There was this girl in my class way back in the days, I remember her
like I just saw her yesterday. She was one of the..quiet ones, as the rest would like to call her. She
was not particularly pretty, just an average looking teen trying to fit into
the crowd.
How did I know she was trying to fit in? For one thing, the way she
spoke around people. She was being
terribly cautious that it was misunderstood that she was being reserved or even
shy. She was in this group in class, the brainiacs , I would classify them as.
They seem to mind nothing but their books even though we had no tests or
assignments due. They fought the teachers regularly for extra marks if they were
unsatisfactory with the ones they were given during a test or a quiz. But she
never did any of those things.
No, she was quiet, as she was depicted. She was with the group but I
am not sure if she ever felt like she belonged in that group. She was unlike
the rest, I could tell because while the rest were arguing for extra marks she
merely sat in her seat, quietly reviewing her mistakes and then would
occasionally look up at her friends and sometimes she would shake her head at
them and then continue to review her mistakes. I can tell she was satisfied
with the scores she got most of the time. It was written all over her face. It
showed contentment mostly, and if she broke into a grin it would simply mean
that she did better than expected.
Compared to her group of friends, she was rather average, though she
could very well beat half of them if she had put in the effort. She was a smart
kid or else she wouldn’t even have been in our class. I asked her before, once
I don’t remember when, how she studied and she said she didn’t and merely waved
it off as she was just lucky to be sitting here. I peeked at her report card
once in sophomore year, you don’t get grades like those based on luck. She was
smart, but she didn’t want to draw any attention to herself.
I had my own group of friends but our groups crossed paths pretty
often while hanging out. Our town isn’t very big and there were only that many
hang out spots back in the day. Surprisingly those brainiacs know how to hang
out and let loose once in a while. They can laugh and joke, who knew? We didn’t
talk to them much, they seemed rather inapproachable since, you know, eyes
glued to the book and all. But she was different. In class she would stare up
at the board in front and day dream, with or without the teacher in front. She
got called pretty often by our Math teacher since she almost always day dreamed
in his class and he also almost always caught her day dreaming. She got called
into the staff office once because she screwed up her homework pretty badly.
It was Algebra, I remember asking during lunch when she finally
returned to class with her book in hand. Her face was unreadable. She quietly
slipped into class while everybody was happy about the break and took her seat.
Being seated a few seats a way, I crossed the room and took the seat in front of
her and turned to face her. She was rather surprised but was poker facing as
usual. She had a very good poker face, practically unreadable if she wanted it
to be that way. I asked what did he want with her and she showed me her book.
Red marks were abundant, needless to say. I scanned her book quickly and
returned it to her. She slid it into her bag and sighed.
She said it wasn’t that she didn’t get what went on during that
class, it was that her concept was wrong from the beginning. We also studied
Algebra the year before and she had misunderstood completely what the teacher
was trying to say and so the wrong concept had been embedded into her brain and
so she got the whole exercise wrong and was called to the office for some
one-on-one tutoring session. She said itso animatedly and with so much horror
in her face I burst laughing. I apologised afterwards but she said it was ok.
It’s been a while since she made anybody laughed she said. I felt sorry for
her. It was pretty obvious that she was the quiet one in the group, one of the
members even called her Miss Invisible, which irked me to no end.
How could you call your friend a name like Miss Invisible? You’d
make her feel bad, as if she didn’t already feel bad enough that you guys were
having most of the fun and did most of the talking while she just sat and
listen like a dumb block of wood. I saw her twitch once when her friends
hollered at her from a distance. It made my blood boil a bit because it was
degrading to call a person that. I wanted to punch him for her because clearly
she did not like that name one bit but was too reserved to say or do anything
about it.
During one of the holidays I bumped into her after having dinner. We
both ate in the same shop but we never saw each other in the bustling little
shop. We were both with our family but I decided to ask if it were ok if the
two of us hang out for a while and our parents agreed. She seemed happy about
the idea of us hanging out, mainly because none of her friends had scheduled
any meet-ups at all and it was three weeks into our three month long summer
break. I asked her what had she been up to since break started and she told me
a repetitive cycle of eat, computer, book, jogging and sleep.
“Wow you guys are boring..”
“Well, not my fault they’re boring…” she said and shrugged and left
me rather surprised. I never knew she could speak in such a tone of voice. A
tone that suggested that she was sick and tired of her so called friends but
had decided to just bear with them since we only had a year left till we
graduated.
That night was the turning point for her. We started hanging out
more during that summer break, turned out that her circle of friends didn’t
meet-up at all. She said it was ok since it was like that every summer. They’d
go off to some place on their own and she was an oversight. I felt sorry for
her but she told me to stop because she didn’t want or needed my sympathy. I
can still remember her eyes. They were filled with numbness because she was so
used to it she didn’t feel a thing. All she wanted to do was to graduate and
leave their sorry butts.
I also invited to her to come hang out with us. At first my group
were a little bit hesitant since they didn’t know her that well. Heck, I didn’t
know her that well but we agreed anyway. She hung out with us a couple of times
and got the hang of it pretty quick. The rest also started to talk more with
her and for once, I saw that her smiles actually reached her eyes. That summer
was the first time I’ve seen her throw her head back guffawing. It was
refreshing, in a way. The rest of the group agreed that she’s pretty fun to
hang around with. She cracked us up with her jokes, laughed till she cried and
was so lively, completely opposite from the girl we always saw in class.
That summer, for her, was the best. That was what she told us. It was
the first time since she stopped going to summer camp that summer was fun! She said
her parents commented on her new found cheerfulness and were very grateful to
the eight of us for helping her. Her parents even treated us to pizza a week
before the school reopened. They were nice folks. They owned the spectacle shop
half of us went to get our glasses at. Who knew? They said if they’ll give us a
nice discount for our subsequent pairs. That was really nice of them. They said
it was the least they could do for helping their daughter find her smile and
laughter again. Apparently she hasn’t been smiling or laughing much the past
couple of years. I noticed, but I think the other seven didn’t. Couldn’t really
blame them though, she wasn’t exactly the most noticeable person in class.
Before the summer was over, we made a pack to continue being a
group. We were a pretty big group, there were nine of us if we include her. She
was hesitant at first, giving reasons like she wasn’t sure how we were like in
school. Summer was a time to let loose and forget about school but in class, it
was different. People changed, even the most laid back will become intensely
serious. We understood and I assured her that we were different. We were a
group that studied hard and played hard. It took a while to convince her but
she agreed in the end, a few days before we returned for our senior year.
First day of senior year, the sad part was, her old group didn’t
even notice that she wasn’t sitting near them anymore. She was with us toward
the right side of the class. We made a bet on when they’d notice and all of us
lost. By the time they noticed, it was already almost half the semester. All our
bets were roughly within the first week of classes. She was a bit hurt at first
but then, it happened, confrontation. It was the softest confrontations I have
ever seen, volume wise.
It happened during lunch. She kept her voice in control, soft and
calm as usual. One of them came up to us and asked why wasn’t she with them
anymore and pretty soon, the rest came to back that person up. Slowly she stood
up and it began. She calmly told them that she was done with them constantly
taking her for granted and making her feel left out almost all the time. She was
tired of them not caring what she had to say. When we felt she needed some
backing up, we stood and backed her up. It was more intimidating that it seems,
having eight people backing somebody up and all eight were glaring. She finished
it off rather humorously, if memory served.
“So, why don’t you guys make like a tree and leaf.”
It was a classic pun. The group nodded and left. One of them turned
around and apologised and hoped that they’ll still be friends or something. She
nodded in acknowledgement before she took her seat and resumed eating. We congratulated
her on a job well done and she gave us a gracious smile, with some hints of
tears in her eyes but she sucked it up. That there, was one brave and strong
person.
The year passed in a blink, ok maybe a few blinks. Ok, maybe in a
whole lot of blinks. In no time at all we were all cramming for our college
entrance exams. We gathered at my place since I had a relatively big dining
hall with one of them long rectangular dining tables for twelve seaters. For about
two or three months we were there, with our books scattered all across the
table. My dad even loaned us one of his portable whiteboards, the ones you can
find in school, for us to have an easier time discussing topics.
One of us was actually the first in class, having stayed on top for
so many semesters we all lost count. She was really proud that none of the
brainiacs managed to beat her scores after finding out what they did to our new
friend. So she used the board most of the time, taught us how to solve
questions, drew mind maps for us to help us remember things easier. Studying in
a group was really fun, our new friend admitted. Before this she had always
studied alone. None of the brainiacs had initiated a group study and she told
us all of them studied separately as well, each too stingy to share any info
that they had. Jerks, we all agreed.
During our study sessions she was really helpful, too. She had her
own tricks of remembering facts and wasn’t afraid to share it with us. We had
an unwritten agreement that we were all working towards the same goal which was
getting good grades to enter the college of our choice. So why not help each
other to achieve that same goal? The results
were more than satisfactory.
After every paper we wore bright smiles and were happily discussing
that we were spot on in guessing which topics would be tested and laughed out
loud when we agreed that thank goodness one of us made a joke about those few
important facts and we could recall the jokes easily, helping us write better
in our paper. The brainiacs constantly looks constipated with their serious
looks on their faces. Brows furrowed and lips pursed. It was not a pretty sight
and she was glad to not be one of them, fretting and worrying about what had
happened and what was coming up next.
We aced our exams. All of us got into the colleges and/or
universities of our choice. That would also mean separation. On the last day
before everybody had to leave we had a party. A farewell party, no alcohol involved
of course. We agreed that it would not be smart to hung over the next day and
miss our respective flights or trains. You’d think that in a group as big as
ours, at least two would be going to the same place. No, all of us were headed
to different parts of the world. Some stayed back in the country, but went to
different states while others flew out to the continents. We purposely booked
our tickets on the same day so that we would not have to go through so many
potentially tearful goodbyes. We sent those who went by trains first then the
rest of us parted in the airport.
Goodbyes were never easy; she cried the most out of us. We understood.
She probably went through her whole schooling life wanting to belong and she
did with us but the time we spent together was short. She gave us each a bone
crushing hug and each kisses on the cheek and of course, the mandatory group
hug. And slowly, one by one we boarded our flights and left.
We kept in contact over our years in uni and tried to meet up
whenever we had overlapping breaks. Our mission to keep in touch throughout uni
life was a huge success. We met up once every few months and during the four
Christmas we had as Uni students, we went on trips to anywhere in the world,
usually to somewhere warmer than our freezing winter.
The last time I saw her would be a few weeks ago I think? She moved
back to our hometown and I bumped into her in the store. She was with her
husband. Actually I saw her husband first, wondering the aisles frantically
looking for his wife. I helped him search and we found her walking aimlessly
with a box of raisins in her hand. It was her favourite snack. When she saw me
her face lit up and she greeted me cheerfully.
“Hey!! I haven’t seen you in the longest time!” and she gave me a
hug while her husband went to return the box of raisin to its respected shelf
somewhere in the store.
“Yea, how you’ve been?”
“I’m great! Are you excited for your wedding? I bet you are! Weddings
are exciting and fun but also nervous at the same time.” She allowed herself a
little chuckle before she continued “what are you doing out here?
Shouldn’t you
be preparing for it? Isn’t it later in a few hours?”
“Yea, don’t worry about it. I have time.”
“Really? That’s great.”
She was about to continue when her husband came and said they had
better go.
“Oh right. I’ll see you at the wedding later ok?” she beamed at me
and I smiled back at her as I saw her
retreating figure.
I choked back a sob as I hurriedly made my way back to my car where
my son was waiting for me.
“Mom, I thought you wanted to buy something?”
“Oh, I don’t think I need it now.”
“You sure? Do you want me to go back in and get them for you?”
“No, it’s fine dear. Let’s go home.”
“Ok…wait..mom are you crying?”
“I saw an old friend in there. I guess I got a bit sentimental.”
“Aw” he gave me a hug and showed me to the passenger seat. He kissed
my temple before closing the door and jogged to the driver’s seat and drove us
home.
There was no wedding later. My wedding was well over 20 years ago. She
met an accident years ago and she cannot remember anything for more than a few
hours at best. But the only thing she remembers as clear as day was that summer
and our senior year in high school.
END.
Author's note: so what you guys think?
