After the first day, school became a bore, assuming it wasn’t one already. The math teacher continued to relate math to sex, including a disturbing comparison between a blind date and the quadratic formula. The choir teacher continued to exploit my skills as a pianist and had even suggested I just play rather than worry about singing. French was my best class, while Japanese was my worst. English, History, and Biology were dull classes I rather dislike attending but were easy to pass. There were a few times when I’d considered skipping the less interesting classes but had been afraid of what the consequences could be.
It wasn’t long before Jade’s personality earned her esteem among the students. I hadn’t expected her to become as popular as she did; I thought she was too eccentric for people to accept, yet it was her eccentricity that made her famous. At the school near the haunted house, she and I had been rejected as outcasts but life was different in the city because of the diversity. With such variety, people willingly accepted her warm idiosyncratic behavior.
Jade tried to introduce me to her friends and have them accept me but I was uncomfortable around most of them. Some of them accepted me, but about half of them were only hanging around Jade because they wanted to garner friendship and felt the only way to do so was to be around those who had friends in excess. I didn’t much mind the four or five close friends, but the crowded throng that paraded behind Jade caused me great anxiety.
I was more of the type of person who liked to sit in solitude without any intrusion. I had a few friends, most of them also close friends with Jade, but most of my existence was alone. As I was often the last person to do anything social, I noticed other introverts in a few of my classes. The old statement cheaters always said “Sit next to the quiet kid; they have all the right answers!” wasn’t as true as I would’ve thought. Many of the quiet kids were only quiet in one class, probably because they either loathed the teacher or didn’t feel it was worth trying to make friends with the imbeciles inhabiting the other classes.
Of course, there were a few people who seemed antisocial or mad at the world but half of them did so inexplicably. The other half just seemed socially awkward.
There was one boy, the one from math who’d presented the macabre project in history, who intrigued me. He rarely interacted with anyone and also managed to grab hold of any random individual’s flaws so that he could strangle the hope out of them. Even with such a powerful talent, he only seemed to use it when perturbed past his breaking point; at all other times, he was friendly in a shunned-and-loving-it sort of way. He didn’t seem to have a cold heart, just a firm desire to be left alone. I noticed that beneath his biting exterior, he was a gentle soul. Or at least, that was what I was gathering from the contrast created in his persona.
He had a guise of arrant supremacy but buried further down, he was a humble gentleman. In the rare circumstances he tutored a fellow student on a teacher’s request, he was patient and understanding. He wasn’t socially incompatible, just socially negligent. It wasn’t as if he didn’t respond when someone spoke to him, but he wasn’t the kind of person who had a sailor’s dialect when spoken to.
It was difficult to describe what he was like and how he was who he was. It was actually easier to describe what he did than it was to describe him.
Jade and I were sitting in history on a Friday afternoon. It was like any other day in that class with one alteration, there was a substitute teacher behind the desk. Our regular teacher was out on maternity leave.
The lesson plans had specifically recommended we break off into groups of four or five, yet I’d chosen to work individually. Jade had been drafted by the people around her to be in their group. The only other person working alone was the boy I was talking about. Even with this being a visible fact for the students, the sub only noticed the pale-skinned girl in black at the front of the class “not doing as instructed”.
“Excuse me, young lady.” The old man’s tone was harsh. “Why haven’t you gotten into a group yet?” He stood over my desk with his wrinkled plaid shirt. “Well?! Aren’t you going to answer me?!” I couldn’t believe the substitute was harassing my choice to work alone.
I’d been about to retaliate when the boy who I’d been observing spoke up after sharpening his pencil. “Why do you care what one quiet girl does? For all you care, you should be thrilled to have one less child to tell to shut up.”
“What did you say?!” The substitute turned on him.
“I asked you why you’re so bothered by one child working independently of the idiots who were assigned to be her classmates.” The class was silent at this remark-except for Jade.
“I object to that!” She stood up. “If I’m going to be any degrading insult, I’m going to be a baka, which by the way, is Japanese for idiot!” Jade stamped her foot and casually took her seat again.
“Move aside. I’m calling security!” The teacher snapped stepping forward.
“That’s fine, it’s speed dial number seven, just so you know.”
“You’re in big trouble for this!” The would-be teacher shook a grizzly finger in the boy’s face as he sidled past him.
“For what? Refusing to allow a fellow student to be bullied by a senile crackpot hired to fill in for a short time as a teacher?” He scoffed. “They’ll expel me for sure.”
The substitute called the main office on the class phone and demanded that two of his students he dragged out in handcuffs.
Three armed security guards came to the room only to find a class of well-behaved students. Our crazed substitute ordered the security guards to take the boy and I away because we were disrupting the class and preventing the other students from learning; he recommended the security guards not hesitate to use their clubs and mace. It made perfect sense to me that the two quietest and brightest pupils were being so obnoxious that the others were struggling to learn. The security guards must’ve understood it too because they chuckled and asked he and I to gather our things and follow them out. I did as I was told but just before exiting, I ran back to the teacher and turned my completed work in, ahead of everyone else. It seemed the substitute had been right to grow angry with me; working alone, I’d finished the work a group couldn’t and that was a substitute’s worst nightmare; a student without work.
The boy and I sat in the principal’s office for quite some time before being seen. During that time, I had to wonder why he’d stood up for me when I was perfectly capable of doing it on my own. Did he not realize my independence? Did he feel that the substitute’s fit of rage was too much for me to deal with? Was he just sexist and concerned that my femininity would’ve been my weakness in confronting the gnarly substitute?
The answer to all these questions was surely the same, a positive no, He couldn’t be idiotic enough to have never witnessed my razor-tongue being used. There had been several times where I spoke out against the math teacher’s life lessons. He couldn’t have felt that the projected rage was too overpowering because I found it apparent he knew a person’s rage was best deflected back at the enraged person. He couldn’t have been sexist; he was too good for sexual discrimination.
There had to be some other reason for the interference. The human mind is a random and unpredictable machine but even so, this boy couldn’t have done what he’d done without some reasoning. Perhaps it was possible for me to find the purpose but I was thinking too analytically. All I needed to find was what would inspire him to step in for me in the event that happened.
As I’d already gathered, he knew I could’ve dealt with the situation, yet he handled in a manner similar to the way I would’ve. That part could’ve been a coincidence but it didn’t seem to be his exact style. He’d been trying to do things a certain way, a way that would garner my attention. If that happened to be true, what was it I was supposed to notice? Had there been a subliminal message encoded in his actions? No, that couldn’t have been it; that kind of subtlety would take time to invent and the argument was too swift for time to play out.
Maybe he’d wanted me to see that he was trying to do something for me personally rather than just defending another student from the raving antics of one eager to agitate. Like the others, that explanation made sense to me but inspired more unanswered questions, like why he’d choose me to defend and not some other person. The answer I found to my being singled out, confused me almost as much as the question had; he wanted to impress me.
Ironically, the answer to question looped back to the original question; what did I have that made him want to impress me? I concluded he wasn’t trying for a mere friendship with me; he was much too reticent to play out such a grand spectacle in order to befriend me. There had to be something else driving him, something more mysterious. As much as it agonized me, deep down, I knew what he was after. The only logic to how I found his goal was that I’d been secretly striving for the same thing.
My thoughts hurtled to a stop when the principal invited us into her office. She sat down behind an oversized desk in a brown leather rolling chair and indicated for the two of us to sit in the worn chairs opposite her throne. “Good afternoon,” She was pleasant enough, Her tone was calm and genial but I suspected it was the one that drove her students to confess and beg for mercy. I guessed that because the boy beside me began cracking his knuckles. “Be honest, are you the two the custodians caught having sexual relations in the broom closet?”
“What?!” I gasped, risking a glance at the instantly alert boy.
“Oh good, I’m sorry for the confusion. I thought you two were some other students.” She pushed her orange-framed glasses up on her nose. “What are you here for?”
I let the boy explain what had transpired while I nodded at random intervals to keep his story believable; I wasn’t paying attention whatsoever. After the principal accepted our story as true, she dismissed us without consequence.
We were dismissed right as the bell rang. The two of us walked together out of one building and into the other. The fact was that we were together but in our minds, we weren’t. Neither of us acknowledged the other’s presence or uttered a word to the other. If we hadn’t each been so withdrawn, it could’ve been an awkward silence ringing in our ears, but we each managed to hide in the realm of our inner beings. In the physical sense, we were walking together, but in a figurative world, we weren’t anywhere near each other. It was an interesting phenomenon to be a part of a paradox.
I didn’t bother waiting for Jade; she knew her way home, besides, I wanted a little time to think. I continued walking, past the intersection that would’ve taken me into the apartment complex if I’d turned, and meandered into one of the open areas of the city. At each level in the skyscraper honey comb, was a park with trees and grass and in most cases, sunlight. On some of the skyscrapers, the parks existed like balconies with one slightly above the other, and on other buildings, the open area was the roof of a part of the building with the rest of the building continuing upwards on one side of the flat roof. Still in other buildings, entire floors were reserved for nature; in these park-like openings, windows were walls tapestried with blue sky and fluffy white collections of water particles suspended in Earth’s atmosphere. Apart from the roof above and the steel columns supporting the structure above, one could almost feel like a part of nature, particularly with the brisk wind ruffling one’s shirt sleeves.
The slice of tamed nature I found myself in had carefully tended flower gardens and a trickling stream weaving a tranquil path across the gently sloping floor into the unseen reservoir electric water pumps worked tirelessly to transport the trickling water back up to the start of the running water. A squirrel perched on one of the many benches placed according to a landscaper’s stenciled designs; the presence of wildlife was a sad reminder of how destructive man’s influence could be, but the skyscrapers had been around for so long, relief was found in nature’s resiliency. Many of the animals in the skyscraper parks were the offspring of the offspring of generations of animals that had followed the original specimens; ever-resilient nature had found a way to adapt and thrive in the created ecosystems.
The squirrel on the bench was just a glimpse of the wildlife living among the humans. Fish swam in the waters of the stream, protected from the pumps by a mesh barrier, but ignorant of the plastic wall saving them from bloody destruction. They nested, bred, and even represented a corner of the food chain. Small birds flew between the parks, feeding in one and nesting in another. Nearly all indigenous wildlife had found some way to live hundreds of feet above their original domain.
I took a seat on a bench near a bend in the stream where guppies plucked invisible food from the surface of the water. Compared to the stressful life in the city, one could almost relax, despite the obvious scenery not being natural. I could look in any direction and see the blue glint of a steel structure, Just over the banister that marked the boundaries of the park was a little more land followed by a tremendous plummet. The trees, animals, and sunlight, despite the man-made feel to it all, did have a serene damping effect on me. It wasn’t the same as the peace of the countryside, but it worked.
It wasn’t long before my thoughts possessed me and I began musing over the situation with the boy. I didn’t even know his name, although I knew him to an extent, I’d just never bothered trying to memorize his name, since it had seemed pretty pointless.
If this boy had feelings for me as I suspected, I wanted to know how far they went. It was going to take more than just a bit of heightened courtesy for him to impress me. I was going to have to test him in some way or another. I just hoped that my testing him didn’t also test his patience.
The only interesting thing that happened over the weekend was Jade showing a growing interest in finding her parents. Apparently she’d discovered one of them in the public records by accident. After that find, Jade was adamant about finding them, more so than before. She’d drafted me to help search, but the only place I could recommend looking was the lost and found, for which, Jade slapped the back of my head in an annoyed sort of way.
Even at school Monday, she was digging. She asked everyone she could think of for help, but to no avail. I didn’t bother trying to help; I’d already proven how much help I could be. Besides, I was too preoccupied with my own thoughts to be much help.
One of the times when I was lost in my head without a GPS system to help me find my way, was in the lunch line. I was standing there, focused only on my curiosities and the movement of the person in front of me. When someone tripped and bumped into me from behind, I turned, with a mumbled utterance of an overused insult. “Moron,” Upon turning, I noticed with hidden excitement, it was the boy. “Oh, it’s you.”
“Funny, I don’t remember changing my name, or did you take that liberty upon yourself to do so?” He commented. That was just peachy; he heard me call him a moron.
“It isn’t like you would remember, you’re so thick, I don’t understand how you can spell your name, whatever it may be.” Oh no! My sharp tongue was taking control!
“I knew it, you took it upon yourself to bestow upon me anew and original name, I never knew I meant so much to you, umm, what’s your name? Or should I just give you a name too?” That got me interested, but not like would be expected.
“And how would someone as mediocre as you invent a moniker for the likes of me?”
“Such bug words! My puny male brain is sizzling!“ He grinned. It made me nervous, although I didn’t let him know. How could he grin at such a time? “Hmm, I must think.” He began scratching his chin. “Think, think, think,” He jerked his pointer finger of the hand that had been scratching his chin into the air. “Oh, I know! How about Sugar Booger? I like the sound of it, it’s got a nice ring to it!” Oh, the sarcasm.
“So it isn’t a myth,” I returned the grin. “You can think!” I applauded melodramatically. “I was always taught pests weren’t capable of intelligent thought, but it doesn’t surprise me to notice how you struggled to find such clever words though.”
“Yeah, because everyone is inferior to you, your highness, all hail the mighty Sugar Booger and her impressive arsenal of vocabulary words!” He bowed low in muck humility.
“Hmm, that’s a thought to ponder, although coming from you, I can’t take it for much. You probably worship the fleas gnawing on your flesh.”
“Indeed I do! Do you want to meet them? I named each and everyone one of them after you, your highness!”
“It sounds to me like you’re infatuated with me, and though you may be on the right track, trust me, it’ll never work. I don’t date transvestites.” It was harsh but it seemed like a suitable test.
“Such discrimination! And in this day and age! Just because some people are special, doesn’t mean you have the right to reject them. I mean, you should know, you’re one of those special people.” He motioned with his fingers that the word “special” was in quotes.
“Indeed I am,” I sighed playing off his jocular tone a few minutes earlier. “Does it bother you that you’ll never amount to the same echelon as the dirt under my fingernail?”
“Does it bother you that this is the reason you have no friends? No life? Does the fact that you’ll end up lynching yourself before the school year’s over bother you?”
“If it would rid me of your putrid sight, then I look forward to the trip to the hardware store to buy the cord.”
“Cord? What happened to good old fashioned rope? And a nice suicidal poem?”
“Why would you care about poetry? Anything worth writing into a poem is surely too far advanced for you, that is, if you exclude nursery rhymes.”
He spoke kind of dreamily. “Mother goose is my idol.” He paused as if coming back to reality. “Okay, so maybe a nice suicide letter?” Perhaps giving your condolences to this cruel, cruel world we all live in.”
“Why are you so intent upon receiving a letter? Are you trying to teach yourself to read? Did hooked-on-phonics not work for you?”
“Yes, hooked-on-phonics was far too complicated for me I’m afraid. But that’s not the real reason, you know the reason Sugar Booger, I just want something to remember you by. My poor aching heart is throbbing with the pangs of rejection.” He clutched at the left side of his chest with his right hand. “Transvestite indeed,” He inhaled. “But now that I think about it, what does that make you?” He was getting annoyed, I could tell.
“Well, with a face like that, you shouldn’t have expected much out of any relationship, including one with your reflection.” I snapped.
“Admit it, you’re just jealous that I’m prettier than you, even as a boy.” He rolled his shoulders back and held his chin high.
“Is that how you get to sleep at night? Do you have to convince yourself that even as a boy, you’re as pretty as your feeble mind will imagine.” I hated to shoot him down, and in contrast, I was having fun anyways.
“And jealousy rears its ugly head. Are you sure you’re not the one who needs to console yourself at night?”
“I do at times find myself thinking such thoughts, but when that happens, I realize the alarm clock is going off and that I don’t have to worry, for every time I wake up, I realize I’m not you.”
“Geez, crush my heart and then assault my low self-esteem why don’t you? No wonder everyone else around here avoids you like the plague.”
“You claim people avoid me like the plague? Are you insinuating they flock to you instead? I find that hard to believe, between your smell and attire, I’d have to say you’re the plague. Didn’t you see the birds falling out of the sky after they caught a whiff of your rank scent?”
“I didn’t claim anything, I was merely telling the truth, and the truth is a-” Translated, the word meant a pregnant female dog. “-just like you. Just what exactly are you hoping to accomplish by insulting me? Are you trying to prove to yourself that someone might just be as pitiful as you?” He was to the point of being infuriated.
“Congratulations,” I patted his shoulder. “You passed.” He now had my respect after lasting for so long without swearing.
“What?!” I ignored his demand for an answer and walked through the lunch line. “Wait!” Again, I ignored him and walked to a table where Jade was sitting with her friends. He couldn’t follow me without abandoning his food and then he surely wouldn’t follow me to a table crowded with people he didn’t know.
Jade invited me to sit at the one empty chair at the large circular table. When I sat next to Jade, she and one of her friends were debating some topic or another. It sounded like they were discussing a possible theater production but I couldn’t be sure.
The boy I’d spoke to pushed a chair between Jade and I, forcing Jade to cry out with an annoyed “Nya?!”
“You’ll live, and if you don’t, well there’s only one other option, isn’t there?” He asked, enticing Jade to leave him alone. “What did you mean by, ‘you passed’?” Everyone at the table was staring at him.
I continued eating without noticing him. I knew he was next to me, but I was pretending he didn’t exist. It was amusing me that he was so interested and annoyed at the same time.
“Excuse me,” He tapped my shoulder. “Sruun? Is that your name?” He learned quickly what it would take to get my attention.
“Yes?” I turned to look him in the eyes.
“What did you mean earlier? What did I pass?”
I smiled. “You’re smart, you’ll figure it out.” I poked his nose.
“No, I’m not! I’ve got a puny male brain!” I found his feeble attempts to persuade me humorous.
“If you say so,” I shrugged. ”It sucks for you then.” I didn’t say anything else and turned back to my lunch.
The boy seemed frustrated at his failure to convince me to explain to him what had happened. As I’d learned, he was slow to anger and what fascinated me was the patience he had. All through the end of lunch and then history, he was almost begging me for an answer; he never received a reply from me. I didn’t intend on giving him an answer until I was ready for it, when that would be, relied on how things progressed. Another factor was when I found a way to break it to him. I couldn’t just march up to him and tell him I loved him, which, I didn’t, but it was the essence of the thing.
The phrase “I love you” had been overused in society. Teenagers regularly confessed their overpowering emotions for each other. I was forever annoyed by their deceitful statements of heartfelt sympathy when less then a month later, many of them would split up and probably find another partner. It seemed as if the expression meant “You’re cool and all but I don’t think I could ever feel any other feelings for you.” That being said, I felt that for the phrase to be as meaningful as it was intended, it would have to be used in moderation. I wasn’t going to tell anyone I loved them unless I’d known them for years or had been dating them much longer than many other couples had and felt an emotional attachment was cemented in my soul.
For me, the verb to love meant that no other single word could be substituted in its place. To be in love was a state beyond childhood crushes, or temporary joy, or even beyond the physical attraction that was the topic of the teenage sex drama. Love was supposed to be the desire to be with a person at all times. The requirements of love were mutual compassion between two people and a profound need to interact with each other, but even that wasn’t specific enough for couples. People who were in live, and not the kind of love a family shares, live in agony when they’re apart. The kisses, hugs and flirting, were just little thinks to tack on the side; they shouldn’t be forced games between two people. Although they were pleasurable, people shouldn’t find a mate just to have a play toy. When people were replaceable or expendable, they became robots with the sole purpose of amusing their partner with sex ploys. It sickened me.
I hadn’t been planning on telling him any time soon, but being the intelligent creature he was, he figured it out by something that happened about a week later in the lunch line.
I’d stepped into line behind him. I’d been off in my own little world when an altercation happened in front of me between two of the private school boys and the boy who’d grown on me; the two rich kids were taunting one of the few male friends I had.
“Ah, I see, it never occurred to me that you felt that way.” My little friend answered in a sarcastic reply. I didn’t know what had spurred the confrontation or even what had been said. All I knew was that beneath his false calmness, he was growing heated.
“That’s why you spend your nights watching old romances in the dark with your right hand.” The two rich kids roared with laughter at their comment.
The boy I had confusing feelings for clenched his fist inside the pocket of his hooded sweatshirt and every muscle in his body constricted. I agreed with the cause for the intended violence; the stabbing statement was a crude shot below the belt, but I couldn’t let my infatuation stoop to their level. The statement had been intended to spark rage in the indifferent boy and it was going to unless I intervened, which I did so with a calm ferocity.
Just as he brought his arm out to use as a weapon, I pushed through and drove my arms underneath his so it looked like he’d been about to hug me. I didn’t know his name, so I said the first thing that came to mind. “Sugar Booger! I’ve been looking everywhere for you sweetheart!” What happened next paralyzed everyone who saw it with shock. I stood on my tip toes and pressed my lips against his soft moist ones. I don’t know how long I held the kiss but I made it seem as if there were weeks of passion and love stored in that kiss, I didn’t use my tongue or anything; I just puckered up and pressed, as odd as it may have sounded.
I released my hold and stepped back with a soft sigh. The boy was drowned in confusion. He’d find out why eventually, but for the moment, he had to suffer.
“I can’t wait to see you tonight!” I teased in a flirty manner. I turned around and pretended to notice the rich kids for the first time. “Oh, hey boys!” I looked around quickly. “where are your female shadows?-Oh! I’m sorry! I didn’t realize your condition!” I paused, but when I did so, one of them spoke up. How rude.
“Condition?”
“I know women like understanding men, but you boys are just too soft!” I poked the flabby beer belly he had forming. “Sometimes you have to stand firm to your beliefs, if you know what I mean.” I offered a sweet smile before turning on my heel and walking out of the food court. Jade was sitting straight up at a nearby table gawking at me, She expected me to come sit with her, that was apparent in her eyes following my every movement, but I wasn’t going to give her that right, after all, we shared a bedroom. I not only walked out of the food court, but out of school for the rest of the day.
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