Sean Griswold's Head

by Lindsey Leavitt

  “I think Monica was Ross’s sister.”

  “Oh. See? I don’t even know their names. Not a Friends girl.”

  Sean laughs. “Well, if I ever see a CENTRAL PERK shirt, I know who I’m buying it for.”

  “Save your money.”

  Then it’s like the conversation is water out of a hose, and someone has turned off the faucet so everything that was flowing so well a second ago is just a slow drip, drip.

  “Well,” Sean says.

  “Yeah,” I say.

  “I better—”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Crazy running into you. Let me know if you spot any other red-shirted girls.”

  I notice he smells good, like peppermint and Ivory soap mixed with tire rubber, but in a good way. Like when you first get a new bike.

  While I no doubt smell like that gyro. I look in my bag for some gum and say, “I will. And you let me know if—” I look up and he’s already left, leaving me dissecting the conversation and planning how I’m going to grill my meddling BFF.

  “Serenity now,” I mumble to a nearby faceless mannequin.

  NINE

  The only thing worse than Jac stalking Sean is Jac stalking me. I ignore her all weekend, skipping the sleepover. But come Monday, she’s there after every class, trying to explain, acting like it didn’t happen, walking next to me and pointing out how much she’s helping me grow.

  “Gumdrop,” she coos right before third period. She’s painted on her Sympathy Look, the one that worked so well on her dad. Back when she used to see him. “You can’t be mad at me! I was helping you. I did it out of love. Someday you’ll thank me.”

  I grunt, which is the closest thing to a reaction she’s gotten. She jumps on it.

  “And maybe I went a little too far with the mall thing, but there was just so much potential there. Sean got to see you outside of school. He met your family. Really, my phone call was an act of sheer stalking genius!” She’s obviously not sorry and obviously oblivious to her own extreme dementia.

  “You’re unbalanced,” I say.

  “So are you. That’s why we’re friends. We’re still friends, right?” She watches me expectantly.

  “Yeah. Of course we are.” Fighting with Jac is like making a cake from scratch when there’s a box of Tastykakes in the pantry. It’s not worth the effort.

  “Oh, I have some notes for you.”

  “Notes?” I ask, not liking the sound of the word.

  “Well, just ideas, really. I think we need to start in on some drive-bys at this Saturday’s sleepover. Figure out what Sean’s doing and where he goes after school.”

  “We don’t drive.”

  “Maybe we can do a walk-by then.” Jac runs her tongue along her braces. “Or a run-by. We don’t want to look obvious. Maybe a bike-by?”

  Before I have time to stop Jac’s scheming, the bell rings and Miss Marietta stumbles in front of the class. Her complexion’s grimy and her normally stylish hair hangs in a greasy bun. Wild Wednesday on a Sunday night? She slides a DVD into the player and slumps into her seat.

  The video’s about mating rituals of animals in the Amazon. Miss Marietta must be really hammered to show a video like this to a bunch of teenagers. Then again, it’s the first video anyone actually watches with interest. Some students take notes—I doubt for educational purposes.

  As fascinating as it is to watch snakes getting hot and heavy, I keep finding myself focusing back on Sean’s head. I do a quick log in my journal, hoping the structure of it will help me stay objective.

  PFE

  February 3

  Topic: Five Senses of Sean

  1. See: Big—but not too big—head. Blond hair. Brownish/goldish eyes. Broad shoulders. Skinny waist. Sculpted calves (just calling it like I see it).

  2. Hear: Regular guy voice. Doesn’t use slang/swear words like other guys I know. Kind of says the word “all” weird, like “ull.”

  3. Taste: Gross! What am I supposed to do, lick him?

  4. Smell: Good. Better than most boys. You’d think all those years sitting behind him I’d notice how he smelled. Now, whenever he’s in the room, it attacks me like those department store perfume ladies who must get paid by the spritz.

  5. Touch: I don’t know if I’ve ever really touched him. Maybe once or twice when passing papers back. You know, even shorter, his hair looks so soft. Maybe it’s time I rub it a little. So I can give more concrete details.

  I stretch my hand across my desk, but stop when I realize the horror of what I was about to do. Pet Sean. Have I lost my mind? Why can’t I stay on track with this? I picked his head—not his scent, or Seinfeld know-how or hair texture.

  But something about this guy makes me want to tell him things. To confide in him. To get him to confide in me. Does he feel the same way? Would he still if he knew about this crazy assignment? Maybe I’m like an artist who gets too close to her subject matter. When you do a still-life painting of a bowl of fruit, you don’t take a bite of the apple.

  Maybe I need to leave Sean, and his head, alone.

  The cafeteria reeks, which could be because it’s Taco Boat day, but more likely it’s the sweat of teenagers lined up against the back wall, convulsively fidgeting as they await their report card doom. And for the first report card day in my life, I’m among the nervous throngs.

  This used to be my moment. Those letters declaring my educational fate sang. Not that I didn’t already know what they were. I would have already added up the percentages myself, checking that the teacher got it right, calculating the exact score I needed on each midterm to achieve an A.

  Now I have no clue how I’ve done on the tests. Ahead of me is a ticking time bomb, one I want to shove into my locker, not take home to my already-don’t-know-what-to-do-with-me parents. Except our school is all checks and balances with our grades—giving us a report card in school, sending one to our home, and posting the grades online. They do everything short of spray painting it on the parents’ bedroom wall. But maybe I can check the mailbox every day. And give our computer a virus so they can’t log on. Maybe I can escape.

  Escape is exactly what I want to do when I see Sean three people behind me in the G–L line. Curse that alphabetical connection! He thinks I’m stalking him, and even if this observation isn’t entirely off (it’s research!), I don’t want to give him any more reason to believe it now.

  I grab my report card and somehow open the sides without ripping the whole sheet, an amazing feat considering how difficult they make those stupid tear-on-this-line-fold-here-and-don’t-rip-here envelopes. I look straight down at the report card to avoid eye contact with Sean, who has retrieved his own and is just within my peripheral vision.

  But when I do look at my card, I notice a typo, not in my name where it usually is—people are always replacing the a with an e—but in the actual grades. There’s a B. I can handle that. Who wants to be valedictorian, anyway?

  But wait.

  C? That’s just average. I can’t be average. Average is for … average people. And yet that is the letter on my report card, right next to the A from the previous quarter. I got a C. In biology.

  Breathing is suddenly a very difficult task. I’m rifling through my backpack in pursuit of my brown paper lunch sack and wondering why you breathe in a sack anyway when I hear a voice that is becoming all too familiar.

  “How’d you do?” asks Sean.

  “Um, all right,” I say, breathing more slowly. “Just finding my happy place.”

  “I thought report card time is your happy place. Aren’t you the Queen of the Honor Roll?”

  I look down and when I look up again, Sean’s expression shifts, like he has X-ray vision and can see through my clenched fist, can see the grades, can see through my skull and into my mind that is crunching the numbers in a futile attempt to recalculate the unexpected, can see into my heart and knows that it’s beating just a fraction of a hair faster when he looks at me the way he’s looking. Like he can see into
my soul.

  I swallow, fighting the urge to crumple up my report card and stuff it into the trash. But instead, I shove it into Sean’s hands and say, “Looks like I’ve been demoted to Duchess.”

  Sean whistles. “Marietta killed me too. I think she was drunk when she did grades. No one got an A.”

  “Really? How do you know what other people got?”

  “Well, I don’t. Not for sure.” Sean blushes. “But it seems like everyone is complaining about their scores and stuff.”

  “Thanks for trying to make me feel better.”

  “One C doesn’t mean you’re not brilliant.”

  “Just average,” I say, even though the use of the word brilliant does help soften the blow. “But, did you do all right? Nothing your parents would ground you for?”

  “Grounding? My parents don’t bother with something like discipline, let alone caring about my grades. But this one is going on the fridge, even if I’m the only one who’ll look at it.”

  “Well, good for you.”

  “Yeah,” he says, his eyes flashing a bit before they crinkle into a smile. “Well, as exciting as discussing my lack of academic direction is, I have to swing over to Coach Jarvis’s office and ask him something about swim. See you later, Gritas.”

  “Later,” I say as Sean walks away. But I don’t want later, I want now. Now with Sean next to me, so I don’t have to face the Grade Goblin alone.

  “I like to bike,” I blurt out, sounding like I’m reciting from an I-can-read book. See Spot. See Spot Say Stupid Stuff.

  Sean cuts back across the cafeteria until he’s looking at me face-to-face. “Uh … that’s great.”

  “No, I mean … maybe we can go on a bike ride sometime?”

  “I didn’t know you ride.”

  “I don’t. Well, I do. Like around the neighborhood and stuff.” I straighten my back. “But I’m looking into getting into like, real bike riding. Maybe.”

  Sean breaks into a smile. “How I ride … it’s pretty intense. I don’t know if you can handle it.”

  I smile back, mostly to cover the fear that creeps up my neck. He gets one Seinfeld reference and calls me brilliant and suddenly I’m asking to ride with him? So much for scientific objectivity.

  “Try me.”

  TEN

  Ms. Callahan’s outfit burns my eyes as she greets me outside the office door. Orange skirt with a floral brown top. Pointy burgundy shoes that match her poorly applied lipstick. And hair weeping for some product. I really must save this woman.

  “How has your week been?” she asks with a warm smile that exposes lipstick-covered teeth.

  “Fine.”

  “I called you in because I took the liberty of checking your grades. I know you’re a bright student. Have you ever gotten a C before?”

  “Yes.” In second grade. On a spelling pretest.

  “Do you want me to talk to any of your teachers? Make them aware of … things?”

  “No. Just bombed a test. It happens.”

  “Yes.” Ms. Callahan folds her arms across her ample chest. “But does it happen to you?”

  I stare at the pictures of her obese feline crowding her desk. So she spends all day giving kids too much attention and spends all night giving her cat too much food. “Apparently, it does.”

  “How are your Focus Exercises going?” she asks, changing course.

  I almost smile. “Good. It’s … fun. I like the … order of it. And I’m learning a lot.”

  “I thought you would. Keep with it.” She pauses. “Although, next week I want to try something new.”

  My stomach lurches. “What’s that?”

  “The activity is called A Conversation with Dad.”

  I blink. My mouth opens. Closes. My left leg twitches. “My dad?” I croak.

  “Not your actual father.”

  My leg—my body—relaxes. “Then who?”

  “Well, whomever you like. Someone representing your father. It’s practice for the time when you’re ready to address him face-to-face. So it can be me—”

  “Not you.” I’m not about to pretend my chubby, Afroed guidance counselor is my bald, cheerful father. “Can I … invite a friend?”

  “If that’s what would make you most comfortable.”

  “I’ll ask my friend Jac. But can I still write about Shha—I mean, my Focus Object?”

  Ms. Callahan cocks her head to the side, a peculiar look on her face. “Do you think this Focus Object is really helping you gain introspection?”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Then, yes, whatever helps. Just make sure you don’t focus too much on this object. There will be a point where you’ll need to let go and move on.”

  Does asking my Focus Object out on a bike riding excursion count as moving on? Didn’t think so.

  PFE

  February 8, afternoon

  Topic: Analysis of how I’m focusing on … focusing.

  → I think I’ve figured out a way to maintain emotional distance from my Focus Object, yet still further my research.

  → I will still write about Sean’s head, but now I’m going to get INSIDE it.

  → I’ve set the goal of asking him five questions on our bike ride.

  → It’s arbitrary, but it feels like the next logical step (if any of this can be considered logical).

  It’s warm out for a Pennsylvania winter. So warm, I slip off my sweater and go outside in nothing but a long-sleeved shirt and jeans. Dirty patches of snow melt into the yellow grass. The air smells overly sweet, like a car air freshener that’s just been unwrapped. I kick a rock across the cracked driveway, watching it bounce until it hits the garage door. The sunlight glints on the basketball hoop.

  It’s been almost two months—an eternity—since I last played. Basketball used to be scheduled in right between homework and my self-allotted hour of TV. It isn’t in my schedule anymore. I don’t have a schedule anymore.

  I grab a basketball out of the garage and bounce it once or twice against the concrete. The smell of the rubber envelops me like teammates in a time-out huddle. I close my eyes and shoot the ball into a perfect arch. I don’t have to open them to know the ball has gone in. The chains cheer.

  A few more shots can’t hurt. Dad and I used to shoot every Thursday, until he got MS. Then our shooting became more sporadic, based on how he was feeling, I suppose, not that I knew that at the time. I think of the failed baskets I witnessed from my window that day. Even though his playing isn’t always that weak, Dad is never going to fully get his game back. One more relapse, and he may lose his shot completely. Although, seriously, that’s the least of his worries.

  Now I’m pumping the ball harder, maneuvering around invisible opponents. The crowd in my head roars louder with each fake out, each shot. I’m about to win the one-person championship when someone coughs. The applause ends. I drop the ball. My dad is standing on the walkway, his famous grin overtaking his face.

  “Don’t stop now, sunshine. I think you’re about to win the game.”

  “Oh. Hi.”

  His smile doesn’t fade. He’s so elated with his discovery, at my momentary athletic relapse, that his face is close to exploding. His hope is too much for me. “Can I shoot a few with you?” he asks.

  I fix him with a stare cold enough to melt the warmth of his smile. I want to freeze him there, so he can’t move. So he can’t feel. “No. You can’t.”

  “Why not?” He shrugs. “Think I’ll take you?”

  No, I mean—you can’t. This isn’t wheelchair basketball. I laugh at my own cruelty. It worries me, this monster inside. The monster who would hurt someone already feeling so much pain. I choke on my laugh, trying to stop the familiar rise of emotion from surfacing. The truth, I know, is that it’s not my dad I’m really mad at. I’m mad at his disease.

  And it’s not anger. It’s fear.

  “Sorry. Gotta go,” I say, brushing past him and into the house. Into the bathroom, to wash the smell of rediscovery off my ha
nds. To wash the tears of self-loathing off my face.

  ELEVEN

  Bike ride with Sean is today. My bike still has neon spokes and I haven’t been on it in a year. Not to worry. After all, riding a bike is like … riding a bike. You get on and go. A much bigger problem is clothes. I know hard-core cyclists wear tight clothes, but I don’t do spandex. The devil wears spandex. And I doubt the devil’s butt is as big as mine. Jac even had me try on a bunch of potential biking outfits—nothing worked. (But it’s hard not to love her. She’s the cheer mom who memorizes all her daughter’s routines and does them in the bleachers during a game.)

  After further deliberation, I throw a pair of basketball shorts over Jac’s fuchsia yoga capri pants and ride my bike out of the cul-de-sac and onto the trail that will lead me into Valley Forge National Park. The weather is warmer than yesterday, but the clouds promise a change soon. I switch the gears of my Schwinn before heading up a small incline. This is exercise, not a sport. Bike riding isn’t competitive. And my dad doesn’t have a bike. This activity feels safe, although I don’t get the same rush I did yesterday with the ball.

  Even with the extra padding, my butt is already complaining about the seat. By the time I cover the four miles to the park, I’m ready to take a break. But there’s Sean, stretching his legs next to the Visitors’ Center entrance. He has on the expected biker shorts, with a blue jacket, helmet, gloves, and those weird shoes I saw when I began my stalking/research adventures. I feel self-conscious about my outfit and about the star stickers I stuck on my helmet in seventh grade.

  “Hey,” I say and plop down next to him. “Sorry I’m late. I had to bike over from my house.”

  “Where do you live?”

  “Near Audubon. You?”

  “Collegeville.”

  “Collegeville?” I gasp. “But that’s like ten miles away.”

  “Usually I bike down to the city.”

  “You mean Philadelphia?”

  “No, New York.”