What are good qualities in a friend? Boy/girlfriend?

Amy helped me bury the body.  She was such a good friend.  I miss her terribly.

I guess I should back up a little.

Even though high school students desperately want to fit in and have loads of friends and dress "right" and know all the right pop culture, they each live in a tiny, selfish bubble.  I suppose some don't, but I sure did.  My bubble swirled around me reflecting me back to me and showing me that I was put-upon and I was unique and I was suffering like no one else had in the history of the world.  I didn't notice, or care, that friends of mine, like Amy, were suffering, too.  I was suffering worse.  No one could understand... except, maybe, that strange, elusive creature: a boyfriend.

I wanted, more than anything, a boyfriend.  The desperation began in earnest during 8th grade.  At The 8th Grade Dinner Dance (the first time we all got dressed up and behaved like gentlemen and ladies), I wore a skirt with my shorts hidden underneath, a pair of sneakers, two pairs of socks, and some horrid shirt with a cute collar.  I boogied without moving my feet with my group of girl friends.  Amy looked fabulous, and she wore pink heels.  At one point during the evening, Amy let me borrow them and I strutted around, trying to get a boy--any boy--to notice.  I would have danced with anyone if he had asked me, including the band director, who, in hindsight, was surely gay.  Mr. Phillips said to me as I clicked by, "Tonight's your night!"  I believed him.  He was wrong.  Amy asked for her shoes back.  I went home still having never been kissed.

Recent polls have shown 1/5th of Americans can not locate America on a map. Why do you think this is?

It wasn't rush yet, but it would be soon, and the drive-thru was already getting a line.  Inside, one guy ordered while a girl entered and stood between the herding bars.  She looked around, detached, bemused; nobody noticed that she didn't look at the menu.

Two bowls of chili, small tong full of cheese product on each, one bag crackers for each.  Regular drink cup.  Double cheeseburger, regular.  Regular fries.  Paper on the tray, food on the paper.  Check order receipt fast, place under chili.  Transaction complete.

"What would you like today?"  The cashier's finger hovered over the picture board on the register, her gaze already wanting to look down.

"I'm not ordering.  I have a strange question."

A tremor went through the cashier's hovering hand as her mind already took a tentative step towards her manager.


BLOG NOTE: This is the pageant question Miss Teen South Carolina answered so horribly.  I use the video of her answering this question when teaching my students about impromptu speaking.  They always assume she did nothing right, but she did quite a bit that was good!  They also suspect it's an unanswerable question, which is also untrue.  Many students even believe that she didn't answer well because she's stupid--wrong again!  I feel bad that, in a way, I force this Miss Teen to relive her crash and burn moment, but, to me, it's wonderful.  It's the perfect way to learn the basic dos and don'ts of impromptu speaking, it's a great way to prove that a strong theme will help a LOT, and it's the best way to knock the cockiness out of those students who don't yet know how hard it is once you're the one in the spotlight.  If you'd like to know more about impromptu speaking, or about this question (or Miss Teen South Carolina) in particular, let me know!

If you were taking a test and you noticed an acquaintance cheating on the exam, how would you handle the situation? If they were trying to cheat off of you, how would you handle it then?

My ninth grade English class was all about smells and vocabulary tests.  Ours was the class with the exchange-teacher from England, Miss Harrington, and all the boys thought she was hot because she had a short, hip haircut and she wore sexy patterned stockings.  And her accent, of course.  This was the year I don't remember doing anything except vocab tests and shunning the attention of Erik, the younger brother of a world-famous tennis star.  Erik played tennis, too, and I guess he was good, but it had to have been difficult to play in the shadow of a Wimbledon-winning older brother.  Besides vocab tests, Erik was the bane of that year's English class.

One of the smells we all fought that year was from Miss Harrington.  While the boys said she was "hot", when the woman was actually hot, she ripened, and in the closed quarters of our small room, it was bad.  I think the jealous girls played it up.  I was not one of them, but maybe it was because I sat in the last row and was most distant from the armpit reek.  Girls would make a show of going to the back and cracking open a window.  If Miss Harrington didn't understand the opening of windows and sides of hands pressed under noses when she walked by, she definitely understood when a bar of soap and deodorant appeared on her desk one afternoon.  I don't know if she used them, but she definitely started dousing herself in perfume, adding to the olfactory excitement of the little room.

Miss Harrington, however, was not my main source of pain: that was Erik.  He hadn't been with our class in middle school, nor had he even been with us from the very beginning of the year.  It was speculated that he'd gotten kicked out of his fancy private school and was only slumming in public school temporarily.  His family was rich, and Erik wallowed in it.  Even my untrained eye could recognize the alligator on his shirts and the freshness of his sneakers.  His clothes were pressed, and certainly not by him.  Erik himself was a sloppy mess.  He thought he was hilarious and God's gift to the girls in this lowly school.  He thought he was cool, and, therefore, he sat in the back row.  Next to me.

I sat in the back because I liked the back where nobody could look at me and I could doodle in my Trapper Keeper and maybe read some Clive Barker before class started.

What would I find if I "googled" you?

My brother Tim tried to make it weird to my parents that my best friend is a boy, but it's not.  Jamie has been my best friend since sixth grade when we were both lost on our first day in Middle School.  I walked into the unlit room 103 to find a boy sitting in the dim.  I slipped into the back row, too, and we waited, silently.  The seconds ticked by without any other students coming in.  No teacher.  Finally, we both pulled out our schedules at the same time.  "Lunch!" he said, slapping his forehead, just as I said it, too.  Without the slap.  We laughed, which I'm glad because I was so scared to be a dork.  Luckily, we were able to be dorks together.  Jamie wasn't afraid of being dorky, which made me feel okay, too.

We're starting high school after this summer, and it hasn't gotten weird in the way Tim thinks it will, even though, you know, hormones and everything.  That's not to say it's not weird.  It is totally weird.

Pageant Question: It is okay for women to wear pants, but why are people so uncomfortable with men in skirts?

"Mr. Ripley," whined Marcus.  "Can you let us out early?"

"You know the answer to that, Marcus.  You're in tenth grade and you know everything, don't you?"  Mr. Ripley ambled over to Marcus' desk.  "You haven't finished your worksheet.  Finish those problems and then you'll be able to talk."

Sharon, always wanting to look good, waved her worksheet in the air.  "I'm done!  Tell us a story, Mr. Ripley!"

The class quieted when Mr. Ripley strode to the front of the room.  "You all wrote down your homework?  All the problems on page 80?"  Cult-like, the students answered that they did.  Ever the showman, Mr. Ripley used the drama of silence.  "Why is it that women can wear skirts and pants, but men can only wear pants?"

The class took a moment before erupting in laughter and their own opinions.  "Scottish people wear skirts!"  "My Uncle Danny wears skirts!"  "Men have different parts!"  "Women shouldn't wear pants!"

Mr. Ripley regained attention by unexpectedly standing on a chair.  "Women's skirts come in so many great patterns and colors, and they're so comfortable and free-flowing, why couldn't I come to class in a skirt?"  Amid the heated debate, the end of class bell rung, and students scooped up their books, still paying attention to getting out their opinions rather than wanting to leave, which had only minutes ago been their priority.  Consensus seemed to be encouraging Mr. Ripley to come to class wearing one of his wife skirts to see what happened.

Pageant Question: What makes you a person of character?

The Summit Park Mall surged and flowed like a circulatory system, dislodging blood vessels into the capillaries of The Limited, The Gap, Merry-Go-Round and McCrory's.  Fresh into their teens and fresh into the big leagues of high school, Ann and Louise stalked the mall to see and be seen and not to buy.  Usually, not even to speak to anyone else, but to gawk and play with their new-found desire to be "cool".  A stop in the arcade was mandatory, followed by a pair of cookies from The Cookie Company, window shopping, and delving into the dark recesses of Spencer's Gifts.

Spencer's was one of the darkest stores at the Summit, and it got even darker in the back, lit only with blacklight.  The fuzzy, fluorescent posters glowed, tiger's eyes gleaming and psychedelic skulls leering.  Ann and Louise would spend a lot of time giggling over the "naughty" items also stocked in the back, like fuzzy handcuffs, boxed lingerie, and books offering sex tips.  The risque greeting cards were also fascinating, including the new line of real photographs of fat or ancient men and women.

Trying to figure out why anyone would want the numbers "420" on a bumper sticker, Louise was interrupted by Ann.  "Come on, Lou.  Let's go."

"Okay," she replied, letting Ann drag her out of the store.

Ann pulled her to a bench a few stores down, and smiled, propping her purse in her la.

"What?" asked Louise.  "Why do you look so smug?"

"These," said Ann, drawing a pair of white sunglasses from her bag, the tags still hanging from the ear piece.

"You shoplifted?  Ann?  What are you, nuts?"

Ann tried to shush her friend.  "Yeah, so keep it down!"

Louise closed her mouth and crossed her arms.  "No."

"No?  No, what?"

"No, Ann, you are not shoplifting.  You are putting those back.  Now."

Ann had the decency to look scared.  "But... I could be caught!"

"You will not shoplift."  Louise stood, pulling Ann up by the sleeve.  "Now put it back."

There was no argument.  Louise marched Ann back to Spencer's and watched while she disappeared into the store, dropping the white sunglasses back into the pile.  She returned without incident.  "There.  Happy?"

"Yes," smiled Louise.  "I am.  You aren't a shoplifter, Ann.  And you don't even need those!  You have a good pair of sunglasses on top of your head!"

Pageant Question: What is your most embarrassing moment?

I am the king of embarrassing moments.  Lord of putting my foot in my mouth.  Emperor of oopsies.  I've learned I need to ride out whatever I've done and let it take me where it will, though it doesn't mean I'm not still haunted.

Last night, for example, I was kept up by going into the wrong class earlier that day; don't worry, it was actually far worse than it sounds.  I was in Norton Hall, passing through on my way to the cafeteria for a bowl of mashed potatoes with gravy, when I glanced through the window of my physics classroom.  My professor was in there.  Students were in there.  Class had started fifteen minutes ago!  I thought I had all the time in the world; I mean, didn't I always go or mashed potatoes on Thursdays?  I had a routine, and what happened to it that I missed the start of class?  In a panic, I threw open the door and slid into a seat on the end as some kid was in my seat.  Hmm.  Some kid I didn't recognize.

"Matt?" said Professor Anderson.  "Are you in this class?  Aren't you in the next class?"  He frowned, and I knew what had happened.  Professor Anderson held two classes back to back, and I had the second.  I didn't know anybody in here.  My class didn't start for another hour.  "Ah, well, I may be mixing up my rosters.  Midterm craziness.  Where were we?"

I didn't move.  I didn't look at anyone, though I knew they were staring at me.  I felt my face burning up and I could barely breathe.  Ride it out, man.  I just had to let what I'd done take me where it would, which was here, taking notes, surrounded by strangers.  And I missed my afternoon mashed potatoes.

Pageant Question: Substance abuse is huge problem among teens. How do you stay drug free? What solutions do you propose to solve this problem?

Vic's house was the first split-level that she had ever seen, and she thought it looked like one of those cool, rich-person's multilevel apartments you might find in New York City.  It was also walking distance from the high school, which she also thought of as cool because she would have gone home every day for lunch.  Lora, however, lived in what had been a "show home" neighborhood back in the 1970s.  As a very fresh freshman, she was only just beginning to think outside her own world view, and it gave her a tingling feeling in the back of her mind that, perhaps, her family was rich, and everyone in Vic's neighborhood was not.

Lora was not Vic's girlfriend, but rather a friend who happened to be a girl.  Cheryl was Vic's girlfriend, and also one of Lora's best friends.  Vic, Chris, and Frankie were buddies.  Lora, Cheryl, Jenny and Barb were besties.  Freshman year was when they all discovered each other and found that boys and girls could mingle.  So far, it was working, and on the night of the Fall Dance, they met up at Vic's split-level to hang out before walking over.

Each of the friends had a secret none of the others knew.  Lora only knew hers: she had fallen for Vic.  Her fall was solidified that night when, in her mind, Vic saved them all from a gang of druggies.

Pageant Question 12: If you could go back in time and meet one person, who would it be, and why?

I was very good at going to school.  I had been doing it since I was three, so by the time I got to college, I knew how to sit and listen for hours, how to take pages and pages of notes from lectures, how to read dozens of books in a matter of months, and how to write so my professors were happy campers.  I was a vessel.  I was a programmable robot.  I was an excellent student.

What I wasn't good at was socializing (no surprise there) or noticing what was right in front of my face.  I had a real hard time with change.  I had gotten extremely comfortable in my uncomfortable life, and I didn't like to look ahead to the time when I would graduate, so I began actively researching graduate programs even back in my junior year.  It was the first semester of my senior year, however, that I looked up.  Literally.  I looked up during APY 377 (the awesomely titled "Magic, Witchcraft and Sorcery"), and actually saw.

I mean, I would glance up during class to look at pictures on the overhead or what the professor might write on the whiteboard, sometimes another student would make a noise and I'd glance, or sometimes I would stare into space and think, but this time, I looked up, and I felt like I became disconnected from my body.  I observed the classroom: a lecture hall class with plastic bucket seats and swing-arm desks in funky 1960s colors.  I observed the cement floor covered with industrial carpeting in a neutral brown.  I observed the three giant whiteboards at the front of the room, the ghosts of notes past lingering in blues and blacks.  I observed the other students, not nearly as many today as would be during an exam, mostly surreptitiously on their phones and a few taking notes and a few more than that staring blindly into space.  I observed the professor, looming over the podium, gripping the sides and reading from his notes.  Probably the same notes he had used for decades.  I observed with a detachment that let me finally see the professor as a human being, and he looked like hell.  My sudden observation allowed me to dig back into my less-observant memory for images of the professor earlier in the semester, and I noted that he looked markedly worse today.  His clothes were dirty and wrinkled, and he looked like he hadn't showered or slept in at least a few days.  But his eyes--his eyes were bright sparks in the recesses of their darkened sockets.  He looked alive.

At the end of class, I noted that the professor was packing up in a hurry, stuffing papers into folders and jamming it all into his bag.  Rarely did anyone ever stop to speak to the professor in a lecture hall class, so I knew I'd have but a moment to stop him.

"Professor Stevens," I began, and he started as if I had caught him stealing.

349

I was going to be an archaeologist, but my father had a family friend talk me out of it.  Already a junior in university, I still hadn't declared my major.  My wide-ranging interests had me in classes like Descriptive Astronomy, Medical Anthropology, Philosophy in Literature, and Abnormal Psychology.  I was getting better grades than I ever did in high school, but not being clear about what I wanted to do after college was worrying my parents.  I suppose my love of Indiana Jones movies was not a great reason to want to become an archaeologist, but I thought it was enough until Mr. Baylor stopped me before he went back down to my dad's den to continue the poker game they had going.

Mr. Baylor leaned towards me confidentially, a green can of Genny Cream Ale in one hand.  "There are hundreds of starving archaeologists sitting around the streets of Greece, hoping some established dig will pick them up."  He shook his head sadly.  "Hardly anybody makes it nowadays.  My son saw them.  Students wasting their lives hoping for a chance at a famous dig.  It's not a viable career anymore."

I nodded and listened to Mr. Baylor's advice, urged on me by my father.  So I went to school the next week and declared my alternate choice as my major: English.  English major, with a goal of being a writer.  Yep.  Much more likely to be a viable career.

340

I despise keeping the secrets of my ex-boyfriends.  Invariably, they have each confessed something to me, and I hold it in my memory, wishing I could tell someone, but feeling some sort of loyalty to the promise implied by love no longer felt; the promise that I would keep the secrets forever.

I suppose it bothers me because they promised to love me forever, and, clearly, that didn't work out.  To whom should I confess these secrets?  Certainly not a new boyfriend, if there even were one.  He would not understand.  These secrets are big, not in the scope of the world, but rather in terms of their intimacy.  How can I stand to keep their secrets?

I can't.  I will confess two of them now from from the worst boyfriend I ever had.  He was abusive, and I barely escaped him with my self intact.  I was in high school and he was only my second boyfriend ever, so I hope you can forgive me for my idiocy.  We'll call him Peter.  Peter, I can see now, was a sociopath.  He lied, and lied and lied to everyone, and especially to me.  He lied to his mother, he lied to his step-father, and he lied to himself.  He was stupid, but oh, so clever.  He could manipulate.  He had no emotions of his own, but he could twist yours into knots.  He was without remorse, but he could make you feel bad about anything.  He was without conscience and would drag anyone down into the darkness with him because you couldn't believe anyone could be so evil.  He would hold me down when I said no and he'd do it anyway.  He would hit me in the leg, though I wished and wished he'd hit me in the face so I'd have a "valid" excuse to escape.  He followed me and questioned me and lied to the police and stole and lied and separated me from my friends and family.  You can see why I don't feel bad revealing Peter's secrets.

Peter has two related secrets.  One: he once reached into the toilet to squash his own poop with his hands to make it look like diarrhea, so he could get out of going to work at Burger King.  Two: he faked abdominal pain to get out of going to school, but he faked it hard and couldn't back down, so his mother, a nurse, took him to the hospital.  He doubled down on his lie and kept faking for the doctors who performed a needless appendectomy.  Peter was a committed liar.  Pity the poor high school girl, so innocent and desperate to please and be liked.  Pity her carrying the sociopath's secrets and her own hidden hurts.

312

My name is Benjamin.  Benny, to my friends, which is why nobody calls me Benny.  I hate everyone and everyone hates me, and that's the way I like it.  My bedroom is my castle; my sanctuary, if you will.  You will because this is my journal and I was told to write what I like, so this is what you get.  I may even swear in it, but if I don't it's only because I didn't want to.  I can end sentences with a preposition, and nobody can stop me.  I am a rebel without an out.  Get me out.

Monday.
I've decided to write the days in my journal because I want to.  It helps me stay on track since I have been kicked out of school and I can't see the day on the corner of the board anymore.  Yeah, that's right: I was kicked out of school.  Bad a$$.  I made a fake swear because I wanted to.

28

Miss Dombrowski looked like she was trying not to look scared. She had been reading Edgar Alan Poe's "The Black Cat" to her sixth grade class, as a special October treat, when the fire alarm began to ring. The class, that had been enraptured by the first "adult" story most of them had heard, automatically stood, as they had been trained, but Miss Dombrowski froze, a crease appearing between her arching brows. She didn't let go of the book, but twitched her head towards the speaker grille next to the clock.

Though no one had told him yet in his young life, Mark was very good at reading people, and he read surprise, then realization, then fear in his teacher's face. Meanwhile, the class lined up and waited for Miss Dombrowski to lead them out onto the school's lawn for a few moments of outdoor freedom.

Miss Dombrowski, however, was not leading them anywhere yet. As the class was lining up, their teacher had put down the book and gotten her purse from the big desk, observed by Last-in-Line-Louise. Miss Dombrowski, her favorite teacher, had given her this nickname, smiling. It was true. Louise always hung back to be last in line and she always sat in the back of class, as long as alphabetical order didn't thwart her. Now, being last in line meant Louise noticed Miss Dombrowski wasn't expecting to return to the room. Her favorite teacher was also still watching the grille above the door, next to the ticking clock.

When the alarm stopped, it felt as if weights had been lifted off Mark's eardrums, and the whole class sighed. "Stay in line," ordered their teacher, "and stay quiet."

Louise backed away until she found her desk. She grabbed her own bag, a shapeless knit thing her mother had made. It was ugly, but it held a lot, and it was practically made out of rope. Louise crammed her lunch in on top of all the other items she had inside, then she shoved her sweater in on top of that. No one saw Last-in-Line rejoin her class except Mark, who stood second last.

Mark was about to risk a whisper when the loudspeaker buzzed an extra-long change of class bell, only it wasn't time to change class. Miss Dombrowski tightened.

"Attention classes. Attention. This is Principal Benson." There was a pause and Louise pictured Mr. Benson letting go of the microphone button and clearing his throat. The mic picked back up. "All teachers, please take your students to Stairway F. I repeat. All teachers, please take your students to Stairway F.

"This is not a drill. I repeat, all teachers, immediately take your students to Stairway F. Students are not allowed to stop at their lockers or in the restrooms. This is not a drill.

"Coordination Staff, please begin your sweep. Coordination Staff, please begin your sweep."

Now the students were beginning to look scared, and Miss Dombrowski seemed to come to herself now that she had something to do.

"Okay, kids. You lined up very well. Now follow me into the hall. Louise, you may turn out the light and close the door, just like our fire drills. Let's go."

8

Peter firmly believed that nothing of consequence ever happened in the town of Hicksville, and he absolutely hated that he had to live there.

Being ten, he knew he had little choice in the matter. He went wherever his parents went, and they seemed to go a lot. This was the third move he remembered; there had been two others while he had still been in diapers, and Peter was thankful he had no memories of those days.

He remembered his first school, and his first day of school. He was a walker, and his mother walked with him on the first day, to make sure he'd make it. It was only three blocks from their little suburban ranch to Gwinnett Bierce Elementary, a slightly more sprawling suburban ranch. It was on that day that Peter first realized that his mother was...different. By seeing the reactions to his mother in the eyes of others, his own eyes were opened, and he could not, no matter how hard he tried, close them again.

Peter could picture how they had looked. Himself: slight, pale, with light brown hair and brown eyes. Dressed as neatly as ever in pressed khaki pants and blue polo shirt, an oversized Peanuts backpack pulled over both shoulders and holding his matching Peanuts lunchbox, a new box of crayons, school glue, and a lucky rock he had found the week before.

His mother: tall, thin, pale, with large brown eyes and dark brown hair carefully brushed into a bob. She was wearing a sunny yellow vintage dress with simple brown flats. Peter remembered his mother getting ready early that morning and checking her dress in front of the mirror. "How do I look, Petey?"

"You are beautiful, Mommy," he had replied, and she was. To him, his mother was the most beautiful woman ever, which made the reaction of his teacher extra baffling to him.

They had walked hand-in-hand right into the school and to his classroom. Peter knew now that it was unusual for crowds to part the way they always parted for his mother, but he didn't notice it just then. Groups would also silence upon their arrival; again, unnoticed at the time.