Breathe

by Tania Trozzo

  For a long time it made her a bit sad to look straight in her eyes. There was a time when she looked at herself in the mirror to remind herself to be strong, to push forward, that everything would be ok. In fact, Tracey, made her look in the mirror every day and made her repeat a mantra until she was once again safe in her family’s arms, well, her aunt and uncle’s arms at least. She smiled. She remembered the day she looked up from the chair she had been sitting in at the police station, with an officer holding her hand while she waited. Once she saw her aunt and uncle walk through the door, she jumped up and she raced to them. One of her first thoughts was that she wouldn’t have to say the words Tracey taught her anymore. So she made sure to not say them again. But habits sometimes were hard to break and still today if she looked directly in her eyes for too long, those words would start coming. She shook her head and headed to her room quietly, not wanting to wake anyone up. She locked her door, sat on her bed and looked outside. She reached into her pocket and pulled out the baggie with the weed and stared at it. What the hell was she going to do with it?

  11

  Gabe

  The weekend went by quickly. There was another party on Saturday night but Gabe didn’t go, neither did Alex, Connor, Leo and a few other guys from the soccer and lacrosse teams. Connor had an intense heart to heart with Leo. It was rare that Leo didn’t work the weekend so they took advantage and spent time with him and ensured Bruno wouldn’t be there.

  On Monday, Gabe walked into school right behind Alex but next to Sonia. He could tell Sonia was nervous although she would never admit it. He showed her the office and both he and Alex waited outside while she did what she had to do. While they waited Gabe kept glancing around.

  “Who are you looking for?” Alex smirked.

  Gabe let out a breath, “Have you seen Leo yet?” Just as he mentioned his name, Leo popped up from around the corner with Bruno right next to him animatedly speaking.

  Leo stopped where they were standing, “Hey you guys. What’s up?”

  “All good Leo, all good. Where you headed, man?” Alex replied.

  “Come on dude, let’s go.” Bruno said to Leo.

  But for once Leo looked at him and replied, “Go ahead Bruno, I’ll catch up later.” Bruno initially looked at him as though he had sprouted a head but then looked irritated. He left quickly, glancing behind his back.

  Leo turned to Alex and Gabe “I’ll wait with you two.” Gabe smiled slightly and nodded and in the meantime Alex and Leo started to discuss Sunday’s football game on TV. While they waited for Sonia to finish up and get her schedule, Gabe tried to not look around. He knew he was trying to find Clara but he didn’t want to seem so obvious.

  Sonia finally finished and they headed through the hallway, everyone parting aside to let them through, some glancing at them with admiration. Kristin caught his gaze briefly before lowering it and then moving closer to her friends. While he was noticing that exchange, he realized suddenly that Sonia was no longer with them. He turned around and saw Sonia smile and wave good bye while a mane of brown hair turned the corner. He looked at Sonia, who winked but proceeded as usual until they all had to split up to head to their lockers and to class.

  Gabe didn’t have to go to his locker for his first class so he decided he would go afterwards. His first class passed by quickly and as he was walking to grab his books for his next class, Connor caught up with him. They got to his locker and Connor began to lean on the lockers to his right. Gabe grabbed what he needed from the top shelf and right at that moment Sonia popped up.

  “Hey!” she seemed frazzled and he noticed instantly that Connor straightened up from the locker. “I have to go to computer science, can you tell me the fastest way to get there?”

  Gabe turned and started to open his mouth when Connor jumped in and said, “I’ll take you. I have to go that way anyway.”

  “Are you sure?” Sonia asked him.

  Connor shrugged, “Yep. See you in English Gabe.”

  “Bye, Gabe!” Sonia exclaimed as they walked away.

  Gabe raised his eyebrows and shook his head. He shoved what he no longer needed inside and was about to close the door to his locker when something caught his eye. Taped to the back of his locker, difficult for others to see, was a little plastic baggie. He furrowed his brow and hesitantly reached for it. He looked around without making it so obvious. Ensuring no one was next to him, he grabbed it off the back wall of his locker. He didn’t realize that he had been holding his breath but he let it out once he realized it was empty. He looked around again to see if anyone was paying attention to what he was doing. Gabe was certain that this is the baggie that went missing at the party. He stuffed it in his pocket and headed to class.

  As he walked to his class he kept searching trying to figure out if anyone looked suspicious or smug but he didn’t notice anything out of the ordinary. Gabe couldn’t focus during his entire next class. He was convinced it was a message but it just didn’t make any sense. The bag was empty so whoever did it wasn’t trying to get him in trouble, at least he didn’t think so. Although it could be a warning, it just didn’t feel like one. He felt like someone was telling him that it was taken care of, and in a way that meant that they had taken care of him and his friends. He usually was the one that took care of other people so he wasn’t entirely comfortable with the feeling.

  His class ended and he cleared out of the room rather quickly needing to get Alex’s perspective on things. Alex was walking with a few people and he looked up and noticed Gabe’s strange expression. Gabe nodded at him and they headed into a more secluded area near English so he could also grab Connor. As they saw Connor head down, he looked at them and immediately headed over.

  “What’s up? Is something wrong?” Gabe lead them around the corner away from prying eyes. He knew that Sarah and Kristin would head to the same class soon as well as others. He pulled the baggie from his pocket and showed it to them. Both guys furrowed their eyebrow and look at him.

  “What is that?” Alex asked. He knew well enough that if Gabe was showing him something there was a reason, he wasn’t just showing him a tiny Ziploc bag.

  “I found it taped to the back of my locker. I’m pretty sure this is the one that I lost at Connor’s house the other night, just that this one is empty. “

  “Ok, but that is just strange. Why would someone do that? I could understand if it was full, then maybe to get you in trouble. But empty? It’s like they want you know that they know you lost it and they found it,” Alex noted.

  “Well, we figured someone had found it right? It fell from your pocket, they found it and now want to let you know. But still they didn’t get you in trouble. Unless, it’s a warning that they will get you in trouble. I mean whoever it was, they were able to open your locker dude,” Connor remarked.

  “I don’t know. I am going with my gut on this. I don’t think they want to get me in trouble, I think they want me to know that they protected me. But then, why not just tell me so I know who is it.”

  Alex was thoughtful, “Maybe they will want a favor in the future. Are we sure it wasn’t Bruno? We all know that it’s kind of something that he would do.”

  Connor responded immediately, “I was thinking the same thing but Bruno isn’t smart enough to open a locker. Plus, Bruno would tell you about it instantly, not play any games. He would want you to know that he saved your ass so he could reap the benefits. Whoever did it, is very smart.”

  Alex and Gabriel agreed. “It still leaves me feeling uneasy and I’ll have to change my combo lock but I think it’s someone that wants to protect us,” Gabe insisted.

  “Ok, well let’s keep our eyes open. Whatever happens, we will figure it out. But outside of us three no one knows. Sonia included. I don’t want her involved. I’ve got to get to class, I’ll see you guys at lunch, let me know if you see anything fishy and I will do the same,” Alex stat
ed and waved two fingers in goodbye.

  “Later. Come on man, let’s get to English. Mr. Brooks hates it when someone is late.” Connor turned toward the classroom.

  “Yeah, ok.” Gabe kept thinking and looking around if anyone seemed keen on what they were doing. They walked into class a few minutes late gathering the attention of quite a few of the students sitting down. He noticed Kristin looked at him with a hurt expression and then quickly looked at Sarah and looked down at her desk. Sarah on the other hand, looked pretentious and actually smiled as they walked in. But his attention was on the girl sitting in the chair next to his. Clara met his gaze and then glanced at Connor who had said hello to her. She smiled briefly.

  “Hey,” Gabe said to her trying to get her attention.

  She quickly glanced at him, swallowed and responded, “Hi.”

  Gabe quickly sat down as Mr. Brooks looked pointedly at both he and Connor for being late. Gabe nodded to Mr. Brooks and put his notebook on his desk. Mr. Brooks started to hand out papers with an assignment. He went back to the front of the class and leaned on his desk.

  “This is your first major assignment. It is a good portion of your grade and gives you a feel of my expectations and standards. Please pay attention and don’t read what is on the paper for right now.” He looked around the class. “I want you to write about a specific event that changed your life or feels like it changed your life. For some of you, it’s easy to pinpoint as it’s something big, for others not so much. I want you to write the event, how it changed you, what you learned, if there is something you do different because of it, the positive, the negative, the good, the bad and the ugly. Just write. Write until you feel like you’ve gotten your point across, until others feel even a small part of what you felt.” Mr. Brooks paused a moment. “This is a work in progress and most of you will revise it multiple times. In a way this opens your own personal Pandora’s box and I’ve noticed that giving it to students in the beginning of the year, allows you to write better pieces on the other topics I have for you. This piece is freeing, if you allow it to be. And therefore, when you write everything else, you get to a point where I really see your creativity come out and that’s what I want. I want to challenge you, and I want you to challenge me. I ask that you be honest with yourself. There is no reason to lie to me, I’m not grading you on your experience, I’m grading you on your writing, on how you get your thoughts across. Have courage to not care what people will think when you write this.” Mr. Brooks continued, “I’m not going to go through the expectations of length and timeline. You can read that yourselves. The first copy is due in 3 weeks. Today in class I ask you to start your outline, come to me with any questions or concerns that you may have and start to really think about what it is you want to write about. That first topic that comes in your brain is usually the one you should choose. But I know it’s not easy and many of you will choose something safer, but I hope you don’t make it easy for yourselves because I won’t be easy on you. I’ll give you about 20 minutes before I walk around and see if everyone is ok or needs assistance.”

  Everyone in class opened their notebook and some began to write. Others rolled their eyes and you knew they were going to try to bullshit their way through this. Gabe knew what he was going to write about so he quickly jotted down some notes. He was ok with writing about his experience as long as he didn’t have to share it with the class. He turned to his left to where Clara was sitting and noticed she began to write something and then crossed it out. She took a deep breath and seemed like she was going to write something and then stopped again. Whatever she was thinking was causing her difficulty. He looked around at the others a bit quickly and they were all intent at writing or pretending to. He looked at Mr. Brooks who was also typing something on his laptop. He quickly wrote a note to Clara.

  Hey, r u ok?

  And handed it over to her. She looked up at Mr. Brooks and opened the note turning her head toward Gabe. At first, she looked surprised that he asked her, but as he was looking at her, for a brief moment he noticed how lost she seemed to be, maybe even a little bit scared. But then just like that, she blinked a few times and up went a wall. She wrote something on the note and handed it back to him quickly.

  Yep, just thinking.

  He looked around and wrote back.

  You seemed a bit…dazed.

  She read it, hesitated a second and then wrote back.

  Nope, just lost in thought.

  Well, she wasn’t one to give a lot of details that is for sure. He decided to change tactics.

  Did you have fun at the party?

  She looked at it and glanced at him with a hint of a smile.

  Yes, you?

  He looked at it and wrote again.

  Do you always answer questions so briefly?

  Clara wrote back quickly.

  Well, you are asking me yes or no questions.

  Gabe smiled. He continued to look around not wanting to attract attention.

  Ok. Well then, I had a good time playing beer pong.

  Just as he finished writing it and handed it over, Mr. Brooks started walking around. He looked at Clara and got back to work. He noticed she still wasn’t writing anything. In fact, Mr. Brooks stopped by her desk to ask if she was ok. He didn’t want to eavesdrop but he understood they were discussing the difficulty she was having today in writing the outline. She told him the assignment would be done on time but she needed some time to think prior to writing out the outline. After about another 5 minutes he told the class to stop and to open to the first chapter of their current book. He lectured for about 15 minutes and asked a few questions until finally the bell rang.

  “Chapter 2 and 3 for tomorrow everyone. Feel free to email me if you have any questions about the assignment. But I recommend you start working on it. It seems easy but I assure you that it’s not as simple as it seems.”

  As they started standing up, Connor turned to Gabe and started talking about practice. Gabe then looked down and noticed a small folded piece of paper on the top of his book. He opened it.

  Me too.

  He smiled and turned to her when he realized that she was already on her way out the door. The girl definitely moved fast. He put the note in his pocket. While Connor and he exited the classroom, he looked up ahead trying to see where Clara was going. Leo caught up with them while they were walking down the hallway, as did a few others. As he walked to his locker he remembered his secret admirer, if that is what we could call them. For the entire period of English he had almost forgotten what had happened. Although he was suspicious and kept looking around surprisingly he wasn’t worried. Sooner or later he would know who this mystery person was.

  12

  Clara

  Clara let out a breath as she rushed from English class. Her chest felt tight and she needed some air. Today was turning out to be a hell of a day. What was she thinking? She had gotten rid of the weed but she couldn’t seem to get rid of that stupid Ziploc bag. The whole weekend she didn’t know why she held on to it. This morning she had gotten here early to practice with Ms. Lawson and to drop off an article for the newspaper for editing and she knew what she had to do. Maybe she should have included a note, but she was glad she didn’t. She wanted Gabe to know that someone helped him, but if you asked her why, she couldn’t say. If she was brave she would just tell him that it was her. But she couldn’t do that. He would start asking questions. She didn’t want to go back there. Ever. Deep breath, Clara.

  She rushed to the bathroom and took a few paper towels and ran them under cold water. She then proceeded to close herself in a stall and put those towels on the back of her neck. She breathed carefully. What a day. Of course she would choose to do something like leave him a message of some sorts in his locker, the same day he decided to write notes to her in class. She chuckled and shook her head. How fucking ironic. And then to top it all off, she has t
o write an assignment about something that changed her. Really? Gee I wonder what that could be? She continued to breathe in and out until she finally felt ready. She threw away the paper towels and stepped out of the stall to wash her hands. As she did a few girls walked in, or more precisely Jamie and Eva. Behind them were a few others who went straight to the mirror. Jamie looked at her.

  “Well, well, hi Clara. I heard that you are now part of the soccer team thanks to your little stunt in gym class the other day.”

  Clara looked at Jamie. “I’m pretty sure I just played some soccer like you did.”

  “Well, don’t think that you can just come in, and get play time on the field. You’re going to have to earn it. One gym class isn’t going to change that.”

  “I have no problem earning it, Jamie. I know I can play. Just like I am sure you can play too.”

  “Well, we’ll see, won’t we?”

  “I guess we will. See you at practice.”

  Jamie had tried to get in her face but Clara stepped around her and walked out. Eva looked at her and didn’t say anything but nodded. She walked out of the bathroom and started walking outside. Air. She needed some air. She heard someone calling her name and looked up. Sonia reached out to grab her arm lightly.

  “Hey, where are you headed?”