“Yeah, I’m fine.”
I bent down and picked up the gigantic eraser. I needed to get some erasing done. I’ve been told the office had spies and narks and that, if they peeked into the window of Max’s room and saw I was talking, I could lose my financial aid. With six months left before I graduated, I didn’t want to mess it up.
Besides, part of me wanted him to be intrigued. Less was more. I wanted him to push. If I kept part of my life mysterious, he would take the bait. Although, the whole thing could backfire and he could lose interest, leaving me with the desperate act of flirting and asking stupid questions. God don’t let me reach that level of desperation.
He stood for a moment longer before he headed back to his desk and pulled out a blank piece of paper. I could feel him staring at me. I wondered what he was thinking. I knew what I wanted him to think. I stole glances when I could, adjusting my arms to see underneath. He scribbled on the paper, folded it and stood behind me.
“Wilson, I know you’re pretty much on your own. Well, I want you to take this…call if you need someone to talk to. Okay?” He pushed the folded paper toward me. He held it out in the open air between us. I watched it quiver. I looked around, and made sure nobody saw me grab it from him before I shoved it in the front pocket of my khaki shorts. I swear he saw my heart pound heavy in my chest. I heard it.
“Thanks.”
Here we go, he’s making his move. I’m so ready for this! I’ll keep it cool for the next month, act like nothing is going on between us, and when I turn eighteen, nobody will be able to stop us. I will be a legal adult. My head spun off into images of us holding hands, walking down the halls at school, and sneaking away for lunch.
Christmas break—public schools called it winter break. I didn’t know what the difference was, except one reminded me I shared a birthday with Christ, and the other made me think about dirty snow. I will be here at the dorms because, well let’s face it—I don’t really have any place to go. Maybe Max will be here with me and he could take me to meet his parents. That would work.
I watched him strut back to his desk. I couldn’t wait to open the note. I continued wiping the boards while he packed up his books and laptop. He tossed a glance my way before he dragged his briefcase across the top of his desk.
“Want me to walk you out?” The way he looked at me melted my heart, causing it to drip into the pit of my stomach, teasing my butterflies, fighting to be free.
“That’s okay. I still have the back board to clean.”
“Here, let me help you. Get you outta here faster.” He grabbed the huge eraser out of my hand, went to the back board, and started wiping. okay, if that wasn’t a sign that he liked me then I didn’t know what was.
“Thanks…,” I stood and watched him for a moment before I had to turn and wipe his words from the board.
“You’re welcome,” he continued.
I wanted to remember this moment forever.
Chapter two:
I sat on my bed staring at the folded paper. There was a part of me that wanted to live in the moment when he had handed it to me. The butterflies in my stomach, the smell of the room, the letter quivering in his hand—I was there again, in my mind. They say that your imagination is the key to your soul. My deadbolt had been sprung wide open with my thoughts about him.
“Whatcha doin’?” a squeaky voice invaded my moment. It was Cindy Browler, my roommate. Typical rich kid. You recognize her name, right? Browler? Her grandfather is the owner of the hip food chain Browler Burritos; thought you might know. They only have about two hundred restaurants in the state of California alone, which makes them one of the richest families in the state. The food was edible; nothing to write home about. People eat up that trendy crap. All it took was a couple of movie stars and sports figures and, all of a sudden, it was the place to be. Anyway, Cindy was an okay person; needy, but who wasn’t sometimes?
“I was just thinking about the test in trigonometry tomorrow; you ready?” Small talk was never a strong suit of mine. But after being roommates with Cindy for the last three and a half years I’ve started to master the concept.
“No, I was thinking: this weekend I’m flying out to see my dad in Aspen, aaannd…you’re coming with me.” Her eyes rounded, hoping she didn’t cross the line with her demands. “I’ll teach you how to ski. You have to say yes, because I won’t go without you. Please.” She flung her body on my bed. The folded love letter from Max catapulted up off the comforter and down onto the floor, landing between the bed frame and my nightstand. Panic rushed through my body as my eyes followed its flight.
Was I really going to get a chance to say no? After she whipped out a ticket in my name? I took a deep breath and held it before I answered her.
“When are we leaving?”
She squealed, bouncing up and down on my bed.
“Oh, we are going to have so much fun. We fly out on Friday night and come back Sunday afternoon.” She jumped off my bed, grabbed her iPhone, and texted her dad that I was coming with her.
What that must feel like. Not the texting part, but the part where she got to tell her dad that I was coming. An experience that was foreign to me. I envied her; not for her money, her things, or even her looks. I envied that she was her daddy’s little girl. Something I will never be. We’re all dealt different hands in life; she got a full house and I busted with a pair of twos. Point was, if I sat around feeling sorry for myself I wouldn’t be going to Aspen this weekend with my roommate.
“O-M-G, do you know who has a cabin in Aspen?”
“No idea, but I assume you’re going to tell me.”
“Yeah, helloo our one and only Mr. Maximillain Goldstein.” She looked me square in the eyes.
“What?” A knot clogged my throat and captured my breath.
“I guess his family has owned their cabin since he…” her voice warped into the teacher from Charlie Brown. Wah, wah… wah, wah, wah...
My mind spun into a vision of Max and me finding each other; stealing hidden time from his family and my roommate to be together. Oh my God, what if he is up there this weekend? What was I going to wear? What was he going to think if I showed up there? What did the note say? What if the note was his number in Aspen? I gotta look at the note.
“Excuse me, Cindy. I need to go to the bathroom.” I reached down, swiped up the note, and pushed it into my pocket on the way to the bathroom. My heart was leaping and excited, I couldn’t wait to read it. I slammed the bathroom door, making sure to lock the knob. I couldn’t open the note fast enough. The folds were tight and the corners stuck together. My pulse fluttered rhythmically before betraying me into beats that thrashed cruelly.
I was totally confused. Was this a joke? What did this mean? I stared at what he wrote, blinking to clear my eyes. I looked again. I mouthed it slow as my eyes took in what my mouth was saying.
“Matt Gladstone 555-2129. Who the hell is Matt Gladstone? Another damn counselor?” My heart shattered. My dreams burst before my eyes. I didn’t understand. I replayed it in my head, him handing me the paper; the love note. He’d quivered as he handed it to me. He’d told me “call me, if you need to talk.” That’s what I remembered. “Call me”—that was what he said. I am such a fool, like he would even want to be with me. What a frickin’ idiot. I crumpled the note and tossed it to the ground. I didn’t cry. Fire could have burned from my eyes, and I still would have held it back. I learned a long time ago that nobody was worth crying over. Nobody! There was no Prince Charming to save me from my depressing life. The only person that could save me from tragedy was me. Maybe it seemed harsh, but it was the only way to save my sanity when I’ve had to fend for myself for so long. There was no mom to kiss it and make it better, daddy didn’t exist, and as far as I knew I was an only child. That was my life in a boarding school’s bathroom.
Cindy knocked on the door and I heard her clear her throat before she spoke.
“Wilson, are you still in here? Are you okay?”
&
nbsp; “Yeah, I just needed to go to the bathroom. I’ll be right out.”
I looked down and saw the crumpled note. I picked it up and flushed it. It was my luck that it would clog the toilet, but instead I watched the black ink bleed purple into the water as the force of the flush sucked it into the sewer. Goodbye, Matt Gladstone. And to you too, Max Goldstein.
I pushed my hands into the freezing water from the tap, because washing them was the acceptable thing to do after you fake using the toilet.
“I’m so excited that you’re going with me to Aspen.” Cindy asserted through the closed door before pounding an enthusiastic rhythm with her hands.
“Me too,” I answered unlocking the door and letting her into the bathroom.
“Let’s get through school tomorrow, because after that it’s you, me, and the hot guys of Aspen,” she sang as she propped the door open with her foot and swung her hands through the air.
I pulled at the brown paper towels from the wall that dried my hands just enough to keep them damp. “Hot guys, that’s exactly what I need,” I mumbled.
***
It was lights out at 11:00 p.m. That was the time Wesley Academy expected us to be done with homework, bathing, and visiting. Well, sometimes—for a senior in high school—we’re up pretty late. Studying for trig tests, looking over government homework, and writing scathing love letters; it all can take up quite a bit of time.
Tonight I was up late writing a two-page letter to him (after I studied, of course). It was four pages; two front and two back, to be exact. Nobody will find it and he will never see it. It was my fantasy written in pen and it was for my eyes only. Don’t tell me you’ve never written a letter to someone you loved, with the full intention they’d never see it. Emotions too embarrassing blot the pages in roller-ball ink. His name with hearts to dot the i’s. Fantasies of him teaching me in his classroom alone scribbled delicately on the back of page two. How his lips felt as they kissed me. My dream of him taking me away from the lonesome hell I called my life. How bummed I felt when I saw someone else’s name and phone number on the note he handed to me. I never signed it—my love note. I folded it into a perfect square and hid it toward the headboard between my mattress and box springs.
Peaceful sleep came easy that night. Maybe it was because I’d written my feelings down, finally releasing all the pent-up emotion I had about him. No nightmares of huge gorillas chasing me with sock puppets or Billy Ray Cyrus being my long-lost father. For the first time in a long time, I dreamt I was a little girl again. I was about eight, it was summer, and I was wearing a bright yellow sundress with huge white polka-dots. My long, blonde hair soaked up and splashed the sun across my face. The faint aroma of freshly cut grass was vibrant in the air. I was happy and my deep blue eyes were filled with hope. I was barefoot as I twirled in the grass at my grandparent’s house. I had a toothless smile as I danced with my stuffed bear, Nemo. I cradled him in my arms; he was as soft as a field of dandelions. I knew we were safe; we had each other. Then, together, we dissolved into a swirl of primary colors.
I woke up before my alarm went off at six thirty. I thought I would be rejuvenated. I wanted to feel like I was eight again; instead I was totally wasted. I pushed the alarm off before it belched its awful, core-rattling noise, and stumbled to wake Cindy. She was already gone. Her bed was made and her bag at the end was already packed. Wow, she was so efficient. Kinda made me feel like I was already behind in a game we hadn’t even started. She was down court, hammering three-pointers and I was still back, passing in the ball. I grabbed my clothes and the towel I was sharp enough to lay out the night before, and headed to the showers.
I liked to shower later in the morning because most girls stressed to get their make-up on and get their poufy hairdos to look right. I was fortunate to not have been given that chromosome at birth. The one that makes a freak out of you when you turn thirteen years old, turning you into a mirror-hogging, narcissistic bitch. Don’t get me wrong, I care what I look like, I just don’t need a two-hour block of time in front of a mirror. Thirty minutes was more than enough time. Usually when I’ve finished my shower and used the mirror, only a couple of girls are left to share it. It was so much more manageable without jockeying for position. I am the senior, therefore, the matriarch of the mirror at seven thirty in the morning.
My first period class starts at 7:55, plenty of time to run across the courtyard to Conversational Spanish. Señora Puttabaugh (don’t say it, I know, she doesn’t sound Latino at all. Trust me, she married to get that name) was one tough Señora. She locked the door at 7:55 and, if you were even a second late, you would miss the entire class. They might as well mark a big fat “U” for unexcused absence across the attendance record. Tardy and truant were words that didn’t exist in her language. You were either there on time or not at all.
Now, I had it down to a science. As long as my feet were hitting the cement of the courtyard by 7:50, I was okay. I would be in her class, Conversando Español, with a whopping thirty seconds to spare. Today was no different. I hated her class, but I muscled through it so I could go to college and create a better life. That didn’t come out right.
My life hasn’t been torturous by any means. I didn’t have parents that beat me or verbally abused me. I’ve been given an opportunity for a great education. I ate three squares and had clean clothes every day. I typed all my work on a school-issued MacBook Pro with wireless internet in my room. And, to top it off, I was attending one of the most prestigious boarding schools around, surrounded by some of the most influential people in California.
Señora Puttabaugh gave us a pop quiz on the Mexican history of Caesar Chavez—in Spanish. Told you she was tough; hope I passed. I slept through my second period class, Humanities. Mrs. Quest was the most monotonous, boring teacher at Wesley. What an interesting subject, the human condition, right? Survival of the fittest and the plight of the common man, right versus wrong, moral codes of conduct, studies based on the mortality of the human race, how could that be boring? She was the queen bee at making it unbearable. Sawed logs, that was all I had to say about second period.
I don’t get lonely; bet you didn’t think I was going to say that. Well, I don’t. Most people think that, because I don’t have active parents, I must be completely messed up; that I should be lonely, all filled with angst and hate. Why? So my life can be as miserable as theirs? Whether I believed in a guy on a cloud in lace-up, leather sandals holding a massive staff or a presence of energy that wanted to see itself so bad that it created us in its image, what right did I have to mess it up? Either way, I only had one chance to make this life of mine matter. Sorry, wait, I’m sorry…my bad. This happens when I fall asleep in Humanities. Every single time, I get preachy. Sorry about that.
My day was going as normal as it could. I had a small break between second and third period. I liked to get an orange juice and chug it before English Lit. I needed the sugar. Mrs. Clouser was another piece of work. Although I didn’t hate her, I didn’t particularly want to spend any extra time with her.
I was convinced she was from the Elizabethan time, it was a bit frightening. She was a Shakespeare freak. Tell me you’ve had a teacher like her. She was able to quote every line, by memory, of Juliet’s balcony monologue while answering in a low, masculine voice for Romeo. Didn’t she know that the parts were all played by guys? Please, it was totally creepy. It was so frustrating because I really hoped she rented the movie Romeo and Juliet from the early nineties. Leonardo DiCaprio, now he made Romeo worth watching.
Mrs. Clouser popped in a videotape from the late sixties; the thing couldn’t go twenty seconds without looking like it was going to break and crack apart. The actors were all in tights. So, of course, where did my eyes go? You could figure that out. The guy who played Romeo was cute, but he was Lenard not Leonardo. The special effects sucked, the dance scenes made me dizzy, and the music was so sappy I almost threw up. It was so bad, I couldn’t even force myself to live in their fantasy. M
aybe it was groundbreaking back in the sixties, but it was heartbreaking in the Y2K.
When the bell rang, I couldn’t get out of there fast enough. As we left, Clouser reminded us that we had to write an essay on the first half of the movie over the weekend and turn it in or else we weren’t going to be able to see the second half. Was that a promise?
Lunch, finally. I haven’t seen Cindy yet and we have Government together. I was hoping to eat lunch with her and then head over to Goldstein’s class together, or maybe she would agree to cut his class with me. I wouldn’t need to tell her the rotten details, just that I wanted to pack and get ready, and that I needed her help. We had a substitute anyway.
Cutting wasn’t the easiest thing to do at Wesley; even though they didn’t watch you like a hawk or anything. They placed your education in your lap. They figured you should want to go to class so you could graduate and go to an Ivy League school. A lot of the students who attended Wesley were on a fast track to Stanford. All of the students were required to apply to at least three Ivy League schools. Let’s just say, most people would get one of their three top choices. On average they send ninety-eight percent of their student body to higher education and eighty-five percent go on to Ivy League schools. Bet you could guess where I’d fit in; and it wasn’t the majority.
“Wilson, there you are! I’ve been looking for you.” Joanie, my BFF, skipped across the cafeteria toward me. Her smile filled her face. She was the only person in the entire world who knew everything about me, even how I felt about you-know-who. That explains why she was also very protective of me. She was the only person in my life who I came to trust with anything. It’s not very common to have a friend you could tell your deepest, most intimate secrets to without fear they would end up on her Facebook page or in her tweets on Twitter.
“Oh, hey J. What’s up?” I always called her by her first initial. It was so much easier than saying Joanie. She locked her arms around my neck and kept skipping, taking me with her. I was somewhat shorter than her, so I flew forward—but was lucky enough to catch myself. I hated when she did that.
Wilson Mooney, Almost Eighteen Page 2