False Start (Boyxboy)

39: A LESSON IN LATENCY

The library overwhelmed the senses with signs of human suffering; the musty smell of old textbooks, a dozen pencils scratching anxiously on paper, equations imprinted into each wooden desk.  Hiro sneezed as I pulled a heavy hardback off a shelf,  resting it in the nook of my elbow to part the pages.

"That's it," he said, wiping his nose.  "Page thirty-two.  I have to translate that Robert Frost poem and find all the figurative language in it.  It's just about some dude in the woods."

I laughed.  "It's a metaphor."

"Says who?"

"Touché."

Using my thumb as a placeholder, I carried the book to the table we'd chosen, tucked away into a corner.  Hiro got to work writing in English while I sifted through all my make-up work.  My teachers hadn't taken any sympathy on me.  My backpack was stuffed so full that the zipper wouldn't shut around it all, and neither could my head.

"Yo, what's up," Hiro said after a while.  "You look like you just left Earth there."

I'd been staring blankly at a Chemistry problem.

"Ah, I just got tired," I murmured, straightening my spine.

I'd learned the material a few months ago.  Even gotten a perfect score on a test about it.  But now I kept getting the answers wrong no matter how many times I reworked them.  Frustrated, I rubbed at the knot where I'd cracked my skull.

"Did you finish translating?"

"Yeah," he sighed, sliding his notebook toward me.  "Will you double-check it for me?"

Feigning confidence, I scanned over his scribbles.

Stopping By Woods On A Snowy Evening

Whose woods these are I think I know.  
  His house is in the village though;  
  He will not see me stopping here  
  To watch his woods fill up with snow.  
  My little horse must think it queer  
  To stop without a farmhouse near  
  Between the woods and frozen lake  
  The darkest evening of the year.  
  He gives his harness bells a shake  
  To ask if there is some mistake.  
  The only other sound's the sweep  
  Of easy wind and downy flake.  
  The woods are lovely, dark and deep,  
  But I have promises to keep,  
  And miles to go before I sleep,  
  And miles to go before I sleep.

I looked back up to see Hiro resting his chin on his fist.

"Looks good to me," I told him.

He nodded.  "Okay.  So, what's the hidden meaning?"

"Well... The woods could be a symbol for something else."  Nothing registered on his face.  "You know...."  I shifted in my seat.  "Like, solitude, for example.  The guy could be taking a breather from the fast pace of society."

"Really?"

"Maybe."

He pulled the notebook back from me, hunching over, ruddy hair falling into his eyes.

"Hmm.  I kind of thought it was about death."

"Why?"

"Or suicide," he added, popping his knuckles against the tabletop.  "Don't you think that's what 'sleep' means?  Dying?"

"...I don't know."

Now my head was in my hands.

"I just don't understand the lines about the other guy.  Whose woods?  Does somebody own the whole damned thing?"