Suppose Junior High could have been even worse? I'd have probably died.
It was about the third week into grade seven that Grant started talking to me. At first I refused to answer back, but he talked so much, he didn't notice.
Then I started to nod and shake my head. Then I would talk to him, little by little.
He sometimes would ask me to come with him to lunch. I didn't mind, but I avoided talking to any of his other friends.
"This is Ben, he's a little shy, don't mind it though, I get to talk more is all."
"Hi Ben."
"He says Hi back I'm sure, so.."
Grant had a funny way of talking for himself, and me. He never asked what I wanted to say, but found the words for it. Like when I looked at him around new people, that meant hello, or if we had already said hello, it meant I wanted to leave.
He was my first friend, so naturally I figured he was probably the best I would ever have.
Grant and I drifted apart as the year went on, I just got sick of his noise, and he got sick of my silence. I returned to reading and drawing during the day.
When I returned home I did the usual chores, then locking myself in my room until my mother called supper.
My mother always called what I did "growing up", I sort of called it hiding. Sometimes I would plug my bedside lamp into an outlet, then put it under my bed and crawl under to read and draw for hours I couldn't remember to count.
Grade eight was somewhat the same, only more people seemed interested in who I was, since all I ever did was hide. Even my hair fell over my face. I remember one girl, who I didn't mind talking with. Well her talking to me.
Her name was Anna.
"You're Benjamin right? You don't have to answer, I already know. I kind of understand too, if you don't say anything no one will judge you right?"
I stayed quiet.
"But, it's not true, everyone calls you mime, did you know that?"
Of course I did, everyone called me it to my face.
"I don't think you're a mime, you are kind of pale, but I know you can talk. I heard you. Last year in math class, you said something to Grant didn'tcha?"
Her odd way of putting everything made me happy, and I sometimes found myself sitting beside her, and looking for her at lunch.
"Say Benjamin, why don't you ever talk to me? You talked to Grant right? He brags about it all the time. Says you told him the answer to the math problem. Did I do something wrong?"
I shook my head, then leaned into her ear.
"Don't brag about this, but I just don't like to talk, it has nothing to do with you or anyone."
That was the first real sentence I had said to someone in a long time. Maybe since school ever started. If my parents asked me how my day was, I said "Good," then disappeared. I never really went into detail, and that was supposed to be independent. As my mother called it.
I guess I was, but the truth was I always wanted my mom to help, I wanted her to pester me with questions, to ask if I needed this, or that. She never did, she seemed too busy all the time.
Anna told me, that he mom was like that too, but was never too busy for her own child.
It was only my younger brother and I living with our parents now. I hated him. He was a cry baby. Always had been.
I really wished Anna had lived close to me so I could run to her house, and we could walk around like at school. Anna was the only person I had full conversations with.
They were small, but they were bigger than anything I'd have with anyone else.
"So Benjamin, you never told me which way you like your name to be said, Like, Benny, or Ben, or just plain Benjamin?"
"Benjamin is fine, you can call me either of those. My mom calls me Benny, it kid of sounds weird coming from someone else though, but I wouldn't really care if it was you."
"You are a really good person to me Benjamin, I'm glad I met you."
"I'm glad I met you too Anna."
Anna didn't come to school for the next two weeks. They later announced to my class that she had passed away from a long battle with cancer.
I ran out of the class when I heard the words. I didn't want to hear them.
I could feel my eyes burning, and I torn away from anyone who grabbed my arms. I kept running, I had no where to run, but I kept going.
Why? My head asked.
Why? My heart asked.
Why? Why? Why? Why her?
Why didn't she tell me? I was supposed to be her friend. At least I thought I was.
I didn't go home for three days. I didn't go to school either. When I passed a house with a radio on, I could hear it calling out the alert for a missing person that was myself.
Even I didn't know where I was anymore, or who I was.
I cried a lot those three days. I talked to myself, and I talked to the sky. I talked and talked, because all I wanted to do with Anna was talk.
And I had always wanted to tell her that I loved her.
When I finally returned home, no one noticed. I went and had a shower, then went to bed.
The next morning I woke up to my mother screaming and crying that she was glad I was ok, that she had heard about Anna and was sorry.
She wasn't mad. Just scared.
And for once, I wasn't her big little independent son. I was her little baby boy, and I finally got to see why my younger brother chose to cry so much.
Everything really does feel better when your mother hugs you. |
Submission Name: Locked Heart [Part three]
