hair, since I hated her guts. Time whittled away on this silly topic, and the bell rang. It was time to go. Another chance lost. School was almost over for the year, I realized as we parted ways. There would only be so many chances left to make with the telling –before it was too late.

Moment of Truth

Everything of the school year was wrapping up. Classes were dealing more with 'final projects'. Biology class became a joke after the IB test, and all we did was watch movies each day. In math class we spent all of our time preparing silly presentations on various mathematical concepts. In English class we were reading one of our last books: The Awakening by Kate Chopin. It was about a lonely housewife who finds herself through infidelity but ends up swimming away and dying.

The Literary Magazine staff got together at the teacher's house to put it together. For the most part, I was pretty much the one who decided what went everywhere and in what order, since no one else really had any interest. Amazingly, it all came together well -the art, the poetry, the stories. I was really proud of what we had done. And so, we sent the finalized version of to the print shop.

And what else was there? Ah yes, I recalled all too often. The nice girl.

It was one of those days in biology class -it must have been after watching some video on sexual reproduction maybe, or something about monkeys. I had gone through the last twenty minutes in class, all of it free time, thinking about what to say to You, and knowing that I was going to make it happen this time. Staring at the back of her head.

To my left, a couple sat together. A dark-haired short girl who was very bright, and her boyfriend who was a tall, blonde, blue-eyed jerk-idiot-moron. They would bicker. She would talk about their new apartment that they were supposedly going to move into because they were in love. Then he would make some retarded sex joke. Then she would say something and he would ignore her. And then she would get pissed, and then he would say he didn't care. Finally, they would make up -for whatever reason- and they would be in love again. I shuddered, and continued staring at the back of You's wonderful head. It could have been any day in May.

But something different happened this time. The lunch bell rang, and I followed You to her locker. "Hey You," I said, and everyone from biology class walked by us, but I was focused, I was ready, and it was time.
"Yes?"
"I was thinking... I only really get to see you at lunch," I said. More people from biology class passed by, and I blocked them out.
"I was wondering..." I turned red, I was sweating in every possible place on my body.
"I was wondering," I repeated, "if maybe I could see you outside of school sometime."
The last people walked by, and I have no doubt they could tell what I was doing, and I didn't care. I only cared about one thing: You's reaction.

She was putting things in her locker, and taking things out. I only saw the back of her head. She wasn't saying anything, still busying herself away. I could not decipher any reaction. I became worried after a few moments.
"So... what do you think?" I asked. Or maybe I only started to ask. But sooner than I knew it, she grabbed my hand and started walking to the staircase.
"Let's go to the lunchroom," she said.

Here it was. I've gone and done it. I thought in my head about the possible outcomes. There's a chance she likes me, and is super embarrassed and flattered. Then there's the chance that she doesn't want to go out with anybody, that she just wants to be friends. I mentally prepared myself for these outcomes, and any others I could come up with while I was following her down the stairs to the lunchroom. We sat down at an unoccupied table, but she very soon got up and said she would be right back. So I sat and thought some more, about what she could possibly be going through. What, what could it be? Does she or doesn't she? I hadn't been able to gauge any reaction one way or the other.

She remained gone for at least fifteen minutes. That was a lot of time to be spending. Was she making a decision? Had she just up and left the building?

Finally she returned, looking very charged. She looked at me, and got herself into as relaxed a position as possible. And she started to smile, a very nervous smile. Hope rushed inside of me.

"Okay," she said, trying very hard to get the word out. "I like you very much, but I'm kind of..."

Come on, here we go.

"...married."

I was frozen. Since she had let that out, she seemed to be invigorated with more strength and continued:
"I live with my husband. We've been married for years. I can't tell anyone because it's kind of... illegal."

I was so completely caught off guard, as one might imagine, that I had no response. No words. No emotion. I just sat there. It couldn't be true.
But there it was.

I clarified for a few minutes. Made sure it was what I'd just heard her say and not something else entirely. Then the bell rang, and lunch was over. And I didn't see her the rest of the day. I was dead for the rest of my classes. I put my head down. On the bus ride home, I sat sideways and put my feet up on the window and just stared at the ceiling, trying to make sense. Any kind of sense, out of anything. Nate asked me what was up, and I complied. I let it all out. Married. MARRIED! MARRIED? MARRIED?!!! HA!! Married. Seventeen years old. Married. Like with a husband. You know. Married. HA! Ha. I felt like I was cracking up, and so I went immediately to bed when I got home. I probably cried for a bit too. Alternated screaming 'You' and 'Married' into my pillow silently, sobbing. Sleep must have come before long. And I thankfully don't remember what dream followed.

Awakening

I had to learn more. And fortunately, You and I were still friends. So it became even more of a riddle for me; there had to be some sort of solution, some reason behind it all. Additionally, my feelings hadn't immediately disappeared, and I held onto the possibility that somehow, somehow it could be made better.

On a day following the revelation was the NHS picnic, which was held at a huge park. There were many people there that I knew and could hang out with, but I instead chose to follow You into the wilderness and talk to her for the entire time.

After coming over to the states, You hadn't really known many people. She had begun talking to this guy, this something like thirty-four year old guy, on the phone. She had been able to talk with him at length, and she described the lengthy conversation as something magical. Marriage very soon followed (that kind of non-legal marriage), and You no longer had to live with the mother she so despised. The reason she didn't like her mother? Because she had remarried after the father's death.

Sooner or later, we were talking and she revealed that it was not uncommon for multiple wives to be taken in her culture. I used this information as leverage, and coldly confronted her about that possibility. She did not see anything terribly wrong with it, however. She actually took joy in knowing she was the first wife. You conceded that she would rather be the only one, but that if her husband needed someone else, she would comply with no complaint.

I would become woozy while hearing this sometimes. Here was my poor, virginal, nice girl; my princess. And right next to her every night was this old man twice her age, with the option for more women. It was tough to bear. She had to have been taken advantage of. This guy had sweet-talked her when she was twelve. And even forgetting about the guy, there were the years of hardship that added to the complications. All I could think of was how much she deserved better. She deserved a life. She deserved the simple childhood she so longed for, because it had been robbed from her by circumstance.

I wanted to give this back to her. Maybe it was stupid, maybe it was uncalled for, and maybe it was just selfish. I wanted to be her knight in shining armor. I wanted to save her from this old man. I wanted to talk her out of it. I wanted to give her freedom. I wanted her happy. And I wanted her happiness to coincide with mine.

Grand plans were drawn up in my mind. How could I extract her from this marriage? At what cost? How much time did I have? What would be the first step? There were so many problems. For one, I had no way of contacting her after school would end. And I couldn't exactly call her. I didn't even know where she lived. But my goal was so pure, so RIGHT, that I had to do it. My brain was overloading with emotion and desperation.

At lunch we began talking about the book we were reading in English class, The Awakening. About the repressed woman entering the magical world of infidelity and independence. I had a lot of trouble forcing myself not to draw parallels. You believed that the woman was being dishonorable, that she should not have left her husband. I argued the other viewpoint, that she had to experience her own life, live her own dreams, that she was a victim of her culture, and that her happiness came before her husband's. I got very emotional in interpreting this book, for it was so close to what I was observing. The book was speaking to me.

My slim knowledge of psychology had explained to me that she had probably used this guy to replace her dead father. But a fat lot of good psychology does. You can't explain to someone why they feel love. You can't rationalize it. I couldn't even explain my own.

Over time though, my head maybe cooled off. Or maybe I lost my initial romantic drive to save her, to go the extra mile. The end result was that I came to accept her situation. Maybe I'm weak. Maybe I should have kept to my convictions. Maybe I lost my one chance to save somebody. Or maybe I was too late to begin with.

The Awakening ends with the female protagonist, after her free lifestyle has gotten her in trouble, stripping naked and swimming out to sea. In my class commentaries, I always interpreted this as a very optimistic ending, that she has finally escaped.
The more popular opinion, however, is that she drowns.


Year End

It all drew to a close in no time. The month of May gave way to June. The layer of green outside was complete. Classes were pretty much completed. Junior year was over.

I sold copies of the LitMag in the lunch room. I yelled at passersby and told them they needed it. That they wanted it. I was very personally involved with the LitMag. I had been a senior editor, for sure. But I felt that I devoted so much of myself into the writing that I submitted, that I felt like it was a part of me. That I was selling away pieces of myself. I wanted everyone in the school to read it cover to cover.

The yearbook came as well. And with it that frantic gathering of signatures, attempting to immortalize those souls that you will end up missing. I didn't really care very much, because the only soul I had come to care about was You.

She was all that was in my mind. I would think about saving her, and about leaving her to her happiness. Additionally, I would think back about better things I could have said to her, more drastic measures I could have taken but did not. I would think silly thoughts too, like becoming 'extramarital friends', or -heck- getting to know her and her husband as friends. On the outside, I must have just been a gigantic husk of unresponsiveness, lost in the past, lost in the future.

Several people were leaving high school forever. Veda, the girl that called me cool and terrified me in so doing was going to the University. Julie, whom I had known since the beginning, who had always been friendly, but was just too attractive and friendly for me to brave knowing better: she was going too. There were more as well. People I wished I had gotten to know, while I had been wasting my time obsessing over others.

On the last day of school, the last lunch period, Julie approached me outside of school. She wished me good luck, and told me (as she tends to do) that I should be more social. Then she asked about You and I, since she always saw us talking together when she went out to her car. I told her that I liked You, but that she was married so there was nothing I could do. That kind of shocked but entertained response followed. We then said our goodbyes, hugged, that whole thing. Even though I did not know her well, it was nice being able to tell someone female, to see her care the slightest bit. And it was nice to say goodbye to her.

I told You to have a good summer. And I told her that she should be happy. That's all I did.

The day droned on. On that last day of school, in my last hour of the day, I stretched myself on top of a radiator near the window and played dead. You was in my mind, but she was a problem with no solution, a story with no end, conflict without resolution.

So I lay there: dead, obsessed, a cool breeze whipping in through the window and the hard steel digging into my back. Drowning in an ocean of my own making.

It was definitely something.






(This was chapter number seven of my personal accounts, "-Liking-: Refractions and Infractions" )
(Next chapter: "8) Intermission" )