What I Like About You

you hold me tight

KANE

The next time we met was during the school fair probably about three weeks from the bump accident.

It was so strange how a person could easily be noticed after being invisible for so long. That was Pete for me: visible.

I don't want to be called a stalker or anything but I saw him everywhere. In art, he's the one in the third row, in Advanced Calculus he's the one near the window, in the Cafeteria he ate with the Math Decathlon Members but most of the time they were too busy solving differential equations, so he ate alone.

It was frustrating. And the worst detail? He wasn't wearing his glasses anymore. More distraction!

I've been so careful as to not let him know that I was "occasionally" watching him which I thought was going great. Staying away from him was also my main agenda. Totem pole people, I worked hard on it!

PETER

Have you ever felt that someone was watching you behind your back? That sick little bug-crawling feeling in the back of your neck?

That was the continuous feeling I had days after, well you know the meeting. Back then, I wanted to catch the seeker, but every time I magically spin 180 degrees no eyes were trained on me.

I know, I know I'm weird and proud.

So the fair? Well nothing really happened. Well oh yeah, the Ferris wheel.

KANE

I hate it when I'm wrong, I just grrrrrr. Well anyways it was the Foundation Week of Pionneer High School and tradition was, unlike other schools, we get to have half days of school for a week plus that year we got two amusement rides and one horror booth which was the bestseller. We, the student council, managed to rent all this with some extensive begging of the principal and the Pionneer Alumna Committee.

All of the rides were positioned in the school field. It was really fun seeing the lights after school, it was like having our own little carnival.

It was Friday and after four days of not seeing the 'distraction' I decided well why not! All my responsibilities were done and it has been four days and it's not as if I'm doing anything wrong! I didn't like him back then I swear!!! It was just curiosity, I guess?

The 'distraction' was busy in the Math Exhibit which I decided to go through. We did have to check on it sooner or later, Mr. Mulvey said we would be marked one day absent if we didn't experience the glory of Integral Calculus and Area/Volume Determination in Action. Boo hoo!

The math exhibit was kinda fun. I remember seeing a tarpaulin of the symbol of Pi saying in a speech cloud, "Get real!" to the Imaginary symbol i while the i retorted, "Be rational!" Then a quote in the bottom displaying IT'S MORE PUN IN MATH!

Math people should really get a life.

To check that we really went, Mr. Mulvey gave us index cards to be stamped by any officer. Guess who stamped mine?

Then the stupid Cuffers came.

PETER

The infamous Pionneer tradition. Honestly it was a pain in the butt.

I was just stamping on a Mulvey Attendance requirement when well what do you know I have been cuffed!

And and not just to anybody! Ladies and Gents, it was Kane Riolle who back then has probably forgotten about me!

The "Pionneer Bond" is the tradition of establishing friendship with an unknown stranger. Creepy right? Once you've been handcuffed to a stranger you have to go to all of everything in the Foundation Celebration. The Cuffers will not give the key until you have finished everything or else you will have to wait until the day ends.

KANE

Derek that jerk!

Honestly I think it was just people's way of getting back at someone. Once, Lana Goldberg broke up with her then boyfriend Austin, who was unfortunately a Cuffer. Austin made sure she got Dandruff Dan handcuffed to her all day. It wasn't helping that that day she was wearing a black sweater, by the end of the day her sweater looked like a domino. YIKES.

But in other instances some use the opportunity to bring back ex-es together. Like a rekindler. But that day I probably fall on the first category.

Pete looked kind of shocked during that moment. He was stuttering nonsensical stuff.

PETER

Shocked?

I was horrified, appalled and all the synonyms for that!

This was not me! I was more of the corner guy, you know the video game playing, computer programming, scrabble playing indoor kind of guy. And then I was suddenly the center of attention! But then again when I was with Kane everything was just 'Oh good golly!'

Derek, the Cuff leader as he likes to be called, laughed along with his minions as he walked away while saying, "Have fun!"

Chen and the others patted me in the back while laughing themselves. Call that friendship aye?

KANE

We stood in a mixture of silence and shock like two idiots in the center of the least visited exhibit. Peter scratched the back of his head a couple a times, I decided to take the first step and ask where he wanted to go, that only increased his head-scratching so I just dragged him along.

We or I mean I decided to go to the rides with less lines so that it'll be faster to get aboard.

Peter was silent the entire way to the first ride. As we walked towards the mini Ferris Wheel, I noticed how tall he was. I guessed he's about 5'10''(which was correct btw) it was odd seeing him not slouched but then again I figured that was due to the lack of the laptop bag he always had strapped in his back.

Okay so when we got there I gotta admit it was huge. When I talked to the amusement park rental director he said the Ferris was about thirty feet tall. But from where we stood it looked about sixty. Not good. You can throw cockroaches at me and I wouldn't scream but if I had to dangle like this in midair with just a thin compartment of metal seating supporting me, I would yell my lungs off.

Derek !!!!!!

PETER

The wheel had five small compartments dangled around the circumference of the circle, that could only fit two people. During the short wait I decided to calculate our position at the end. The ride mechanics was simple, two minutes of rotation clockwise, then another two minutes and about seventeen seconds counterclockwise, then we get off one by one. From what I could tell that day, the torque of the wheel was about one rotation every five seconds meaning if we were in the bottom at the start of the ride, we would be at the exact top after about the four minutes it rotated in total.

Kane looked pretty nervous at the moment when it was our turn so I decided not to tell her.

When we got on, she did the most unexpected thing.

KANE

Yes, I held his hand!

I was scared for all I care!

But Pete actually did something sweet that day, when I said I couldn't do it. As we entered the metal seats it tilted in a scary way, he told me to lean on him and close my eyes imagine that I'm in a swing. He wrapped his arms around me and I gotta admit it felt kind of good.

I remember while we were dangling, tilting, and rotating all in the same time while in midair, I opened my eyes to find his closed as well. I learned something that day, you really can't judge a book by its cover or rather for Pete's case an encyclopedia by its hard bound cover.

Who knew the wimp that everyone judged him to be would turn out to be so calm in the face of danger.

He must have sensed me staring caused he opened his eyes afterwards.

Gosh those grays...

Here we were in the most uncomfortable place in the world handcuffed by fake shackles, and I was just staring.