Thu, 19 May 2005

Owen: School
There are people who come in and out of our lives who aren’t friends, who we may not even really know, but who do or say something at a time when nothing could be more perfect and fitting and right and then leave us better than before. It could be something as simple as someone letting you into traffic, or giving you change for the phone, or giving up a seat on the bus. They may not even remember it ever happened, once it’s over. For reasons we may not understand, however, it becomes a model for the way we look at ourselves, at each other, an example of how strangers can care about each other in the most fleeting and permanent ways.

Owen was always terrified of the lunchroom. Ever since beginning middle school, seing his friends fall away into castes and cliques he knew no entry for, he constantly felt out of place without anywhere to go. Because his family lived out in the sticks, there was never the aukwardness of having to share a seat on the bus, of being turned away, as there were more than enough seats to keep him safe from the spitters, at least until he had to get off the bus and walk past the windows. During breaks between classes, he found he could walk the hallways, looking determined, drifting from drinking fountain to drinking fountain without being a still target or entering his next class too early. He spent his recess breaks in the library, where no one thought to look for him. For a time, he spent his lunch breaks in there as well, until the librarians informed him they would not let him miss lunch no matter how much studying he said he had to do. Owen thoguh maybe he could just get milk and drink it in one of the empty hallways, or out on the bleachers, but until the bell rang no one was allowed out of the cafeteria. Maybe he could hide in the bathroom down on the annex floor where nobody goes. Maybe he could just go home. But now he was in line, and monitors were watching, and it was too late to do anything but hope for a flu epidemic which would leave large blocks of valuable cafeteria real estate open. Owen remembers there was a casserole in the menu. They were out of chocolate milk. There was no place open to sit at all, unless someone was saving you a seat. Owen wandered up and down the tables, looking for the most inncouous place to hide himself, starting to sweat under his arms and down his back, turnign red in the face, feeling everyone stare, when he heard a voice say “Why don’t you sit here?”.

That was how Owen met Sarah Mossiman. He thought about inviting her to his birthday party, which was still two months away, but felt all shy and knotted up inside and thought it best to wait. He was certain there was plenty of time. Owen tries hard not to think about it now, but sometimes there’s no getting away.
(12:10.05.19.2005) [/alpha/owenrissa] #