Dear Dad

September 21st

September 21st,

            It was spirit week at our school all this week.  Today, being Friday was fancy Friday.  We all came to school in our fanciest clothes.  I wore a nice shirt and a tie.  I’ve never worn a tie before.  I had to have my mom tie it because I almost chocked myself twice trying to figure it out.  I was at my locker and happened to look to my left at the perfect time.  I turned and saw Anabella walking down the hall looking as beautiful as ever.  She was dressed in a vibrant colored, floral printed, fifties style sleeveless dress.  She had black heels on her small feet and had her curly dark red hair in a fancy up-do.

            She walked over to me and smiled at me.  She looked down at the ground fixed her pearl necklace and then looked back up at me.  “Hey beautiful,” I said to her.  She kissed me and I put one arm around her.  I slammed my locker and we started to walk away.  I heard my locker screech back open.  Really!  We turned back around and I slammed it again.  It opened again.  I slammed it and held it shut.  When I let go it stayed closed.  We started to walk away again and it opened again.  I’m about to kill this locker.  I went back and closed it.  It finally stayed.  I walked away with Anabella.

            We continued our venture down the hall.  People kept looking at us like we were aliens from a different planet.  We were in the middle of the main hallway when some guys that I had never met before came up to us.  We stopped and they stared at us then laughed to themselves.  “Something wrong?”  I said to them.  They took a step closer.  Anabella leaned into me.  I could tell she was frightened.  The tall guy in the middle looked down to me and said, “What’s wrong with you dude?”  I was seriously confused now.  Had I done something wrong?  “Um, nothing that I know of,” I said back.

“Then why are you such a loser?” He said in a tough, intimidating tone.

“Excuse me?”  I said back insulted.

“I get the whole being a nerd ‘Ooh I like writing’ thing but why do you like this freak?”  He said pointing to Anabella.  I leaned into Anabella and whispered, “I think they might be high.” I let go of her and stepped towards him.  “What did you just say?”  I said angrily.

“I said your friend’s a freak.”  He bent down and got really close to my face and said, “Freak, weirdo, loser.  Do you understand English?”

“I understand English fine, thank you.  What I don’t understand is the problem you have with Anabella.”  Anabella pulled me back to her.  She signed to me, ‘Stop it, let’s go.  These idiots aren’t worth fighting with, you’ll only make it worse.’  The guy in the middle moved his hands in a jerking way to mock Anabella.  “Why are you so weird,” he said slowly  while trying to sign. 

“Hey, man back off.  It’s not her fault she can’t speak.  Maybe you should try to understand and see that it’s not easy and you’re not going to make any difference bullying her.  So, BACK THE FUCK OFF!”

            The rest of the day after that was a blur.  I remember yelling at him and him getting very, very angry.  After that is all black.  I woke up in the nurse’s office with a black eye and was sent home.

            Anabella came over later to see if I was okay.  She was dressed normally again.  She told me that she thought I had a concussion for sure.  I was out for a while and my eye was swollen now.  She looked up at me and gently ran two of her fingers over my bruise.  ‘I’m sorry you got hurt for me.’  She started crying.   I pulled her in and hugged her.  “Listen,” I said, “Don’t be sorry.  I’d rather me get hurt than you.  You mean the world to me.  No, scratch that, you mean the universe to me.  The world, the moon, the sun, and all the starts in the sky, that’s how much you mean to me.  I love you.  I love you Anabella and I don’t ever want you to be hurt.”  She looked up at me.  She had stopped crying and her eyes shined like beautiful emeralds.  She didn’t have to say it back; I could tell by the way she looked at me that she loved me.  She stood on her toes and kissed me.  I kissed her back.  I ran my fingers through her curls.  She placed her hands on the back of my neck.  I held her close to me.  I wasn’t going to let her go, ever.  I held her close as long as I could.  We stopped kissing after a while.  She hugged me and placed her head on my chest.  I held her tight.  I guess she felt safe in my arms and was afraid to go back into the world.  I wasn’t going to let her if she didn’t want to.

            She went to leave.  She opened the door and turned around delicately placing her hand on the doorknob.  She looked outside and then at me.  She’s so cute when she looks at me like that.  She picked up her hand and signed, ‘I love you.’  Then she left.