In a World Just Right

by Jen Brooks

  “Thank you, sir. I appreciate it.”

  I hold up the summer school application to indicate my thanks, and leave his office. Another student is waiting for him in the common area. She smiles at me as if I am a regular human being instead of an invisible man. I think her name is Candice.

  The hallway crowds are thinning as I step out of guidance. Mr. Diamond forgot to give me a late pass, and I don’t want to interrupt the beginning of his meeting with Candice, so I hurry to creative writing, hoping Mr. Eckhart forgives a few seconds’ lateness. I’ve never seen him issue a detention, but I’ve never known anyone to need one in his class either.

  The late bell rings just as I reach the door. I have to stop Mr. Eckhart from closing it on me. I slide into the classroom and see the desks arranged in groups again. As usual Kylie is sitting by the window with Zach and Emily, but there’s one empty desk in their group. My usual group mates, Kaitlyn and Luis, are sitting with two empty desks.

  I want to sit with Kylie, but she doesn’t end my awkward pause by waving me over. She glances up at me, but Emily is talking to her, and she shifts her attention back to her friend.

  I am, to use a good creative writing word, crestfallen. I thought yesterday’s outing meant Kylie would publicly acknowledge me today. Without an invitation I can’t just join them, so I go to my usual spot with Kaitlyn and Luis and sit facing Kylie. She glances over again but gives no hint that I should have chosen to sit with her. I wonder if she wanted me to, or if she’s afraid what Emily and Zach would think, or if she’s had a change of heart since our kiss. Now I have eighty-four minutes of hell to worry about it in a class where I hoped I’d be in heaven.

  Mr. Eckhart begins class with a rare lecture. Today it’s classic and not-so-classic ways to deal with meter. Iambic pentameter and all that. I open my notebook to write down his examples of stressed and unstressed syllables and the famous poets who arranged them to make brilliant verse. As I thumb through to a fresh page, I pass the draft of the poem I wrote for Kylie last night. It’s crossed out and written over with words in the margins. It’s not Keats or Shelley, but its final draft is sitting in my backpack waiting to be delivered to Kylie at the end of class.

  COSMIC MYSTERIES

  by Jonathan Aubrey

  Who is God,

  And what is His plan?

  What is truth,

  And how do we know it?

  When will it all end,

  And what will come after?

  Where is consciousness,

  And what is a dream?

  Why does the universe exist,

  And are we alone in it?

  How are you here

  And let me be with you?

  Okay. It’s really, really not Keats or Shelley, but it’s the best I could do, and in Kylie-Simms-is-my-girlfriend it’s exactly the kind of poem that would make Kylie tear up because she would know how much affection went into it. The thought of girlfriend Kylie triggers some guilt, but if real Kylie’s behavior today means she’s dumping me before we even go out, I have the rest of eternity to repent for the sin of cheating on my girlfriend. I flip past “Cosmic Mysteries” and smooth out the blank page that follows, but my thoughts wander away from Eckhart’s lecture.

  The idea of summer school makes me weary. Kylie won’t be summer schooling in either world. Instead she’ll be working her summer job before going off to college. In Kylie-Simms-is-my-girlfriend, that means the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. I don’t know where real Kylie is going to school.

  In Kylie-Simms-is-my-girlfriend, with credits intact and good SATs, I’ve also been accepted at UMass Amherst. Kylie thinks we’re going off to college together, and I suppose we could, but I suspect it won’t be as easy to catch up on material in college as it has been in high school. I’ll have to miss a lot of college classes in Kylie-Simms-is-my-girlfriend if I’m simultaneously trying to make up high school classes to get a diploma in the real world.

  The bigger question here is what Mr. Diamond was asking me in his guidance office. What do I want to do with my life?

  I’ve totally been avoiding the answer. There’s this little birdie or guardian angel or scrap of conscience telling me to make something of my life, to stop escaping into made-up worlds because it’s the easy way out.

  Well, little birdie/angel/conscience, I’m happy in my other worlds. Since when is it a sin to be happy? Huh? The real world is nothing but pain and disappointment, so get off my case about my drug of choice. My crappy life has earned me the right to be an addict of world-making.

  What’s that, little birdie? If my other worlds are so great and the real world so awful, how come I keep coming back?

  I don’t know!

  I don’t know why I haven’t cut the cord and chosen life in Kylie-Simms-is-my-girlfriend. With a girlfriend’s love and a college education secured, it should be a no-brainer, right? Right? Why don’t I close my eyes to the real world and disappear forever into happiness?

  Because despite all my misery, I want to be real. Real is real. Some primal part of me understands that the worlds I make can’t substitute for the real thing. They are a consolation for everything I’ve lost. They keep me just happy enough that I can bear coming back to the real world time and time again. Ironically, my worlds are my tether to reality. Without them I might not have the will to live.

  I thought I could get away with this come-and-go existence, but the desire to be real has become so strong since I made that mix-up in the hall when I almost kissed Kylie. It’s no longer good enough to have scattered happiness across a bunch of worlds. I want the best parts of my life to be here, in the real world, to the point where I don’t need to make other worlds anymore. I want Kylie’s love for real. I want friends. I want family. I want my life to have a purpose.

  But the real world denies me all of this, so I don’t know what to do but flit back and forth from one made-up place to the next, gathering bits of each into a chopped-up pile of life. I don’t know how to transfer all the pieces into this one real world to complete a picture, and no one can help me. I am utterly, utterly alone in this.

  I probably should start considering plans that don’t include Kylie—life plans for how to get a degree and a job and a real life. But when I try to do that, my soul cries out for her.

  And my soul cries out for something else, too. Something lost when I was eight years old that I want more than anything, more than even Kylie, to have back.

  I’m pissed at Mr. Diamond for doing this to me. Today of all days when I have to figure out what yesterday meant for me and Kylie. I don’t want to think about the future, because at this moment everything feels like it hinges on the next thing Kylie does.

  The clock says ten minutes have passed, and my notebook is still blank. I’ve been watching Kylie the whole time. Kind of openly. She’s caught me doing it but hasn’t smiled. She hasn’t frowned either, so I don’t know what to think.

  People are putting their notebooks away, and I realize Eckhart has given us a direction I didn’t hear. I close my notebook and wait for the handout he’s delivering group by group. It turns out to be a worksheet on poetic meter. Luckily, after forcing us to take a crack at the answers independently, he lets us discuss with our group mates. Kaitlyn and Luis have observed that I took no notes and graciously help me with my answers. By the tentative way they speak, they know something’s wrong. I wonder if they think I’m doing a posttraumatic crash freak-out.

  As class nears its end, Eckhart gives a homework assignment and we pack up. There is an awkward two minutes when we sit waiting for the bell, and Kylie doesn’t come over to talk to me. Even though others are traveling about, she stays parked with Emily and Zach.

  I take out my sealed envelope containing “Cosmic Mysteries” and debate whether to deliver it on the way out. I was so sure of Kylie when I kissed her yesterday, but an entire class’s
worth of cold shoulder has shot my confidence.

  “Are you okay?” Kaitlyn asks. Her eyebrows are raised in worry for me. It’s touching, but a little weird coming from Kaitlyn Frost of the unicorns and rainbows.

  “Yeah. Just tired. Thanks for helping me today.”

  Then the bell rings and we’re all headed for the door.

  I hold the poem in my hand and rise slowly, trying to time my exit to coincide with Kylie’s. She looks at me and lets Emily and Zach move ahead of her. I take this as encouragement.

  Instead of meeting me at the doorway, though, she stops to talk to Mr. Eckhart. She doesn’t indicate in any way that she wants me to stay, but unwilling to give up just yet, I go out the door and stand in the hallway. The classroom empties, and a moment later Kylie emerges.

  “Oh,” she says, like we’ve just bumped into each other in an elevator she thought would be empty.

  I think my hand is sweating. The envelope I’m holding feels slick.

  “I didn’t know if I should wait for you,” I say.

  Her cheeks pinken, and she gets flustered. “Oh, I, uh, I’m sorry. I had to talk to Mr. Eckhart about something.”

  “Okay, well . . .” I don’t know what else to say. The halls are crowded with kids. Eckhart is coming toward the door, and we’re blocking his exit. I can’t read Kylie’s emotion. “I guess I’ll see you later.” Some vague, maybe-in-class-tomorrow later. I turn to go.

  She grabs my arm. “No, wait.” Her fingers fall away when I turn. “What class do you have next?”

  “Spanish, Perez, E-Hall.”

  “I’m headed to F-Hall. We can walk partway.”

  Eckhart is almost upon us, and he clearly sees us talking. I wonder if he’s the kind of teacher who has an opinion of me, and what he thinks as I walk away with Kylie Simms.

  It’s not far from creative writing to the place where E- and F-Hall split, and it’s a conversation-free journey. I doubt anyone passing would believe that we’re walking together. When we reach the stairs she has to climb to F-Hall, we pause.

  While trying to empty my voice of all pleading and desperation, I ask her, “Do you think we could get together later?”

  She pulls her upper lip in. Thinking about it. Then she nods. Without another word, without any concrete plan, she slips by me and up to her class. I’m left standing there with the envelope still in my hand.

  This weird sensation comes over me. As the chaos of changing classes swirls all around, I get this impression that everything in my world is a painting on a window, and if I walk up and scratch some paint away with a thumbnail, I’ll see a great, wide something else beyond. Something foreign and not so nice—the real, real world I’ve never had to face. Is this what it means to hit a milestone—like high school ending—in your life? To come one step closer to adulthood? Is that great, wide something else the world of responsibility Mr. Diamond was talking about? I reach out to a post holding up the staircase and scratch some paint off it. Brown flecks fall away and expose the royal-blue layer of some year past.

  * * *

  After track practice in Kylie-Simms-is-my-girlfriend, I give “Cosmic Mysteries” to girlfriend Kylie. She reads it with the usual ardor she brings to all my poetry, and gives me a great big hug for thanks.

  “What’s the occasion?” she asks.

  “Just another day in love.”

  Cheesy, I know, but I get a kiss for that. And another kiss. And I’m glad it was my girlfriend who got the poem from my hand.

  I’m guessing that somehow real Kylie will feel this moment, just like she’s felt the others lately. It’s almost like giving the poem directly to her, too.

  CHAPTER 12

  GIRLFRIEND KYLIE HAS TO BUCKLE down and get an English paper written, so I luckily don’t have to make an excuse for not seeing her tonight. I go back to the real world and dial up real Kylie to see if she meant it earlier about getting together. She doesn’t pick up her cell, so I call her house number.

  Her mother answers. “Hello?”

  “Hi. Is Kylie there, please?”

  “Who’s calling?”

  “Jonathan.”

  “Sure. Just a minute.” A microsecond pause. “Jonathan . . . Aubrey?”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “Okay, sure. Just a minute, Jonathan.” She calls to Kylie, and I hear the click of another phone picking up.

  “Hello?”

  “Hi, Kylie. It’s Jonathan.” Another click tells me Mrs. Simms has hung up her handset.

  “I know. Caller ID.”

  “Yeah.” Now that we have that out of the way. “I didn’t know if you still wanted to get together tonight.”

  “Well . . .” I feel an excuse coming on. I have too much homework, or my mom needs me to do something, but instead she sighs like she’s resigned to fate. “Okay. Have you eaten yet?”

  “Uh-uh.”

  “How about Mexican Station?”

  Does she know I love tacos, or is that just a lucky guess?

  “Should I pick you up?” I ask.

  “If you want. I can go whenever.”

  She’s not reluctant, but she’s certainly not thrilled. “Be there in a few minutes.”

  When I get to her house, she emerges in jeans, sneakers, and a Windbreaker. Her hair is pulled back in her signature ponytail. She makes no comment on my shiny red car, which is good because I’m a little embarrassed about it. I know high school boys are supposed to appreciate nice cars, but that’s because high school boys driving them want people to notice how cool they are. As I’ve said, I strongly prefer going unnoticed.

  Because it’s a Monday night, there isn’t a wait at Mexican Station. We’re shown to a table by the window where we have a view of the parking lot. At least if my car’s stolen, I’ll be able to ID the culprit.

  I haven’t done any of those gentlemanly things like open Kylie’s car door or pull out her seat, because I get the sense that fawning over her will only increase the distance I want to bridge.

  “What are you getting?” she asks as she peeks over her menu. She’s noticed I’m not reading mine.

  “I always get steak tacos.”

  I’m curious to see what she picks, because girlfriend Kylie is physically incapable of eating something other than a chicken burrito in a Mexican restaurant. She closes the menu as our server approaches, and sure enough, we order steak tacos and a chicken burrito. When our server leaves, we start crunching on the free chips and salsa.

  “Let’s play hypothetical questions,” Kylie says.

  “Huh?”

  “You know, questions with situations that could never happen, but you give an answer anyway.”

  “I know what hypothetical questions are.” There’s mariachi music blaring over the PA system, so I wasn’t sure I heard her correctly. The idea of playing a game is weird, but her face is deadly serious. “Okay, I guess.” Girlfriend Kylie has never asked me to play hypothetical questions.

  “Do you want to go first?” she asks.

  “No, you.”

  “Okay.” She scoops salsa onto a chip and stuffs it into her mouth before it drips. “If you had to live in one season—spring, summer, fall, or winter—for the rest of your life, what would you pick?”

  “Hmmmm.” She’d probably say summer. Girlfriend Kylie has always been in love with summer. “I’d pick fall.”

  “Why?”

  “I like leaves.”

  “Because of the colors? Or you like jumping into a big, raked pile?”

  “Everything about leaves.” I crunch down two chips loaded with salsa. “And you?”

  “Winter, definitely.”

  I finish chewing and swallowing my bite while I deal with my surprise. “What do you mean, winter?”

  “You know, snow and Christmas and two school vacations.”

 
; “But you hate winter.”

  Her head tilts in surprise. “Winter has always been my favorite season. What makes you think I hate it?”

  “Uh, lots of people hate winter in New England, so I just assumed.”

  She narrows her eyes. “Don’t assume things about me, Jonathan. I think you’ve been making a few assumptions lately.”

  The verbal slap warms my face with embarrassment. “Sorry.”

  “You pick a question now.”

  “Okay.” I’m not supergood at this, so I say the first thing that pops into my head. “If you could talk to any one person, dead or alive, for five minutes, who would it be and what would you talk about?”

  “That is so not original.”

  “And your question was somehow the awesomest hypothetical ever?”

  “At least it’s not asked in every English class I’ve ever taken.”

  “So what’s your answer in every English class you’ve ever taken?”

  She sits a little straighter in her chair and crosses her forearms on the table. “Once I picked Jesus. Once I picked JFK. Once I picked Amelia Earhart. And once, the very first time I ever was asked, I picked you.” Her tone dares me to be surprised about that.

  I guess I should be surprised. Or startled or something, but that kind of admission seems par for the course these days. “What could you possibly want to talk to me about?”

  “That’s privileged information between me and my English teacher.”

  “Isn’t there a rule that the askee has to answer the whole question?”

  She caves with a quick shrug. “I wanted to ask if you were mad at me.”

  “Why on earth would I be mad at you?”

  “I was in fourth grade. Remember I told you I thought you ignored me in third grade because you were mad at me?”

  “Jeez, I hope you’re over that by now.”

  “I don’t know. You seem a little irritated.”

  “I kissed you yesterday, Kylie. I thought we left the park on a good note. What happened between yesterday and today?”