Wilson Mooney, Almost Eighteen (39 page)

The paper was soft and the folds were
flat but worn, like he opened and closed it too many times. My
hands trembled as I walked back to my desk, waiting until I was
sitting to open it. The room was filled. There was someone I knew
at every desk, Cindy, Joanie, Bonnie and Jacky. My heart pounded
fast and loud when Max’s mom came over and told me to take a deep
breath and open the note. Tears were streaming down her face as she
reached to touch my cheek. Her hand was so cold it cooled through
my skin and muscle, all the way down to my bones.

My eyes dropped to the
folded paper in my fingers. I fumbled to open it, taking care not
to rip the fragile worn edges. I brought it to my face pressing it
to my nose, I smelled him. Lavender flooded my senses. I pulled
open the last fold, it was in
his
handwriting. The words bounced and jumped off the
page, breaking apart as the tears landed on his thoughts written on
the lined, creased paper. Mistake, age, student and too young, were
his words that clawed their way into my head before they poisoned
and ripped their way down to my heart. They destroyed every
butterfly that struggled to survive, every last
one—dead.

I looked up to an empty room; I was
alone. I stumbled to leave, clutching the handle on the door when I
saw my mother in the doorway. Her arms outstretched, was it me she
wanted? It couldn’t be me. I turned to look behind me and that’s
when I saw Cindy. She ran past me into my mother’s arms. They clung
to each other, an embrace I had waited my whole life to get from
her. It wasn’t for me.

My eyes sprang open. I was back in my
dorm room with Joanie, still asleep. My heart leapt from my chest
clogging my throat, making it hard to take a deep breath. I knew it
was a dream, it was just hard to swallow the messages it sent to
me. I could justify Cindy in my dream; she and I were on the outs.
I could even see the fear of losing Max; him being my teacher and
me not being eighteen. But my mother; I never saw her
coming.

The only thing that made the first
part of the day half bearable was the thought of seeing him fourth
period and after school. I wondered if my butterflies would be
there, waiting to come back? I had to admit, a small part of me
wondered if he was going to have a substitute today. And if it was
a little gray-haired lady in black I wasn’t stepping foot in his
room.

Cindy didn’t sit with us at first
break. She made it pretty clear she was still mad. I even tried to
make eye contact with her during Humanities, nothing. She was good
at making me feel terrible and guilty. It was lunchtime when I
figured she knew about Max and me and was waiting for the right
moment to destroy us. Joanie and I skipped lunch and went back to
our room. I needed to talk to her before I faced Max. She was my
rock and I needed to be grounded; it was the only place we could
talk in private.

We sat on my bed and she knew exactly
what to say to make me feel okay. I told her my dream and she
reasoned every scary image away with a positive twist. I loved her
for that. I called her my best friend but she was more than that.
She was my mother, my sister, my best friend, and the only family I
truly had. When I get married, she will be the one to give me away
and stand next to me as my maid of honor. She was everything to
me.

We were on our way to Max’s
class when I shoved my hand into my pocket. My cell phone wasn’t
there and I
always
carry my phone with me. It was like leaving my room without
shoes, it just doesn’t happen. I told Joanie that I probably left
it on the bed where we were talking and I’d catch up. I ran back as
fast as I could. I didn’t want to be the last one walking into
government after the bell rang. I wanted to mingle with the crowd
of girls going into his class. It made it easier to get to my desk
without anyone noticing me.

I pushed our dorm room door open as
Cindy pulled. We ran into each other. She didn’t say anything, even
when I tried to apologize for dropping the “F” bomb. She just
stared through me, smirked and kept walking. I spotted my phone on
my bed. It was open. My body flushed a cold sweat from every pore.
Why didn’t I clear all my messages? I spun around the room looking
for evidence of where she was. Maybe she didn’t see my phone. I
snatched it up scrolling through our texts, seeing if our words
were as descriptive as I remembered. I couldn’t believe I had just
given her the biggest weapon that could annihilate everything Max
and I had.

I ran to his class; adrenaline pumped
fast throughout my entire body. I struggled to convince my mind
that she didn’t see it. She had government with me and I wanted to
catch her before she went in. I turned the corner to his classroom
and saw the door slam shut. I cased the room as I peered through
the diamond-wired window. Looking to see if she was slinking her
way to her desk like a shark hunting for a kill. She was laughing
and talking to Jacky when they both looked across the room. I
followed their gestures. There he was, Max. His back was to the
class; he was erasing and rewriting something on his whiteboard. My
knees went weak and I shuffled away from the window. I had to go
in, had to be there to show Cindy that nothing was going on between
Max and me. I grabbed the handle when the second bell rang. I was
late and everyone was going to see me walk in. I wanted to vomit;
get the anxiety to leave my body. I needed to remember what every
day before the weekend was like when I came into his room. I took a
deep breath, swallowed the last bit of regret and pulled the door
open.