sophie.

Chapter 7

A DAY IN THE PAST

Every year during the first few days of June, Polo throws a big celebration with a neighboring town called the Marco Polo Jubilee, which is honestly just as stupid as it sounds. And if you couldn't tell it already, the neighboring town was named "Marco," which really showed how much the town's ancestors liked to screw with us. Reason being, the two towns hated each other, the motives to which I'm still not sure about. I guess Marco was the big brother of the two, had more business and some recently-paved roads, but Polo had more of a homey feel, and was sort of campy. And in that respect it makes sense that the two sides loathed each other, because one always had something that the other didn't. Not only that, but during the Marco Polo Jubilee, there was always a heated sense of rivalry, because while most small-town festivals were centered in one spot year after year, the Jubilee had two: one in each town. 

It was funny, because never did either town blatantly state that they hated each other. But trust me, if you were from Polo and decided to shop at the grocery store in Marco, you were in for a bad time. Trust me, I know. I made the mistake of forgetting to fill my gas tank in Polo before I left town one afternoon, and upon returning, I had to get gas at Marco's local station. I figured nothing would change beyond the expected ritual of filling up my tank, but standing opposite the old cashier, I casually told of my predicament, and she less-than-kindly kicked me out without gas. Consequently, I had to spend twenty minutes calling various people I knew in hopes that they would spare me sympathy. And at last, it was my own mother that came to my rescue, but not before I guilt-tripped her with the fact that she had an obligation to help me in my time of crisis, plus the fact that dad couldn't come because he was off in Mozambique for a few weeks.

Anyway, the Marco Polo Jubilee is often (strike that, always,) hectic with the combined populations of both towns. And because of the competition that keeps both places on their toes, the decorations and theatrics are always overbearing, and unnecessarily add to the overall confusion and calamity that occurs. Also, seeing that such an event happens every year, it'd be understandable for the average person (such as myself) to forget what happened which year.

This was all, indeed, rationalization on my part for an event in my life that I apparently did not remember.

See, back in high school, there was this guy. He wasn't really relevant in my life, but during senior year we had a computer class together, and were given assigned seats next to each other. He was cool enough to talk to, so in times boredom, I did. And knowing me, I was always bored, so we had a lot of time to discuss various subjects. One time, on a very average day, we were talking about the Jubilee, and he laughed mid-conversation out of nowhere.

"What?" I asked him.

"Remember that man with the balloons?" he chuckled. I gave myself a moment to recall it, but nothing actually came to mind.

"No. What year was it?"

"It was the year you and I hung out that day," he answered, and I stopped typing for a moment. He and I had never actually hung out during the Jubilee before, and I found it strange that he would say so. He caught on to my confusion. "End of sophomore year? I asked you if you wanted to hang out that day and you were like, 'I have nothing better to do'?"

Now, that last part right there, I remembered. He had more of an innocent crush on me than anything else, and I wasn't particularly fond of breaking his heart at the time, so I said sure, and then... blank.  It was as if my memory had completely wiped from that point in time. And I knew it had returned not long after, because the next Saturday, dad had come home from Chile with an unintentionally funny postcard of a woman milking her pet goat.