Behind Classroom Doors

LXX- Summer

I set the box down on the floor with a grunt. I'm sweating way more than I'd like this early in the day. "Thanks for helping, it would have cost a fortune to hire movers." Jake says as he walks in with his arms full.

I walk over to him to take stuff from the top. "It's no problem honestly. I'm not doing much until I leave for New York." Well, aside from going to California next week.

"Yeah, when is that?" Jenny asks, her hand on her swollen stomach. She's getting closer and closer to her due date.

Hopefully I'll be back from the wedding before she gives birth. "Check in is July 25th."

"What a coincidence that's your birthday."

I laugh nervously, "Happy birthday to me." I know Seth will be there but I won't know anyone else. My fingers are crossed that my roommate will be tolerable. I set everything down and wipe my face with my shirt. "Have you guys heard from Bee?" She posts pictures on Instagram but other than that she's been MIA.

Jenny shakes her head, "I think she's having too much fun." Her eyes are dark and slightly sad. It's probably her hormones but a tear runs down her cheek. "Sorry I guess I'm just a little sad we don't get to travel." I couldn't imagine having a baby so young and everything I could be missing out on.

Jake goes to her side and says, "We'll have something better than traveling."

I roll my eyes at how cheesy they are and can't help but smile. They're the golden couple, they're soulmates. I choose to believe that she's keeping her baby because she truly believes it's the best option. Still, I can't believe how far even a perfect couple like them have come.

In a way I envy them. It's silly and childish but they have something Shawn and I couldn't have. The option to be so out and in the open. The option to truly be together. "I'll go get the last of it." I dismiss myself, walking around them to get to the door.

The area is nice enough to start a family. Quaint but I know they'll make the most of it. When I make it down to the car there's one more box in it. It's labeled, high school, in black sharpie. The box is open so I peek inside, it's filled with scrapbooks and trinkets. I pull the first one out. It says Freshman Year on it so I open it to reveal the first page. I laugh at the picture of three very young best friends. Becca had braces and she was in the middle with her arms wrapped around Jenny and me. Jenny's hair was much longer and brushed out to perfection. I looked chubbier in the face, but mostly the same.

I flip through it some more. Pictures of all of us the whole year are in this book. All of the embarrassing ones taken off guard and all of the planned ones that are somehow still terrible.

Before I know it I'm on the scrapbook from sophomore year. Bee got her braces off and Luke is close behind in almost every picture. Jenny won her beauty pageants so there are several pages dedicated to that. I'm in the book but not as much as I was in the last one.

I move on to the one from junior year. The only pictures of me are with Dean. I looked happy but I was never alone. My friends were always much more photogenic than me. There are pictures from the masquerade and go-kart racing. They're all group pictures and the ones that weren't, consisted of Jenny and Becca last summer. 

I shake my head and move on to senior year. The back of the book has plenty of pictures of me and the girls. Graduation, prom, and our monthly sleepovers. The front only has one picture of me. It was around Thanksgiving and I'm not even smiling, I wasn't happy.

I close the book and put it back in the box. Am I really going to go to California next week like nothing ever happened? Like I'm not terrified of Dean and how miserable I was with him. He kept me sheltered and hidden from the rest of the world. I felt less hidden when I was with Shawn and we had to stay hidden.