1) Mirage

Part One
It's tough to start things. It always is. The most important part is just jumping right in. Some arbitrary beginning position. So I'll give it a try.

As far back into the past as I can reach in my memory, I can't find any girls early on that I was friends with, or even cared about. Near the beginning of it though, it started with a dream.

Dream

She was someone. Just a someone really. Someone that I found a connection with. it was a simple desire, really. To find a completeness in togetherness.

I dreamt about her a very long time ago, very early in my conscious memory. This places it at pre-third grade. That's eons ago. The important thing about this dream was that it was so very vivid. In elementary school, I didn't really remember many dreams, but I remembered this one for some reason.

I'm on a gigantic sailing ship. I'm little, around 7, 8 or 9 (which I was). For some reason, I am hanging out on the side of the ship, and there is a lengthy rail separating me from the ocean. Inside of the rail, for some reason there are vending machines. This was dreamt at a time when I was not very familiar with vending machines, and they were still a fantastic thing. I must have been sent to the vending machines with some money from my parents.

While at these vending machines, SHE shows up. Or perhaps she was already there. Shortish curly brown hair, wearing what could possibly be red horizontal stripes. And that's all. There was no conversation really, just the essence of her presence, and that was definitely the most striking thing about the dream. It was a dream about the girl being there. Just being there, in this isolated place with me.

While I never had any real female friends (who can blame me... I was like 9 years old, remember?), and I don't even think I _wanted_ to play with girls, I found myself hoping and hoping to have this dream again.

In time, I did. But I think it took a while. The dream showed up again slightly modified at a couple stages in my development, but the theme remained: a comfortable female presence in an isolated location.

She was just a someone, really. It could be anyone. Anywhere.

Kristina

In third grade I think I reached my peak, as far as creativity was concerned.
I was still as much of a wuss as I am right now, which is to say: total.

Third grade was when me and my friend Brett really got into Paper Games. Paper games were like videogames, except for one important fact: they were on paper. Usually, each game would comprise of one person controlling the universe and drawing whatever two dimensional scenery/layout was necessary for the game to work. The player(s) would then tell that person what exactly they would be doing. Of course, this ended up making all of the games turned based, even if a lot of the time they were drawn up to look like a Mario game or some such thing.

A lot of these paper games were all design and no payoff. I would draw notebooks and notebooks full of levels only to find out that playing the game the way we played it was not possible. Along with the similar 'Talk Games' we played during recess, these games actually allowed a great deal of creative improvisation. That's because, even if you designed the game, a lot of the time it was just more fun to take it in a different direction altogether. (For example, in 'Army Game', when my friend went through a mysterious door, I decided it would be a good idea for him to visit the game show American Gladiators for a little while, in the middle of his raid on a small town). As one might suspect, it was also difficult to remain consistent.

This was especially true of my most popular paper game, titled 'Gopher Game'. Gopher game worked like this: I would draw a sideways 2-d landscape of a farm and a tree and some vegetables sticking out of the ground. Next, everybody playing would be represented by their initial, because I had no idea how to draw a gopher. I still don't think I could draw a gopher. People would then take turns saying what their gopher would do (He could dig, and above ground he could jump and stuff, and maybe eat vegetables or something). I probably had different things for him to do at any given time, because I made it up as I went along.

At the height of the game, I had upwards of like eight people playing at a time. And boy did it feel good, I tell you.

What also felt good was that Kristina was playing too.

At some point early in the 3rd grade school year I ended up sitting next to her, right on the edge of the classroom. I am sure I was sitting there from at least Halloween through the Christmas party when I felt sick and thought I got lead poisoning from my pencil. If you remember your grade school years appropriately, you'll know how much longer this period of time might have been.

We took a liking to each other immediately, or so I think. Before no time, she was giggling and I was BS-ing about God knows what. I think at one time I was describing how I had been stung by a stingray once, and she was pretty much calling my bluff. And she would also give me a giggle when I would 'unexpectedly' find that my sandwich had no meat in it, or that the meat had no bread around it. Why, it was all worth it -lunch or not- to hear that giggle, and have her call me silly or stupid. It didn't help that Mr. Daniels started inspecting my lunch to see whether or not I had an eating disorder, what with not eating my defective lunch much and all.

Also, I had a pink eraser, and one of us put a smiley face on it, and she called him 'Buddy'. Buddy the eraser. She would introduce him in such an amusing way. Buddy went through a lot, but I think I had him all through grade school. He occupied that holiest of locations in the grade school desk in the left corner near the front (or maybe it was the right). Buddy was a perfect encapsulation of our playful relationship that year, I think. We would both take him out sometimes and have him jump around, or maybe just sit on the crack between our desks, watching us.

I got a neat little notebook soon enough: One of those tiny memo pads that can almost fit in your pocket. I set to work labeling the first page: "Charlie's TOP SECRET NOTEBOOK". Oh yes, the untold treasures I planned to put in there. But when it came to fill the sucker up, I couldn't seem to think of anything but the girl right next to me. She told me that her last name had two 't's, which was unusual, because who would think to spell it that way? Well, now that I knew how to spell it, it was time to put it in there.

"I think I have a crush on Kristina..." I wrote in nice neat handwriting.

I don't even think I knew what a crush was (did anybody?) but I wrote it anyway because that's what it felt like. She was a girl, and she was sitting next to me, and she was friendly. I think that's about the biggest reason I reached such a conclusion.

"Geography," my older brother would tell me six years later, "is the only reason people get together." It was bitter advice, but I found it explains a great deal more than it should.

Soon enough, the expected happened.
Some girl came up to my desk one day, holding my top secret memo pad in her hand, and asked "Is this yours?". I didn't think so at first, but sure enough, the blasted thing WAS mine. I must have dropped it in the coatroom when I was digging in my backpack...

Suddenly, I could see across the room, and there was something happening. Oh yes, I could SEE the gossip taking place right before me.

When the accusations came from classmates, I denied all of them. NO. NO. NO WAY. I do NOT have a crush on her. Not at all. I didn't write that. Half crying, I said it was all a lie, that someone else wrote it.
(Then how'd they know how to spell my name? Kristina might have asked)

I think the fallout lasted a long time. I'm pretty darned sure it was a long time. But Kristina and I were still friends, kind of. School friends. As much friends as we had been. She didn't really seem mad at me when she found out about the notebook, or even when I denied the contents.
Soon enough, the TOP SECRET NOTEBOOK went straight into the trash. So much for a diary.

When her desk moved away, I think, is when I REALLY got a crush on her. Or maybe it happened more gradually, over the years. I saw her sometimes in 4th grade, but she wasn't in my class. We got caught playing an aggressive game of Footsie in Mr. Reeve's class, and that creepy one-armed Vietnam vet made a joke at our expense.
She also must have pushed me on the tire swing a couple times as well, the old 'goosebump' routine, where the tire goes up and down like a boat on a whirlwind sea. It almost made me vomit.
In sixth grade, we once again shared a classroom, and I think I liked her more than ever. Not that I knew her. We never met outside of school, which is silly because I had such fun with her.

She was sitting next to my friend Brett in 6th grade, way up in the front row. Sure, I must have been jealous. But I was too busy playing paper games and talk games with Brett and the gang to need the jealousy. That spring me and Brett developed possibly our finest gradeschool achievement: Chicken Game. Actually, we must have invented it in 4th grade, but it REALLY took off in 6th grade. The game was a tag variation that involved a fox and some chickens (not real ones, but as roles), and the rest of it was actually playground specific. But it was bloody fun, and more and more people started to play, until we almost had the whole class playing.

At some point in the spring of 6th grade (note that this was also the last grade of elementary school for us, meaning we were really at the top of the chain, a great feeling), Kristina and I were both chosen to host the big read-athon prize enticement ceremony. Basically, we two would stand in front of a big pile of toys and prizes that kids could win through reading sponsorship. With a microphone and everything -in front of the entire school- we had to talk about all the fantastic prizes and how easy it was to win them. It was an interesting and surreal experience, for sure. Left alone in the auditorium with all of the prizes and the lights turned off, we chased after each other and played tag and roughhoused.
Kid stuff.
And yet I couldn't help but have an eerie feeling, altogether much like what I felt in my dream... Isolated, but with someone I admire.

Did we bond during this experience? Did we find that we could not stand being without each other?
Not really. It was kind of fun. But I think there was no way I could admit to liking her, even though my desire was boiling up in such a way as to inhibit my everyday activities. It would have ruined the moment, though, that wonderful feeling alone together would change if I broke it. And even after all this time, I have no idea how she might have felt.

Finally, the time came for graduation from good old Tuttle Elementary School. Go Tigers.
I was introduced to that horrible of most horrible nerve-wracking things: the yearbook.

I did not get Kristina to sign my yearbook until the very last chance. It was at a reception, and I really overcame a difficult inner obstacle. I got up, and I crossed the entire lunch room, and I entered the table full of girls, and I asked her if she could sign my book. She said "sure", and we looked for a place to do that.

At this point I spilled my orange drink all over the floor and some on my yearbook, because I was exploding with nervous energy. I really wanted to spill it all -my feelings, that is- but how could I? There was no chance. Once everything was signed, we said our goodbyes (Which was probably just 'goodbye'), and I left with my parents.

I was interrupted on my way out by Vanessa, who was getting a picture taken with Mr. Peterson, the 6th grade teacher. "Wait, Charlie," she said.
She caught up to me in the stairwell. Vanessa was the first girl in the class to have a bra, and as such was regarded as a slut by many, but I found her to be nice enough, and I sat with her and helped her sometimes that year. Well, in that stairwell on the last day of school, having just awkwardly said goodbye to Kristina, my parents watching, Vanessa ran up to me and gave me a big sexy hug. "Thanks," and maybe "Goodbye" she said. I was so surprised I barely had time to say the same to her as she went back in to finish her engagements.

Replenished with this wholly unexpected display of affection, I could momentarily forget the prospect of leaving grade school, and all of my classmates, indefinitely.

Jr. High

I remember the first day of Junior High. It was early, the earliest I had yet woken to go to school. I was also walking in an unfamiliar direction from my house.

About a block from the assigned bus stop, a figure was approaching from the opposite direction a few blocks down. With each step, details emerged and soon she was recognizable: It was Kristina.

We both seemed to pick up running shortly after the discovery, and we met right at the bus stop.
Maybe we knew that we were both going to the same school, maybe we didn't. But this pleasant surprise, for me at least, got me through the day. And it was necessary.

Junior High was hell. I may not have concluded that for several days, but it surely didn't take long. The building was funnily shaped. I had to decipher my schedule from a printout. Everyone was old. There were separate staircases for up and down. Between classes only four minutes of passing time were allotted. In addition to worrying about social problems, memorizing combinations and lock numbers and even the basic operation of the stupid lock all helped to fully form the overwhelming introductory disaster.

My first elective class was Industrial Technology, which turned out to just be 'cut things' class. This was my first class each day, and many of the people there were perfectly representative of middle school jerkwads. Though I did meet with some friends from elementary school, there were enough potential tormentors around to encourage silence as the best camouflage. Unfortunately, my choice of long hair and my clothes were enough to attract the worst of them.

It was all part of the Junior high experience for most people, I"m sure. But it was by far the worst social situation I have ever endured.
After shop class, I had the upcoming nightmare of physical education and health classes (in which the class I was in actually succeeded in making a substitute teacher quit, right in front of us).

At this particular middle school, seventh and eighth graders took classes alongside each other (which would make 50% of a regular student's time taking hazing, and the rest giving it). It was easy to gawk at the female eighth graders in my magnet. At that age, one year really did make all the difference. In addition to the physical difference was also another difference that made it impossible to relate to them. It was better to stay out of their way and admire from afar. There were a couple girls I did admire in a physical sense, I guess. But I think it must have just been the boobs, because the girls themselves were inaccesible.

Also notable of this school: everyone was split up into little magnets of kids. Each magnet had a math class, an english class, and a history class. The fourth class was magnet-specific, and the rest of the elective classes were shared. As part of my nature, I had chosen a science magnet. Others would have chosen art, or anything besides science.

In several of my classes, I learned a lot. I was also rewarded a lot for being somewhat bright, especially in math class.

Mr. Guertin, the math teacher, was a very old man with a haircut like Einstein who liked to energetically trade insults with the troublesome students and challenge the smart ones, while encouraging everyone else. He offered math puzzles and riddles as extra credit, and created his own fun worksheets. He even posted people's names on the walls, indicating those who had solved math riddles and how far they were in a series of puzzles. I took a great interest in the math puzzles (likely because I finished his worksheets speedily), and by eighth grade, I was racing my nemesis/friend to finish them first.

The other class that encouraged me was Pre IB, which was simply a prep course for a high-school magnet. But what was special about the class was that it was restricted to only the motivated students, making it safe to study pretty serious stuff. We actually read books in that class, and I had my first experience with Shakespeare's Othello as well. Most importantly about Pre IB was that every week, a creative writing assignment was to be turned in and sent to people who would read them.

On an intellectual level, I think I finally found myself in junior high -or at least the realization that I could excel.

Unfortunately, this realization came at a time of complete social inadequacy. One problem I had was that everyone now related on a level of offense. Making conversation amounted to insulting someone. While the new people were bad enough, even my friends from grade school seemed to turn into jerks.

While everyone else was learning their social skills in this environment, I drifted away and spent my time on more 'important' things, like playing Final Fantasy Three, and reading lots of books in the corner of the lunchroom.
Well, it's an excuse anyways. I like it better than saying that I am 'naturally' unsocial, even though I can't be sure.

I became more and more silent when I was with my friends. The choices in adding to the 'conversation' with friends were:
A) Saying something that interested me, but would be weird and make everyone think I'm a fool and possibly give leverage for future taunting.
B) Use my wit to sneak in an insult to someone who had already said something stupid (or something from column A)

If everything people said seemed to make someone uncomfortable, I decided that I would be best off just not participating. It would save someone some embarrassment.

The decision had more detrimental effects than I expected, leaving me critical of everything I said for a long while. So it was back to the books, where I didn't have to participate or worry about interacting incorrectly.

I read books like crazy: during the bus ride, during homeroom, during lunch, and before I went to sleep. I was a bookworm of epic proportions.

If it weren't for my academic success in these years, I would have suffered intolerably. As I said, my friends were turning into jerks and I wasn't making any others to replace them. The world was turning to muck, and all I had left was this leftover hope of being with Kristina.

For two years, I woke up to meet Kristina nearly every day at the bus stop. The bus stop was such a surreal place, in the darkest hours of the early morning we stood there, alone for a time, waiting for a long yellow vehicle to whisk us away. Somehow, the setting emphasized my somewhat dreamlike feelings for her.

Getting to know her at the bus stop turned her over time into someone entirely different than what I had so many times made her to be in my mind. I enjoyed her company though, and my never-ending crush on her -I don't think it really grew, but it must have stretched itself out and still encapsulated me in a thin shiny layer.

On the bus I would sit and look out the window in a nearby seat in the front, occasionally sneaking glances at her in conversation with Keith the busdriver. Everyone talked to the bus driver, who was very fun. And sometimes I would be called in to say something or another, but not often. I would be the quiet one.

And then when yearbooks came, my group of acquaintances decided that I should show them who I liked. After initially trying to make up a fictional description, I was soon uncovered and I had to base my riddle-like statements on Kristina, though I really wasn't enthusiastically smitten with her, or so I had convinced myself. She was just default. She won by sheer seniority. Finally, it came out. I liked her.

Fortunately, this time it didn't get out very far. My grade school friends kind of passed it off, some of them remembering her, some of them knowing her better than I, most not caring. I was off the hook, at least.

But I did then realize I had to choose whether I did like her or not. The end of junior high was here.

And I must have decided I was done with her. Done with that version of her I held in my head, or done with the real her with which it contrasted. Or more likely, I thought it would be too difficult to admit, and I simply gave up. And at some point, maybe the last day of school, maybe the second to last day, I must have said hello to her that morning. Whenever it was, whatever it was, it was the last time we talked.
As they say, I never saw her again.

*****

I think I still have that eraser, the one that Kristina named 'buddy' in third grade. Stowed away in some desk drawer, with all the other mementos; a remembrance of someone who is no longer what she was, someone who likely never WAS what she was. I won't ever know. But inside of that eraser remains that giggling girl that I fell in love with and never really got over. I'm sure she's on that dream boat somewhere, fishing her pockets for coins. I don't know what I should call her, but one thing's for sure: it ends with two 't's.

(This was chapter one of my accounts, "-Liking-: Refractions and Infractions" )
(Next stop, chapter two: "2) Personating" )