Zebrahead (interracial)

sound of silence

The next day at school seemed as if it was going by in slow motion.

We had atleast five classes a day, each being about an hour thirty.

Most of the people in all my classes were people I got along with just fine. That was, until I went into my English class to see Daniel Byrd.

My goodness, if God had specifically designed someone in the world to jump on your nerves, my designated person was Daniel.

It started after we had been seeing eachother after school for nearly a week. The principal hadn't told us to stoip doing so, so we continued with our hourly meetings.

It was still thrity minutes before we were dismissed to go home, evem though I didn't get the pleasure of going straight home anymore. Daniel began to tap on his desk with his pencil.

One thing about me is I have the worst case of mesophonia.

And I do mean the worst.

Everyone else in the classroom acted oblivious to the tapping, so I tried to do that also.

But the patience of Brenda Maywood can only go so far. I glanced at Mrs.Cunnighamm, whom had her nose deep into a philosophy book, briefly glancing upward at me and giving me a wary smile, directing her eyes back to her book.

I turned my attention towards Daniel and hissed a whisper at him.

"Would you knock that racket off already? You're giving me a headache."

He leaned towards me, pencil still in hand, hand still tapping the desk. "Nobody else seems to mind. You just might have to take one for the team." He smiled coyly.

"The only one taking something for the team will be you once I shove that pencil up your-"

"Brenda? is everything alright back there?" Mrs. Cunningham started.

Tucking my hair behind my ear and facing forward, I did a tight lipped smile. "Yes ma'am. Just offering to put Daniel's pencil away for him."

A chocked laughed went off behind me. I turned to see it was Daniel who made the sound.

He caught on to my corny pun. My lips quivered into a half-hearted smile.

Just as soon as the smile was upon his face, it was gone.

****
The more I tried to find reasons not to like Daniel, the more I ended up turning those things into something positive about him.

We sat at a round table in the cafeteria working on homework from the days class subjects.

Well, at least I was.

Daniel on the other hand seemed to be in his own little world, scribbling in a composition note book. Me being the curious cat in every situation, I asked him what was he doing.

"Writing." He said curtly.

"Writing what?" I pressed on.

He sighed heavily and looked at me impatiently.
"Don't you think if I wanted you to know, I would have told you by now?" Daniel looked back down, putting his attention back into scribbling in the notebook.

I pursed my lips, and quickly snatched the notebook from his pencils puncture.

"Brenda, give that back." He said, his voice wavering and cracking slightly under his anger.

"You asked for it." I said in a sing-song voice.

He slammed his hand against the table, his face flushing a bright pink. "Brenda, I said give it back right now!"

I giggled at the sight before me. "What are you gonna do? Lynch me?"

"I just might be considering it."

I grimaced slightly at his response.

The room grew silent shortly before he spoke again. His voice came back, softer this time.

"Please, will you please give that back to me?" He pleaded.

Still being defiant, I flipped through the book. There was a series of drawings and what looked like to be poetry or some sort or writing that he most likely did himself, since he was so clingy over this thing.

"What's in here anyways?" I questioned.

I stopped turning the pages when I got to a page that had a drawing of a beautiful girl that almost looked like-

Daniel suddenly and surprisingly snatched the notebook from my hands, the pink flush that once touched his face slowly dying down as his regular skin tone finally came back.

"Why do you always do that?" He asked.

"Do what?" I asked back.

"Act like such a- such a-" He stammered

I rolled my eyes at his struggle. "Act like what? A nigger? A jigaboo?Coonie? come on now Daniel, i;ve heard everything in the book and I'm barely sixteen years old. This all is getting old..-"

"I wasn't going to say that." He said cutting me off.

"Then what?"

"I was going to ask why you're so stubborn and persistent." He stated, wiping the cover of the book as if my hands were unclean.

I ignored his question, suddenly irritated. A thing or two clicked in my head as he spoke.

"Was that a picture of me I saw in there?" I challenged.

"What are you talking about?" He asked in return.

"I saw it. Nomatter how fast you snatch a book from my hand, it still won't change a thing. I.Saw.It." I said, spacing out my words.

There goes that pink flush of his again.

He sat down, his face sulking as he realized he had been caught. He flipped a few pages until he got to the page that I knew I'd seen. And as a matter of fact:

It was me.