-----
Moving was just awful.
I didn’t tell anyone, even if Mom sorta guessed, and Barry told me he knew it was no fun, just so I knew he knew... but it was. It was way worse than they thought.
I threw away all my stuff before I packed. I was gonna be in the men’s rez and I had to. I was going to stop. Period. Forever. It took weeks trashing and destroying it bit by bit so nobody would know. Making invisible stuff disappear. It woulda been funny if it hadn’t hurt so much.
Mom, Dad, Barry and my sister Jan all helped me move and all said goodbye and good luck and they’d be visiting lots and I’d be home all the time too. . .and all that.
I almost couldn’t talk. Finally being there, here, I didn’t want to even go to college any more. I hated it, that I wanted to cry, that I was so mad, or sad, that I felt lonely, even if that makes no sense.
But it was all because of here. Rez. Men’s residence. Prison and alone and all my things gone.
Dennis Trent was already set up in our room. He was my new roommate ‘cause I was in a double room in a really old residence dorm, Tanner Hall, because all the first years had to have doubles, and live in residence.
If I’d gone to State I’d’ve had a single. Here I had no privacy. So no stuff, ever. And no time alone.
Dennis was nice enough and everybody got along with him really well and were laughing at jokes and stuff the whole time but I mostly was quiet and I guess Mom noticed that ‘cause she kinda hung around me and was quiet too and when all of the others were down at the van one time she pulled me to sit on my bed and gave me a hug.
“Lots of changes, mmm?”
I nodded at the floor. I knew she was worried but I just couldn’t pretend I was happy like Dad and Jan. Or Barry. He always got along with Dad better than I did. The jock and the fireman. Everything sucked. I couldn’t tell her why, or anyone, either, which made it worse. Tons worse, even if I’d never tell anyway.
“I.... If I could’ve gone to State....” I knew we’d already talked and argued and explained all about it, but I still was mad, or sad anyway, about not going with Barry and Jan. And Carol. Like we planned. And I coulda kept some stuff... I would’ve had my own room.
Mom hugged me harder. “I know, honey, I know... and I’m sorry you’re not happy right now but we still think you’ll do so much better here, and soon you'll make friends and Dennis is really nice, isn’t he?”
He was. But I wasn’t happy and it didn’t matter.
~*
“Oh, maaannn!” Dennis leaned over and plopped his forehead on my shoulder in dramatic misery.
The very first class of the term, very first day of classes, Intro Psych, and we’re told we had to “volunteer” to be subjects for grad projects on our own time. Lots of our own time.
Some of them sounded weird enough to be fun, like human lab rat stuff, and the prof was kinda goofy about it. But most were just extra work.
Like the one study, the prof said it was a really important one that every first year student was doing, not just in psychology. It was this fifteen page book of questions that we all had to do, right in the main class, almost right at the beginning.
There were all sorts of questions, computer tick answers, but hard. There was easy stuff like favorite foods and colors and songs and stuff, but tons more complicated questions about, well, like how to answer, like the right *words* instead of the right *thing* and lots about what people do, choices and right and wrong and stuff. Even sex questions, like about what girls would do, or boys, different. Not *sex* sex.. but different thinking. Tons of stuff, and some of it was really hard to choose, to keep the boy and girl stuff apart.
-
It took me almost forty-five minutes and everyone was waiting for me and I was beet red when I had to bring it up to the front, the last one.
The really tall guy who was waiting came up half way and took it from me and left the class. He almost ran. He’d taken out booklets all through the class, like three other times, but this time it was just mine. Everyone watched him. And me. When I got back to my seat Dennis whispered to remember the prof said it didn’t matter how long it took and it was okay. But I was even more embarrassed he said that.
Anyway, at the end of class (it was really short after that, just textbook, marks and exam info) at the end we all had to make sure we stuck on the paper badges from the question booklet things and troop into another room right across the hall to choose our “volunteer” work.
There were about a dozen projects all set up at tables, like a science or job fair, with grad students and applications and computers and little cardboard advertising displays and all that kinda stuff. There were more students than our class wandering around, too, so the room was pretty full.
We were the last ones in the room ‘cause Dennis had had to talk to the prof about using an old textbook or something and I wanted to see if I could at least sign up to do the same stuff as him, so I waited too.
Right inside the door a really pretty woman asked if our tag things were from our own booklets and then she read mine out loud (numbers) and the same tall guy who took my booklet typed it in a laptop, or he typed something, anyway. The table was set up like a little office. A scanner and printer and all.
There were three other people at the table, two guys and a woman, besides the really pretty woman, and they all looked at him. The tall guy. He pointed at it to the others and the really pretty woman went around to look at whatever it was too.
And then they smiled at just me, except the tall guy with the computer nodded at me and did something else and kinda talked at the screen.
“Robert Samuel Johanson?”
“Bobby.” I hate being called Robert. My dad's Robert. And my name wasn’t on the test.
“Student number?”
I told him (I had to find my card) but he was just checking. And he knew my dorm room, and Dennis’ name (he checked it was him) and that we were roommates, and my schedule. Everything. He had like the whole university on the thing, or was connected or something. Wireless, I guess.
Then they all kinda sat back in their chairs and the pretty woman stood up straight again, all at once, like the computer had said ‘The End’ or something, and the pretty lady smiled really big and said they’d like me to be in their study. Then she kinda thought of it and read off Dennis’ sticker numbers to the tall guy and they all looked at the screen again, maybe even longer, and the tall guy pointed at some things and they all nodded and the pretty lady said Dennis should go and look at the other projects.
He tried to look mad or something but he was pretending and tapped my arm ‘bye and went in to look at the other tables.
I sat down and they said they had funding and they’d be able to pay me and the main thing was a big questionnaire thing every month, all year, and they’d buy lunch or whatever when we did too. They all nodded dead serious at me, except the pretty woman. She just smiled.
“What else do I have to do?” I figured there had to be a catch. No such thing as a free lunch?
Viola (I just noticed they had paper name tags with actual names) kinda perked up even more.
“Weekly phone or drop-in check-ins? They’ll only take a few minutes at most, and weekly counseling at the student support services offices, and then a once a month thing that has to be in person, and will be similar to the questions on the form you did in there.”
I was thinking, counseling? For what? I was a bit afraid of counselors and psychiatrists... and what if it was ‘cause of my stuff? Maybe the test thing could tell? Then I thought maybe that’s what their study was about. But I couldn’t ask. And they were interested in Dennis, but didn’t ask him...
“How come Dennis isn’t in this too?”
“You just fit the student profile we’re looking for.” The tall guy looked at the screen again. “And he doesn’t.”
He looked up at me and smiled a second, like just to be polite. I thought that it wasn’t like he was sneering at me or anything.... he wasn’t looking at me odd at all. None of them were. Geeky, but not bad.
Viola added “And he *is* in the study, sort of, already. Every freshman on campus is, just some are doing the followups and counseling? It’s part of the way the study works.”
After a moment thinking that that made sense, and they weren’t being mean, and I guess they didn’t know, I asked about stuff like how long the counseling was gonna be, and when. They said as long as the whole year, and right away.
Anyway, I finally said okay, and they smiled *way* more realistically.
There was the big release form the prof told us they’d have, that lets grad students experiment on freshmen that took about twenty minutes to read and ask questions about (they made me), and a kinda ‘what am I doing in school’ form, with all the classes I was taking already on it (they printed it right there) and I filled in what I wanted to do for fun and stuff, even if I didn’t in the end, after Viola asked me to, and then we figured out a maybe time for our first big meeting in four weeks and they gave me a card for the counseling offices that Viola said she’d call me about, and we were done.
At last. It took almost a half hour.
I noticed other grads putting away their stuff, and then that almost all of them were gone. I looked around and there was nobody from the freshmen classes left, just Dennis reading a paperback and waiting for me I guess, and Professor Hawkins leaning on a table, and looking at me like I was doing something interesting, or wrong.
I should mention that I’m really, really insecure, I guess.
I grabbed my forms and tried to hurry out, but Professor Hawkins smiled at me on my way past and said I might enjoy their project.
I didn’t know what to say to that, but I tried to smile back.
Then a really weird thing happened. Bad weird.
There were about ten students in the hall, I think all from our class, and when I came out behind Dennis they *all* stopped talking, and looked at me.
It was totally scary, like a nightmare, really unreal. Professor Hawkins was right behind me and bumped me and I and spilled all the release forms all over and was embarrassed to death.
But then *they* all looked embarrassed too, I mean, everyone in the hall, like all at once.
After, I thought maybe it was her they were looking at. The prof, I mean. Maybe waiting for her, but I was shaking when I finished stuffing the papers in my pack and I left as fast as I could. I was sure the prof was looking at me, even when she was helping with picking up.
Dennis said he didn’t think she was, after. But he said I should sit down too, ‘cause I was shaking. He probably thinks I’m insane.
I want to quit the study. Maybe psych, too. I have to be in the study, but only like Dennis.
~*
Our floor proctor’s a senior named Jarrod (like the sub guy, ha ha ha.) Proctors are kinda the guys in charge of each hall, all through the rez.
We met all of them for Tanner and Walsh (the girls-only rez) at a big meeting on Friday that was supposed to make us all friends, or at least tell us about all the rez programs and stuff. They’re all nice, I guess, but way more party types than me, or Dennis even, he said.
Jarrod came around every night the first weekend to tell us about something or other going on, but mostly to say hi, so we could talk, he said. He was nice, but we’d never be chums, y’know?
Anyway, that night when he came around Dennis said he just wanted to lie around, and I was glad I had an excuse not to even try, like I usually felt I had to.
So we made hot air popcorn (Dennis brought a popper) and drank coke and talked about what we thought we might have signed up for.
I didn’t really know, even if they kinda explained for about a half hour. But mostly counseling and surveys, or questionnaires, or interviews, maybe. He said since he’d be doing counseling himself, sometimes, maybe he’d be my counselor!
He did it in high school, peer counseling he called it, and he was already registered for training for it here. He said it was a real help, sometimes, and he felt really great when someone said they were helped by talking with him. Even about really small things, like schedules or homework overload, that he said was about the biggest problem, in high school, anyways.
But when I showed him the card I had about the counseling I was supposed to go to he thought it probably wasn’t peer-type stuff.
That kinda led to us telling each other more about our families and high schools and the stuff we did before, (me: not much. him: tons).
After just three days I guess we were friends, ‘cause it was sure nice to just lay on our beds and laugh and remember. And he had a wicked sense of humor.
We both said how strange it was being in university, too. Away from home and in rez, and how different it was from high school. And home.
He said they had a really great reputation here for teaching, for training teachers, ‘cause he wanted to be one, ever since he was in grade school. He grinned and said his heroes were teachers he’d had.
I smiled and said “Geek...” and he laughed.
He lived in a small town about three hours away, really near State U, but he said we were at a way better school. ‘Specially for teaching.
I told him about how I was going to go to State until last month and then my parents changed their minds and said that they wanted me to come here instead. He kinda already knew that, from Jan and all them.
Mom and Dad said that lots of their friends had told them that it was a way better place, and I’d been accepted too, ’cause I applied to about five schools, and I even had a little scholarship if I came here. Free rez, anyway.
But I didn’t really know anyone, ‘cept him. I really missed Carol and Barry and my family. I still missed my cat, but more, now. I didn’t tell Dennis that.
But he seemed to notice stuff like that, that there was stuff I didn’t want to show.
He was really quiet for a few minutes and just looked at the ceiling. Then he asked if I was homesick.
I didn’t say anything, except try to breathe normally, but he was still quiet and I guess waiting, and then he said, “I miss my mom...”
I stared at the ceiling, and missed Mom too. So it hurt.
-
He’s a total jock and was gonna try out for lots of sports, but he’s gonna be a really, really great teacher too.
-
After Dennis came back from brushing his teeth and stuff he opened a new package of pajamas and asked if I wanted the top ‘cause he only ever wore the bottoms and it was brand new? He laughed and said his mom was still always doing stuff like getting him new pajamas and underwear “for special occasions.”
It was way too big, even for him, and was like a tent on me, but he smiled like he wasn’t going to laugh, even though it was pretty funny, I bet. But it was nice, too. Like a night shirt, even. I almost couldn’t put it on after I thought that. But he didn’t laugh.
Anyway, he made sure his alarm was set earlier than it needed to be for his first class so he could get up and have breakfast with me. (I was dumb and signed two eight o’clock labs, Tuesday and Thursdays.)
Then, after the lights were out, he spoke really quietly, in the dark.
“Night, Bobby.” He sounded like he was still lonely for his mom. Or again.
“G’night, Dennis.” I tried to make it like it was better.
~*
End of Part One
-----
The next night we stayed in again and talked more about our best friends. Barry, and a bit about Carol, and his friend Justin, so mostly our guy friends, about the stuff we’d done with them, and the things they did.
At the end, like after hours of laughing and telling stories, Dennis got all serious and quiet.
He said he was worried he’d never see Justin ever again ‘cause he’d gone to a college in Washington and he thought they might never manage to get together.
He said he knew it was stupid, but he was still afraid. He wasn’t at home any more, and neither was Justin, and their visits might not ever match up, and then they’d just stop being friends.
I was pretty quiet.
Then he said, hey, remember how Barry helped with my stuff when I arrived and how he’d laughed at me, or Barry, maybe, or at both of us, when he’d hugged me goodbye, because I’d been so stiff?
I remembered. That Barry hugged me is what I remembered.
I really missed him. We used to do everything. And Carol, and before, Janice. I just missed Barry most....
After a long time Dennis was so quiet I almost couldn’t hear.
“I wish I'd hugged Just more, goodbye...”
I didn’t know what I could say, but I knew what he meant.
I hated it there. I wanted to go home so bad. But Barry wasn’t there anymore, either.
A long time after he turned the lights out I could tell Dennis was still awake and I turned over on my side towards him and whispered.
“Hey, Dennis?”
As soon as I said it, I wished I hadn’t.
“Hmm?”
I didn’t want to ask anymore.
“Nothing...”
He turned on his bed too, I could hear.
“No, really, it’s okay.... What?”
He didn’t sound mad. Or anything. I thought what I could say, or how.
After a long time, I breathed louder.
“Barry kinda... let me talk about things... and... didn’t laugh at... stuff...”
He didn’t say anything and was quiet for a long time too, almost a minute, maybe.
“I promise I won’t laugh either.”
“Okay. Thanks. Me either.”
It was quiet again.
“Do you want to talk about things tonight?”
I thought about it, but was scared.
“No.”
Then I thought that sounded rude, after.
“But thanks?”
“It’s okay, Bobby. Any time.”
It was quiet again, for a long, long time.
“Bobby?”
“Yeah?”
“Thanks for asking me.”
-
The next week I started seeing Ben, my counselor.
We’d set up the next appointments each time we finished so they wouldn’t interfere with other stuff we both had. I’d see him twice a week for about a half hour, or sometimes an hour once a week, too. Or more, if I wanted.
He was a grad student and counseling was part of his degree work, he said, but he’d been doing it since he started school, like a peer advisor and stuff. Like Dennis.
The first time, we talked about what school was like mostly, and how I was doing and stuff. The same kinds of things I'd talked about with Dennis. We talked about Dennis too. He said he sounded really nice. Well, he said Dennis sounded “like a good friend.”
And he said he never told Viola or the study people anything, and our talks were private, and he’d only tell anyone anything else if I was “at serious risk.”
That’s just the way he said it. It was on the confidentiality form I’d signed when we started, too. If I was going to kill myself. I guess that made sense.
-
Late September one night, after he turned out the light and I was really sad because I’d been talking with Mom and Dad on the phone and was really missing home, I got the courage up to talk to Dennis about what I was thinking.
“Dennis?”
I was pretty quiet. Maybe he was asleep or something, and maybe he wouldn’t hear and then I wouldn’t have to.
“Yeah?” He answered right away, almost as quiet.
“Are you asleep?” Maybe he wanted to sleep.
“Not really.” He waited a tiny bit. “You wanna talk?”
I did, but I was too embarrassed to start. I just made a mmmm sound.
After a long time, maybe a minute, he made a sound.
“Bobby?”
“Yeah?”
“What do you miss most?”
I really had to think what I could say. It was almost what I wanted to talk about.
I wanted to say sitting with Mom and drinking tea and watching the late news, like we did sometimes. I missed walking with Carol and Barry and studying with Janice and talking and laughing. Sitting with Dad at little league games in the park and telling him about my week and what I wished and stuff like that.
-
I couldn’t tell Dennis anything or I’d’ve cried.
-
I told Ben about how I kept seeing people looking at me, and I think I even saw some laughing at me, but I never was sure. I told him about the hallway thing that happened the first day too. Again.
He said he didn’t know, but did I feel like I should do something? I said no, I think I was just paranoid, but he said I wasn’t.
We talked a lot about it. But I’d been getting more and more anxious, all the first month. I tried to pretend I was okay because I couldn’t say why I was so afraid. I just said I saw people looking.
I didn’t even have any stuff for anyone to find anymore. I didn’t do anything anymore, either. I just thought about it all the time. And that people could see.
Viola did all the weekly project stuff, and asked how I was feeling too. But she didn’t see me much ‘cause we mostly talked on the phone.
She asked me if I was happy at university. And I really wasn’t, but I didn’t say that to her. I said it was okay.
I talked to Ben about it, though, after she asked. We talked about it a lot, with the other stuff.
Dennis noticed I was getting stressed, I guess, ‘cause he asked if I was okay lots of times, but I always said I was.
I was missing a ton of dorm things that were supposed to get us socializing or something ‘cause I was becoming afraid to go out. Not just shy, like I told people.
Dennis missed them too, I guess, when he stayed in, just for the company, he said. He said he knew everyone anyway. And he still went to some things.
-
I tried to remember as much as I could about home, and Barry and everyone, and not feel bad, but I almost couldn’t remember feeling good. Ben said that once, too. That I never talked about good stuff anymore.
September was awful, all in all.
-
After supper one Friday I felt like going out, for the first time in weeks. Dennis wanted to go with me but I really wanted to just walk.
I wandered around and kicked some leaves and it was really a pretty night. Or evening, I guess. I felt better than I had in a long time, and I didn’t know why, but I thought of the student newspaper.
I’d really wanted to volunteer there, like in high school, but I had had so much to do and was tired so often.
It was too late to go to their offices, I figured, but I was near the student union building anyway where I thought they were and went to find it and it turned out they were still open, and really busy, just like it was noon or something.
There were about a dozen computers all around the walls and people typing on most of them, and music from an old stereo cabinet and this *huge* printer was slowly rolling out a sheet about a yard square with four people standing looking at it and they seemed to be really tense.
It looked like a real newspaper office, just like in the movies. Way more than high school anyway.
A tall, skinny lady with really long brown hair looked at me from the group around the big printer.
“Can I help you?” She sounded busy, or maybe tired, like she looked.
If I ran out they’d remember it was me who was there before. . .so I couldn’t even just leave. . .“Umm.. I was. . .I wanted to ask about volunteering. . .or, anything..?”
She stood up then, more, and smiled.
“Cool!” She looked a lot younger than a second ago, too. Like a student instead of a teacher, maybe. She had her hair in a long, low pony tail and was really skinny and way taller than me. More than six feet. She looked about fifteen.
“I’m Ellen Saunders, editor.” She came over and held out her hand.
I shook her hand and even *it* felt skinny. She didn’t look sick or anything, but was she *ever* thin.
“Bobby Johanson.” I tried to smile better.
She had a really nice smile then, and looked at me more, like she was memorizing me or something. She looked like she hadn’t slept in a week too.
I didn’t know what to do. I was scared she was watching me, even if she was smiling, and I think I’d been kinda expecting to maybe find a secretary or personnel department or something. I really thought they’d be closed...
“Are you free right now for an hour or so?” She looked like she was really sincere, too. I nodded.
“We’re printing layout drafts of the week’s paper and could use all the help we can get?” She smiled like I was really welcome. And it felt kinda more like high school, sorta. Better.
“Okay,” I smiled back. “I, um... only worked... I mean, volunteered... on our school paper, one year, though?”
She smiled even more and led the way over to a big group of tables all pushed together in the middle of the room and pulled over about a dozen big sheets and I saw they were newspaper pages, all in one printout. Two pages on a sheet.
“Can you read these? We need them to be, um, looked at... for stuff - anything that’s not right? Copy edited?”
I guess I looked like I was worried or something so she speeded up and tried to look better, I think.
“Look, you don’t have to be a pro editor or expert or anything and we’ll be going over them too, but every pair of eyes speeds things up, y’know?”
I guess she answered my questions, or at least some of them, and I didn’t feel like an idiot, so I nodded a bit.
“Okay!” She turned around to the two guys and girl who were still watching the sheet still coming out of the printer. And everyone, I guess.
“Guys! *This* is Bobby Johanson and he’s volunteering and he’s gonna do read-throughs, so no stupid stuff! Trevor!!”
A big guy typing at a computer looked around and looked mad at her. “What??!”
“NO stupid stuff!”
He kinda flipped his hand at her, like some of the fingers shoulda been down. He was scary-looking, but he just barely glanced at me and turned around again and looked at his screen.
Two of the printer group, a short, heavy guy who was almost bald even though he looked young, and a tiny dark-haired girl, did kinda “who, us?” faces and acted stupid, I think to make Ellen happier again.
The third guy hardly looked at me and just looked worried about something on the printing sheet, or something. He was looking all over it and kinda moving it around in the light, I think. Then he nodded, like to the printer, and looked around at me. I was watching what he was doing with the paper.
“Bobby Johanson?”
I nodded, and Ellen nodded too, and he smiled at me. I was a bit embarrassed that I’d been looking at him and he saw me, but he didn’t seem to notice or anything.
“Good to meet you.” He smiled really nice. I mean, he had a nice smile.
The other two with him looked back at me again and it was like they were seeing me the first time. I guess they were really busy.
After Ellen explained a bit more what she wanted I chose a pink highlighter off the table and smiled at her like I was ready to start and she shuffled the pages into the order she wanted them, and I started in.
They argued and swore at some computer problem, and typed and edited and phoned, and sat at the same table as me sometimes and even did the same stuff as I was doing, and I marked a few things on most pages and even found a thing on one page where the font looked sorta different and they were really happy ‘cause Ellen said it was the kind of thing that was a huge pain and cost money to fix if they only found it at the last minute.
On the last sheet in the pile, the back and front pages of the paper, there was a story about a meeting about safety on campus and gay students and stuff.
I really noticed it because the picture and lots of the quotes were from my psych teacher, Professor Hawkins.
I was thinking that I’d be able to tell her I saw her in the paper and that I thought she’d said good things. I didn’t know if I could, but I wished I could.
“Gary wrote that.”
I jumped. Ellen was looking over the table at me and I almost fainted I was so scared that she saw me looking at it. He was the guy from over by the printer, the one who said hi and smiled. But I almost fainted just because I was reading it.
“He’s a really good writer.” She smiled again.
Right then someone poked their head in the office and said the coffee place was closing and I realized it was eleven o’clock and I’d been there almost four hours and I was *really* later than I’d planned, but I’d finished the whole pile of pages and... it felt good.
I said I had to head out. Ellen looked like she was more than tired, but she smiled and said thanks a whole lot for my help and I felt like I did something great.
But then after a second she asked if I was in rez like she knew and she said there were two muggings on campus over the summer and she hated to lose volunteers, so she made Gary walk with me.
Well, she asked him, and he whined and she did ‘mad mom’ at him and he smiled at me and made it a joke, so I wasn’t so embarrassed.
He was like six-four and one hundred pounds and one big freckle and really smart. And he was finishing his masters and had even written a book, or a big essay that was printed anyways. On microeconomics, whatever that is, and it was used as a reference for some courses! And he was just 23.
Ellen told me about the book and stuff, he didn’t. She'd kinda told me a lot about the paper and who they all were ‘cause she’d come over more times tan anyone else to see how I was doing and to get the papers I’d already done and ask what my notes were and stuff.
But I hadn’t talked to Gary and he turned out to be a pretty funny guy, and kinda quiet at the same time. We talked at his desk while he did some finishing-up stuff on his computer he said he had to do before we went.
He said that nobody’d attack him for fear of being killed when he died and fell over, ‘cause his heart barely managed to get blood to his brain at the best of times.
He said there was a safe-walk thing with volunteers, so people didn’t have to cross the campus alone after dark and didn’t I know about it?! And that I should use it, but at the paper I could ask him or anyone else, and two were always safer than one.
I said I would, but I really didn’t think I needed it, and he snorted at me and said “Just *who* did you think it was for?” and stood up and headed for the door, so I went too.
Once we were in the hallways (the paper was *way* in the back of the building) and I didn’t know what else to say, I asked him about the article, and my professor.
He looked at me kinda sideways and down ‘cause he’s that tall. He looked like he was thinking what to say.
“Sheila’s great. She made a really strong case for the campus becoming, and I quote, ‘a place for people to live, a home instead of just a workplace.’ She calls it community consciousness.”
He thought some more. I was thinking that it was cool that he really did think about what he said. His eyes looked different when he was like that.
“Y'know, she’s worried that students, especially in the residences, aren’t as safe as they should be.”
I guess I looked at him different at that. I think he said it so I would.
“There was a really bad harassment thing last winter... three students were expelled and one was charged. And there was a sexual assault, two years back.”
I didn’t know what to say.
“She says this is a home for hundreds of students, and we’re responsible to make it better every year, not just start each year in the same place and hope, and then react if something bad happens. That that was *real* affirmative action.”
He nodded, like he was listening to her, and I guess he had the story in his head, and a lot more. It wasn’t all in the one I read, anyway. I said that, about things that weren’t in what I read and he smiled.
“I’m going to do a bigger feature... next week is the main stuff.” He smiled more at me.
“I guess it was a good story if you remembered it?”
I had to smile, ‘cause he was digging for a compliment, but I put on a serious face.
“I found it... trenchant....”
He broke up a bit. It was one of my high school paper’s favorite inside jokes.
“Damn! And I was *so* going for pithy!”
He held the dorm main door after I carded it and followed me in and I guess I looked a question.
“I’ll stay right to your room, okay? Remember the... thing...?” He looked a bit odd, or mad. I figured he meant the assault. The rape. It was. He was.
He stopped and looked down the stairwell we were near. “I covered that one. It was pretty bad... awful. Lots of students moved out, and I can’t blame them.”
I stopped and looked over the rail too. It went down just one floor from there, but it was all old white tiles and grey marble and dark oak and looked scary all of a sudden and I took a bit of a step back. The rail looked too low.
I wondered what he was thinking, and then thought maybe I didn’t want to know, ‘cause he looked like he wanted to hit something.
“Sorry.” He kinda stood up more. “I hated that story. It...”
He looked in the stairwell, at the walls. “Everything was bad.” He took a breath.
“Except the safewalk program was started and I guess it’s better here now, and the proctors are better trained, and what the board’s doing...” He looked down again.
“But it was still bad.”
He turned around and leaned back on the railing, which gave me a real chill. He looked at me really square.
“I still have nightmares sometimes, not about that, I mean directly, but about... about the girls.... They were really scared.” He looked kinda under his arm at the stairs again and kept looking down there. His voice got deeper.
“They talked to me at a floor meeting, almost a month after, and some of them were crying they were still so scared when they talked about it, and they still had to live here...”
He coughed a sound and looked at me. He looked so serious.
“So *ask* if you’re walking around late, okay? Or even earlier, if no-one’s around, okay?” He looked like he wasn’t mad, but he would be if I didn’t.
I nodded okay. I didn’t know what to say.
So we went up to my room and there was a light on so Dennis was probably still up and I said thanks to Gary.
He said it was no problem, and *remember,* and even if I needed to walk alone *to* the paper, he practically lived there, so call, hey?
He waited until I opened the door and then he waved ‘bye, at Dennis too, I think, and walked away.
I shut the door, quiet so I wouldn’t wake anyone up on the floor.
Dennis was reading, and waited a sec before saying another “Hi.”
I said hi too and sat down on my bed and told him who Gary was, and that I was at the paper, and I was glad I didn’t wake him up getting in late.
He said it was okay, and went to bed right away, too. He looked tired.
I didn’t get to sleep for a long time. I kept imagining what Gary saw down the stairs. I pretended Dennis’ pajama top was a real nightie.
I really wanted to call Mom and Dad, but it was too late and I was too scared to go into the hall.
-
End of Part Two
-----
I didn’t sleep very well at all, all that weekend. I had nightmares, about people watching me, and the stairs, and falling, being pushed.
And I missed Princess. I missed everyone.
I didn’t see Ben the following week. I don’t know what I could have told him anyways, so I cancelled. Dennis asked me about it but I said I just couldn’t make time.
Thursday was when I was finally meeting with the grad students, after psych class. I felt awful by then and Dennis had asked a bunch of times if I was sick and even said I should see someone at the clinic, but it was just not sleeping well.
The grads had a small seminar room booked and Dennis walked over with me after our class and I introduced him to Vi again (I didn’t remember the other ones’ names, but they introduced themselves) and he left after they said they were gonna take me to late lunch, after.
He said he was skipping his history class and he’d be in the room all afternoon and I should call if I needed to. I nodded. Talking seemed harder and harder.
They made me talk.
Vi and one of the other ones took turns asking me all sorts of pretty embarrassing questions off printed papers they had, and the other two typed my answers (I guess) on two laptops that they said were the *real* project, ‘cause it was all about statistics. Or data. I don’t remember. But like the first thing.
Some of it was the same kinda stuff Ben and I talked about, but more about how much and how often. Frequencies.
Even with that, lots of the questions were about being lonely, or unhappy. Or scared. Or my answers were. Or they began to feel like that.
And then some of it was about sex. About if I was seeing anyone, and I told them I really just hung out with Dennis. They asked if *we* had ever kissed, or had sex. I couldn’t talk at all for a while.
They acted like it was just another bunch of questions.
There were two little video cameras running, and a digital tape recorder on the table. They said that the purpose of their research was secret and I shouldn’t ask any more or they’d have to kill me. Or their prof would kill their funding.
But the questions were... too hard.
I wasn’t too laughy by the end. I almost couldn’t hide how bad I felt. By then the questions were like... I mean, like they made me hurt like cuts. Ben never did that.
When they finally closed the laptops they said they were really pleased with the session, and then asked if I still wanted to go eat?
I really wasn’t in the mood for going anyplace. In public, anymore, ever. Ever. I was even trying to figure out how not to go back and see Dennis...
But he wouldn’t make me talk, and he could tell if I wanted to just sit. I wanted to tell him I felt so bad. But I was afraid to see him after what they asked. I was afraid I’d say too much.
I wanted to go home. But there was nothing there, except Mom and Dad and no Princess and an empty room.
I didn’t say that, any of that, but they still tried to make me feel okay about it, about lunch, I guess, and said they’d be there and stuff, and I finally said I would after I thought they were going to think I was. . .something.
I didn’t know.
We all walked across the quad to a pub-kinda restaurant up two floors in the Student Union building. Hale’s. I never even knew it was there. Or where it was, anyway.
“Ladies, gentlemen... Table for six?” The guy at the door picked up menus and smiled at me. He made me more nervous.
Vi said yes, they had reservations. It turned out to be about the biggest round table in the place. It woulda fit ten and we could've fit at a smaller one, but that's where we were put.
The guy put the menus down and walked over behind me and kinda pushed my chair in just as I sat and I’m pretty sure I blushed or looked scared. I was scared.
He asked if I wanted anything to drink, and I just shook my head and looked at the table, and then he asked everyone else.
They all ordered coffees or drinks or whatever and he said Bret would wait on us and smiled at me again and walked away.
I was almost ready to run out, but I was more afraid they’d really, really think I was weird.
Everyone looked at the menus or kinda talked about them, that kinda thing, except Viola was looking at where the waiter guy had gone. I looked down before she could see me.
-
I said about two words all lunch, and I felt like a crud. I know they were sorry I was there.
After I left them, I ran all the way back. I felt like if I didn’t run something terrible would happen. Like I was being chased, or I would fall and break. I felt like it already had and would be way worse if it caught up and really happened.
I didn’t tell Dennis about anything, even though he kept asking if I was okay and I was shaking so much I wouldn’t go to supper.
Mom and Dad called me again that night, twice in two nights, and I didn’t tell them either, but I think they both could tell ‘cause Mom asked twice if I wanted to talk about anything, and Dad said he was proud of me and he loved me, he hoped I knew that?
I wished Dad hadn’t said that. He wouldn’t be proud of me. He wouldn’t love me.
I went to the shower room and made sure the water was loud, and cried.
He’d hate me.
I had a bad dream. I didn’t remember, but I was gasping when I woke up.
Dennis said I made a noise.
-
In the morning Dennis said I was talking in my sleep, but I wasn’t making any sense. He said I still looked really tired, too.
I almost skipped classes, but I knew that if I did, I’d never go, ever again, so I got up.
I went with Dennis to breakfast and this nice older lady at the cash register who was always really cheery to everyone took my meal card and punched it and said “Enjoy your breakfast, dear!” and smiled really big at me.
I got really cold, even if she was like that with everyone. I knew that, but I felt awful. And Dennis looked at me.
I forgot to get my card back when I walked away. The lady almost shouted “Your card, dear!!”
I started panicking and running and half-spilled my tray when I put it down somewhere, some table, and then I just left.
My stomach hurt and I almost fell. I hurt my thumb when I tried to get in our room and pushed the door wrong, before I had it open. I cried over my thumb.
Dennis got my card for me, ‘cause he brought it to our room after he didn’t eat either, I guess, ‘cause it only was about ten minutes after, after I didn’t eat. At least I stopped crying by then. My thumb still hurt, though.
-
I felt like an idiot, and I couldn't think about what was happening. Or understand. Or even if it was the same stuff as all month. Or even if the lady was real. I mean, what I thought.
Dennis was kinda quiet when he sat on his bed and just looked at my card.
I was laying down and trying not to get sadder, or more scared, or suck my thumb, or anything. But I was thinking a thousand miles an hour, in circles.
It felt like smaller and smaller circles.
Two days it had happened, and that never happened before, so much, ever, except what happens to everyone.
“She thought you were... in trouble... or something...”
I tried not to scream, or yell, or cry. I guess he didn’t see, ‘cause he was still looking at my card when I finally could peek.
“... said I should get this back to you...”
He made a tiny noise with the card and moved.
“She said... asked if... if I did something to... you....” He looked down again, his voice. He sounded hurt.
I was too scared to say anything, even though I was really awfully sad then that I made him feel like that, that she’d say that, that he... he’d... I closed my eyes and covered my face with my arm. It was all too hard.
He didn’t move or anything, ‘cause I could hear.
“I...”
He breathed.
“Can you tell me what’s wrong?”
He kinda trailed off. I squeezed my eyes shut really hard.
“Bobby?”
He didn’t sound mad, or like... or anything bad. More like he was checking if I was listening.
I unsqueezed my eyes a bit and moved my arm to around my mouth, but I still wanted to stay hidden. I hid my mouth.
“I don’t know...” I opened my eyes and looked at the ceiling. “Yesterday... it feels like *everyone* is... looking at me... and they are!”
I looked over at him. He was shaking his head no. I looked back up.
“I keep looking and they’re looking... but I’m not...” I started to breathe faster and I think I was afraid to say the words, as if they’d be more real. I couldn’t tell him....
“At lunch... this guy... and, and...”
I put my arm back up again and started to cry more, my eyes, anyway. I was so frustrated. And then I was ashamed. I had to keep hiding my mouth so I put my other hand on my eyes.
“And now... that lady, and... I’ve only been here... they don’t even KNOW!!”
I rolled over and hid against the wall and started to really cry ‘cause it wasn’t fair and I wasn’t *doing* anything!
And then I remembered Dennis was there and he was a guy, and even if he wasn’t there, *I* was a guy, and I was crying but I was almost quiet... I tried to stop, really hard...
And I said that...
I felt him touch my shoulder a second.
Oh god.
I sort of choked and made myself disappear into the crack between the wall and my bed and...
He started to rub my back a bit and I lost it completely. I felt him sit on my bed and I jerked, and he stood up and stopped touching me and I think he left after just a few more seconds, but I was trying with all my soul to die and I’m not sure.
-
I slept for about an hour, or the clock said, anyway. At least Dennis wasn’t there. And I had to go to class, late. So I had to stop crying. I wasn’t when I woke up.
I peeked out the door before I left, I was so afraid of seeing anyone. I felt like a liar. A pervert. I felt like I didn’t belong there, and anyone who saw me would know.
Fridays all I had was one huge class, Bio 102 and lab B, and I *had* to go because it was our first real lab that week, and I had to go. Even an hour late.
-
Two hours later I'd been almost able to forget about everything by being confused and worried and afraid about bio instead. And my fingers hurt from writing. My thumb was bruised in the joint. My hardest class.
The prof said the labs would be really hard, too. He said “challenging.”
Raymond, the TA who was going to be instructing the lab section I was in, took us over to show us the lab room and our lockers and review all the lab assignments and stuff, and handed out *huge* piles of photocopied lab assignments, or experiments or whatever. He said we had to to read them all, or have each one read before the lab, anyway, and he went through the whole lab schedule and then, just before we were finished, after almost another hour of paper and worry, he read off all the lab partners according to some list thing he had and matched me up with a *huge*, I mean, like *really* muscled woman named Lori who looked like a trucker and was about ten years or more older than me and smiled really nice.
But we weren’t... I mean, almost everyone else seemed to already know each other. I mean, their partners. I didn't remember any lab partner choosing choice thing from any class.
Anyway, I went to ask Raymond, the TA, about the schedule stuff (I think I had about thirty weeks worth of stuff for twenty weeks of lab) and about Lori.
He said to a few of us that a bunch of the labs were doubled up some weeks, and before I could figure out what I should ask about Lori he kinda pulled me over to him, or motioned, or leaned closer, and whispered.
“Bobby, Lori’ll make sure nobody hassles you about anything, okay?” He smiled at me like he was really pleased.
I was thinking, he knew me?
“She’s a nice woman and a good student, and a friend, okay?”
And he kinda stood up more and smiled at me really nice and looked another little question “okay?” at me too.
I was too confused to do anything more than kinda nod back... but then I was thinking, I was gonna be hassled? And Lori was a woman.... And I felt almost scared again. I felt scared. I felt really scared.
I got all my stuff back together, which was hard ‘cause I was trying to hide and I felt almost sick, and when I turned around and tried to pull my pack on, Lori was on a lab stool about two feet away and looking at me and smiled a little one and hiked my pack up for me and said “See you next week, okay, hon?”
She smiled more, bye, and walked out and waved at Raymond, who smiled back at her and then at me too.
I was feeling like in the cafeteria again, even if it wasn’t the same because they didn’t scare me like everyone else had. I wasn’t scared of *them*. But I was really scared.
Lori and Raymond knew me, and looked at me. The looks were differnet, but they were the... they looked at me.
After about ten minutes in the washroom trying to stop shaking, I had to go over to see if Ben was in. I didn’t think I could tell him what I wanted to, but I wanted to see him.
I went back to the dorm to drop off my pack ‘cause it weighed about twenty pounds, and it was almost on the way. It was on the way if you walked around all the busy parts.
The room door was already open and I had a little heart attack and almost went and hid, but I thought I was being crazy and I peeked and Dennis was sitting on his bed reading.
He looked up and saw me, so I went in and tried not to look. . .like I was. I was still too scared.
“Hey.”
He folded the paperback on his finger and kinda sat up a bit. He looked really sad.
“Hi...”
I put my pack on my bed and sat down on the chair at my desk. I looked at my hands and turned red, ‘cause then I was really remembering about crying. I think I even thought how do you say sorry for crying? I started to shake again.
“Bobby...”
I looked and he was looking at his own hands too. I looked up more. He did too, at me, and he was red. I thought he was mad.
“Look... Bobby...”
I was gonna say something snarky like “Don’t wear it out...” ‘cause I was scared, but I knew I shouldn’t and felt bad for even thinking it. I’m shit.
“I’m really sorry about this morning.”
I looked at him hard for a sec, I think ‘cause that’s what I was going to say before. Wished I could say.
He looked more at me then, too, and he was really, really... sad.
“I was stupid and I’m sorry.”
I almost said something then, like “What?” but he went on, really fast.
“And I know I shouldn’t have touched you or sat on your bed, without asking, and I’m *really* sorry and I won’t again and I’ll understand if you want to move or get another roomie but I’d like to... still, um, try, if it’s okay with you?”
He was looking at me like I was gonna hit him and he kept talking fast. “I mean, if it’s okay with you? I mean about rooming? I mean, I like you and I want to be your, your... friend and... I’m sorry?”
I looked at him like he’d already hit me, and couldn’t think. I had *no* idea what he was talking about. He looked down.
“I mean, I’d like to...”
Right then Jarrod, who I had kinda been avoiding ‘cause he was... I don’t know.... Anyway, he poked his head in the open door right then and looked at us like we were being too loud or something.
“Everything okay?”
He looked at Dennis, anyway, so I was wondering what... I wasn’t wondering fast enough to figure out what. Dennis had his head ducked down.
“Are you alright, Bobby?” Jarrod looked at me and was different. I thought of Ben for a second. I closed my eyes.
“Bobby?”
It wasn’t the same voice. There was a girl right behind him who I remembered was the proctor in the other wing on our floor, the girl’s wing. Jarrod kinda moved to the side and opened the door more and she came in a bit.
She had on the dumb “Proctor” shirt they all wore for the orientation stuff and I remembered her name was Anne and she was looking at me like I was still crying. Crying gain.
"... "
I figured out right then that Dennis had TOLD them, and I got really mad and more scared and a hundred other emotions that make you red and I figured out that was why he was apologizing ‘cause he had *TOLD* everyone! And everyone was laughing about me all day while I was gone to class and I was going to have to leave...
Mom and Dad... they’d tell me to stay and I couldn’t, so I couldn’t call them... I thought... I really didn’t think.... I just knew this was what it was all about....
It was all over.
Anne came in and sat on my bed and touched my knee on the side and Dennis and Jarrod left and closed the door, all at the same time, and I guess they were talking or something, but I don’t remember.
“It’s okay, it’s okay...”
She was trying to calm me down or something but what did she know? They were going to laugh at me and call me names and I couldn’t stand that ever again.
I hadn’t cried in years where anyone could ever see, even when Princess got sick and I held her when the vet put her to sleep, and I still held it in until I was in my room and then was quiet so nobody knew.
I shouldn’t have thought of her just then, ‘cause I started to feel like she was getting still again and stopped purring...
I cut my legs, then. For weeks. I was remembering that. I wanted to. How it hurt.
Anne hugged me really hard and said it was okay and nobody could hear me.
----
End of Part Three
-----
So I cried about my stupid, dumb, dead cat, and how Dennis had told on me and how he hated me no matter what he said because he told, and how everyone knew, and what happened with the... other... stuff too, I guess, and bleeding... It was no use. It was over. They didn’t even know and... it was over.
I tried to tell Anne I was okay after I started to get better, or under control, but I just got even more embarrassed when I realized I did it again, and that she saw me, and Jarrod... and Dennis saw me again too.
It was no use. I wished Dennis hadn’t seen me.
I wished I could just die, I think... like getting that idea, for the first time. I mean, like a plan. The word.
I got quieter, then too, not just calmer.
“I have to...”
Anne didn’t say anything, but she kinda looked more like she was listening, I guess. So I kept saying it. It didn’t matter, anyway.
“I can’t... can’t stay... now, when they... know... They saw me...”
I didn’t want to say die. I had to stop. I didn’t know why I told her that much.
Anne just waited, I think.
I looked at her, really, I guess the first time. She was upset, but like it was okay, and I wasn’t making her mad that I was crying, or disgusting her, I guess.
So I stopped thinking for a while. I was scared of thinking two things, over and over.
-
I ran down, and she waited. Then she talked really softly.
“Dennis?”
I nodded a bit. Whatever she meant, but yeah...
“He says he... it’s okay”
I looked a bit more.
“He only told Jarrod, and he only told me. Really.” She looked at my eyes for a sec.
How could she know?
“He just thought I could help more, okay?”
I guessed she understood, from whatever I said. I tried to think a bit, or get less stressed, anyway, which was like the same thing right then. If... them.. just them?
“Just... just... embarrassing... you guys... know...”
She looked like she was getting an idea or something and took my hand and squeezed it.
“Dennis telling us? Telling Jar?”
I looked down. She squeezed.
“He just was scared you were... that he hurt you.” She sounded serious, but like not-bad? And not making fun of me.
“He didn’t know what to do, or if he’d made it worse? And he left because he thought you wanted him to, *not* to tell anyone.”
I peeked at her. She looked like it was true. She smiled a little, too, then.
“He thought about it, too, for a long time, so he wouldn’t do something dumb? Before he asked Jarrod for help.”
She smiled more, but not funny, more to show she was trying, I think.
“He really wants to be your friend, and I don’t think he’d ever do anything to embarrass you. He’s a nice guy. He called to make sure you were... you made it to your class.”
I looked back at my hands, and hers too, on mine, and thought that if it was only them that knew, if it was over and only they knew, then maybe I could stay, and everything... if the other stuff would stop, like normal...
“I never cry...”
I didn’t want to talk more, but I was really... relieved, I guess, and Anne was smiling like I wasn’t a wimp, even if I was....
I was still afraid what the guys would say, but at least I wasn’t thinking as much about moving out, or leaving, anyway. Awful, cold stuff. Cutting. Worse.
After a long time Anne asked if I was okay with Dennis coming back in, and said if I *ever* wanted to talk I could see her and that it was okay if I cried ‘cause that was normal and *nobody* thought it was wrong and *everyone* cried. She was a girl, though.
And she made sure I knew I could go to see the counselors too and I told her about seeing Ben, and she smiled and said “Then Ben, then?”
I just nodded and smiled weird at that and she laughed a bit and I felt way better. Even if she still didn’t understand that I couldn’t cry like she thought.
Instead of Dennis coming back in, she kinda led me out and we went down the hall to Jarrod’s room. I’d never been in it before. He had a corner one all to himself, and even real furniture, like a sofa and a chair and a fridge.
Anne fake-knocked on the open door.
“Knock, knock, guys!” She was being kinda silly like she was in orientation.
Both of them were there and they both had Cokes and Jarrod asked if we wanted some. Anne pulled me in and down on the sofa between her and Dennis.
He was stiff and his hand crinkled the can and I couldn’t look up further than that, but he didn’t move away when our elbows touched a second, either.
She said it was okay, and I was okay and Dennis was okay and he did the right thing and I was okay with him. Okay?
Jarrod was laughing with her and I think she was kinda like the class clown and they really knew each other well, you could tell. But they made it normal, and we talked about other stuff for a while. They did, Jarrod and Anne, and a little bit Dennis.
I think that was the idea, I mean about being normal. Dennis acted more normal after a while anyway. Like he acts, not the sad way.
Around six, just before they served supper in the cafeteria (it was late on Fridays and a bigger, fancier meal, almost like Sundays, even if fewer students were there), we all went down and sat together and some of the girls from Anne’s wing came in and sat at the table too, and it was nice, ‘cause they hadn’t sat with us before. Dennis and me.
Like any Friday, the cafeteria was pretty empty, with everyone out for the night, or back home for the weekend.
Dennis had said before that he was going to be going home too, and I was going to ask him if he was going right away ‘cause I knew it was a long drive but he was talking to a girl and saying he was gonna be here all weekend if she wanted to come over and maybe they could talk? He was being all charming like he is ‘cause she was smiling in his eyes and the girl beside her was giggling. So I didn’t ask.
I didn’t talk to anyone much except Dennis and Anne and Jarrod, and not even them, much. But nobody looked at me like I was a crybaby, so I guess it was okay. It was okay.
They were talking about a dance over at the student union building and I knew Dennis wanted to go from the way he was smiling at the girls and I knew he wanted to stay ‘cause of what happened, and so I told him I was going to go to the paper and volunteer again. He has the nicest smile.
Or maybe I was just happy he smiled.
-
Dennis walked over to the paper with me and said I had to get Gary to walk me back, or someone, and he went with me right to the office doors, just like Gary.
I promised.
Gary stopped typing something enough to give me a big smile, which was nice too. It was normal. I liked the paper.
Around ten or so, after I finished a read-through of everything that was there, Gary walked me home in the rain with his huge golf umbrella.
We talked about regular stuff, and then, after we’d been quiet for a few moments, he looked over, the way he does.
“You look like you’ve lost weight, I mean, a lot, recently...”
I looked down. Maybe I had. Then I thought I really hadn’t had much appetite, lately.
“I guess....”
He looked at me more. I didn’t want to say, I don’t know... that I was scared?
“I’ve been...” I couldn’t think of anything I could say.
“It’s okay.” He sounded like it was, too, like he trusted me.
He was quiet while we walked more and the rain on the umbrella made tapping noise and I thought. I could see my breath and I wished I’d brough a jacket.
“I’ve...” I had to stop and try again. I hadn’t been planning to say more.
“I was... scared...” I talked at the ground and looked at the puddles and leaves, but I really wanted to tell him. I didn’t know what to say. I didn't even know why.
Everything I could say was stupid or sissy. Sissy.
I just stopped... thinking... and started to feel bad again, like I’d been punched... like everything was useless. I was almost shocked how fast I could feel so bad.
Gary kinda pulled me back closer under the umbrella ‘cause I’d walked sideways from it.
“Hey.” He almost whispered.
Everyone scared me.
I thought again. Gary thinks about what he says. He wouldn’t have said anything if I looked ok.
I straightened up a little and looked up at him. He looked all worried, and I thought of Dennis. And tried to think of what I was going to say.
Except for people looking at me, or laughing, and maybe I was imagining that, everyone was... better? I was just scared. And cried.
And he was scared I was in trouble. That someone was hurting me, maybe. He knew about bad stuff. I wondered for a second if he knew about razor knives.
I shook my head, but I guess I looked horrible, from his face.
“I’ve just been scared... and not eating much, I guess.”
He nodded and waited and I guess it was okay to not say more, but I told him I was seeing Ben, ‘cause that seemed important, like with Anne. I didn’t explain it very well, I think, but he relaxed in his eyes a bit.
He really didn’t say much more, but he made me feel better.
Dennis was in, when we got back, and Gary waved at him, like the last time.
Just before I went in, just before he would have walked back, he stopped and looked at my eyes.
“Will you call me if you need to?”
I nodded, but I couldn’t talk. He nodded and smiled and made a tiny wave and walked away to the stairs.
Right after I closed the door there was a little knock and I opened it again, thinking it was still Gary.
Jarrod was there instead, and smiled at me like he was trying to think what to say.
“Hi, Bobby. Just checking in.” He smiled more. I nodded. Checking in?
“Well, see you at breakfast, maybe. ‘Night.”
I shut the door quietly, again, and went and sat on my bed. Tired. Exhausted. Confused.
Not scared, though.
When I looked over at Dennis, he was thinking, I think. He had our english lit novel open and it looked like he’d read way over half of it already. I’d hardly even started it.
He was looking at me, too.
“Are you still okay with, I mean, the... with me?” He was looking right at my face.
What I thought then was that he was so much like Gary and that he would have gotten mad for those girls and he'd safe-walk people around too. He already did. And he had just been worried for me. Too. I smiled a kind of sad smile, ‘cause I was still sad. Too.
“I’m okay, really.” I tried to smile better. “Thanks.”
He looked at me a bit straighter and smiled a bit too.
“That’s good. I was worried you thought I was being... a... jerk... or something... and I knew I wasn’t, or I wasn’t trying to be, but... y’know?”
I knew, so I nodded and tried to smile. He probably tried too.
He went to get washed up for bed and I put my pack stuff away, finally, and put on my pajamas, or his pajama top anyway, and shorts, but I was too embarrassed to go wash and brush my teeth in it so I wrapped my housecoat so people wouldn’t see it.
I felt like an idiot, but it wasn’t too bad, just so long as I could wear his jammies.
I *am* an idiot... I’d’ve asked Dennis if he thought I was, but it would’ve been too embarrassing.
See?
And Dennis wears the same pajamas. The bottoms.
See?
I know it’s not really the same. He doesn’t pretend.
-
Before I fell asleep he kinda whispered really quietly in the dark.
“Bobby?”
“m?”
“Thanks for... understanding, okay?”
“It's okay...”
I thought about it a bit.
“Thanks, Dennis.”
I almost cried a bit more, remembering what Gary said, and thinking what Dennis did, about just touching me.
But I was quiet.
-
In the morning, ‘cause Saturday was kinda a holiday, I slept late.
I mean I woke up early, but I stayed in bed and listened to my radio turned down so quiet that I wouldn’t wake Dennis.
He had all the covers wrapped up in a kind of big twist around his middle and his legs were sticking out and he was bare on top and it was pretty chilly, but he was still sleeping. He said he was always warm.
He snored a lot, too, but not loud. Just quiet noises.
I wondered if he rolled around or if he messed up the bed on his back... and if he stopped snoring then? I was thinking that I’d have to watch him some night.
His alarm went off and I jumped. He hardly even stopped snoring but just reached over and whacked it and it stopped and then after like five minutes he woke up. He’d stopped snoring right after the alarm, but it was *minutes* before he kinda shivered and opened his eyes and blinked and looked sideways and smiled at me.
“Morning.”
I was smiling at how weird he woke up.
“Morning.” But I kinda laughed, too.
He looked at me like I was being stupid or something.
“What?”
I had to smile more. “Did you know that you wake up *after* you turn off your alarm?”
He thought I was sleeping or something and imagining stuff but I kept trying to tell him how weird it was.
He just said I was still asleep and dreaming a really stupid dream. And he was still asleep too, and I was snoring and bugging him.
-
At breakfast there was a different lady at the cash register ‘cause it was the weekend, which was good ‘cause I was nervous.
Another thing that was different was that Anne and some of the girls from their wing waved us over to eat with them again.
There were six of them, the rest were sleeping in, or home, or whatever, and it was really nice to talk and joke around.
Dennis’d gone to the dance the night before but had left after an hour they said, or asked him about it, anyway, but he knew them all and introduced me, along with Anne. I mean she introduced me too.
They all knew my name, I guess ‘cause I was Dennis’ roomie, and even that I volunteered at the paper, and what classes I was in, and stuff like that, and it was like we had a lot to talk about, even if it was what a blabbermouth Dennis was.
But they just said he mentioned me, and Anne mentioned me, and so on, and he *was* a blabbermouth, yes, but a cute one.
He acted all silly like he didn’t know if he should be insulted, and I said he made noise all night long in his sleep, too...
“I do not!!”
I just nodded and smiled like I knew, and told them about his quiet, little snores.
Kathy, one of the girls, snorted.
“So... like *cute* snores?”
They all started pinching him and doing tiny snort and whistle noises and he was trying to still act mad but he laughed too and finally jumped back from his seat when he started to get ticklish, I think.
“Well, what about Bobby!?” He kinda pointed at me. “When BOBBY sleeps...” He stopped. He looked like he was trying to think up something awful, or embarrassing... Everyone waited and I kinda blushed for I don’t know what. Well, I knew, and that was why.
“Dammit. I always fall asleep first...”
All the girls laughed at him and then he perked up like he remembered.
“He talked in his sleep once!!!” He said it like “Ah Ha!!”
They all looked like it was good gossip and were laughing and giggling and telling him to dish, dish! He just looked less ah ha-ish...
“Well, um, he made, um, noises like talking...”
Everyone looked like he was really lame.
“Any *names*, at least?” Anne made it sound like he was the *worst* gossip she’d ever met.
“Um...” He looked at me like I was the problem. “He didn’t use any consonants, I think...”
They all looked at him with pity. Then they looked at me.
“How do you *live* with someone that boring?” Kathy mentioned, like it was a really nice question.
I looked at Dennis and smiled and tried to fake a yawn and not laugh. He tried to look hurt and I had to look back at Kathy.
“Wellll...” I started to smile too much. “He’s way better than sleeping pills...”
-
I only figured out why they were laughing so hard after we left, and then I was *way* too embarrassed to ask if Dennis knew. Oh, man...
-
I wanted to talk to Ben about all the stuff that happened, but he wasn’t in on holidays. Or weekends. Dennis said he was gonna finish the novel we had to read and I hadn’t hardly started, so I thought I better at least do that.
I like to read laying on my bed but Dennis kinda sits all over the place. I mean, he like moves to a different position every couple of pages almost, against the wall, on his pillow, on the stupid desk chairs, and he finally settled down on his chair with his feet up on the bed. It looked uncomfortable.
After he was that way for about a half hour I had to ask.
“Isn’t that uncomfortable?”
He looked back at me, ‘cause he was almost facing away.
“What?”
I couldn’t tell if he heard me.
“Isn’t that uncomfortable? Sitting like that?”
He looked at his legs, like he didn’t see what I meant, and then back at me. He looked confused.
“Like what?”
“Like you’re all upright in a hard little chair and your legs are straight out and you’re holding the book like, like in the air..?” I tried to make it sound uncomfortable. It *did* sound uncomfortable!
He looked back at his legs and his book, I guess. Then he looked back at me and smiled.
“No?” He grinned. “Why? Are *you* uncomfortable with the way I’m sitting?”
“No! Yes! It just *looks* so... so awkward! Isn’t your neck sore?” I tried to make uncomfortable face too.
He laughed at me a sec.
“Hey, *I’m* almost finished the book!” He waved it and he had about three pages to go. I had about three pages read.
“I can’t understand what he’s saying!”
He gave me a look, like I was being stupid.
“I mean, what he means, I mean, I *understand* but I can’t get interested because he keeps on... I mean he uses that old-fashioned style, with all the big words...”
I sounded stupid.
“Gimmie five minutes, okay? Just five minutes and I’ll be finished it, okay?”
He didn’t sound like he was making fun of me.
I nodded okay and he just turned around and sat up again and read.
I tried, but it was still as boring and I was thinking more about what he meant. I was on page seven for like the fifth time.
“Okay!” Dennis kinda slammed his book closed, or woulda, if it wasn’t a paperback. He moved over to his bed and pushed the chair away and sat facing me.
“Let’s try something.” He opened his book back up to the first page.
“I’ll read the first paragraph and you read the second one, okay?” He looked at me like it was normal. I think ‘cause I looked like it wasn’t.
“Out loud. Look, Justin and I used to study plays this way and it works, okay?”
I tried to look like it was okay, even if it sounded weird. He started to read.
“It had been an auspicious week for Captain Rodrigo Jose Figueras...”
He made it sound like normal talking and I tried to copy him, and just said the words for the next paragraph.
But I still had trouble with the way it was written, with how it didn’t seem like anyone really talked.
He stopped me after just a few sentences and came over and sat beside me and kinda looked at me if it was okay? I nodded.
“Okay.” He closed his book and put it down beside him and then moved closer and took my book and held it open in front of both of us.
“Read along with me, but in your head, okay? And if you see a word you don’t understand, or a sentence that doesn’t... work?... anything that you don’t understand or anything, just point to it when I get to saying it, if you still don’t, okay?”
He said that was the way he learned Shakespeare.
He started reading, “It had been an auspicious week...”
When he read, it sounded normal. Smart, but normal. And when I pointed to a word he kinda said it and some other word or sentence, like in commas, that explained it, and kept reading, and it sounded normal. Some of it was Spanish and he spoke it pretty well.
And in half an hour we finished the first four chapters! And it all made sense!
He grinned at me, or my face, I guess, when I turned the page and it was chapter five and I wanted to keep reading and *liked* the story!
“See?”
I was suddenly embarrassed that he was so smart or something, but he just smiled and looked at the book again.
I read every second paragraph this time, and he told me meanings just the same.
“The Indians of the Andes believe in the existence of angels...”
-----
End of Part Four
-----
He made us stop for meals and we still finished just before nine.
We sat on my bed most of the morning, and then moved to the couch in the hall, and then ended up on a sectional on the big balcony in the student union building that was really comfortable, and it was quiet up there too. He said he liked reading there in between classes, like it was all quiet and private in a crowded place.
We were leaning back in the corner and he turned the page and it just ended...
It was over. I mean it was one of the best books I ever read. It was so funny and tragic and smart, and about the real world but really about this fantasy, magic world... and love and... and I wanted to know more about the people, about all of them.
“It’s...”
I looked up and Dennis was smiling, I guess ‘cause I was holding my book like I was afraid it would run away. I just looked back at it.
I didn’t know what to say.
I wanted it to be new so I could read it again and I was sad too 'cause it never would be again. I looked at the cover, and thought it was beautiful, too...
“It’s beautiful...”
And I started to cry ‘cause it was, and ‘cause I’d never get to read it again, ever, like that...
Dennis put his arm around me and just sat with me.
“It *is* beautiful.”
I wiped my face and looked at him, at the way he said it. He was still looking at my book, in my hands. But he looked at me too, and he was smiling.
“That was fun, wasn't it?”
I nodded and looked at it again and wished. My eyes were still running.
“Want to do the next one the same?”
I looked at him like he was crazy, or an angel. He smiled really big and hugged his arm around me harder.
“There are two more in the story.” He *really* smiled big, at my face, I think.
“Two more?”
He nodded.
I had to look at the book and think how good it was, and that it wasn’t over.
I wasn’t even embarrassed.
-
I woke up *way* past breakfastime and Dennis was already gone, maybe to breakfast, or lunch, even...
I put on my oldest jeans and a baggy tee and went to wash up a bit, and wake up. I’d taken a long, loud shower before bed.
I took the book too, so I could look at it during breakfast. And while I brushed my teeth. I had to stop at the door and go back and get my toothbrush after I thought that. And then my towel.
Outside our room, Jarrod was asleep on one of the hall sofas, from down the hall, I guessed, and there was a cafeteria tray with a couple of coffee cups and fruit peels and stuff on the floor.
He looked like he’d been up late, and then I thought that eleven wasn’t really *that* late... but then I thought that I didn’t know if he was up to eleven... after eleven... when I went to sleep...
I... I was still asleep.
I thought about asking if he wanted to go to breakfast too, but I wanted to be alone and look at the book some more.
I decided I wouldn’t wake him up, even if he would’ve been more comfortable in bed. He looked like he would've been more comfortable on the floor, too....
And why he wasn't in his room, just down the hall..? And why wasn't the couch down the hall, like usual?
And besides, he was asleep.
I was too, still, from the way I was thinking. Again.
-
I went to the cafeteria straight from the washrooms. Way more awake.
I looked at the book as I walked, at the way the cover picture made sense after we read it, little pieces like stained glass, all broken up and complicated, but like parts of the story.... It was more like a painting, though, or like those rubber-stamp pictures, and really simple, but it was beautiful.
There’s a big entrance/lobby/waiting area on the way, with the elevator and stairs to the girls-only tower, and doors for the student housing offices, and past them the cafeteria building.
When I came down the three little steps from our dorm hall, there were a lot of people there.
A couple of campus police and a city policeman were talking with the rez manager, who I vaguely remembered from September. They were over by the glass doors to the outside that were all covered up with cardboard that looked like it came from packing boxes and I figured they must’ve been smashed or something. There was a lot of cardboard. Both sets of doors.
Some of the proctors were there too, beside the elevators, talking really seriously to a short old guy who I thought was the Dean of residences or something. I remembered him in a suit.
“Hey, Bobby!”
Anne was with the proctors, and waving, so I waved hi back.
They all stopped talking and looked at who she was waving at, I guess, and I turned red, like usual, but I kept on going to the cafeteria. But she came over, so I stopped.
“Hey, Bobby.” She smiled a bit, like she knew she just said that. “How’re you doing?”
She talked quiet but normal, and I was glad she was ‘cause it made me feel like it was okay to see her. I mean, like it was normal again, after. I smiled more. Maybe different, but way more. I was still happy from the book.
“I’m really great, thanks.” I didn’t know how to say thanks more and I didn't want to get emotional so I kinda tried to change the subject.
“What happened?” I looked over at the police and the door.
The Dean and the rest of the proctors had gone over and were looking at the door too, or something. The cardboard, anyway. Talking and looking.
“Someone wrote... marked up the doors... and the police... well, Haroldson, wants them to treat it like a crime and they want it to be an incident or something...” Anne sounded tense.
The talking got way louder and more confused. Even the campus policemen were talking loud, and *all* of them were angry.
“Hey, guys.” Jarrod was right behind me. I almost jumped but I guess he was making sure I wasn’t going to jump or something, and he kinda touched my arm as he said it.
I smiled after I knew it was him, like right away, and almost made a joke about him on the couch, but when I looked he was looking at the argument by the door. He looked all awake too.
One of the girl proctors by the door was getting really mad and was like *hissing* and I heard her say “It’s *not* just about goddamn *defacing*!”
The Dean guy stepped right between her and us and said something quiet that made all the arguments kinda just *stop* and the girl who was so mad stood around him and looked right at me.
She got red and turned her back and said *really* mad, “FUCK!”
She quiet-shouted it at the floor, like a yard away from the dean and then jerked away and ran around us to the stairs, back the way I'd come from, and pounded out of sight.
I was shocked. I didn’t even know her and it was so scary that she was mad at me...
One of the other girls ran and chased her and the Dean and police started whisper-arguing more then, but really quiet.
And *everyone* had their backs to us.
“C’mon...” Jarrod kinda took my arm. He put his arm in mine and held it with his other hand too, and led the way towards the cafeteria doors.
He sounded really odd, and looked really, really tired. More than before, seconds before.
Anne angled over behind us and ran her shoulder into his other arm.
“Sucks.”
“Yeah. That’s the word...” He led us into the cafeteria and Anne closed the door even though it was usually left open.
-
They didn't talk in the line. I didn't either. It was too weird to understand anything, even enough to ask.
I got some breakfast, and Anne too, but Jarrod just got a juice he had to pay for ‘cause he’d already got his card punched that morning and said it wasn’t worth it to get another punch.
He kinda joked that the most important thing he’d learned at school was how to manage his cafeteria account. But I think he was trying not to talk about what happened in the lobby.
Almost as soon as we were seated there was louder shouting outside and one of the proctors who'd been arguing, a guy from the floor right above ours, I thought, a really huge, fat guy, came in. He didn't look happy.
He stopped, holding the doors open, and everyone looked at him and he looked all around the room and then at us, and stomped over to our table.
“Jar, Anne. Can you...” He stopped for a sec and looked at me, like he was maybe trying to remember my name, but we never really met.
“I’ll come.” Jarrod drank his juice in one gulp and stood up. He put his juice glass on my tray and looked at Anne and me. “See you later?”
We said bye and sure and stuff, but it was weird. It was like he was getting the experts or something...
Anne looked across at me, weirded out too, and made it unanimous.
“Drama...” She kinda sighed and looked tired too, like Jarrod. And she’d looked better just a minute ago, too.
I thought I should say something, but I didn’t know what. I tried to smile like it would be okay, but since I had no idea what, I didn’t really think it would work.
I felt like Anne was a real friend after yesterday, after she kinda understood what I meant without me having to say all of everything. But all the complicated feelings I had seemed like totally different than the complicated things in her eyes... I felt like I was no help and I'd just stumbled into something and made it worse.
So she kinda surprised me when she reached over and put her hand on mine and squeezed it.
“Thanks. It’ll be alright.” But she looked worse. “Do you have any time, after breakfast?”
I said sure, just study stuff... not even.... I hadn't planned my day.
I looked at my book and showed it to her and said it was the best book I ever read and I was going over to the book store after lunch to get the sequels and I had to write a paper on it but she could borrow it, after...
But she’d already read it and laughed and said stuff like “No, really, did you like it?”
She said she’d read it a few years ago, when she was in the same English Lit, and I guess I’d forgotten she was a senior.
And then for some reason I thought about what Gary said about the... rape. About how so many girls were so scared, and just then I figured out that Anne was here... then.
And Jarrod.
All the proctors. They all were, and all in residence ‘cause they had to be fourth or fifth years...
All the complicate feelings came together. I got tired too.
-
After we finished eating, and really didn’t say anything more, she took my hand again and walked to the cafeteria doors.
The campus police and the Dean guy, Haroldson, were watching a couple of guys who were taking the doors right off their hinges, still covered with cardboard. There were old wooden doors leaning on the wall.
Anne led me over to the elevator to the girl’s dorm that I wasn’t supposed to go in. There was a sign, right there, and the dean guy was right there, too.
I was going to say something like that but I guess Anne was thinking the same thing. She pushed the button and leaned against the wall by the door.
“It’s okay if you’re with me, okay?”
I nodded, but I was still nervous. The doors dinged open and Ann pulled me in, and as the doors closed I looked out and the dean guy was looking right at me. He looked mad. I thought I was in trouble, even with what Anne said.
-
The top floor of the girls' rez tower was a really bright, big room, with almost all-glass walls on two sides and low couches and armchairs here and there and a kind of kitchen over on one wall.
“This’s the girls’ party room for all the dorms.” Anne went over to a couch right in the corner of the two window walls and flopped down, and after a minute I sat on the same couch too.
We could see most of the campus, and the city too, miles away. She looked out the window with me for a bit and then kinda flopped her head back and rolled it over to look at me. She still looked really tired.
“I hate this.” She closed her eyes and looked almost sick.
I was going to say something, like “What?” but she opened her eyes again and skooched over a bit and took my hand.
“The... door, stuff..." She leaned over and held it really hard. She had the saddest eyes.
"It was about you... and Dennis, probably...”
I looked at it and couldn’t think except... Dennis? The dean so angry. Police. I almost couldn't even whisper.
“What stuff?”
She tried to look calm or something. Less tired. Less sad. She sat up a little and turned more towards me so our knees touched.
“Someone wrote... umm... homophobic and, um... threat stuff on the doors with, some kinda glass paint, etching stuff, so they can’t wash off...”
She looked at me more... not seriously, ‘cause she was really serious before... but more intensely, I guess.
I was trying so hard to figure out what she meant, and was thinking. “Homo...”
I wasn't really thinking. I was panicking. Like all, everything I'd been afraid of, all the laughs and looks...
Like everything was real and hard and as big as those huge doors and everyone reading them and...
“Sometime... before five...” Anne closed her eyes. Her voice was painful.
“They don’t, they didn't really know..." She swallowed and talked better.
"Anyway... a girl from here found it and, and she called the campus, the cops and they called Baens, tthe manager, and he called Jarrod.”
She opened her eyes and looked like twenty years older, and I knew she was going to cry so I slid over and hugged her.
She kinda shook and kept talking, really low, but she cried too.
“He woke me and we came to see the, the... the doors... and he made Haroldson come to the rez too, called him, I think...”
She stopped for a while. I thought about what she said about it being about me, and police, and homophobic... Mom and Dad...
“Dennis saw it and he freaked.” She moved a bit, but kept hugging me. Holding on.
“He came to see, after... some... student I guess, someone... told him... this morning...” She stopped for a moment and calmed. She nodded on my shoulder and then sat up a little. So I could see her face. She kept my hands. Or we grabbed each others'.
“His father’s coming, I think... an' he’s over at the admin building... until he gets here...”
I stopped holding. She grabbed my hands harder, though, and looked at them, and me.
“Jarrod made him go.” She must’ve seen how confused I got at that.
“He was being... I mean, he was really angry and...” She thought a bit. “Jar thought he was going to scare you... we thought, he was so mad, and we knew you were having a hard time, and we, I mean Jarrod and me, thought Dennis would still be too mad, if you got up then, when he was really scary...”
I thought really fast. Got it all at once.
Homophobic. He thought I was gay and so then he wanted to hurt me, or hated me... or something... Or. Friends with the fag... He touched the fag. In the campo he sat...
But he was so nice, and yesterday, and last night, even about me crying, and...
It was because people were saying *he* was gay. The graffiti. I looked at my hands. As big as all the doors. Where everyone saw it.
Anne held my hands more, harder. I still knew.
“It’s... it was what people are saying, isn’t it?” I kept looking down. “About me, I mean...” I was gonna cry again, and feel like a sissy.
Dennis wasn’t my friend.
“He doesn’t want... he didn't want them to see him too...”
"No."
I looked up a bit. She was really tired looking, still, but she was almost smiling, too.
“No. It’s *not* because of you... I mean, I guess, it is, but not that way...” She squeezed my hand more.
“Bobby, the only problem is the... asshole, or whoever, who wrote on the doors, or... *anyone* who says anything, bad...”
“But Dennis...”
“Is mad that anyone would do that.”
She must have seen that I didn’t really understand.
“To you.”
I had to think for a second more.
“He’s not mad at me?”
She smiled, at my face I guess.
“No. He’s not mad at you at all.” She smiled more at me. “He really, really likes you. That’s why he’s mad. Because you’d be scared.”
I guess I looked stupid then. Or funny.
“And he wants to protect you.”
She laughed a tiny bit ‘cause I made even more fish face.
Then she got more serious, but still smiled. I think I looked totally, completely confused, because I was.
“He *knows* you’re scared about how people are talking about you, and you’re afraid everybody will hate you or something...” She leaned a bit closer and pulled my hand more in her lap. She looked a million percent better, all of a sudden.
“He just wants to make it better for you and he doesn’t know how... He was talking to Jarrod about it, Friday. And then this morning... He was all angry that he couldn’t do anything... about the door... and got really worked up and almost got arrested.”
She smiled again at my face.
“Cal, the big guy? kinda had to drag him away from the campus police when he thought they weren’t doing anything.” She smiled like it was a good thing.
“I know you haven’t known each other for long, but he really, really likes you. And he’s one of the good ones.”
I knew what she was talking about, that he at least wasn’t disgusted with me for what people were probably saying, or my crying. But... we sat, touching, where people could see... and he read to me...
And he let me cry and even smiled at me...
“He was... mad?”
Right away I knew I sounded even more like a sissy than crying would, but Anne smiled really big and looked less tired, and a *lot* happier.
“Yes! He was yelling and all red and made them put up the paper on the doors and kept saying what if you came by and *saw* it, huh? Huh!?” She did the huh really in my face and laughed.
“Cal hauled him away about the same time the city cop looked like he was gonna cuff him or something.” She laughed really loud for a second and then smiled more normally.
“Haroldson told us to get him away too so Jarrod took him over to the UC to get him to eat or something.” She stopped, like the story was over. Then she added, or really finished it.
“That was about three hours ago... You really slept in. But that's what happened.”
I thought of something else.
“How come Jarrod asked you...” I thought some more. “How come they even called Jarrod?”
She made a bad smile.
“Because it was about you, and he's your proctor. And Baens knew he could help because they learned a lot after, well, there was a rape here, and when the, the...”
She looked at me all tired again all of a sudden. I thought it wasn’t tired... More like really sad.
“Some...” She held my hands really tighter. She thought a bit more and then looked in my eyes.
“No one wanted you to get scared or hurt by some jerk...” She looked like she was checking me or something.
“Baens' a smart man. The stuff on the door....” Her eyes teared up.
“He didn’t know for sure, so he called Jarrod, and he... tried to do his best. And Jarrod knew it was gonna... it was more serious, and called Haroldson..." She looked down.
“But Dennis was the one who made them cover it, he was so mad like the instant he saw it, and we were talking so much about everything else, for, for...”
She shusshed me, sort of, when she stopped and breathed deep and thought some more. She started talking again after almost a minute.
“Two years ago there was a sexual assault in... in... in the... residences.” She looked relieved that I just nodded.
“The girl it happened to... got help, like right away... and really good help, like counseling and stuff...” She looked in my eyes again, to see if I understood, I think.
“But seventeen girls left the residences, and we think three boys, because of it, almost right after, and some just ran away, almost the next day, and most of them dropped out...”
She was crying, all of a sudden, and looked at our hands.
“They said one girl, Tyra, tried to... to kill herself... because of it.” She sniffed.
“After she was gone for four months, after she left, she... she... and she never said why, I mean, before...” She looked up again, and was crying hard.
“But... but she was scared at what... what happened... really scared...”
She hugged me hard.
“The girl it happened to got so much help, and the ones we forgot about... for...”
She just stopped. Sniffed.
“We *didn’t* forget... but we didn’t know how bad it was!”
I tried to hold her but she had my hands and I was afraid to say anything or pull away while she was shaking.
She finally slowed down and sat up a bit and leaned back a bit. And let go of my hands. They were numb.
“I’m sorry, I shouldn’t tell you this stuff...” She kissed my cheek and sat back, and kept hold of my closer arm.
“So, anyway we know how it can be bad to be so afraid, but it was Dennis who knew it would be *you* that was afraid and made us stop being stupid experts.”
I think I understood, then, what she had been telling me. What she was talking about. All, how it connected.
“Then how come Dennis, I mean, then how come he’s leaving?” I really wanted to know why he didn’t tell me... about what he did. Why he didn't come back to our room, even...
“He’s not leaving!? Oh! Oh! Jarrod said he just shouldn’t *be* here... when he was so mad, or... upset, anyway.”
“But his father’s coming!”
She tried to make a smile.
“He called home and his father’s coming but that's just 'cause he was mad and what happened, not to leave! I think he’ll still stay for sure.” She looked much better.
“He made Jarrod watch out for for you, outside your room. He wanted to make sure you were safe and didn't want to wake you up and make a bigger deal of it... We didn't think you'd walk right by Jarrod.”
I started to shake. I didn’t feel safe or anything normal right then. Like a hundred feelings all catching up and rushing around in my chest.
Anne and Jarrod and... a lot of them didn't hate me for... for what was on the doors. They thought the guys who'd *write* were wrong!
Dennis was... mad. But he was okay, and not mad at *me*. And he wasn't leaving.
And he liked me. Still. Even with what was there.
He held me, yesterday, and he still liked me.
-
I asked Anne to walk with me back to my room and I think I was afraid I’d cry in front of the men in the lobby but she said it was okay and put her arm around my shoulders in the elevator before I even said that and kinda blocked me from even seeing them and we walked out really fast.
I didn’t even look who was there.
-
Dennis wasn’t in our room and I was afraid again that he wasn’t coming back, even if Anne said.
I looked as calm as I could and thanked Anne and said I really needed to have a nap, or study... I can’t remember what I said, exactly. But she hugged me again and let me close the door.
I sat and looked at Dennis’ bed and started to cry, ‘cause I was a fag and a sissy and now people knew it for sure, and I was crying ‘cause Dennis wasn’t coming back, and he’d rubbed my back... and held me... And Anne said he was, but he wouldn’t... ‘cause he found out...
And she said he was mad *for* me, to protect me, and he liked me and *wasn't* leaving... but his father was coming, driving down because of the doors and then *he'd* know and make Dennis leave, even if...
I wanted him to rub my back again.
-
And I forgot my stupid book upstairs. I started sobbing.
-----
End of Part Five
-----
Someone was knocking on the door. Not really loud, but not stopping.
After a second I was awake and wiped my face on my sheet and sat up, but I was suddenly afraid to answer.
I sneaked over and stood and listened and then, after a few seconds I got embarrassed and tired and thought I should open it, but I didn’t want to, ‘cause Dennis had a key.
“Bobby?” It was soft.
I shook, but opened the knob, almost crying again at the... I kept one foot tight against the door.
Gary was there. Anne too, behind him, and Jarrod and the Dean guy. I just looked at them.
No Dennis.
Gary looked at me like he did when we were walking, like I should listen.
“Can I come in?”
I looked at the floor and nodded, all dull and slow, and thought they all were gonna come in, but Gary closed the door behind him and sat on Dennis’ desk chair and I sat on my bed.
I looked at the floor and my hands and knees and feet and waited, I guess I almost was too tired. If Dennis had been there... well... he wouldn’t be...
“Can I?”
I looked up and Gary was kinda motioning or pointing to the bed beside me.
I nodded. I didn’t care, and that was a really bad feeling. I looked over at Dennis’ empty bed.
Gary sat right beside me, right up against me, and put his arm around me and pulled me really close and then he leaned his head over on top of mine and put his other arm around me in a sideways hug.
All the stuff from that morning... all the... drama, Anne had said... all the feelings and pain, and feeling like everything was falling apart and then was going to be wonderful... and then...
-
Gary whispered after a while that he was there.
-
Ellen at the paper heard, at home, about the residence, the doors, and called Gary from her house, and he’d come over and talked to Jarrod, ‘cause he knew he was my proctor, and knew him too, I guess...
And *everyone* was worried about me, and that’s why they were there, Gary said.
He said they were my safe walk.
He said I should see a counselor today, if I could. Even if it wasn’t Ben.
“For what?”
I knew that was the wrong thing to say, right away, but I think I meant to say, why bother...
“Because you aren’t happy, Bobby.”
He hugged my shoulders harder and leaned in so he was whispering.
“You aren’t happy.”
-
He mostly just hugged me. After a while we talked.
I mean, he got me to talk. All the thoughts and feelings, even when they didn't make sense. And he never said anything about them, just listened.
After, after I said about... about some of the worst stuff, he made me promise I would call him or someone if I felt like I wasn’t safe, even from me, and he said it wasn’t okay to want to “leave.” He said that was dangerous and *he* didn’t want me to go.
He made me say “suicide,” too. That that was what I meant. And made me promise to go to see Ben or someone else for counseling first thing on Monday morning. And not to be alone until then.
After about an hour he said he was going to go to the paper and said, “Wait...” and went and made sure Jarrod was in his room and that he’d be there all day, or Anne.
He said Jarrod and Anne were my safe walks too.
-
I was trying to sleep again when the door opened and I almost screamed ‘cause it might've fit in part of a bad dream I was having, or the noise was, and I couldn’t remember it even, right then... But my heart was racing.
Dennis was there. In the doorway.
And a man and woman. The man was looking at me like I was in trouble and I didn’t know what to do. He was Dennis' father and was going to make him leave.
Dennis stepped in the door and kinda stood to the side and looked at me and them. I tried to stay sitting up.
He was there. Back.
“Mmm, Bobby... I'm sorry, I knocked... This is my mother and father. Mom, Dad, Bobby... Johanson.”
He looked at me more, and didn’t smile and I thought it was like judging, or blaming me, and then I remembered he was all mad and... in trouble because of me and was embarrassed and now he blamed me.
I couldn’t think anything good right then, even if he was back. And his father hated me, I could tell.
“Out. Out out out out.”
His mom wasn’t as big as Dennis but she shoved him out and he leaned over to see me through the shutting door, ‘cause I had to look up more to see what was going on, and he still wasn’t smiling.
“Ohhh...” She came over and sat on my bed right where Gary had been and took my hand and looked all over my face.
“Dennis told us all about the graffiti, Bobby. I know what you must feel like...”
She stopped and smiled a bit sadly and looked at my eyes more. She looked a bit like Dennis. She wasn't mad, either.
He hadn't been. At the door. He hadn't...
“Just listen to me. How could I ever know?" She held my hand tighter. "How are you doing?”
Dennis and all, just then, that thought, I nodded.
She looked in my eyes for a minute. I didn't understand what she was doing, or what she wanted, but I was a little less scared from when the door opened. Maybe a lot.
"You don’t have to talk, if you don’t want, and I’ll shut up if you want me to, okay?”
I nodded again. At least it made sense to nod. Talking felt too hard.
“My son is a bit slow at times, but he’s... true... in his heart. He didn’t want to leave you alone and he’s very worried that he did...”
She looked at my hand, I guess, and then at my eyes, and talked really softly.
“He’s very protective of you, you know.” She watched my face turn red, ‘cause I was thinking 'protective'... like Anne said, too. What it meant about me....
And that maybe he didn’t hate me. Or want to leave.
“A lot of people...”
She was speaking a bit oddly, and I looked at her to see. She was asking something. She held my hand a bit closer to her too.
“What?”
She smiled a bit. “Your proctor, Jarrod Milner?”
I nodded.
“He told my husband that if he...” She thought a second. She looked like she was thinking of ways to say whatever she meant.
“Henry is an emotional man. And he's very protective of *me* and... of Dennis as well.”
I thought about what she could mean by protective of Dennis. Not good thoughts.
“He wanted our son to move out, out of residence altogether.”
I know I looked strange. I was starting to panic, and all I could think was that Dennis *was* going, it was true, she'd said exactly what I thought, it was going to happen, and even if it was a different reason or way... but the same, and he’d be gone.
“But your Mr. Milner, and Mr. Haroldson and a woman, Mrs. Harbison I think, convinced him that Dennis was perfectly safe with you.”
She smiled at my face. I know ‘cause she touched it too and almost laughed.
“It’s okay, dear. I trust you not to ravish my boy.” She smiled more normally again. She squeezed at the same time, to mean about me, I guess.
Then she looked serious at my eyes.
“I know my boy hasn’t told you this, but I think you should hear it.”
I nodded a tiny bit. I was listening as hard as I could.
“Dennis and Mr. Milner talked for a long time this week about your problems, about... what Dennis told me...” She looked right in my eyes.
“He said you were becoming more and more afraid of going out? Of leaving this room?”
I felt like dirt. Then she hugged me closer with one arm.
“Dear, don’t be like that? He said people were treating you badly, and staring at you, and he understood but he was afraid to talk to you about it more than you wanted, that he might make you feel worse.”
She looked all over my face and in my eyes and was trying to get me to look at her more, I think.
I was trying not to cry. That’s all. He thought... I didn’t know.
“He said he thought he would die if people treated him the way they were treating you, and you still went to class and... out.”
I looked up then. What? She smiled a little again.
“He thinks you’re very brave. And strong.” She smiled more at my face. “And he wants to help you, if he can, if you’ll let him, and he wants to keep people from hurting you.”
She stopped smiling, but she tried. Her lips were shaking.
“He cried, on the phone, this morning.” Tears were in her eyes.
“He was scared by the writing on the windows and thinks you might hurt yourself now and he’s very afraid for you, and doesn’t know how to help.”
I started to cry and forgot to be afraid she’d see. He was afraid? He cried to her?
“I... I didn’t!” I tried to say ‘mean it.’ But I did.
She pulled me over and hugged me hard.
“I know, I know...” She waited a moment and kept talking, quieter.
“Dennis liked you from the beginning, very much." She sat up and smiled at my face again. "He promised your parents and your friend from high school that he’d take care of you. Now he's worried he can't.”
I just... felt... shocked. My..? What did Mom and Dad, and... Barry... say?
“You didn’t know that, did you? Did you know that when Dennis applied for residence he said that he’d be fine with a gay roommate?”
I looked freaked, I’m sure. She smiled more, the same, and kept on.
“And did you know that your Mr. Milner and Mr. Haroldson both came here to talk to him about you before you moved in, and he said he would like you as his roommate..?” She smiled.
“Even tough you weren’t gay?”
I was trying to breathe. I couldn’t understand her. It didn’t make any sense. If they knew... but she said they didn't think... what did Mr. Haroldson know about me at all? And before!?
She kept talking and I was sure I was missing some of it.
“He told us... *they* told us some of this only an hour or so ago and my husband is *not* happy.”
She grinned, and then kinda switched to a kind of story-telling.
“Dennis’ best friend is gay. Did he tell you about him? Well, Henry was never happy with *that* either, even though they grew up together.” She really grinned.
“They went to some dances together that almost gave him a coronary, and last spring Justin *escorted* Dennis to the senior prom and if you ever tell my husband that, I will deny any knowledge of it!”
She was grinning like a clown by then and I was doing an idiot imitation.
She smiled more normally after a minute and touched my face again.
“My boy isn’t gay, or isn't sexually active that way, anyway, but he thinks being gay is just fine and finding out his best friend was just made him worry about how high school would be harder for him, and so he helped...” She shone, she smiled so nice.
“I’m *very* proud of him.”
I was crying again. I was barely able to keep from bawling and she held me again.
“Dennis loves his friends, dear." She hugged me tighter.
"And even after so few weeks, he loves you. He thinks you’re *very* special.”
She waited ‘til I could hear better, but kept holding me. I tried, but I clutched at her.
“Mr. Milner told my husband that he’d call the campus police if he scared you.” She squeezed me really tight for a second and then sat away a little.
“And my son told him he wouldn’t ever visit home again either, so there!”
She sat me up, again, and smiled like everything was really right when I had to smile at that.
“Did I tell you how proud I was of Dennis?”
I couldn’t remember, but I nodded agai. She didn't have to say. I couldn’t talk, anyway.
“Dear?” She waited ‘til I could nod again again.
“I think you should call your parents.”
I looked bad, I guess, ‘cause she hugged me, again.
“When you can, dear, but you need to tell them how you’re doing, and they’re your parents, and parents really know more than you might think...” She pulled back and looked in my eyes and smiled really sadly.
“They love you very much, too, you know.” She said it like it was so sure.
But I wasn’t. I was really afraid of what they'd feel about me.
She made me promise to at least call them, and hugged me really hard, like a shake on a deal.
“It’ll be all right...”
-
Dennis came in after a while and sat beside us and said no, he wasn’t going home and it was okay. He was okay.
He was answering his mom, not me. She just fed him the questions.
He told me he’d talked with Barry and Carol and my parents when they came and said he would watch out for me and Barry said he'd pound him if he didn’t.
He smiled too, and I think he liked Barry. Barry’s really nice.
-
His father stayed outside, or away, and Dennis said he was scared, that’s all.
His mom stayed with us ‘til they had to drive home, just before suppertime, and invited me to their house the next time I could go.
She hugged me really tight and whispered it’d all be okay. That everything would be fine.
Dennis hugged her for a whole minute.
-
After they left Dennis sat on his bed and sighed like he was exhausted, or didn’t know what to do. Then he smiled at me.
He came over to my bed and hugged me just like his mom did. But harder, and warmer.
“It will be alright. Really.”
I was stiff at first, and he hugged me ‘til I was warm and softer and he even laughed a tiny bit, and then started talking really quiet.
“I have a friend who needed hugs just like this one, sometimes, you know. And he didn't think he deserved them...” I could tell he was looking down at me.
“He’s way bigger than you, bigger than me, but he got scared too.”
I whispered, “Justin?”
He looked down at me, but he wasn’t mad.
“Mom told you about him?”
I nodded. I didn’t know if it was okay then.
“Well, I never told you, but he’s gay...” He snorted.
“Did she tell you we used to kinda date?” He really smiled in his voice. I nodded a bit and he hugged me even closer and talked over me again.
“All the kids in school just freaked ‘cause I had a steady girlfriend and sometimes she’d come too, and we’d all hold hands or something.” He grinned really big.
“He needed to feel like he was normal... And then when he did, he was the only out guy in our whole school and he’s my best friend, and...” He stopped.
He just held me, and I could tell he was thinking.
“Justin means... he’s my family?” He looked at me like he really wanted me to get what he was saying.
“He was my best friend when we were little, and all through school, and we did everything together. He thought I’d hate him, or stop being his friend after he told me he was gay, after... when he told me.”
I nodded. I knew he didn’t.
“But I was really shocked, or surprised... I don’t have the word for it, but I can see how he thought... I mean, that I...”
He stopped and hugged me back in, and this time I hugged a bit too. He was shaking a little.
“I can't even say it. He thought he’d be alone and, and have to go to school alone, and have no friends, ever again, for telling me.”
He squeezed me really, really tight and then let me go and sat up more and looked at me. He kept my arm and held it in both hands.
“And all I could do was sit there when he told me.” He looked down at his hands and slid them to my hand.
“I just sat there... for so long, he left...”
He sat there and thought.
“He... I was his best friend, or he wouldn’t have told me.”
He was crying?
“It took me a long time to even understand what he meant, being gay, really, like not just a joke or, or sex... what he meant... An’ then I thought what he had to go through to tell me, ‘cause I might've been... might have been like he thought... and then I got mad that he would think that... and it took a long time for me to stop being mad at him, and then mad at myself, ‘til Mom told me I was being stupid.”
He stopped crying, or shaking, anyway, and wiped his face. He looked at his hand, like he was surprised.
“He told me the hardest thing, and I just sat there...” He stopped and just looked. “He left after I froze...”
He wiped his face again.
“His mom said, when I finally went over, she said I should go in and I went and sat on his bed, just like this, and I said I was sorry I was mad and I was dumb and I was mad that he thought I would think he... was... I don’t remember what I said, but it was stupid.”
He made a fist, like to stretch, and opened it again. He looked at me, and really close, and took both my hands with his.
“He laughed later, I mean like for days, weeks, and said it was the same afternoon, even before supper, the same day, after school. Like, an hour.” He looked down again, for a second.
“But I wasn’t his best friend then, ‘cause I was mad and stupid and... wasn’t.... And he said we’d fought before, too, and it was the same, but it wasn’t the same.” He was really still.
I wanted to say something but he was still talking.
“He coulda killed himself.” He blinked, slow.
“I never saw him as scared as when he told me... or even after...” He looked at me again, and was red some places and pale in others, all blotchy, and tried to talk slow.
“If you *ever* feel like that, *EVER* feel like hurting yourself? Please get me? Please?” He looked right in my eyes, almost crying again, too.
I nodded. I’d hurt myself, sometimes. Bad.
He nodded too, and really squeezed me.
“I know you’re not gay, but it’s the same, okay? I mean about me? Okay? And I need you to be there for me too, okay? And I want you to meet Justin sometime too, okay? He’s really a great guy and he’s a bit scary but once you get to know him you won’t be and besides, he only hits me.” He laughed a bit, kinda sad-happy. “He says it’s my job.”
He was talking fast and kinda just talking. “He doesn’t really hit me...”
I was almost frozen. I mean, not like frozen, but I was thinking so hard that I was never more inside myself than then. Right that second.
About what Dennis was saying, and his mom, and Gary and Anne and Jarrod. And the door. And the Dean. And my Mom and Dad. And Barry and even Carol.
When I came back up I leaned in and hugged him and he hugged me back and rubbed my back.
After a long time I breathed. I had to think. Instead, all I had were feelings.
I’d never felt more scared. Or safe.
----
End of Part Six
-----
Dennis really needed go to supper and said we could talk more later but we had to stop then, okay?
But I was hungry too, when he mentioned it. And *he* hadn't even had breakfast!
He got Anne and most of the girls still on the floor to go too, and Jarrod, and all the way down (after Anne checked and the doors *were* gone*) they asked Dennis about his parents and since I hadn't done more than shaking his father's hand, I listened too. Patty said he hardly even talked to women, or girls at all. So much she noticed him *not* doing it.
Dennis said he was still figuring things out from having a son like him. (He winked at me when he said that.) A son who had a gay best friend in school. Or was the best friend of the gay kid. He said it just wasn't something his dad had ever had to think about, but he'd come around.
When we reached the doors, Jarrod told them about the whole thing and said it had to do with a homophobic threat and only a few students saw it, but it was aimed at me and Dennis, and named me.
Dennis put his arm around my shoulders when Jarrod said that. Then almost all the girls kinda did, too.
-
We took up two tables and I didn’t say much, but I felt pretty good.
My thoughts seemed to be clearer. I was trying to figure out what his mom meant, about Dennis, I mean, and I guess about me, and what she said about Justin and him. And what his father must be like, since Dennis loved him... like I only saw him one, tiny way and not what he was really like.
His mom said he was scared by the door thing. Dennis was.
He said he didn’t think I was gay. His mom too. I didn’t know what they meant. If they said that, then they must be thinking it, or have been told it... that I was gay, or something, or they wouldn’t say so.
But *I* never told anyone that...
So, *really*, they thought... I was gay. And the *school* too... they asked Dennis.
I couldn't believe how calm I was, thinking all that.
Dennis said he talked to everyone, my parents and Barry and Carol, about me when I moved in. About that? Like...
That made me scared again. That they thought I was gay? Or... they knew about my clothes?!
I think I started to go pale when I thought that.
“Bobby?”
I looked up and one of the girls had asked me something, I guess, or was just checking if I was there. I had a hard time paying attention enough to even figure out she was asking something.
“Pardon?” Mom always said I shouldn’t say ‘Huh?’
“*Are* you coming with us?”
I’d missed something.
“What?” I thought about what I must’ve missed. Going somewhere. “Where?”
Patty smiled at me like I was being cute. Or stupid.
“The movie tonight?” I must’ve looked out of it. “At the SU? Do you wanna come too?”
She smiled like she wanted me to, I guess. Go, I mean.
“What movie is it?” She rolled her eyes just the tiniest bit and I figured they’d already talked about that too. And from Anne's glance and smile, a lot.
“Earth to Bobby? Casablanca?”
She smiled and I didn’t really get embarrassed ‘cause I *was* thinking and just missed it, but I still had to think about it. I was tired like it was ten o’clock already, but it was only after six...
A movie?
I looked at Dennis and he was talking to Anne and another girl. And the two other girls than Patty were looking at me, like waiting to see if I was going, I think.
“Is Dennis going?”
He heard his name, I guess, and looked over at us, and then at me, and smiled.
“Mm?” He made that little question noise and raised his eyebrows. At least *he* hadn't seen me asleep in my seat.
One of the other girls sorta interrupted and talked really slow. “He wants to know if you’re going with us to Casablanca tonight.”
Dennis looked at all of us and then more at me.
“Would *you* like to go?” It sounded like he would if I did, or would.
His mouth smiled just the same, but his eyes sparkled, like it was... real... and... he wasn’t making fun of me, even if practically all the girls were giggling or laughing at me then.
I suddenly realized it was his smile like he had when he was talking to girls, like I’d noticed so many times, and that he used the same smile with me, and he always had, for at least a long time...
“Bobby?”
I looked over at Jarrod, or not at Dennis, anyway.
“You okay?”
I saw Dennis move, or do something, ‘cause he hadn’t moved when I looked back, but I at least got one thought finished by not staring at him for a second.
The movie. He asked me to go. No. I asked him, really. Or if he was. Going.
No. He asked if I would like to... and smiled.
I nodded at him. Like I would like to go, and he was smiling again, and I sorta understood what it meant, and yes, I did want to go.
He smiled even more and I grinned at him and Patty made a sound. I don’t remember what it was, but she was smiling at me too, when I looked, so it was a good one, I guess.
“So-ooo, you’re coming?” She smiled like “annnnd...?”
I looked at Dennis again for a second to be sure and he nodded a tiny nod and I smiled back at Patty yes.
“Yes, we're going. When is it?”
Everybody except Dennis laughed at me, and he smiled.
-
We had about fifteen minutes before everyone was going to meet in the front door hallway and Dennis closed the door and sat on his bed and I sat on mine and looked at him and I was suddenly embarrassed at what I’d been thinking at supper, and still was, really. That he asked me like I was a girl, almost.
But I knew he didn’t hate me, and he even said he liked me, and his mom said he really liked me and told her I was his friend and he thought I was a special friend, and he argued with his father about me...
But I didn’t even know what I wanted him to think about me.
I didn’t know what *I* thought.
He sat down beside me and I hadn't noticed him moving.
I looked at him and he was making the same question look with his eyes that Gary had. And smiling like it wasn’t bad, either. I was still thinking a mile a minute, but not enough about right then. And trying not to think about any of the stuff... I didn't know.
“Do you still want to go?” He asked pretty quietly, but then he was really close, too.
Okay. Fifteen minutes. That’s what I thought. Fifteen minutes.
Then I thought that I had about fifteen *hours* worth of thinking to do. Some of it was really bad. Some of it was really good. I was gonna cry if I thought some of it.
And it was okay if I did it with Dennis there. And it was okay if I didn't do it right away.
But if it was a sad movie, I thought... if I remembered what I knew about it, it was.
I knew he’d stay if I didn’t go. I had to think.
“It’s sad... isn’t it?”
He nodded a bit, but he smiled too.
“But it’s really good too, and funny, a bit, and has a happy ending.” He smiled like he knew what I meant. He smiled a lot of different ways.
“If I cry will you console me?”
He didn’t cry in movies, I was sure, but I nodded.
He looked right in my eyes and smiled really nice. Like when we finished the book. Like when he was just happy. It was one of his best smiles.
“You know that you don’t have to go, you know?” He was still smiling, but he was serious too, I could tell.
“No. I mean yes.” I tried to smile like him.
“But I’ve never seen it, and it sounds... I mean, everyone says it’s good...”
I really didn’t have a reason to go, just that he was too.
He smiled a little bit different and nodded and put his arm around my shoulders and squeezed me for a second.
“Okay, but if you want to leave, just ask and I’ll walk back with you, okay?” He looked right in my eyes and was serious.
“Okay.”
I had to look down when I said it because I was thinking about more than the movie. Like, maybe they were right...
Dennis didn't think so, 'cause he just gave me a little squeeze more and stood up.
He pulled his beat-up purple and white high school team jacket that he always wore everywhere and looked at it like he didn’t think it was the right thing or something.
“It’s cold and wet out, you know.”
I looked up and he was smiling that way again and I guess trying to get me to get a jacket too, so I stood up and tried to think about what I had, and then if I really should go, but then Dennis wouldn’t either, and he
“Here.”
He was holding his jacket open to me. He waved it a bit and I stood closer a step, and he smiled more and I turned half-around.
I put my arm in the sleeve and he pulled it up and held the other side and then I had it on and he snugged it up the way salespeople do in a store, except it wasn’t snug. It was big.
“It’s really warm.”
I looked down at it and kinda held it closed with my arms and could just reach outside the cuffs with my finger tips. I looked up then.
“You can borrow it tonight but I want it back, okay?” He was smiling like I was making a silly face or something. He nodded too, and I nodded back.
He got his ski jacket and then opened the door and held it while I passed him into the hall.
-
All the girls were at the front doors already and talking as we came around the last turn in the stairs. As they turned and looked at us, they suddenly each got quiet.
I had a cold moment like when that happens. When I know people were looking.
But they were looking at Dennis. Just glances at me, but really at him. We reached the floor and he stopped.
“What?!” He sounded like he was joking, but not? I turned and he wasn’t... he was *less* joking every second.
I suddenly, really, really wanted to just go back upstairs and not talk to anyone and not see the movie.
But Dennis made the smallest step to right beside me, and put his arm around my waist and pulled me into a hard hug and just stood there and I could feel him shaking.
I didn’t want to push away, but I really didn’t want him to hug me there, either. And I didn't know why he did.
Suddenly one of the other girls and then *all* of them made a big noise of talking and laughing and then one of them hugged me from behind and they were all apolgizing and came around us and were touching me.
Dennis kept on hugging me and I suddenly realized I was hugging him too. Had my arms around him.
He made a rough noise and did something, I could feel it, and they stopped, and even stopped touching me, except Dennis.
I was *really* aware that we were in the hall, and what I was doing, and I got pretty stiff. Dennis had to have felt it. I wanted him to let go of me, or step away from me, or freeze, or say “Stop it...”
Instead, he hugged me *really* hard for a second with both arms and leaned his head down and whispered “That sucked.”
I just stayed frozen, but I tried to nod. Or look like I agreed.
He must have figured it out.
“They were just surprised, you know?” He still whispered. “That you had my jacket on.”
I was able to nod a tiny bit.
“But it was just like those other times, mm?”
I hugged a little harder.
“I’m here now.”
I hugged a lot harder.
-
He managed to get us back to our room and me calmed down, and without me crying or anything...
Then he convinced me to go to the movie after all. Or he just asked, and I did want to go. Still.
I know that sounds too simple, but he really mostly just hugged me for a minute, and then mostly just talked quietly and I mostly just sat and nodded. And held on to him.
And thought. It *was* like when people laughed, but only because I was self-conscious, not as if I felt all the fear and stuff. And they were my friends.
It was like a echo of how bad it could really feel.
And it only took about ten minutes.
He promised that he’d stay right beside me and even hold my hand and hug me if I needed him to, and I could hug him any time too, and the girls and Jarrod would make sure it was okay.
I didn’t say anything about that, he just said it and I nodded, and he only made me say anything at the end.
He asked *really* clearly, for sure, if I wanted to go, really.
I said, “Yes.” And smiled. I did.
So he went out and talked with them in the hall for a minute and came back and closed the door and asked if I was *still* okay, and then we went out, again.
Patty and Anne were the official apologizers, I guess.
They said they were sorry and stupid and thoughtless and could I ever forgive them and Patty said Anne was lower than the gum under my shoes and I had to laugh even if they were embarrassing me.
After that it was okay and we finally headed out. Ten minutes late and hurrying so we could get snacks.
The rain had stopped for the moment and it almost felt like it was gonna snow. We could really see our breath, first time that fall.
Patty had her arm around mine and Dennis did too. I mean, he had one of my arms too.
-
Just after we all stomped into the SU through the automatic doors doors, a couple of guys I recognized from one of our rez's other floors hurried past us heading towards the bar and arcade, and I heard one them say, “That’s the faggots I told you about.”
I felt like an electric spark of cold. Dennis kinda jerked and Jarrod stopped where he was in front of us and had a face so mad I could see it from behind.
And I twisted around out of both Dennis' and Patty's arms and yelled at them!
"Shut up!"
The stopped for just a second, about twenty feet away, but didn't turn around and then they kept walking. I yelled again, as loud as I could.
"That's harassment and it's against the law! And it hurts people and *you're* doing it!"
Everyone was stopped. Us. Even *they* almost stopped.
Jarrod looked at me, and all of us, I guess, and got a little bit more normal looking, but was still mad. Then he looked at them again, almost to the corner. His voice was gritty. And loud.
“Floor three-A, right?”
Even like a hundred and fifty feet away, they looked like they just figured out who he was, or just noticed him, probably, and knew they’d screwed up bad. One of them nodded a bit and the other one elbowed him and kinda ran around the corner. His friend... stopped.
After a second of looking back and forth from us to his friend, the one who nodded left too. We could hear him yelling at his friend down the corridor.
I really wasn’t as bad as I thought I should've been. I was scared, but I wasn’t frozen. I turned around and Dennis and Patty were holding arms, or she was holding his... I took his other one again.
"Are you okay?" I knew how mad Dennis had been about the graffiti and it must've been just like it there...
He nodded and then said he was.
Then he let go my hand and put his arm around my shoulders and squeezed. "Are *you* okay?"
I nodded. I was. "Stupid idiots..."
Patty said something a lot ruder in a whisper, but Dennis stayed really quiet for about ten seconds and then smiled at me.
“Justin woulda kissed me and grinned at them.”
I thought about what he’d told me about his best friend, about how scared he’d been at the start and how after, after, they’d even gone to the senior prom together. I nodded a bit and almost smiled.
He grinned at me and then leaned over really slowly and kissed my cheek.
I didn’t do anything that anyone could see except get red and.. well, I tried not to smile more, but Patty made a little jump or something.
Dennis grinned at everyone and then he looked at me and smiled like the two jerks had never happened.
“I hope you’ll pardon my lips?”
Okay, maybe like they had happened, but it was different... like it was *good* that they'd happened.
Patty kinda squealed. “Justin? Are you really gay!?” She was gonna twist his arm off, from the look of it, and she wasn’t big.
Dennis grinned big and pulled us both into walking again, ahead of everyone else.
“Nooo, but I went to my prom with him, he's my best buddy, and he dances divinely...”
He closed his eyes and hugged me around in a circle like a dance and acted silly-in-love.
-
Even Jarrod was better, if coughing and laughing so much he couldn't breathe was better.
Patty made really funny noises and I think was trying not to say anything else. The other girls were dancing divinely. Dennis strikes again.
I celebration, Jarrod and Anne said that they’d pay for the movies for all of us, which was really big of them since the show was free, but it was still funny.
Jarrod *did* talk to whoever he knew and got them to wait a few extra minutes before starting so we could get snacks, anyway.
----
End of Part Seven
-----
Casablanca was *wonderful*.
Okay: the special effects were *awful* (there was a plane you could almost see the strings on) and the clothes were really old, and it was the first black and white movie I’d ever seen on a big screen (pretty big, anyway) and it took getting used to, and it had almost every cliche in the world in it. But it was still wonderful.
I cried a couple times and when it was over, just from the emotions, even though it did have a sort-of happy ending.
And all through it, Dennis hugged me when I cried, just like he promised, and even when I wasn't.
He didn’t cry at all, even when they sang that song, or when Ilsa looked at Rick and had those tears. But I still hugged him.
And I could tell he understood.
-
Everyone waited until I calmed down, which was only to just after the credits were over and the lights came up, but almost everyone else was gone. Dennis waited with his arm around me and smiled.
“He’s the kind of man that if I were a woman, I’d be in love with him...”
Gary from the paper was standing at the end of the row and smiling at us and Patty and Kathy and a couple of the other girls started to get mad at him but he smiled at me more and I guess they saw he wasn’t being mean.
I tried to smile hi, ‘cause it was a great line that I almost remembered word for word too, but I mostly just made a kinda gasping noise. I just had so many emotions. And so many didn’t seem to be from the movie.
Gary sat down and waited, I guess, along with the rest of them, and I got better.
Jarrod said, "Hi, Gary. Girls, Gary. Gary, the girls."
I still wanted to cry, but I could stop, so I sat up from Dennis and wiped at my eyes. He still kept a hand on my shoulder.
"Good movie, hunh?”
He said it pretty quietly, and wasn’t making fun of my crying. I nodded again, more. It was good. Great. I nodded as much as I could. I was still trying.
He hugged my shoulders again and was just casual, but talked quietly.
“Ready to go home?”
-
Gary walked with us and talked with everyone about the movie. He said he was watching as many of the old ones that the SU was showing as he could ‘cause he thought these might be the last times he’d ever get the chance to see them on the big screen. The only time on film instead of video.
Kathy said she’d seen Casablanca a couple of times on TV and it was WAY better this way, like a different movie. Almost all of them had seen it on TV or video.
Gary said there was even a movie course next term that studied it and some other Bogart films. I thought I’d like to take a course like that.
Mostly, while they all talked, I held on to Dennis’ arm and tried to think about all the feelings I was overflowing with.
It wasn’t all the movie. Well, it *was* the movie, but it was the guys in the concourse, and Dennis’ jacket, and him kissing me, and how he hugged me, and how he made it okay to cry in the dark.
All the things that happened that night were all rushing through my head, over and over.
How I started to cry when Rick made Sam play As Time Goes By, ‘cause he couldn’t cry and I could see how much he was hurting.
Even Sam was. All the men, and how the women cried for them.
And how Dennis squeezed my arm then. How he looked when the two guys said that before the movie...
Dennis put his hand on mine, on his arm, and kinda whispered. “Still okay?”
I nodded. I was okay. "Are *you* okay?"
He nodded and smiled.
“I am, thanks."
After a few more steps, he said, "Jarrod’s springing for pop and beers in his room if you want to go?”
I didn’t want Dennis to go and leave me, so I nodded too. He looked serious and squeezed my hand more.
“Are you sure? I don’t have to.”
I tried to smile a little and nodded again. “Sure.” I croaked, but I wanted to go. I sure didn’t want to be alone.
Suddenly it all seemed too weird. Everything. Dennis and the girls and Jarrod and Gary and... me. Especially me.
What I was doing. Crying in the movie. Holding Dennis. And walking and everyone talking, like it was normal.
But it was wrong.
I kinda stumbled, or stepped on something.
I mean, I didn’t fall down too bad or anything since Dennis caught my arm and saved me, but you woulda thought I was lying on the ground from everyone checking to see what happened.
Like falling or tripping was what was wrong, not how I was acting. Crying, or holding Dennis.
Or them not screaming and hitting me.
Or hitting Dennis.
I started to breathe hard and fast and looked at all of them, looking at me, waiting for it.
It was all so bad... I remembered the time in the mall...
“Bobby!”
-
After, I though it was Gary, or Jarrod, but I was in the mall right then and cringed and tried to spin away from the hit, but Dennis held on to my arm and I fell down in a puddle on my side and it was ice cold in an instant and I couldn’t get my feet under me...
-
I was scared that I did that... tried to run and that I thought that they were going to hurt me... but I was back there, and then *they* were there too, in my head....
And Patty was probably scared at what I did and I couldn’t stand to hear her cry. I didn't know why she was hugging me, but she was, and the rest were all around us.
“Patty...”
I wanted to apologize, but she was hugging me all of a sudden and I didn’t remember how I got all wet.
“”It’s okay, it’s okay, Bobby, it’s okay...” She was saying it in my shoulder over and over and hugging me and getting wet from me.
“I... I was remembering...”
I didn’t say it too clearly, I know. I didn’t even say why, mostly ‘cause I couldn’t think of all the reasons, all the hundreds of reasons, right then. I was cold and hot and my heart was racing like a motor. Like I was scared.
I was scared by the feeling in my chest. It hurt worse than my hand.
“No... *I’m* sorry, Bobby.” Patty sounded so serious, and I knew I'd missed something again.
I opened my eyes for what felt like the first time in hours, even if it was just seconds, and she was crying, or her eyes were tearing up, and she was trying to say something to make me feel better.
I felt guilty... shame... some hard, hard pain. That I hurt her. Made her wet. That I lied to all of them, and that they would hate me.
I knew that would hurt more, no matter what I did or said, and it was all my fault.
-
I tried to talk more, but I think Dennis knew I couldn’t, and he was the one with his arms around me.
-
We were in our, room and he was taking my pants off and being rough and hurting but saying “It’s okay, Bobby, it’s okay... I’m sorry...” almost all the time and explaining he wanted to get me dry and it was okay, he wouldn’t touch me. But he was.
He got me in his pajama shirt and he made me get into bed and took the blanket off his bed and put it on me too. And he did it all really fast, hurrying.
And when he was finished, when I was under the warm blankets and looking at him, he sat down on his bed like he was really tired.
I knew it was me, because I was a terrible person... I was a freak. I was a pervert, what I thought, thought about. What I did. What happened happened to freaks.
“I wish...”
That I was dead. Gone. I knew. I opened my eyes to hear him say it.
He was standing beside me, tall, and for a second I thought he was going to hit me or kill me, and then I saw that he was making that little movement with his hand to ask if he could sit down.
I had to think.
When I nodded he sat on the edge beside me, and held out his hands, or his arms, just a tiny bit, like almost shaking, and looked in my eyes like he was going to cry.
“I need a hug really bad.” He was very quiet but he was breathing *really* deep, and his voice was choked up. He looked like I felt.
I couldn't sit up, but I did and he hugged me through the blankets. I couldn't get my arms out.
“Are we...? Are we... pushing you..?”
I tried to think.
I knew he didn’t see. He was scared he... that they'd done something.
But really, it was me. It was all the stuff from before. It was other people, like those guys... but only... not really them, for me...
It was all the stuff I'd kept secret.
-
He kept touching me, keeping his hand on my leg, on my arm. He kept asking if I was thirsty, or cold, or warm, or what he could do...
He didn’t hate me. He knew I was a sissy and he still didn’t hate me. But he didn’t know all of it.
-
I decided to make him see. So he would hate me. I closed my eyes.
I'd tell him the worst thing and I knew he'd stop touching me and maybe hit me and kill me. And then it would be over.
-
Jump.
-
“I... I dress... up.”
Then I waited. I looked at him and tried not to hide.
He just looked at me back and didn’t understand, ‘cause his face didn’t get mad and he kept his hand on my arm and even kept moving it the same soft way.
I decided I didn’t even say it loud enough for him to hear. Harder the second time.
“I dress up... like a girl.”
I had to close my eyes hard. I pulled my arms close to try and not get too hurt, suddenly more afraid. I wanted to take it back.
Too late.
But he kept touching my arm and even squeezed it a bit. It felt like a long time.
“Why?”
I jerked when he said it, ‘cause I was sure it would hurt. I mean, that the next thing he did would hurt.
But he wasn’t mad. Or he didn’t sound mad. I had to look after a second. I peeked.
He was smiling at me. A smile. Even more when he saw me peek. It was like all the last minutes hadn’t happened. Like I hadn't said that.
“Why do you dress up?”
He made it a nice question, I mean, not like sneering. Like just “why?”
And it was one of his beautiful smiles. Really beautiful.
I didn’t know. I mean, to answer him. I didn’t ever think in my whole life that anyone would ever ask something like that and not mean it meanly.
He smiled even more. “Sorry. Stupid question.”
He made a stupid thinking face and smiled again, right in my eyes. He made *his* eyes smile that way too. So different after he was so sad.
Did they do that? Did he do that?
“How about...” He grinned and squeezed his eyes up. “Are you pretty?”
He kept my arm and kept smiling, like it was a good question and could never be an insult. He made a duh face and laughed.
“Stupid again...” He smiled really, really happy. “'Course you are.”
I stared at him. And all of a sudden I could think.
I was a... a sissy, and *wanted* to be one... and he *knew* it and he was still smiling at me, like before, and it meant he was...
My friend, and like his mom said...
I’m not gay. I mean, she said that, that he knew I wasn't.
And he did, too... Why did they say that? How could Dennis think that with me, right there? Why was he so normal? It was about Justin, ‘cause he was gay, too. Or he was gay. So then Dennis *did* think I was gay.
But I wasn’t just gay. I was a pervert. Why would he say something that mean? Was he mean?
But he smiled...
-
He said I looked all hurt and scared again, after, about why he pulled all the blankets down and hugged me.
He hugged me really hard and rubbed my back and talked all the time so I almost couldn’t do anything but listen and he said he would never hurt me and he was sorry if he was acting stupid, and he really did think it was okay, and that I'd be pretty, and did I need him to stop, or did I need anyone else, and he didn’t want me to be alone, was that okay?
He kinda talked the whole time, really quiet. I just held on.
He stopped talking.
-
He didn’t hate me.
That was what I figured out.
“You don’t hate me?”
He leaned his head back a bit and hugged me even harder.
“No.” He smiled a serious smile. “I *don’t* hate you.”
His smile got more real but he leaned in again and I couldn’t see it anymore.
After about a whole minute of almost not being able to breathe he sat back and smiled just perfect. Like *nothing* was wrong.
“I don’t hate you. Not one bit. I love being your roomie. I love your stupid music. I love that you cry when you’re sad. I love hugging you. I love people knowing I’m your friend...”
He kinda slowed down and stopped, and stopped smiling.
“Bobby, I promise I won’t ever think you’re a bad person, and won’t ever hurt you on purpose and I promise... I promise I won’t ever, ever, *ever* hate you.”
He leaned over and kissed my forehead and sat back again.
“Okay?”
I nodded a bit. He smiled again.
“Mom says I love my friends.” He smiled really big. “So I must love you.”
-
He said he loved that I cried when I was happy too.
I couldn't stop.
-
When he left to tell Jarrod and all them, he tucked me in all around. I mean, he wrapped the blankets around me all around, so it was tight, and said he was going to leave the door open and he could hear if I called.
I guess I understood. I still tried to hide and turned to the wall. My face, anyway. I didn’t try to get loose.
I could hear him in the hall. He kinda yelled and I guess they came out to him and after a few minutes he came back and sat on my bed again.
“Is it okay if some of them come in? Anne and Patty and Gary are really worried about you...”
He must have seen what I was thinking then. Rolled over and looking at the wall.
“And they know you’re in bed already...” He rubbed my leg through the blanket while he was talking. Like that was all.
“Are you okay with that?”
I almost couldn’t, but I nodded, and then shook my head a little. I didn't want to scare them, but I wasn’t okay.
I had a thought, just then, like a few seconds before, like a few seconds before that... that dying would solve everything.
Nothing to talk about. No laughing. No hurting. No hating myself. Never being a sissy, ever again.
Even though Dennis didn’t hate me.
I wasn’t okay. I knew I was what Ben warned me about.
But I told Dennis. And he hadn’t hurt me. He was touching me and not hurting.
I’d promised.
The lump in my chest was so huge I couldn't even cry anymore.
“Dennis?” I whispered at the wall. I didn’t know what I wanted to say, but I had to say something to him. Tell him, somehow.
He stopped rubbing my leg and inched up the bed a few inches and touched one of my arms. He didn’t say anything.
I just stared at the wall and felt tears start to come. My face hurt, but my chest let me breathe.
He didn’t move for a long time, and then he squeezed me for a second and got up to close the door and then sat right back and touched the same place on my arm and waited.
I... thought... that he was going to wait, and it could be private. Just between us. Saying it.
I tried over and over to get the right words. I couldn’t say them. Not to him. But I didn’t want to die. Not really...
Even though it was all I could think about. All I could see was the wall... at the mall.
“I don’t feel safe.”
I said it really clearly. Just softly.
His hand stopped. He sat there and kept touching my arm and I kept trying to think of a better way to say how bad the thoughts I had were.
“I’m here.” He was even quieter. “I’ll keep you safe...”
He touched my hair and I looked and he looked angry, except he was crying. I closed my eyes.
-
Denis touching me was nothing like my memories.
-
A long time later it seemed, there was a soft knock at the door and Dennis said “Just a minute...”
He was just as quiet as before, kinda kneading my arm. Sitting on the floor.
“I have to go tell them something.”
He didn’t do anything else. Didn't move away.
I thought I had to decide what to tell them. Even about what. I didn’t want to tell them what I was feeling.
I had an idea.
“Can you tell Gary... you’re... I... That I’m just not... not... okay?”
I looked at his face again. He had tear-tracks all red on his cheeks and around his mouth, like they burned.
But he looked better, too. I mean, his eyes tried to smile at me.
“Okay.” He touched my hair again. Patted it, I guess, and stood up and tucked the blankets even tighter.
“I’ll still keep the door open, okay?”
I nodded and tried not to look like I was afraid of what he meant. He nodded too, and touched my arm again for a second.
“I’ll just be outside, in the hall, and I can hear you, just like before, okay?”
He thought of something, from his face. He sat back down on the bed.
“Do you want someone to wait with you?” He looked in my eyes like I couldn’t speak or something. I had to think, and it was hard.
-
Patty ended up sitting with me and I ended up trying not to cry or hide or curl up in a ball and other pathetic things. Like die.
She didn’t do anything to make me feel that way. I just had worse thoughts after Dennis left. It wasn’t her fault at all.
But I wanted her to go. I decided.
“I’m okay...”
She perked up when I talked and I could hear her smile.
“I was so worried when you fell down and wouldn’t talk and I *know* you’re okay!”
She stopped and looked at me more. Then she looked all wrong and grabbed at me around the blankets and yelled.
-
They took me to the hospital in Jarrod’s car. One of the other guys from our floor had a big car too, and about a dozen of them were with us in the waiting room at the emergency.
I was mad. Scared, anyway.
I'd given up trying to tell them I was okay. They didn’t listen.
I decided to tell the doctor or whoever that I was okay and that I’d see Ben and then I’d get a razor blade or something. Longer.
I'd looked it up once, the femoral artery. Just deeper than I already had, and two or three inches higher. Stabs.
I knew it wouldn’t hurt too much.
Less than *I* hurt.
-
In the waiting room Dennis made all of them sit away from us and hugged me and sorta rocked and talked and asked me all about everything and I wasn’t going to tell him but he figured it out and told the nurse that I was going to get a knife, and that I knew how.
The nurse made Dennis stay with me and brought a doctor and the doctor tried to make me say what I told Dennis, I guess, but I was mad that he tricked me.
----
End of Part Eight
-----
It was early morning and I was still fuzzy from a needle. And a long talk with a counselor. Shrink. Whatever.
Jarrod, after he signed some school insurance stuff, helped me find the way down a different elevator than I remembered and turned me the right way...
Almost everyone was still there and they came in a crowd when Jarrod opened the doors, Dennis and
Mom and Dad were there. Just got there.
Even after talking to a shrink and a counselor guy almost all night (it felt like, anyway), even numb, I started crying again.
I really didn’t want to tell Mom and Dad what I felt like, ever, or how bad...
Or anything.
-
Mom and Dad came over and hugged me away from Jarrod and they were both crying. Mom more.
It was a long time.
Dad stopped hugging first, or at least part-hugging, because he kept just my hand... and I guess that made Mom stop too, though she kept an arm around me.
I felt really better they were there, but way worse too.
-
Jarrod had called them when we were waiting, really early on, and they drove down, all night.
-
I'd promised the counselor guy, and I guess I wasn’t going to do it, but it was embarrassing, and I still had.
I mean, I was afraid what everyone would think.
Embarrassing was such a stupid word when I was going to kill myself.
And it wasn't even possible to be embarrassed enough about the other stuff.
-
They took us out for breakfast after they made me say it was okay, and that I was awake enough, and everyone else was.
They sat beside me, around me, and Dennis sat on the other side with Patty and Jarrod, and everyone else was at the next table and were all close. The girls and Gary.
They told them more stuff, after Dennis told them stuff, and so on. But he didn’t tell them about what he told me about, about loving his friends, me.
Or kissing me.
But he looked at me like he did, still, even then, after.
He smiled and I knew it was 'cause of the others, not me.
Not even Mom and Dad.
-
“Are you still alright, honey?”
Mom almost whispered it, and I think it was because I was being so quiet. Not everything, just about that. Right then.
I nodded I was, and I was.
Better, anyways. Better than wishing I could hurt more. So I was better. So I tried to smile. I was still drugged, too.
“I’m better, Mom. Thanks.”
She smiled at me for real for the first time.
Dennis smiled, on the other side. Too.
Anne was at the other table, nearly beside Patty, and she was looking at me, or all of us, when I noticed her, and it was different than everyone else.
Patty sat up. Anne looked at her and they'd been talking.
“You’re staying, aren’t you, Bobby?” She thought something before I could.
“In residence, I mean? He can, can’t he?” She switched to Mom and Dad.
“I mean none of this, this weekend, I mean, is because he was in rez, and he has good friends, and Dennis and...”
Dad kinda lifted his hand up an inch and she stopped. Nobody said anything for a few seconds and I tried to think what I should say, if I could. I looked at Dennis, to see if he could say, I think.
And I thought about how I thought he was going, not me...
“Bobby?”
I looked at Dad. He was talking slow, the way he does when it’s important, and Mom really held my arm and hand hard.
“Do you want to stay?”
I don’t know what my face looked like, but Dad looked like it was okay. I tried to think how to say it.
Like, if Dennis wasn’t there. Like if I didn’t have sedatives in me.
They knew I was thinking... that I'd *thought* about hurting myself, and they still weren’t mad at me. But they had to be scared, too. And Dad still asked if I wanted to.
I'd told Dennis about dressing, and he was still really nice. He just teased me, I think. *I* was the one who tried to hurt me.
I looked up at Dennis and he smiled and I remembered that he said he still wanted to be my roomie. That he said that exactly. That he wanted to keep being my roomie. And what his mom said. He was protective of me, she said.
I started to shake, I was so scared.
I figured out what I had to say to Mom and Dad. That I had to.
That I never thought I ever would.
-
I made Mom and Dad sit on Dennis’ bed and Dennis sat beside me on mine and I was almost too scared to start. So I was quiet for a while.
I kept thinking that the doctor guy would tell them anyway... so I could. I had no idea if that was true, but I kept saying it so I could...
But I was still scared beyond belief. Bigger than scared, but I guess that’s the best word. Terrified.
I was too scared to touch Dennis in front of them, afraid they’d laugh at me or hate me. But I moved so his leg was near my knee.
He put his arm around my shoulders.
I wanted to die. But I didn’t want to die. I really didn’t. But it felt like I was going to. See how scared isn’t enough word?
I leaned a little bit over, away, and I knew Dennis understood. I still had to close my eyes.
And he kept his arm there, too.
-
I told them about cutting. Mom got really sad and cried but Dad hugged her and Dennis hugged me.
I told them I had to, or I would’ve been worse. That when I cut, I stopped feeling like I had to die for a while, when it'd been too hard. That the pain in a cut wasn't as bad as the pain in my heart... and put it outside...
I told them I'd wanted to kill myself, before, last night, and even a little bit before breakfast, but I didn’t any more.
But I told them I could still think about it like it was real, too, like it was easier than anything.
That it was really scary, but I couldn’t stop that memory of wanting to.
-
I almost fainted from breathing too hard, and Mom came and whispered that there wasn’t *anything* I could say that would make her not love me, anything. Dad came around and hugged me hard too, after Dennis sat over on the other bed.
-
I talked as loud as I could, which wasn’t very, and told them I used to put on some of Mom’s and Carol’s clothes, and used to have some of my own too. Until I left for there.
I stayed really still then, and waited for them to hate me, or laugh. I don’t even know why I told them that, then. It was way worse than the cuts. In between cutting and death.
But Mom and Dad just hugged me harder and I finally opened my eyes and Dad was sort of smiling at me. I mean, he wasn’t happy-smiling, but he wasn’t mad either?
“We already knew...”
-
They knew about the cutting from Mr. Tarrington, my school counselor who knew, kinda, in my high school...
They all knew I wasn’t happy, and that I wasn’t like a normal guy, and that I cut, and that was why Mr. Tarrington had to tell... and even if he didn't, they knew that I dressed. Mom and Dad knew. Barry and Carol.
Carol told Barry. She had to.
Mom said my sheets and some towels and stuff were blood-stained and she already knew something, even the first time. And Mr. Tarrington had told them about what we talked about, about the cutting, and that I was trying to not get worse and that he would’ve told them if I got worse... and that I shouldn’t go to State.
They called him. He'd kept my secret. He told them it was a borderline thing, but he thought I was safe.
Mom and dad told him about my dressing. My stories.
He'd said that I should go here. That people like Jarrod and Anne were here. And maybe someone like Dennis.
And the Psych study I was in.
-
I didn’t understand all of it. They said so much.
-
The shot they gave me finally made me go to sleep. Or being up all night.
-
When I woke up Dennis was sitting like he does, reading or doing homework or something.
He told me it was late Monday, because I was confused. I thought it was Sunday morning for a long time. It felt like Sunday.
He said Mom and Dad were in a room downstairs and they were going to stay at the school for a few days.
Or I could go home with them. Or other things. I was still fuzzy.
-
He sat and rubbed my arm while I woke up, finally.
I looked at his hand and thought through all the things I could remember from the weekend.
“How can you know?”
He looked at me like I wasn’t very clear. “Know what?”
I thought more.
“Dad said you, and Jarrod, you knew about me, or the school...”
I tried to think more. I was still half-fuzzy. But I really needed to know. “I never told my, my counselor... in high school...”
He put a nice, firm pressure on my arm.
“I mean, about...”
It was too hard to say dressing up. Even though he knew.
He still just touched, held my arm. It was more than holding.
I looked and he was waiting and listening. I tried to get it right.
“Did you know about me? Before? Before I told you?”
He turned a bit more to face me, to sit more facing me, and then kinda rearranged my arm and blanket so he was holding my hand outside the blanket. All like he was trying to not let me go while he did it. Then he looked right in my eyes and was serious, but not mad at all.
“Okay. No, I didn’t know. But I knew that your parents were afraid about you hurting yourself, and that you were maybe gay, or not.” He smiled at me really nice.
“They said you were probably not gay, and maybe bi, and maybe transgendered, and... well, I figured out you were pretty much a girl pretty fast.”
I guess my face was odd.
“When you moved in, Barry hugged you just like your mother did, did you know that?”
I didn’t, and shook my head. I didn’t know what he was talking about either.
“When you were moving in, when you were really sad sometimes that day, that first weekend? You'd kinda sit down or just stand there a few times and your face would be so sad, and a couple of times your mom or Barry hugged you.”
He looked at me and thought. “He did it once, but I noticed he did it the same way she did...”
He really squeezed my hand, and pulled it more into his lap. Then he smiled better.
“It wasn’t really like they were doing it the same, but it was more like it was with a girl, I thought...”
He looked in my eyes.
“I thought it was like you were a girl. To Barry. And then I looked at the way your mom was, and your sister, and even your father, a bit, and they’d already told me you might not be gay, and I thought maybe you were a girl, right then.”
I tried to think and remember and almost had to concentrate just to not wander off in my thoughts.
“How did anyone... I mean, here at rez, or..? Know?”
He nodded a little.
“I think maybe your guidance counselor probably told your parents about here. When I applied here I read... um, the calendar had a pretty big section on counseling and safe campus and rez stuff, and about peer support and students who might be in danger from harrassing, and I knew I wanted to be part of it, because of Justin?
"So anyway, when I applied for rez I checked off all that on the forms and they phoned me right away after I was accepted, and I came here in August for an interview but they didn't have anyone to match with me, or that wasn't already with someone or whatever... I dunno. But I guess when you registered late, or as soon as you were set up to come here, which was pretty last minute, I guess, they called me about you and you sounded nice from what they said, or at least not like a jerk, and I said I’d take you as my roomie.”
He looked at me like I wasn’t looking too good. I wanted to cry.
“And I’m *not* your counselor or you’re my project or anything.” He leaned way down and hugged me up.
“You’re...”
He sat up again and looked at me and he had tears and I did too and I think that was why. He put a hand right on my chest.
“I just got to choose you as my roomie, before we even met, and Jarrod got to choose us, or people like us? for his floor.”
He smiled worse and let go for a second to wipe his face and mine and took my hand again.
“I thought you’d be... like... Justin...”
He started to cry, sniffed and gasped really hard, and hid his face with his arm and I knew he was disappointed I wasn’t and I got sad, like before; and like before I started to feel worse and tried to stop showing it.
When I started to turn so he wouldn’t see me he almost hurt my hand.
I looked.
He still had all the tears and was wasn't trying to pretend he didn’t.
“I *don’t* want you to be like him... I just thought that *then* and you weren’t and I’m not comparing you! I like you just the way you *are*!”
He stopped hurting so much, but he kept holding hard, and put his other hand back.
“I...” He stopped, and his eyes looked like he was still hurting.
“I’m sorry.”
-
Justin only wrote him once, the second week. I knew he’d written him more than a few times, and about ten long e-mails. I remember how much he’d liked me telling him stuff from Barry’s and Carol’s letters that they’d written me in the same envelope from State almost every week. And their pictures. Justin hadn’t even e-mailed. He'd even got calls from Justin’s parents. They hadn't gotten more than a letter or two, either.
All at once I thought about how he was lonelier than I ever was for Barry and how I had him but he didn’t have Justin...
How bad I must've been for a roomie because I was so depressed' so often...
I started to cry again when I figured it all out.
-
We called from Jarrod's room. He had a university-paid phone.
Dad said I should call them and not to worry about the charges and we used Jarrod’s phone in his room and I made Dennis talk to both of them, Barry and Carol, after we got them both on the same line after about fifteen minutes, and I told them about what I... was, I guess.
It was hard, but way easier than before because I knew they knew. And they *were* really good, and not mad, and Carol cried and even said she was happy.
But mostly I wanted Dennis to have them as his friends, like they were to me, like he was. Even if they were all the way at State.
Even if he wasn't really a friend. To me.
I already knew they’d be ok with him. I just knew.
I didn’t say that, but that’s what I meant. It made my chest hurt, it felt so good.
-
When we hung up after more than an hour, it was past eleven.
I hugged him as hard as I could, the way he always seemed to do me, and tried to make up for Justin and the way I was.
Was before.
----
End of Part Nine
-----
Even though it was late, Mom, Dad and Jarrod and Anne were waiting in our room.
I told them all I wanted to stay in rez.
*And* with Dennis, when Jarrod said I had to say if I meant that, too. After Anne said I could’ve had a room in her wing too.
And I was holding Dennis’ hand all the time and they all said I had to be clear with him what I was saying, or meant, or something...
Dennis started laughing and pulled me over into a hug against his chest and then he pulled me out into the hall again and told them to wait, and closed out door.
He walked over and sat us down on a hall couch, two doors down. I was still too red to look at him.
“No sex.”
I cringed. Like tried to shrink. He was whispering at my hair, holding me.
“And no kissing except friends-kissing, okay?”
He didn’t even change his hug.
“And I’ll still be really careful to not embarrass you, and if it’s okay, I’d still like to just wear my pajama bottoms, but you have to at least always wear tops and undies around me, besides, okay?”
He sounded like he was teasing a bit, but not too?
“Okay?”
He jiggled me a bit, and I guess I wasn’t as red as I was before, because I heard what he’d said.
I still didn’t look up.
“Okay...”
“Okay.”
He held me and jiggled me a bit different and then leaned down and put his face in my hair again.
“What would you like me to call you? Is Bobby okay?”
I nodded.
“Good... I like Bobby.” He was really quiet and jiggled me the same way. “It’s a pretty name.”
After a couple more minutes he whispered, "Okay?”
-
Everyone was smiling a bit, and still serious a bit, I guess, but Dennis said it was all okay and he would be very careful and he said “respectful.”
Jarrod and Anne left after they both gave me hugs.
-
Mom and Dad said I had to go home for the next weekend and they were going to come pick me up, and that I had to see Ben and maybe whoever he said I had to see and that Dennis or someone had to be with me until Ben or whoever said it was safe, and that I had to have a cell phone and call them any time I had to, any time. Or call Dennis, and Dad said he’d buy us both new ones too, the next morning, before they left, after they asked him.
Too much.
-
They said we were all going for late supper because I slept through it and Dennis hadn’t had more than a sandwich since breakfast, or something. Even if it was almost midnight. Or after eleven, anyway.
So we went out to a restaurant, after I showered. Dad said I didn’t need to, but Dennis and Mom both smiled and Dennis wrinkled his nose and pretended to gag and made it a joke.
But it was really nice. Breakfast had been hard, and Mom and Dad being there had been part of it, but supper was almost like being home.
Dennis told them all about what we did, and what I was like, I guess, like at the university, and he made up all sorts of silly stuff and made them laugh and told them about the book we’d read and Dad told him about all the books they’d read to me like that when I was little.
I remembered, when they told him, and I’d never thought before then how it was sort of the same.
Dennis was looking at me and smiling when I looked up, after it was quiet for a little bit.
“I’m going to buy the other books tomorrow morning, okay?”
I wanted to tell him that I lost my book, but then I figured out that it didn’t matter, and that it'd be so good to read the other two.
“We’ll still read them the same, right?”
Mom laughed, and she said at my eyes or something when Dennis asked what. Dad hugged my shoulders more.
Then he looked at Dennis.
I don’t know what he looked like but Dennis’ face got serious and he looked at all of us and then at me.
“I guess you want to know what we’re doing, in the same room...”
He smiled like it wasn’t bad and I guess I knew it was okay. I mean, that it wasn’t bad with Mom and Dad. I didn’t look at them. Dennis kept talking at me, at them.
“I haven’t gotten completely undressed in front of Bobby, and he’s really shy about that and doesn’t either, and I hug him and kiss him a lot, but not on his lips, because it makes us both feel better, and I think I think of him as a girl, and maybe like my best friend, but like a girl...”
He was smiling more and more, and looked at Mom.
“I’ll be really careful, ma’am.” He crooked his smile. “I know I’m weird, but...”
Mom made a little noise, like she was trying to say something, but not words.
“And I’ll try to take care of her, okay?”
Dad made almost the same noise and Dennis laughed at us, like he knew we’d look exactly like we all did.
-
Mom and Dad were still in the residence for the night and we all said we’d meet for breakfast. Mom cried for some reason, but wouldn’t say why and I almost got upset too, but Dad and Dennis both said it was okay and we finally stopped hugging and they went downstairs.
Dennis opened our door and inside, he sat on his bed and kinda waved that I should sit on mine and he looked at me like we needed to talk. He didn’t look bad, though.
I wanted to sit beside him. I think it was just because I was almost worn out from the whole weekend, or four days or whatever. But I really wanted to be beside him so he could hold me.
He looked at me and almost made a speech. I mean, like it was formal and important, the words.
“I meant what I said, about looking out for you, and that I’m still going to be respectful, you know.”
I nodded a bit. He did too.
“So, have you been okay, I mean, comfortable, with me changing in front of you, the way I have been? I could change in the showers, you know...”
He looked like it was really important. Like room rules we had to agree on. Not bad, but still really important, so I nodded again. He did too, and smiled a bit.
“Okay. But now you know I think you’re a girl?” He nodded, a bit more?
I nodded back. It seemed less good. More serious, anyway. And a little terrifying. He thought for a second and looked right in my eyes.
“So will it still be okay? Really? I mean, staying the way we’ve been? About privacy and how we change and what I wear, and going to bed or the showers and all that?”
He looked all over my face, and looked worried.
But I thought about what he was asking, and remembered about his pajamas, and what he might mean, and that I was okay with how he was... how he dressed, I mean, and he was like he told Mom and Dad, like he was never naked... I nodded.
“Yes.” I looked at his face, like it wasn’t quite enough. “I’m really happy with how things are... how you are?”
He nodded more too, and smiled.
“Okay!” He grinned totally different.
“Now... what would you like to wear, *different*?”
He said that Jarrod and the girls and *everyone* else on our two floor wings was okay with whatever I wore and none of the guys knew anything about me but they were *all* on this floor because they filled out their rez papers just like him, and they all would be really okay with me if they knew I was different than a straight boy.
Or even different than a boy, he said. He winked and laughed.
And I should stop looking like a fish. He said that too. But he came over and hugged me, at last.
“Do you want to wear something that Anne got you?”
He whispered that.
I guess I didn’t freeze or something, or not much, because he got up and gave me a bag from his desk and then sat on his own bed again and smiled at me.
I opened it. There was something white and flannel, and with a bit of satin ribbon. I looked up at him and I think I looked like a fish again. He was smiling like he does, like I was something good to look at.
I took it out, still folded up.
A nightie.
There was a note folded in it.
“Bobby. I hope you like this. It’s like one I have that’s really comfy and warm and I think you’d look cute in it and most of the girls in residence who wear nighties wear something like this. Just wear your robe with it for the halls. Sleep tight!
XXOO
Anne”
I hadn’t had any girl’s stuff since August. I'd never had a real nightie. It was white with tiny, pale flowers and a ribbon across the front with a bow, and long sleeves and a rounded-off collar. It was beautiful.
-
I was still just looking at it when Dennis came back from showering and he looked like he’d done something wrong and then I figured out that he thought it was wrong that he’d given it to me, or that Anne had, or whatever. If I was still just sitting there, holding it and staring.
“I’m sorry... but it’s so... I was looking at it and I’m sorry...”
His face turned into a big smile all in a second and I stopped apologizing.
-
I needed to shower again before bed, but I did it in about ten seconds and dried and brushed and was back in the room, and Dennis got up again and smiled and... left.
I heard his flip-flops go away and got undressed from my housecoat as quick as I could and pulled on the nightie and looked in the little mirror and I could only see my shoulders because it was a really small mirror and too high, but it was really, really pretty. I tried to see it from every angle. I looked down a lot, too. Mostly.
There was another quiet knock at the door and I realized that Dennis was being polite.
I was red, but smiling all over when I opened the door.
I didn’t know what to do, but I kinda held my own hands.
He looked me up and down and I got *too* red, but he took a step back into the doorway and made a little twirl with his finger and pretended to be all critical or something and I laughed and turned around with my arms out and when I came around to see him again he was smiling.
He stepped in and closed the door and hugged me.
“You look beautiful...”
And in all the years I tried to look like a girl and all the things I wore and the makeup I tried to use and no matter how much I liked the result, it was the first time in my whole life I felt pretty.
And Dennis was the first person to see me, in my whole life.
-
He hugged me hard until I could stop crying.
I didn’t even know why I was, because I felt so good.
And I cried for a long, long LONG time.
-
I woke up before Dennis.
I looked at my arm in the sleeve of my nightie and whispered “My nightie” and listened to how good it sounded.
I'd had a pretend nightie before, a huge t-shirt, and even wore it some nights, but was always afraid.
I looked at it in the light from the window and pulled up the front and stroked the ribbon and saw how they were slightly different whites, the ribbon and the flannel, and how I almost couldn’t see the flowers in the dim light.
When I looked back over at Dennis, he was looking back at me and smiling too.
I was only red because I bet I looked like an idiot, not because of my nightie.
“Morning.”
He smiled even more.
‘Morning to you, too, cutie.”
He looked up at his clock where he kept it on his desk over his bed and it was about eight, almost an hour later than we usually got up. I tried to remember what day it was, even. Tuesday.
“Aren’t you going to class?” We both had Psych at ten, and I’d missed my eight A.M., but I *had* to go see Ben. He shook his head a bit and grinned.
“Nope. I’m going with you guys and making sure none of you get lost.” He tried to look serious and still grinned a bit.
“You’re coming too?”
I guess he didn’t really think I’d be serious because he looked at me like he was thinking about how I looked and leaned his head up on one arm.
“I want to check with Ben if there’s any problems with me being your roomate and if there’s anything I need to do even if it is all okay.” He looked right at my eyes.
“And I wanna see him, or someone, about Justin.” He looked all okay, but his eyes got shiny and I knew how he was.
I got out of bed and went and sat beside him and rubbed his arm, the same way he did for me so many times and he laid back down and closed his eyes and a tear ran down over his ear and onto his pillow.
I didn’t know what to say or what he wanted to talk about, and we didn’t even talk about it the day before, but I knew he was really homesick for him. I guess that’s not the right word, but it was more than just missing him.
I leaned over and hugged him and leaned my head on his shoulder and wished I had the words.
After about a minute he moved his arm out from under me and hugged me and made little noises in my hair and I’m pretty sure he was crying.
When he stopped, or I couldn’t hear him, I kept rubbing his back and tried to think if I should say what I thought. I thought if I was the same as him, I’d like it if he said something.
“Do you think he might be lonely?” I tried to be really quiet.
He started to cry again.
-
He was still pretty upset, but at least not crying anymore.
“I’ve been mad that he hasn’t been writing or returning my my e-mails, and...” He sat beside me and held my hand. And looked at the floor.
“Do you have his phone number?”
It was like I was saying something he didn’t understand. I thought I shouldn’t maybe be making suggestions in case I was really wrong...
“It’s still really early there...”
But he looked like he couldn’t think of a better idea in the world. Then he hugged me and kissed my cheek.
He stood up and pulled on jeans and a tee and ran to the door and said he was going to the phones in the main lobby, where the door thing was, and don’t leave without him! He almost slammed the door too.
Then he came back and found his wallet for his phone card.
-
When Mom and Dad knocked about twenty minutes later I'd changed and was too shy to show them my nightie but I said we had to go get Dennis and when we got to the lobby phones he was leaning and facing away and almost hugging the phone and really quiet, so he could have been whispering.
We sat on a bench by the doors and Dad put his arm around my shoulders and Mom took my hand and we all waited. Dennis was barefoot.
-
After about ten more minutes he stood up and talked a bit more normally and said bye a few times and then hung up and wiped his face facing the phones and turned and started walking over to the hall before he saw us and stopped.
He’d been crying again, for sure, and we all stood up and I went over and hugged him as hard as I could and he did too, for just a few seconds. Then he stood up more and smiled.
“He’s going to go see someone today...” He tried to keep the smile, but was still sad.
“He’s lonely, like you said, and was depressed, he said... he figured...”
His eyes started running tears again and his face scrunched up. Mom hooked his arm and pulled him over to the bench and sat him down and I sat on the other side of him.
He covered his face with both hands and hid and shook and made choking noise. Mom hugged him and made “there, there” noises and pulled out some hankies for him. I tried to just touch him, if that makes any sense.
After just a few seconds, less than a minute, he slowed down and stopped and Mom dug out a little pack of more hankies and gave him a couple more and he dried his face all over and looked embarrassed at Dad.
“I’m sorry...”
Dad reached across me and touched his arm for a second and said he didn’t need to be.
“Everyone cries, son.” He looked at me too, and all of a sudden I thought that I’d never seen him cry, ever. Like Casablanca. Until the day before.
But Dennis was better, and straightened up and said a thanks at Mom and Dad and then took my hand.
“My friend’s in Vancouver, um, Washington... and doesn’t know anyone and he’s been depressed and we just talked and...”
He looked down and put his other hand on mine.
“I was... mad he hadn’t called or anything and...” He looked at me for a tiny second and then at Dad.
“Bobby said I should call him and, umm, ah... he’s gonna try to see a counselor today, too.”
He looked like he was trying not to cry again. Mom touched his arm.
“Is he alright?” She was pretty quiet. Dennis closed his eyes, or looked way down.
“I don’t know... I guess so...” He rubbed my hand.
“Better now, anyway.”
----
End of Part Ten
-----
Mom and Dad took us out for breakfast again, after we left a note for Jarrod and Anne that we were okay and I called so I could see Ben for sure and Dennis could see someone too, at noon.
It wasn’t as noisy at the restaurant as the morning before and I wasn’t scared like then, but Dennis was way worse than normal. I guess he noticed we were worried about him and said about the only thing since he'd sat down..
“Sorry...”
Then he went back to quiet. He didn’t eat much either, just pushed stuff around the plate.
I tried to think what he was thinking. All month he'd hoped Justin would write or stuff, but he never said so, and today he found out he was depressed and that was why, and he was way worse.
I reached around his arm and held his hand with both mine under the table and sat closer and talked as quietly as I could.
“Did you think it was his fault... and now, you think it was your fault?”
He kinda sat still.
“But he was depressed, and you were helping me... and so then it’s my fault?”
He made a movement.
“But you saved me.”
He made a noise and turned but I looked at just his hand, kinda counting his fingers.
“And you called him and he’s going to go see someone... and maybe you saved him?”
He pulled almost away, he turned so much towards me, but I kept his hand, and I thought of a best way to say what I meant.
After that, I looked at his face.
“So you saved us both and we’re your fault.”
I had to smile. He looked so surprised, and trying not to cry, and to think... all at the same time.
Mom made a noise and I looked over. She was smiling at Dad. *He* was staring at us and I think trying not to laugh or something.
I looked back and Dennis was looking at our hands. He peeked up at me and his voice was all rough.
“When did you get so smart?”
He didn’t say it like an insult, but more like I really was so smart. Then he smiled like, like... I had to smile too, and tried to look smart. And that made me almost laugh.
“Who, moi?” I looked at Mom and Dad. “I’ve always been smart, haven’t moi?”
Mom started to laugh.
“C’mon, guys! Back me up here!”
Dennis made a laugh and pulled me over in a hug as hard as he could.
-
After we'd finished but before they brought the bill Dennis made like a sigh, and pulled me closer, but gently.
-
Dad told us we should both come next weekend, and he’d see if Carol and Barry could make it back too, but for sure my sister'd be there and he knew everyone would like to see each other, or meet and stuff.
He said it better.
Dennis said he could drive us, and he’d make sure as soon as he phoned his parents. Ben came out then and I introduced him to Mom and Dad. He already knew Dennis from other times.
-
I told Ben all the stuff that'd happened and especially about Saturday night and the hospital and I showed him the prescription and said it was like so much was better, just in a day, and about dressing up, and my nightie (even if that part was hard) and about if maybe I was transgendered and what Dennis said. I asked him what he thought?
He said he thought I probably wasn't happy in a traditional male role...
And he thought I had very good friends, and that Jarrod and Dennis and Anne and Patty were good people to keep me safe.
When I asked, he told me the study thing we all filled out at the beginning of the year was to see if people could be found and gotten to counseling and support and stuff, but that my stuff from high school and from my parents had already kinda done that too.
That’s probably why Ellen kinda knew me at the newspaper too, he thought, maybe: because I told Mom and Dad I was going to volunteer there and they might've told them to watch out for me. Just to watch out.
But the university wouldn’t have done that. He suggested I could ask?
I told him about the safe walk stuff Gary said...
And how he was...
Ben smiled and said maybe Gary liked me?
-
It was a really long visit, almost two hours, and he made me tell him all about the cutting, and the suicide stuff and how I felt and all that, and he gave me a number to put on Mom’s phone that I had just then that was a crisis line that was the same place the hospital counselor was from (I checked her card later) and said he wanted to see me the next day too.
There were lots of things to talk about. And he wanted to talk with Mom and Dad.
Dennis was finished too, and had been for over an hour. After Mom and Dad went in I told him about what Ben said about thinking maybe Gary liking me, and for a second he looked odd, but then he got all dense and said of course Gary liked me, I was *nice*...
I had to say that he meant maybe Gary *like*-liked me.
“That’s what I just said...”
I was going to try to say it again, different, but he looked too innocent and I figured it out.
So I pretended to not get it either.
-
He told me he saw a counselor for about a half hour that he talked to about Justin and then he saw another one that his counselor said was in charge of the 'sexuality and gender project' that he said was the one with the study we were all in, and it was the same one as in the calendar, in the school registration stuff he'd filled in.
I told him Ben just said it was to find people who needed counseling. He said maybe Ben wasn't allowed to tell me any details about other people's stuff?
Anyway, Ms Harbison, the project coordinator or whatever, told him he had to see her about every two weeks from then on and I'd keep seeing Ben and the study group because they were all doing different stuff.
But he was supposed to see her so he could feel safe being my roommate, about me. He almost didn’t want to talk about what that meant but he finally said it was supposed to make sure he didn't get too stressed.
I must've looked like that was bad, because I thought that it meant I was going to be a problem for him, and I guess I started to think about moving, or him leaving, and he kind of interrupted.
“But *I* told her I’d see her for you, not me, and *just* ‘cause you’re in the project.” He made me give him my hand even though it was pretty busy in the waiting area, and held it with both of his and the receptionist guy smiled really big at us. I think Dennis never noticed him even looking.
“She wants me to see her just *because*, as part of the whole thing, and *not* because you’re any problem, okay?”
And he looked okay. Not stressed-out.
And he said he wouldn’t tell her anything private, but he was supposed to see her and make sure nothing was too hard, or too different than he was okay with, and it was *just* for the project.
Ms Harbison told him they were just starting it all up and wanted to make sure nothing bad would happen to anyone. And Jarrod and Anne were already seeing her every week anyway. Too.
He said he was okay. I said I believed him. But then I thought of something. That he'd called it a gender and sexuality thing.
“Do you think there’s someone else sort of like me in Anne’s hall? Or our side?” I looked in his eyes and he hardly even thought about it.
“No, I don't think so... there's really not anyone like you." He smiled. "I'm way more what the project's about than any of them."
I smiled a little at that, too.
"But I bet the project's why everybody on our floor is there, even if they don’t even know you’re the reason, and even if Ms Harbison planned for more. But I bet lots of rez applications didn’t even get filled in, that part, about if they were gay or trans or whatever.” He thought for a few seconds.
“And I bet except for Ann and Jarrod, they don’t even know there *is* any project, or that they’re on our rez floor because of it...” He looked more at me.
“All the other guys... they’re just on our floor ‘cause they’re nice people and said they were tolerant. And if some of them are gay or whatever, then great!”
I had to think about that, just to fit it in with everything. There were three rooms that weren't filled on our two wings.
“So you think no one else's like me? In all the rez?”
I guess that didn’t make too much sense. “I mean, not like me, or not really, but because they wrote they were more than gay and lesbian-friendly? Or the school knew?”
He thought more.
“I dunno... but... Jarrod and Anne might..." He made a strange expression.
"But I think our floor is..." He thought. "I bet there're other proctors who know... or were at least told to keep an eye out? But I bet our floor is all of it, the project people, really."
He rubbed my hand a bit. Then he smiled really big.
“When we moved in, the only one on our floor not in on the project in some way was you.” He snorted a bit and smiled even bigger. And bumped my head with his, gently.
“And now you are.”
-
When Mom and Dad came out it was almost two o’clock and they had to go home before suppertime and wanted to sit down with us before, so we went to lunch in the campus centre food court.
-
They were sort of serious and a lot different than at breakfast and I worried that Ben told them something bad or scary about me, or even told them I should maybe leave. I was afraid to ask.
Then Dad sat up and looked like he does.
“Boys.” He stopped.
“Sorry. Bobby, Dennis.”
He looked like it was bad, but Mom was just serious. She put her hand on his arm and Dennis put his on mine, on the table.
Dad started again.
“Mrs. Harbison said that you are both doing really well... they thought so...”
He kind of slowed down and thought for a second.
It was really noisy, with rattley music and a tons of people talking and walking by, and some carts or something clanking. And I think Dad was trying to be quiet too. He had an odd look.
“I... we, want you to be careful, about... if you... I mean, if either of you have...”
Dennis squeezed my arm and smiled really big when I looked.
“If we have sex?”
“WHAT!?” I grabbed my hand back to my lap and almost shouted at Dad, or Dennis. At someone.
Dad, probably! It was for sure what he meant from the way he looked!
“Dad!”
Dennis almost snorted, but he just laughed a small noise.
“We talked about it... remember?”
“We did not! I mean, we said we wouldn’t! You said! *You* said we wouldn’t! Shouldn’t!" I had to look at Dad again!
"DAD!!”
I was *really* freaked that he would ever talk about anything like that in the student union and in public, and with *Dennis* with me!
I didn’t know what. Or... WHAT!
I pulled my arm further away from Dennis and tried to look severe or something.
Dennis waited to see what I meant, he said after, and then he scootched forward a bit and spoke really quiet and reasonable. I think at everyone, because we were all just staring at each other, all different ways.
Even though he moved to the middle, closer to everyone, he looked at me.
“So we *don’t* plan to have sex, and even if we ever *did* we’d make sure it was safe and that we’d both feel good, right?”
He smiled at me, and Mom and Dad too. Dad looked like he'd had a heart attack and Mom was almost laughing. At Dad, I think. But I was still mad. A least a bit.
And maybe a bit... I didn't have a word.
-
I had to keep peeking at Dennis.
-
Mom said Mrs. Harbison just said that I *might* have sex sometime, and I was almost 18 and all...
Dad said that he just wanted... to make sure... or something...
Dennis just smiled. I saw him smile a couple of different ways. I saw him look at me, too. Or catch me peeking.
-
Dad didn’t talk about it any more. Instead they asked us where, and we chose some basic phones in the bookstore and set them up with the right numbers.
Then Mom asked, just like it was normal, since we were shopping mode, if I wanted to go shopping for some girl’s clothes and I got mad again, even if Dennis still said I was really just embarrassed.
Again.
-
And Mom never acted like I was ever mad.
-
I didn't want them to go, and Mom cried almost as much as I did, but after Dad said they'd see us the next weekend and Dennis could meet Carol, Mom and Dad left.
-
About eight o'clock, Dennis finally got me to show him what Mom bought me.
After he promised not to make any jokes or tell. And after he asked about a hundred times.
And I *really* wanted to show him, I was so happy.
-
He said he liked the shirts and tops and sweaters and asked why I didn’t get any skirts or anything and I finally showed him the one we bought, but it was really scary and he smiled and said it looked nice and I said I’d probably never wear it, but it was... sweet... that he said that.
I really meant I’d never, ever show anyone. Anyone else.
And he gave me a present from Dad.
It was wrapped up in silver paper. He said Dad wanted him to wait to give it to me 'til after they left.
It was the three books in the series that we’d read, even the first one I'd lost, and another one by the same author. So it was from Dennis, too...
And a tiny box.
The little plain card said, “I love you very, very much. Your Dad.”
I started to cry a little even before I opened the box, and then I really got going.
Dennis sat over and hugged me and I guess he already knew what it was.
Little diamond studs.
Dennis said that I could go and get my ears pierced any time, for free, that it came with them, and they were really good ones. And he used his t-shirt to wipe at my eyes so I wouldn’t get tears all over my new top, he said.
-
We went over to see Jarrod and Anne, and Dennis said I should leave on my new stuff and I looked just fine and very nice and I wasn’t just going to hide in our room, was I?!
He made it sound silly and okay, I guess, but I was still really scared and he held my hand and pretended to pull me. But he was really just holding my hand.
Jarrod wasn’t in but Anne was when we went down there, and she almost screamed at my new earings and made me show them to all the girls who were in and they all made a big deal over them and said I *had* to get my ears pierced as soon as I could and I could get more than one in each ear and most of the girls had just one but some of them had more and Patty had *three* in each ear. But she had her nose and an eyebrow and her navel pierced too...
They all thought the new top I was wearing was nice and asked what else I got, too, and Dennis sort of made me show them and they said it was all really great and I could borrow some of their stuff sometimes and asked if they could borrow my green sweater, especially.
I said almost nothing the whole time, I was so scared they would say something bad, maybe, or something that would hurt.
But the only thing that hurt the whole evening was when they left. And that didn't, really. Or it wasn't them.
-
When the door closed, Dennis sat on his bed and looked at me and smiled. I don’t even know why, but that’s when I felt like everything was wrong again, and that it was all going to get worse, or like it had already started to. And I was scared again that Mom and Dad even knew, or even Dennis.
I still don’t know why, but I felt all the bad stuff then. After it was all good stuff.
Dennis got up and sat beside me and hugged me and rubbed my back and didn’t really say anything and I think that was good, because I didn’t know what he could have, or what I could say either...
-
I felt a lot better after a while and he hugged me even harder for a second and kissed my hair and said it was a lot to deal with, wasn’t it?
Maybe that was it, because I nodded and it felt like he was right.
And because it was still pretty early he said we could read some of the second book, after we got ready for bed, if I wanted?
-
He did all the reading, and except when I closed my eyes and imagined, I just watched him.
His face.
He looked at me sometimes too, even when he was reading, and he smiled every time.
----
End of Part Eleven
by Michelle Wilder
-----
It was the first normal morning in almost a week, except Dennis asked me if I was going to wear any of my new stuff and I said of course not, and he said why not?
“Because they’re girl’s clothes and everyone will laugh at me!”
“Nobody laughed last night, and I wouldn’t laugh at you, or tell you you should do anything that people would laugh at.” He looked really serious.
“But...”
“And you look great in all of it, and besides, aren’t you going to see Ben first thing this morning? I bet he’d like to see you in it, don’t you?”
“But...”
He smiled really nice at me.
“And if you don’t want to, it’s okay, but if you *do* want to, I’ll make sure nobody bugs you and even walk over to your appointment with you and then meet you for lunch before English?” He looked like he really wanted me to.
“How can you make sure no one bugs me?” I didn’t sound very sure, I’m sure.
“I’ll make everyone on our floor watch out for you and tell them they’re authorized to kill.” He said it all matter-of-fact, like everyone was a bodyguard or spy or something, and didn’t even smile until I did.
-
He looked at all my new tops again with me and said the white top and the tan sweater with the big white diamond pattern on the front was really, really nice and wouldn’t attract attention it was so casual, but what did he know, he was a boy.
But he thought, speaking *as* a boy, that I'd look pretty in them.
He didn’t try and make me wear the skirt, either, but he said I could if I wanted to, too, and it'd be the same. But I never could.
Then he left me to go see Jarrod and Anne he said, to get them to tell everyone that I needed to have them watch out for me.
I almost put it all away and got out a regular guy shirt, I was getting so nervous, but I was still in my nightie and suddenly I thought, if I did, if I wore my new clothes today, I’d get to wear girl’s stuff all day. I mean, for the first time ever, ever, all day.
I sat down on my bed and just thought.
The more I looked down at my nightie, the more I wanted to try. And maybe even if someone laughed at me it would still be sorta worth it, if I could?
Someone knocked at the door and I... it wouldn’t have been Dennis... and then I thought it might've still been, if he thought I might be changing, so I said “It’s okay! Come in...”
The door opened a bit and instead it was Anne.
“Morning, Bobby! Hey, aren’t you getting dressed?”
She opened the door more and slipped in and closed it.
“Is something wrong?”
She sounded worried and I didn’t know what to say.
I mean, I knew I was scared, but that didn’t seem wrong, because it *was* scary to think about going outside like I wanted to, and I *could* just... *not* do it... and it wouldn’t be scary anymore, but somehow it all seemed too important not to...
I was thinking in circles. Good circles. Scary ones.
And every time, they seemed a bit less...
I mean, for the first time ever, I *could*... I mean, what Dennis said... and I COULD! I really could.
I didn’t want to say all that, but I looked at her and tried to not sound all scared and still tell her, somehow, that I really did want to do it, and if she could help, but I didn’t know what she could do, even?
What I did was almost strech out my new sweater, I held it so hard.
“I’m scared.”
And I didn’t want to say that part.
She sat down and put her arm around me the exact same way Dennis did, but smaller, and smiled at me really big.
“Is that what you’re gonna wear today?”
I guess I nodded or something. Like she'd heard the other part instead.
“With the white shirt?” She looked over at it and I did nod.
“That’ll look really nice. Are you gonna wear jeans or a skirt or nicer pants?”
I knew the skirt looked really nice with the sweater, or at least in the store, on hangers, but I was way too scared to wear it. I hadn't even been able to try it on....
But I hadn't even considered wearing it, really, before she said that, even when Dennis...
And I had a pair of jeans and a pair of loose white pants. They were way looser than usual pants and they’d look stupid with the tan sweater. But I had a green hoodie sweater too. But they'd look wrong with any sweater... they needed a nice shirt...
-
Anne made me go and shower. She was dressed when I got back and she said the green sweater went perfect with my new jeans and the tighter white button shirt and I shouldn’t zip it up (the sweater) except maybe the middle (it zipped both ways) and it looked great that way and I should leave the shirt untucked and she ran out and brought back a pair of flats and long green socks she borrowed from Crystal that looked really nice and she said I could keep them, the socks, which were kinda the same as knee-high nylons, but heavier.
Crystal said I could have them. The socks.
But she wanted her shoes back.
I couldn’t see what it all looked like in our mirror, but Anne said it looked really nice and all I needed to do was dry my hair nice, and we went back to her room and she called Patty and she did it with Anne's blow dryer and made it way nicer than I ever got it at home when I tried and she spritzed it and said all I had to do was not touch it too much and *don’t* finger-comb it.
Patty said all she really did was part it totally different and make it fuller and put some of it in long bangs, more foreward. And said I should get it cut better. Soon.
-
When I came out Dennis was waiting in the hall where the boys’ and girls’ wings met and there were like a *hundred* people there, practically our whole hall, and they *all* turned and looked at me.
I froze, and Anne bumped into me and then Patty pushed us both, and then Dennis stood up more, like taller, and smiled at me like he was going to burst and I suddenly felt like it wasn’t scary at all. Or like all those guys weren't there...
Or, even if it *was* scary, it didn't matter.
-
So a lot of us walked to breakfast together, almost all the girls and about half a dozen of the boys from the floor, and I was nervous as I could be and a few of the guys even teased me a bit, but it was more like about my having new clothes and not looking like a geek like usual... but not about me? And Dennis walked holding my hand, and he laughed at them and said some of them were just jealous.
-
Their teasing made me feel *better*, somehow, so I guess they weren’t really teasing at all. And, like, Murray had driven some of us to the hospital, I remembered, and I thanked him.
I smiled when he said he was glad I was better. I was.
-
When I got to the cashier, it was the same lady from the last week and she smiled like she usually did and I got scared, and then as she gave me my card back she smiled even more and said, “You look very nice today, dear!”
I’m sure I got red, but Anne bumpped me and told me to get a move on! and it made everything start again and seem normal and I thanked her (the lady) and I tried to smile and not spill everything.
-
We took up all of two long tables. So there were sixteen of us.
Dennis sat on the other side of the table, and Ann and Patty sat either side me and right away started asking me what I was going to do next?
They thought I should wear makeup and stuff and wanted to show me how, and other stuff, and I was trying to figure out what I thought, or should say anyway... and even if I'd ever even told them..?
And it wasn't a bad thing that they were... that they knew.
Dennis was looking at me like he does, and smiling like I was funny.
“What?” He acted like I was looking at him funny instead.
I had to think so I didn’t just say “What what?”
“How come you’re looking at me funny?”
He looked like he wasn’t, and like I was making it up.
“I was just looking at my pretty roomate...”
He grinned like it was a big joke and it felt just like the teasing in the hall, and I smiled back, because it *did* make me feel better.
“Oh, HO!” Patty shoulder-checked me and made a short laugh. Anne leaned in the other way and they squished me and laughed even more.
Just then, Jarrod came up then and pulled up a chair to the very end of the table and smiled at all of us and really smiled at me.
“Wow! Do you ever look nice today, Bobby!”
I mumbled thank you and ducked and then had to smile at him a real thanks.
He looked at Patty and Anne too, and I guess they didn’t want to act silly with him looking, or Patty didn’t, anyway, because she sat up. Anne kept leaning on me and laughing and stuff.
”Ahem.”
Everyone looked at Dennis, ‘cause it sounded stupid, but he didn’t look that way. He looked at everyone at both tables.
“Like I said upstairs, I... I mean, could everyone look out for Bobby today, between classes, and in class, I guess, just in case anyone bugs her?”
Patty and Anne squished me again, or hugged me in a squish, anyway.
-
Dennis and Beverly, the only girl on the floor taller than me, walked with me over to the counselors’ offices.
I had a list of where and when everyone was going to meet me, at least in most classes, and in English and Psych Dennis was with me, and in Bio and Calculus there wasn’t anyone, but Lori was in Bio, and I told them about her.
Intro Calc classes were really small and all over the campus and there were tons of different TAs, so I had to walk over to that class by myself and just stay where there were lots of people.
The only thing wrong was that the more everyone talked about it, the more nervous I got, thinking what could happen, or that people would make fun of me because I knew that that’s what *they* were afraid of. And I was terrified of.
So I wasn't really part of whatever Dennis and Beverly were talking about...
“Hey! Bobby!”
It was Lori, the lady from Bio. She was walking over and smiling at me and kinda packing papers and stuff in her backpack while she walked and it was all getting all wrinkled. She dropped a page in a puddle too and just wiped it on her pack and shoved it in.
“Hiya, kiddo! Glad I ran into you!”
She was smiling way different than when we were in the lab, like then she was a grown-up and I was a little kid, and now like I was a friend.
“Who’re your friends? I’m Lori, Bob’s lab partner in Bio.” She looked back and forth at us.
“Hi, Lori. This is Dennis, he’s my roomie, and Beverly, she’s on our floor. And I like Bobby better?”
I was going to introduce her to them when I remembered she just did, and that all I knew was her name anyway.
She kinda turned our way and we all started walking again.
“Beautiful day, hunh? Have you looked at the lab for this Thursday yet?”
I figured she must've meant me. And she sounded like it was about something less-than good.
“Um, no... I’ve been really busy... is it hard?”
"Oh, yeah..." She smiled and nodded. So it was, but it wasn’t too bad.
“I just glanced through it so far myself, but yeah, it looks hard. Prob’ly an hour just to set up and two to get results, and maybe three or so to write up.”
She still smiled like it wasn’t really bad, even twice as long as the lab was supposed to be.
“So we both better have it read ahead of time and figured it out or we’ll never get finished in time. And unless we get together and split the write-up work it’ll take forever to do that too.
“Soooo... Angela, Connie and I are getting together right after the lab to do the results and write-ups and they invited you too. We’re over in Sigma Phi house on the Crescent. Interested?”
There were about two dozen rooming houses and frats and stuff on Alumni Crescent. And sororities too, I guessed. It wasn't far.
Beverly leaned over and asked what class it was? She made a face when Lori said.
“I took that with Benson last year and only barely managed a B. You have to really put in the hours. He didn’t even care how hard the labs were. You really should hook up with them.”
-
We arranged that I'd meet Lori an hour before the lab, to prepare, and she’d come by the rez about six-thirty after the lab and we’d walk over to the sorority house.
She waved bye until Thursday after I promised to read the lab. Twice.
Beverly said, “She seems nice. How’d you end up as lab partners?”
Dennis laughed at her. “What, like she wouldn’t rate a nice lab partner?”
Beveley laughed too, but I was kinda thinking too hard, I guess.
-
Ben was ready when we got there a bit early and Dennis had to go, but Bev said she’d wait for me and do some reading.
Dennis gave me a big hug and even kissed my hair when he left, and totally enbarrassed me in front of Ben.
-
“You look very nice.”
As soon as we sat down in his office Ben said that.
I looked down at myself, at my sweater, mostly, I guess. I liked it in the store and it was the only thing that I asked Mom to get me especially. She picked out everything else.
“Thank you.” I kept looking down.
“Did you do your own hair?”
He was smiling when I looked up again and I’d forgotten that Anne and Patty did my hair different and was kind of embarrassed that I thought it was the clothes he was noticing.
“No, Anne, this girl... the proctor on my floor? and her friend Patty did it for me this morning.” I thought that I had to tell him how much Anne really helped.
“Anne said I should wear this sweater, too.”
“Is it hers? It really suits you.” He looked really interested and I relaxed a bit.
“No... I went shopping with my mother yesterday and we bought some stuff, and I picked this out myself... and these jeans... and kinda white khaki pants? and Anne loaned me these shoes to go with the jeans, or I think they’re Crystal’s...”
I ran down after that. Except then I remembered.
“And Dad bought me these beautiful diamond studs but I don’t have my ears pierced yet but I’m going to get them done for free ‘cause it comes with the earings. They’re really beautiful...” I looked at my sweater again and played with the bottom zipper pull.
“He bought me some books too...”
-
We ended up talking for almost an hour about Dad and Dennis, instead of me. About Gary too, and Barry.
He wouldn’t say, or didn’t, anyway, but I thought he thought I was gay, and that was why. Which made talking about Dad really... wrong. I didn’t tell him that, when I thought of it.
Near the end we talked about how I was feeling inside, about cutting and depression, and all the weekend stuff, too. But Ben thought I was going to be okay, he said.
And I had to see him the next day, again.
He said the weekend and all last week were really serious, but I knew that.
He said I was doing really well, too.
-
Beverly was still waiting in the main room when I finished and she walked with me as far as the other side of the quad and then she had to go over to the Arts Complex and I had to head to Calc in the portables and she said bye and be careful and gave me a little hug.
-
As soon as I turned to walk, and couldn’t see anyone I knew, I got cold.
Frozen cold.
I just stood there and couldn’t walk, or move, even.
I shook, like shivering, and thought I could go back to the room, or not move, or if there was a bench I could sit down...
“Bobby?”
Beverly was beside me and touched my arm and I looked at her and didn’t know if I should say anything, but then I really started to shake for a second.
I grabbed at her arm and was almost crying, I was so relieved... but I didn’t know why.
It was only like thirty seconds she was gone. Less.
-
Beverly took me back up to counseling and said it was okay if she blew off a class or two. I didn't say anything. I was trying to figure out what happened.
We had to wait about ten minutes. I had a hundred thoughts.
-
Ben looked like he was mad at me or something, but I don’t think I can really tell what he thinks most of the time.
He said he was going to call another counselor in if it was okay with me? and I nodded, but I really didn’t want to. But he said he really had to.
Ms Harbison, Rachel, she said, came in just a few minutes after, and I wasn’t really very polite, I guess. She sat down on the little couch beside me.
“Bobby?”
I was still scared at what happened. If Beverly hadn’t looked at me before she went in the Tucker Building... I don’t know what.
“Bobby?”
She was a bit louder and I moved and looked at her. “Are you okay? Do you need medical help?”
I looked again when she said that and she was really worried, and I woke up, or stopped thinking so hard, I guess. Ben was worried-looking too.
“I’m sorry. What?” I knew what.
“Sorry. I mean, no. I’m okay, I think. I was just thinking.” I knew that sounded stupid, but it was right.
”I think I almost had a panic attack.” I said it at Ben, like it was a normal thing, or that he would understand.
“Right now? Here?”
I guess not.
“No, I mean outside, when I was alone, I think I was almost like... Saturday, like I could feel getting that scared...” I got quieter.
“But?” He was quiet too.
“I didn’t, when Bev came back. I was scared, but I didn’t.” I shivered a bit at how it felt, though.
Ms Harbison leaned over or something.
“Bobby?” She was looking at my eyes. I nodded what?
“Do you need to do anything?”
“I...” Anything? I looked at Ben and he was waiting too and I looked back at Ms Harbison and I knew Beverly was waiting outside.
“I...”
I started to cry, even if I didn’t know why. Ms Harbison gave me a hankie and I wiped my eyes and nose, but I was just crying.
"A man... a man followed me when I was alone, at the mall and he... touched me... and then... "
I didn't say it very clearly, but they understood.
-
It took a long time.
-
They thought I wanted to go home back to Mom and Dad, but I meant home with Dennis, and they thought I needed to go in the hospital, like I was at risk, but I was just scared by my memories and hadn’t even thought of that.
Like the memories weren't *real*, like thoughts... anymore?
And they thought it was because of my new clothes, or because I was doing things too fast.
But after we talked, I was sure it was because I was alone. Because It felt like after the first time I ran away and was alone, and he followed me.
Because it felt just like that, for some reason. But, really, it *wasn't* like that at all.
-
Even after all the explaining what I thought and what it felt like, they were still scared for me.
“Can I ask a really important question?” Ben sounded like it was a bad one, but I nodded.
He thought for a few more seconds.
“What are you're most afraid of? Right now?”
He leaned way over towards me, like as close as he could, like if he wasn’t in another chair our knees would be almost touching. Ms Harbison was really still.
I thought for a long time. It was a hard question. Not like scary in a movie... or accidents...
It was something the man had said. And Carol.
It was like a little bit of the cold I'd just felt outside.
“When..."
A memory
Right then
"If Mom, or Dad... or Carol...” I had to think harder...
“... left.”
I was holding my own wrist, really hard.
“If they left me.”
I started to cry and I pushed my thumbnail in hard and tried to stop it.
“If they stopped being... even on the phone... or... to see me...” I looked at Ben.
“If... if... Carol said I wasn’t... her... brother...”
I had to let go so I could hold on.
-
I remembered a time when my sister said ”freak,” when a cross-dresser was on a TV show.
I'd never felt worse. Ever, in my whole life.
I remembered she said he was stupid looking or something... She'd looked at me weird, too.
I remembered I almost ran away right after she said it, but not so she could see, and I couldn't talk or think, and as soon as I could that day I tore up all my stories and drawings and threw out my stuff, and stopped everything.
For a long time. A long time.
I started cutting after that, about a year later, when I didn’t have anything else. I was around thirteen or fourteen, because I never made up stories again until after that, after cutting the first time, for over a year.
I missed them so bad... I used to read them over and over and even dream them.
-
The man in the mall was after that. He called me a freak, too. And if I ever told anyone...
I never felt worse, in my whole life. And I couldn't tell anyone.
-
I knew that Carol was going to hate me and not see me anymore. She'd said... that. It was what she meant.
But we'd talked... just the day before... and she knew that I dressed, in her things sometimes, even....
And Mom and Dad said she knew even before I went to university, and she still hugged me then and looked sad when she was leaving...
and she said goodbye.
I told them I didn’t know what that meant. I mean, that I was just sure she would... not like me... and that she still even cried a bit when she left. And I knew those didn't make sense, together.
And how I *knew* she wouldn't have if she already knew I was a freak.
But she did.
-
Ms Harbison left, she said to make a phone call, and came back after about twenty minutes while Ben and I talked about my stories that I used to write about me, as if everything was different, as if I was never a boy.
He asked if they were different when I started writing them again, the ones I'd just thrown out that summer.
-
When she came back Ms Harbison had a big folder and took out some papers.
“I just talked with your mother and she gave me permission to talk to you about some of this.”
She looked at one page and then looked at me and was really serious. I waited because I didn’t have any idea what.
“Your sister said this to me on the phone, six weeks ago.”
She looked up at me, I think to see if I was listening, and then she read.
“He’s been in my clothes since he was about four or five and I guess I used to think he was gay, but I think he’s a girl, a transsexual, maybe.”
She looked at me again, still really serious, and looked at the paper again.
“He gets really scared if people talk about anything like crossdressers or homosexuals around him, so we don’t.” She looked up again.
“These are from a long conversation we had.” She looked at some other pages and read again.
“We all know he cuts, or slashes or whatever, and I know Mom says it doesn’t mean he’s trying to kill himself, but it scares me so much I can’t stand it.”
She looked right at me for a second and then read again from the same sheet.
“If he could be happy I’d give him all my clothes and I don’t care if he’s a girl, or gay or anything. But I’m so scared he’s going to kill himself, and I can’t help him. I'm afraid to even talk to him and maybe make it worse.”
She put the papers back in the folder.
I just listened, and watched, and tried to fit it together. The stuff I knew, and Carol said, and that they were the same, and how I couldn't believe them, almost.
“She loves you.”
I looked at Ben. He smiled a little.
“And she knows you dressed in her things, and probably was trying to say something about that to you back when you were watching that show you remember.”
I closed my eyes for a second.
“But perhaps... because of that man, and what he said... you were too scared to listen clearly? Yesterday?”
He sounded so right.
-
I understood what they meant, I thought. I knew...
“So this is all... really about me... just... hurting myself? All this?” I felt my eyes fill up when I had my next thought.
“Dennis too?” And Mom and Dad...
Ben made a noise and I looked up, even if he was blurry.
“No. That's *not* why you're here. And Dennis thinks you're...”
He blinked and looked at Ms Harbison and then at me and was dead serious.
“He likes you.” He smiled. I think at how he sounded like before. But he's talked to Dennis...
“He said that?”
“He said that.” He nodded.
He was serious again. And he knew all about what I thought.
“And none of your friends in residence volunteered to help a depressed student. They just said that they would be supportive of gay or transgendered residence-mates. Except Dennis said that he would like to have a gay roommate, because of his friend. And when we called him about you, from what we could pass on, he said he thought he’d like *you* as a roommate.”
He looked at me and spoke really clearly.
“What everyone is trying to do, including your parents and sister and friends back home, is keep you safe - while you find yourself.”
He smiled at me and Ms Harbison.
“And Dennis, to use his *own* words, loves you.”
-
They both though all the *change* was the problem, and bringing up a lot of old feelings that were like... the opposite of what I thought I *should* feel, but that was normal...
They said I was adaptable and flexible and other psych words, but they meant they didn’t know exactly how long, but I’d start to get better. Not panic.
And if I could have someone with me *all* the time I probably wouldn't panic again, but that was impossible, so I had to at least try to remember what my family *really* thought about me and that I wouldn’t be abandoned or hated or stuff like that.
And my friends. And Dennis.
I still had to go to see Ben every day for a week. And they'd see if I could change some classes or drop one or two, and still not lose my grants. So I could maybe have a little less stress.
And I should call home. And talk to Carol again. They didn’t say I had to, but they said I’d feel better. That it'd help erase the wrong ideas I had running around in my head.
-
Ms Harbison gave me a small hug. It felt like she practiced them.
She wasn’t a really huggy person, but Ben was.
I never knew I was, before. I wasn't before.
-
Bev got a note like mine that was sort of an excuse for missing classes all afternoon. And her morning one. And mine for all day.
The secretary said at least we wouldn’t get penalized for missing, but we still had to make up the work. He was really nice and said he thought I looked lovely and Beverly called me a shameless flirt and he laughed.
She said we should eat lunch in the student union because we were already there anyway and she chose and we ended up in the same fancy restaurant where I went with the grad project people.
The same guy was at the door and sat us and I noticed something that I didn’t before. He wasn’t gay.
Well, maybe he was gay too, but what I could see was really, he was feminine.
And when he smiled at me, just like before, it was just a really nice smile and I smiled back.
Bev looked at him after he left and then at me and asked if I knew him? I just said I was there for lunch before, and he just seemed like a nice person.
I even said "person".
-
Ben and Ms Harbison said I should tell Dennis and Jarrod and Anne about trying to not be alone for a while, like Dennis hadn't already figured *that* out...
But I told Bev, too, while we waited for our food, so I could ask if she could walk back to rez with me and she smiled at me like I was totally stupid and said of course!
-
I told her about Carol and Barry and Jan and everyone and she said they sounded nice and she asked about Barry and if we talked much, before and I really didn’t know if we did.
I thought about it. We hung out, and did things, and sat around a lot, and talked... Maybe a lot. Not as much as with Dennis...
“On...”
I looked at her and she was all thinking.
“On the phone? In Jarrod's room, when you and Dennis were on the phone to... Barry and Carol?”
I nodded and waited, ‘cause I could tell she was trying to say something right.
“You guys talked like...”
She thought again, a pretty long time. She looked at my hand where she had it, and then at me. Bev talks slow, like thinking about each sentence.
“Y’know, all the girls on the floor think you’re both adorable.”
She smiled at my face.
“Because *you're* just like a girl.” She squeezed my hands.
“And Dennis treats you like that, too.” She grinned even more.
“It’s so sweet...”
-
The waitress came with our burgers and when she went away Bev started grinning again so much I couldn’t stop either.
“Stop it!”
I wasn’t really mad or anything, but she was being creepy. Well, not really *creepy*, but I didn’t want her to, or at least I didn’t want to talk about it.
What she said.
She told me *all* the girls who weren’t going with someone had tried to get Dennis to go out but he mostly hung out with me, and that made him even more special? She grinned again after she said that.
“Really?”
I think I was kinda amazed he was that... whatever... attractive, I guess.
“Yes! He’s like the nicest guy ever!” She really meant it.
“But he’s, like, like... plain? I mean ‘cept for being a jock, sorta? I mean, he’s...”
Dennis just wasn’t really good looking, I meant. I didn't mean he looked bad, 'cause he didn't, he looked great... I thought... but I thought girls liked...
“Earth to Bobby?” She smiled real, like no grin.
“He’s not a model, he’s a guy?” She made eyes. “And he’s a keeper, you can bet on that. Whoever he settles down with will be one lucky girl.”
She looked at me like I should have figured all that out, I guess.
“But right now the only one he talks about, or goes out with, special..?”
I figured it out.
“Is... me?”
She nodded big.
“Is you.”
-
She said we didn’t have to talk any more about it if I didn’t want to, ‘cause I think I stopped talking.
Which was good, the not talking about it, ‘cause I was thinking too hard.
What Bev had said, and what... everyone said...
We still ate, and even talked a bit more, too, but not about that, about Dennis. I still thought about him.
-
When Dennis touched me it was like the exact, exact, perfect opposite of the mall.
-
I was definitely gay. I was thinking it, figuring it out. Even if I was transgendered, I was gay. ‘Cause I liked boys. And my stories all used to have boys in them, like princes and knights and Robin Hood and all that, and I liked Gary. And Dennis... and Barry. But all of them totally different. Especially Dennis.
I didn't even know if having boy friends was gay, really.
I couldn’t figure it out for sure, all of it, them... But *I* was definitely gay.
-
While we were walking back to rez, Bev figured out I was thinking about something, I guess because I was out of focus. Or because I'd been on autopilot for the last half hour.
“What’s going on in there, girl?”
I heard her, and I guess I woke up, but I looked up at her, and I had to ask.
“I think I’m gay...”
Or say it, anyway.
She looked at me like she was kinda surprised I said that.
“You like girls?” She really looked like she was serious. I guess she thought I meant I was bi.
“I guess, sorta...” I looked at her more.
“But not like *that*, really...”
She just looked more serious.
“Then how are you gay?”
I guess I thought how to say it clearer. More clearly. Then I figured out what she meant.
“If I like boys...”
She looked at me like I was stupid.LIke it didn’t make sense. What I said.
Or maybe, if I was transgendered, like a girl, like transsexual, then I wasn’t.
Except I was a boy, or was one... really.
“I’m a boy, so if I like... like boys... like, that... like, *sex*...” I had to whisper, so I could even say it.
“Then that’s *gay*...”
I thought about what I said, and it still was right. I looked at her to see what she thought.
She was thinking too. But not bad stuff. After a few seconds she nodded.
“Ok, I guess I can see that...” Then she smiled a bit silly and waggled her head.
“But I think you’d be way gayer if you liked girls.”
“I would not! If I liked girls I’d be all normal like Dennis... or Gary!”
“So *they’re* all normal and they still treat you like a girl... even if you say you’re a boy?” She smiled weird. “That works... how?”
I just looked at her like she didn’t get it and she smiled at me like I was being stupid again or something, but not mean.
“I don’t think you *can* be gay, really...”
Or she was still thinking about it.
“If you like Dennis or Gary, then it’s like... I mean, it’s the girl in you, right?” She looked at me and kept talking.
“And if it’s a girl you like, well you’re still like a boy, so you can’t be gay then either.”
She stopped, like that was all. But I'd already thought all of that.
“What if the boy part likes boys too, or the girl part likes girls..?”
Bev walked some more. We did.
“Then you can’t *not* be gay, either... if the, if your... boy part and girl parts are both always... there, I guess?”
I hadn’t thought it that way before. I wondered why...
“... bi, really. You have to be... Even if you're only attracted to one sex, you’re *two* yourself.”
She said it pretty quiet, but it was pretty big idea. Yeah...
“I guess...” I smiled at her like she was smart.
“Hey, Bev? I think I’m bi.”
“Ya think?!” She laughed way more than it was funny, but I was still pretty glad she did.
After about another ten feet she walked closer and grabbed my arm.
“So? Gary, hmm? He’s that tall guy..? He’s cute! Have you been out yet? What’s he like?”
She was kidding me, but she still made me blush all over.
“I just *said* Gary! I didn’t mean him especially! And we haven’t been out or anything and... he...”
I didn’t know what to say. I didn’t even remember everything she just said. I didn’t even really remember *saying* Gary.
Besides.
“Ok, ok.” She stopped asking and stuff, but she kept hold of my arm as we walked up the rez steps.
“What about Dennis..?” She held the outer door open for me.
“Dennis?”
“Yes, Dennis? Your roomie? The totally nice guy we were talking about? The one who likes you?”
“I know who he is! I mean, what about him?” She got her key card out of her pack while I peeked in our mailbox. I thought about how Ben said he said he loved me...
“That’s what I asked.” She pulled the door shut behind us ‘cause sometimes it caught. Jarrod said we had to be careful about that 'til the fixed it... She turned around and faced me, close.
“Are you, ummm... romantically interested in him?” She didn’t take my arm, but she was that close again. Bumping noses. Waggly eyebrows.
I had to hide how red I got. She took my arm again and headed upstairs.
He’d said all that about no sex, and I thought that was good too, but I still thought maybe he was like in my old daydreams, like he liked me that way. And what he told Ben.
The hallway was echo-y. Dennis wouldn’t be there, and I thought about the alone thing...
I didn’t want to ask Bev again, but I was afraid of how it felt too.
She opened the door and it was her room and I never even noticed us going there. Past ours. Mine.
“I’m gonna try and catch up a bit on my sociology reading. Wanna keep me company?”
I thought that was a great idea, and ran down to our room to get the first bio lab.
And think.
-
I thought. I thought a LOT. I brought over my pillow and laid on Patty's bed (after Bev said everyone did) and held the lab notes like I was reading, and thought.
I was gonna call Mom and Dad that night. And then try to reach Carol.
And maybe Barry, too. Again. Too.
I was gonna talk with Dennis. Before bed.
I was gonna have to talk with Gary, too, I guessed... Or I could just wait and see if Ben was right...
It didn't matter if he wasn't, and I didn't want to mess anything up. I liked Gary, but not like that.
-
I nearly made a noise when the door popped open, but it was Patty and she was all floppy-tired.
“I HATE calculus.” She fell on the bed beside me and cried on my leg and then looked up like it was the worst day of her life. “Did I ever tell you how I feel about calculus?”
“You hate it?”
She shook her head. “I hate brussels sprouts. I hate polka music. I hate... cold showers. Calculus, there must be a bigger word, a... a... billboard! I *LOATHE* IT!”
Bev hardly even looked up at her and didn’t seem to think anything was really wrong, from her one look.
Patty put her head back down on my leg and growled. I was gonna pat her leg or something when she sat back up all of a sudden and smiled at me.
“God, that felt good!” She looked all normal, like nothing was wrong and wasn’t ever mad, or hating, or whatever. And wiped her eyes.
“How’d the quiz go?” Bev still didn’t really look up. Patty made a little bad face.
“I did okay, I think, but it was a real bear...” She picked up her pack and dug out her calc text and a fat notebook and put them on the bed.
“It’s just so... d-darn... frustrating!” She switched from Bev to me. “Are you any good at it? I could *really* use a tutor or something? Just to make it less gobbledy-goop?”
I had to shake my head. I thought it was tougher than any of my other courses and I couldn’t understand half of the stuff so far. And I'd missed a class... and there was a quiz?
“Wanna at least study together? Please?” She really looked unhappy, and she had the same textbook.
“I’m no good at it, really...” I tried to think of something better to say for her.
“At *least* study with me? I can’t stand it, it’s... it’s just so *frustrating*!!” She sat beside me and kinda looked like I was her last hope or something. Bev still just ignored her.
“We’re not in...” I was looking at her book, and her notebook, I guess. We had the same text...
“I know we’re in different sections, but our exams’ll be almost the same, and most of our assignments’ll be out of the book? Pleeeeease??” She looked really sad. Other things, too. Pathetic, helpless.
“Please?” Bev drawled it. “She’s like this three times a week...” She looked at her like she was a huge pain, but funny too.
I looked at the book again.
“Maybe, I guess...”
“”Oh, thank you! Thank you!! You’ve saved my life!! Thank you!!” She draped her arms all over me and made a big silly hug and fake cried.
Bev looked at me like “See?”
-
We really did study.
Like, we started at the first page and went through our notes, and we made it up to about mid-September's work and I think I really did understand it better. It was like we got totally different things and when we put them together, they worked, mostly. Better, anyway.
She knew how to to the functions and stuff, and I kinda got the concepts better, like the purposes or reasons for them.
-
I thought, like if we’d done the studying like this a few weeks before, I’d have understood that...
Patty still liked to kinda explode every so often and make up bizarre curses about Newton and our profs, but even she grinned most of the time.
-
Bev had her head propped up on her hand and was smiling at us.
Patty was writing really fast, popping her pen back and forth from the line she just wrote to the one she was reading and making little happy noises and then humming, and when she finished she popped her pen tip a few times like a beat and smiled up at me really big.
I smiled at her too.
I was practicing braiding her hair in this complicated way Bev showed me that Patty liked and Bev had no patience for. She'd get up and look every so often and correct me or show me how, or when I asked.
And Patty'd look up every so often at Bev and then at me and grin like 'calculus was fun!'
I slapped her head to keep still almost every time because I lost the pattern almost every time, too.
And then Bev would laugh too. Every time. She said she was glad she skipped her afternoon classes, 'cause she learning more, there.
It was great.
-
Dennis got back a little after four and I guess saw the note I’d left on his bed and came and smiled around the door.
Bev smiled and said hi like she wanted to say more, and smiled me the rest, and Patty screamed hi and jumped up and ran and dragged him in to sit on her bed beside me and started telling him about our studying and that I was the *best* study partner ever and he was soooo lucky!
Bev started laughing and sorta pointing at me.
And I turned red.
“Speaking of studying, wanna read some more of that book after supper?”
Dennis kinda changed the subject, since that book wouldn't really *be* studying...
I didn’t care if I turned red. Or if I was bi.
Or if Bev and Patty laughed at us.
It was *good* laughing, and Dennis was smiling at me with his eyes.
----
The End
This is the end of almost the first story I ever wrote. I hope you liked it.