Detention 9

Typically I hated going to school, but after spending time with Chris for the majority of the weekend, I was actually excited about seeing his face in class. I had fallen asleep smiling Sunday night, and had woke up smiling Monday morning. My happiness almost disturbed me. I wasn’t used to be happy for more than one day--more than one hour actually. But I felt relaxed and anxious all at once; relaxed because for once things were going smoothly, with no excessive complications, and anxious because I couldn’t wait to see Chris again. I couldn’t believe I was so excited to see him. I had just seen him the day before, and the day before that, and the day before--but it seemed like everytime I saw him I was seeing him for the first time. Ironically, Chris was the first, and currently only boy who had maintained my interest for such a long period of time (and three weeks is long for me) and I believed that Chris felt the same way about me. I hoped he felt the same way about me. 

The bus ride to school was quiet and boring for the first ten minutes or so. I was sitting in the very back row of the bus, looking out the window, when I heard a boy call my name. At first I figured that he was talking to someone else, because obviously I wasn’t the only person named Brandon in the world, and also because I really don’t know too many people--who knew my name. So I ignored it, and then the guy said, “Hey, Brandon.” I turned and so Scott Howard making his way toward the rear of the bus with me. Looking at Scott, it was really difficult to believe that he was only a fifteen-year-old freshman. He had such incredible, mature good-looks, and such a self-assuredness about him that made him seem at least five years older. Scott sat across from me on the bus. He was smiling a whole lot. I had really never talked to Scott Howard at all in life, so I really felt uneasy sitting across from him, just looking at him without saying anything. 

“Hey,” I said.

Scott kept smiling. He had a really nice smile, but I wanted to know what he was thinking. “So what did you do this weekend?” he asked. 

Obviously Scott had talked to Chris and Chris had told him what had gone down over the weekend. “Just kinda hung around,” I told him.

Raising an eyebrow, Scott asked, “That all you do? What happened with you and Chris when me and Billy and me left Friday night?” There wasn’t that many people on the bus, especially in the back, so I think Scott that it was alright if he talked really loud, so that the few people who were on the bus could hear everything he said. 

“Same thing we always do,” I said. 

“Which is...?” Scott persisted.

“You know what I’m talkin about Scott. Don’t play dumb.”

Scott shrugged. “That dude...what’s his name...Jason? He looked extra pissed off when you told us to get outta your house and Chris stayed.”

“It was just too many people and too much going on,” I said. “I just really wanted to be alone.”

“With Chris,” Scott stated. 

“Yeah.”

The smile on Scott’s face faded away. He turned his head to the side so that I only saw the profile of his face. I was ‘almost’ amazed at how beautiful his face looked when it was turned to the side. There was a few moments of silence between us. The bus stopped at a traffic signal. Looking down the narrow bus aisle, I saw a small Mexican girl staring at me with large dark eyes. For some reason her eyes reminded me of Chris’: the kind of eyes that can see right through a person, directly into their mind. The little girl was staring at me like she knew me without ever seeing me before. Finally she turned back around in her seat and began saying something to her mother in whispered Spanish. The bus moved forward, and Scott said to me, suddenly, out of nowhere, “He really likes you.” He turned his face back toward my direction. His eyes were really light-colored and piercing. 

“Huh?” I asked, confused. 

“Chris. He really likes you.”

My heart skipped. I looked at Scott in disbelief. “How do you know?”

Scott shrugged. “I dunno. I just do.” That pensive expression returned to his face, as though he were thinking about something really deep and complex. I just looked at him without saying anything for a while. And then after a few minutes, a question came to my mind.

Scott gazed at me like I was crazy. “No. What made you think that?”

“I don’t know...do you have a boyfriend?”

“No,” Scott said firmly. “Had one once and then that shit got fucked up. So I said never again.”

“Why? What happened?”

“I liked him more than he liked me.” Scott shrugged. “When I was fourteen. I was stupid back then,” he said. “I thought that if you really liked somebody, then they would like you back the same way. It really didn’t make sense to me back then that someone could like you one day and then all of a sudden not like you the next and move on to someone else just like it meant nothing. I thought if you liked somebody it would just go on forever, but...guess not. So I don’t even bother with the idea of being in a relationship.” 

Forever. I hated the concept of that word. Nothing lasts forever, does it? Even when you really try hard at making something work out, at the end it just fades away doesn’t it? You can’t really love someone forever can you? I wondered if I could love Chris forever. I was still getting used to the idea of admitting to myself that I loved Chris. But I didn’t know how long I would feel that way, or how long he would feel that way about me--hopefully it would be a really long time. But I don’t know. 

Scott and I got off the bus together and made our way toward the school. As we were walking, I told him, “You don’t gotta walk with me if you don’t want to. I don’t want to embarrass you in front of your friends or somethin.”

“Why would I care if somebody sees you walking with me?” Scott asked. 

“I don’t know. People might be like ‘Why were you walkin with that gay dude’ or somethin stupid like that.”

“I thought you didn’t care what people thought of you,” Scott said.

“I don’t. But you might.”

“No, I don’t,” Scott said. And then Scott said something that really surprised me. He said, “Brandon, people don’t see you the way you think they see you.”

“What do you mean by that?”

“More people like you than they would like to admit. A lotta dudes at this school--especially just a lot of ‘jocks’ or whatever you wanna call `em would love to get at you. They’re just too afraid. Chris was just the only one that had enough balls to go for you.”

All of that sounded unbelievable and unrealistic to me. “Scott, I don’t believe you.”

We made our way inside the school gates where there was a lot of students hanging around. “You don’t have to believe it if you don’t want to, Brandon. But it’s true.” Scott started to walk off in the direction of his friends. “I’ll talk to you later,” he said. 

As I went into the school building, making my way down the ultra crowded hallway to my locker, I saw Jason walking in my direction. I got super nervous and tried to look at everybody except for him as he passed by. I wasn’t sure if he saw me or not. I hope he didn’t. 

Chris was already in his desk when I entered Algebra class. He turned and looked at me as I walked through into the classroom. His lips were closed gently, and his face showed no general emotion, but I could tell by his eyes, the way that he looked at me, that he was happy to see me. I sat a couple of seats away from him, close enough, but not too close. I didn’t wanna be the type that clings on to someone like a leech; I wanted to at least pretend that I wasn’t jumping out of my skin with excitement when looking at Chris. Occasionally, throughout the class period, Chris would turn around and look at me with that same placid expression on his handsome face, and that same look of thinly disguised desire in his eyes. Every time he looked at me, my heart beat skipped. I was becoming more captivated by this boy by the second. It was almost frightening.