What It Was Like

by Peter Seth

I whipped around the corner and, halfway down the block, I luckily found a parking spot in front of one of the big, old Tudor houses that lined the street. I got out of the car, locked it, and hurried down the sidewalk, joining the crowd of people moving toward the high school.

  Approaching Oakhurst High School on foot, I was even more impressed by the newness and sleekness of the building, glistening in the sharp winter sun. My high school was old and brick and used-up; this building was made strictly of New Money. As I ran across the street, dodging cars, I looked at every kid – every girl, actually – looking for Rachel. Since it was winter, the girls had big coats on, some with fur collars turned up and heavy scarves, hiding their faces, and some girls wore hats. Rachel used to wear this little navy blue ski cap sometimes, but mostly she let her long, dark hair – of which she was so proud – flow in the wind, even if it meant being cold.

  I hurried toward the majestic front entrance, looking this way and that at the rush of kids heading up the steps toward the doors. At the curb, there was a line of cars dropping off kids, including quite a few Cadillacs. Fortunately, I didn’t see the Princes’. The last thing I needed was for Eleanor to see me. I stood in the middle of the stream of kids as they went up the front steps, ignoring me in the rush. All these kids seemed to be good-looking and well-dressed, so much neater than the scruffy, pimply guys at Columbia. I looked into all the girls’ faces, but I didn’t see Rachel. I did see more than a couple of girls who looked like Rachel: pretty, confident girls with the same long, dark hair, parted in the middle. But I didn’t see my girl.

  Two loud buzzing bells from the building sent everybody into a faster gear. I guess it meant just a few minutes to homeroom, and some kids still had to get to their lockers. I stood against the tide of students rushing past me, wondering what to do. There seemed to be another busy entrance on the side of the school by the parking lot; I could check there. She might be coming in from that side, but I didn’t have time to decide. I had to do something quickly; I turned and joined the flood of kids going in.

  Once I got inside the heavy glass doors, inside the lobby, it was warm. They had good, strong heat in there. As I walked in, I looked both ways down the hallway and saw nothing but kids: kids walking quickly, kids at their lockers, slamming them closed. Dozens of kids, all ignoring me. I had absolutely no idea which way to go to find Rachel.

  Three bells buzzed, and the intensity of activity increased. More lockers were slammed. I had to do something: I saw a group of girls, pretty girls. Girls who might, just might know Rachel. As you know by now, I’m a fairly shy person, but I had no choice. I walked right up to them, tall girls with long hair and jewelry and soft, pastel sweaters.

  “I’m sorry,” I asked, trying to make eye contact with any one of them, “Do any of you girls know Rachel Prince?”

  They all looked at me blankly. Pretty, empty stares that said nothing.

  One of the girls, a blonde wearing a long OHS letterman’s sweater, leaned forward and said, “Do you go to Columbia?”

  Dumbfounded, I said back, “How do you know that?”

  The girls just giggled and looked at each other, sharing some silly secret.

  “Do you know where Rachel is now?”

  Four bells blasted again before they could answer me.

  “Do you know anyone named Eric?” I asked in a loud, specific voice, but they looked at me as if I were talking in a foreign language.

  “We gotta go,” the tall blonde said.

  Scattering for their classes, the girls started walking away, saying goodbye to each other, and ignoring me. But one girl, a cute redhead, grabbed my sleeve.

  “She has English first period, I think,” said the redhead, releasing me and disappearing into the throng.

  “Where’s that?” I shouted. “Where is English??”

  But she was gone in the rush of kids. The hallway was emptying quickly, and the classroom doors all seemed to close at once. Suddenly I was alone.

  At the far end of the hallway, I saw one of those Safety Officers, like the one outside the student parking lot, coming toward me. I immediately turned and walked the other way quickly.

  “Get to your class, son!” he yelled out between cupped hands. “Tiiime’s up!”

  I picked up my pace and got to the end of the hallway to turn a corner, out of sight of the rent-a-cop. I was thinking, “Where could the English classes be?” I probably had ten minutes when these kids were in homeroom to get to where the English classes were: wherever that was. I was getting sweaty again. I opened my collar wider and tried to get some cool air onto my neck.

  I heard footsteps behind me, but I didn’t dare turn around. Seeing a flight of stairs on my right, I took off and ran right up, two at a time. I just felt that it was best to get off that first floor, just in case the rent-a-cop was behind me. I mean, I still sort of looked like these Oakhurst kids. Maybe I was a little shabbier, but still, I was only one year out of high school.

  At the top of the stairs, I went left and down the hall. I breezed down the hallway, checking out the bulletin boards covered with lots of colorful flyers for summer programs in Europe and sailing camps in the Bahamas. Lucky kids. I figured that this must be the foreign language area: not English.

  I kept moving. I only had a little time before homeroom broke. If I had any chance of finding her, I had to be in the right place at the right time.

  “Hey! You!” a gruff voice yelled from somewhere behind me, far down the hallway. I didn’t turn around, but I knew he was yelling at me. “Stop right there!”

  The bell rang, and I took off down the hallway. The doors of the classrooms flew open, and kids started to flood into the corridor, giving me cover for escape. I turned left, and there was another staircase there. I ran down the stairs, taking two at a time, holding onto the banister so I didn’t break my neck.

  Back on the first floor, I turned right and saw something that made my heart perk right up: a big poster of William Shakespeare’s impassive, impressive face – so I knew that I was in the English area. Finally.

  By now, the hallways were streaming with fast-walking, loud-talking kids, rushing all around me. Frantically, I looked at all the girls’ faces as they passed by: no Rachel. A few almost-Rachels, but not the real thing. But she had to be somewhere in the rush of kids getting to class. I knew that this was my best, maybe my only chance to see her, and I was not going to blow it.

  There! At the end of the hall, I saw a flash of blue-blue eyes, somewhere through the crowd of bodies. I took a chance.

  “Rachel?” I yelled over the loud buzz of kids. “RACHEL!”

  Just then, a hand grabbed me roughly by the collar and pulled me backwards.

  One of those Safety Officers turned me around with a jerk of my neck and growled into my face, “Are you a student here? Lemme see your ASB card!”

  I twisted out of his grip with a throw of my shoulder and backed away. He was big and wide, with a determined, angry scowl.

  “Wait a minute!” I said. “Isn’t this a public school?”

  “Do you belong here?” the guard snapped. “Come with me, son.”

  I backed further away from him, one more time yelling, “RACHEL?” over the crowd’s head. People started to clear away from us, watching the confrontation between the guard and me.

  “I thought this was a public school,” I said as I moved away from him, preparing to escape when another pair of hands grabbed me from behind. It was a second security guard, the one I had seen when I came into the building.

  “Come with us,” he said. “You don’t belong here.”

  “RACHEL!” I yelled again as I struggled unsuccessfully to break free. The two of them got hold of me and started pulling me back down the hallway as I screamed “RACHEL!!!” one more time. “I tried! . . . I TRIED!!!”

  All the kids were watching the spectacle of me being dragg
ed away by the two rent-a-cops, but I didn’t care.

  “SAY SOMETHING!” I screamed, hoping that somewhere in the crowd she would hear me.

  All the kids were laughing and shouting and pointing at me as I was pulled away, twisting in vain to escape the guards’ strong grip. Yes, I felt shame and embarrassment, but over the din of laughter and jeers I thought I heard her call my name one last time. But I wasn’t sure. It could have all been my imagination.

  ≁

  They let me go after about two hours of questioning in this tiny, windowless room without calling the police on me, but it took a lot of smooth talking and believable promising on my part. First, the guards yelled at me for a long time about trespassing and illegal entry. Then this nasty assistant principal whose name was Peevey came in. He said he “knew about” me, having apparently talked to Eleanor Prince about this boy who was “bothering” Rachel and causing problems for her and her entire family. I rationally told him that Mrs. Prince misunderstood me and my motives.

  I was beyond relieved when they let me go. But, in a twisted way, for all the hassling I got, I was happy that I did it, that I had tried to see Rachel “one last time.” I remember thinking that as I drove back home to drop off the Ford before I took the bus and subway back to Columbia. By then there was no hope of making my afternoon classes, so I decided to save the money on the cheaper trip back into town. Funny, even as I was messing up my life, at each step along the way I was trying to do the right thing. I was honoring Love and my true feelings. I wasn’t hurting anybody. I was trying to be honest with what I actually felt and what I thought that Rachel felt. OK, maybe she didn’t feel the same way about me anymore, or she wouldn’t have done what she did. At that point, I realized that things had definitely changed in some truly essential way. I had to turn a leaf and readjust my thinking. That was it: from now on, I couldn’t be responsible for Rachel anymore, only for myself. Maybe it would turn out to be a good thing, after all.

  Part III

  What Happened Then

  Record of Events #27 - entered Tuesday, 9:43 P.M.

  ≁

  The next few months were not easy, but I got through them, barely. At first, I almost couldn’t stop thinking about her, about calling her, about getting back with her, about going over to her house and knocking the door down – to hell with what Hell-eanor or Herb or anybody thought – and making things right. Every night at 8:00, I thought about a call that I didn’t make. Every Friday night, I didn’t drive over to Buckingham Court, to that big brick house at the far end of the long lawn. Everything I did, I did without Rachel.

  In some ways, life was easier for me, loveless. With no Rachel in my life – make that: with no Rachel present in my life – I was free to do many specific things that I was previously unable to do. Like watching 8:00 TV shows precisely when they began. Like having Friday nights to myself. Like . . . that’s the end of the list. Oh, yes: I had my “freedom.”

  Fortunately, some things were in my favor. New York, and especially Columbia, are made for the lonely. Everybody is equally lonely, everybody shut up in the dorms, especially in winter, and no one cares. So everybody leaves everybody else alone. I shouldn’t say that “everybody” is lonely. I would see some people who weren’t as I walked around the campus and the neighborhood; I would see families . . . friends . . . lovers. I accepted the possibility of positive human contact. But at that moment, being alone was the best way for me to survive.

  The first weekend, even though I wasn’t going to see Rachel, I went back home to the Island. By now, it was almost like a reflex. Roommate A had gotten used to my being gone every weekend and bragged that he had a “hot little chippy” in his weekend plans for the room. Plus I had all my dirty laundry from the week that I had gotten used to my mother doing, saving me from going down to the gross washing machines and dryers in the basement of the dorm like the other poor sucker freshmen. So I went home.

  In some ways, that was the best thing to do. I could sleep later, undisturbed by Roommate A. I could stay in my room and not talk to anybody. There was food downstairs in the refrigerator. I had my stereo and my records. All I had to do was stay in my room, do my homework, and lay low. In time, I’d get over Rachel. Oh sure, I’d be blue for a while and my heart might have been technically broken, but I knew that, over Time, I’d recover from her love. I refused to let something that was once good create anything bad.

  Those were good resolutions; I wish that I had been able to follow them. Instead, my sleep was lousy; there is no other word for it. And I didn’t really have much of an appetite, no matter how many of my favorite foods my mother offered me. I just wasn’t hungry. I couldn’t keep my mind on my reading. Every second thought, every third paragraph, reminded me of Rachel. Or something about her. Or something about Eleanor or Herb or Mooncliff. I’d be studying for some test or quiz, and invariably I would come across a word or a concept that would flip my mind right back to Rachel. Say, I’d be studying for an exam on minerals and there would be a mention of “cobalt compounds” – I couldn’t not think of her eyes. Or I’d be hammering out some mini-essays on Descartes, and there would be a section on the reality of sensory perceptions. And I would think of how Rachel felt when I held her. Not that long ago, she’d lain in the bed across the room. With me. But that was over. Would I rather have been reading Descartes or touching Rachel? What a question. I know it was stupid, but all thoughts eventually led me back to her. My mind couldn’t help it. I was sick with thoughts of Rachel Prince.

  I didn’t leave my room till late that night. I think that I was afraid that I would drive over to Buckingham Court, but by then it was too late and I was too tired. I drove over to the Lex instead, just because there was no other place to go, and there are few things more comforting than a Linzer cookie and a tall glass of cold milk. On the one hand, I felt pretty pathetic, seeking consolation from a raspberry filling, but on the other hand, I knew what made me feel better. I wanted to reduce things to simple pleasures, so as not to think about anything complex, or anything at all.

  “Hey, man,” someone said to me, poking my shoulder. I was sitting in my favorite booth where I thought I could see everybody who came in, but I guess I was mistaken.

  I looked up and it was Marty, a kid who went to my high school, from my homeroom. He was with another guy.

  “Hey, Marty,” I said. “What’s up?”

  “Nothing much,” he replied. “You know this dude, Freddy Masaro?”

  “Hey, man,” I said to the tall, skinny guy next to Marty. I wasn’t sure if I knew him or not. He might have gone to our high school, or maybe from somewhere else.

  “How’s life?” Marty asked.

  “Life sucks,” I said cheerfully

  “So what’s new?” Marty chuckled.

  They were just standing there by my table, so I said, “Wanna sit down?”

  “’K,” Marty said, and the two of them slid into the booth, opposite me.

  “You getting’ something to eat?” said Freddy to Marty.

  “Yeah,” answered Marty. “Let me think about it. What is that?” He pointed to my plate.

  “Linzer cookie,” I said with my mouth full, spraying crumbs all over the tabletop.

  “Nice!” he said. “I think I’ll have a chili dog and fries. Maybe cheese fries!”

  “Make that two!” said Freddy, slapping the tabletop in a quick drumbeat.

  “So how’s Columbia?” asked Marty. “I figured you’d be halfway to law school by now.”

  “Not quite,” I muttered. The last thing I wanted to joke about or think about was more school.

  “Freddy goes with me to Nassau,” said Marty.

  “How is that?” I asked them.

  “High school with cigarettes,” said Freddy.

  I laughed, “I know what you mean.”

  “Hey,” said Marty, “You want to come to a part
y tomorrow night at Freddy’s house?”

  “It’s not really a party,” said Freddy. “It’s just a bunch of people hanging out.”

  “OK,” I said, finishing my milk and belching. “I’ll think about it.”

  “You should come hang out with us,” said Marty. “It’ll be fun.”

  “‘Fun,’” I repeated. It sounded like a foreign word, an unknown substance. “Lemme think about it.”

  ≁

  I spent the next day, sleeping, waking up, working some, and then sleeping again. I didn’t call Rachel, didn’t drive over there – nothing. I should say nothing physical because I spent the whole day with Rachel floating in and out of my thoughts. Even when I resolved myself to “Stop thinking about her!” – that was thinking about her. She tormented me with her absence.

  Finally, as if to punish myself for ruining my day – OK, I did knock off a paper for Brilliant and did some distracted studying – I decided to ruin my night as well by going to that party at Freddy’s house. I figured that a night with those losers would thoroughly depress me, even worse than losing Rachel. (I shouldn’t call Marty and Freddy “losers.” They were nice guys; I was the loser.) But I couldn’t stay in the house anymore, especially when my mother urged me to come downstairs to watch “a very exciting Mannix.”

  Freddy’s big basement was crowded with kids, both boys and girls, and no one I recognized. It had a ping-pong table, a loud stereo, and a table full of cans of beer and soda and boxes of cold pizza.

  “His parents aren’t home,” Marty shouted in my ear over the pounding, loud Cream. “So don’t trash anything.”

  “I won’t,” I yelled back.

  Marty laughed. “Right. I forgot who I was talking to.” He patted me on the back and walked away.

  Left alone suddenly, I went and grabbed a beer from the table. No Rolling Rock like at Bailey’s. I took a Budweiser and found a place to sit in the corner. I could watch the doubles ping-pong game from there while I sipped the sour Bud and wondered what the hell I was doing in Freddy Masaro’s basement.