Here in this Sorrow

Annie Stenta

With his awful skin condition, Warren Boyd looks like a creature out of some kind of zombie movie, like the ones my dad watches late at night. I really don’t like talking to him, because I can’t find a single redeeming feature about him. If he was just gross-looking, I could get past that, because looks aren’t really important, but he is mean and dumb too. I try to be polite to him, because if you don’t have anything nice to say, you shouldn’t say anything at all, but it’s hard at times. I try to get him to understand that I don’t care about him going into the Marines. My brother was killed by friendly-fire during in Iraq, so I’m not exactly fond of the military. I tried to explain this to Warren, but he congratulated me. Thanks a lot, congratulations for a seven-year-old kid that lost her most important person in the entire world. I had to walk away from him, or I would have started crying.

He also loves to tell me about the cruel things he does to everyone. It’s disgusting! Am I supposed to be impressed that him and Ben Tramer put someone’s head in a toilet? Do I come off as someone that would enjoy hearing about that? If so, I need to seriously re-evaluate myself. One time, I asked him what he would feel like if someone was throwing spit-wads at him, and he said he would smear their face in the ground. Chrissy Tanden is friends with him, and told me he has it pretty hard at home, but come on! Why does that make it okay to beat the hell out of Christian Duke?

He is so insecure about his skin condition too. One time, I asked him about it, and he got really upset. He said he needed some kind of special treatment, and his family had no insurance, so they couldn’t afford it. I told him that it’s what’s inside that counts. I meant that he was a horrible person, and it doesn’t matter what he looks like, but he thought it meant I want to sleep with him. Personally, I couldn’t think of anything more horrible.

When I come into the upstairs hallway, John Parker is sitting half-way down the hall against his locker. I went out with John once, right after I broke up with Brian Mier in the fall. John and I didn’t exactly mesh, so we only went out on one date. John wanted things to happen way too fast. I mean, I’ve known John since we started school, but he thought I would sleep with him on the very first date. Brian and I were together almost a year before I slept with him, and he was the only guy I’ve ever been with. I was pretty upset when I found out John had already rented a motel room and bought condoms, but I let it pass. He’s such a sweet guy, and I didn’t want to ruin our friendship.

John is really excited to see me, and gives me a big hug. I haven’t really talked to him much in a couple weeks. He tells me he doesn’t have any classes this period, and follows me down to my locker. Very few of the lockers in this hall are occupied, so there aren’t many people up here. John asks me if I’m seeing anyone, and since I don’t really want him to ask me out again, I tell him I am. He seems disappointed, and excuses himself quickly.

It’s not like it’s a total lie. Last night, I met this great guy at the diner down the street, this junior kid named Stephen Joyce, who I had never met before. I mean, I knew who he was, I had heard his name before, over the loudspeaker, and from other people, or whatever. I always thought he was just a dumb stoner kid, one of the kids who stand at the edge of the school property smoking cigarettes at the beginning of the day.

Last night, I was in the diner, trying to struggle my way through Hamlet, which we are reading in my AP English class. I’m having the hardest time understanding the language. I’ve been reading Shakespeare since I started high school, and the Old English might as well be Greek for me.

Stephen Joyce walked in and just sat down with me. “That is my favorite play in the world,” he told me, and introduced himself. I was shocked! A junior who not only read Hamlet, but loved it? We started talking about it, and it just went from there. He is a pothead, which I don’t understand, aren’t they supposed to all be dumb?

My Calculus class is on the bottom floor of the school, so I go back down. Hopefully, Warren Boyd won’t still be wandering around down there. Calculus is so frustrating, because it’s my only non-AP class, and it’s the only class I’m failing. I don’t know what to do, because I need this class to graduate, and I don’t know if I’ll be able to recover this late in the year. Last I heard, Cornell didn’t accept failures.

Maybe it’s something else that Stephen Joyce knows. Not only does he love Shakespeare, and Lord Byron, he’s some kind of chemistry genius. Where was he last year, when I needed him?
I go to Calculus and struggle through the class. It’s such a joke. I promise Mr. Jefferies that I’ll be in after school for help, even thought it will probably do me about as much good as it did any of the other times I stayed after. I go back up to my locker to get my English notebook, and my copy of Hamlet.

Stephen made this play come alive for me. I felt like I was there when he read some of these passages to me. I had never felt that way about any piece of literature before, no matter how much I enjoyed it. Even when we read Inherit the Wind, which was my favorite thing I ever read in school, I didn’t feel like I did last night. I want to ask Stephen to come study with me again. He had mentioned going to that party after the game on Thursday. I didn’t want to go, but maybe I will now.

When I got to Mrs. Tremier’s class, Jenny Haggerdy is still in my seat. She looks like she’s been crying.

Go to Jenny Haggerdy