I shut up when she leans to her right and reaches into a drawer, pulling out a folder thick with forms. She licks the tip of her thumb and flips through a few of the pages until she finds whatever it is she's looking for and pulls out a green sheet of paper that she gives to me.
"You can get this one. I know you can," she says, turning the page around so I can read it.
COMMUNITY LEADER SCHOLARSHIP $5,000
I spin it right back around and push it closer to her.
"It's the same problem as the other form. I've got nothin' to say about myself. Not that some scholarship group wants to hear anyway."
She just slides the paper back.
"Then let's find things for you to say." She's adamant, but I laugh because she has no clue how hopeless this cause is. And the more she fills my head with potential, the sadder I get about my reality.
"That IB class thing...I don't think I'm supposed to be in there."
I'm not arguing my case very well, and that's part of the problem with all of this. I'm not articulate. I'm not some genius in hiding. I looked at some of those assignments listed on the board in Ms. Forte's class and I didn't know what most of them meant, or if they were science things or math or whatever. I'm not sure what I did to land myself in here, or why I'm her cause, but she just needs to drop this and leave me alone.
"You're giving up too fast, Joey." She leans forward on her elbows, and I instinctively slide my chair back a few inches.
"I don't want this," I say, shrugging and looking around her bare office. She has two pictures on her desk, one of her with an older man and a little girl, the other is a man dressed in a military uniform. I point to it.
"That your husband?" She shows a hint of a grin then moves her hand to the picture to turn it so she can look at it straight on.
"It is. He's on his third tour with the Navy. That's our little girl, Melody."
She twists the other picture more so I can see. I bet she has these pictures in here to seduce kids like me into the illusion of a happy, normal life like hers. If Dub were in my situation right now, he'd say something to make her uncomfortable—not a full threat, but just something that makes her feel off. I could talk about how lonely she must be with her husband overseas, or I could tell her a lie about how I know someone who just died in the Navy. I could even just sit here and stare at her with the right look in my eyes that makes her want to do anything she can to get me out of her office.
But this is where I'm not like the others—not like my dad or Dub. When I was a kid, I'd watch the older guys start fights at restaurants or yell things at women on the streets. They'd celebrate and laugh like it was Christmas afterward, but by the time I was eleven or twelve, I realized that they really weren't doing anything other than acting like dicks. I saw the expressions on other people's faces, and a lot of them were scared, sure...but most of them were just disgusted.
"Melody's a nice name," I say, pulling the form into my hand to read it. "I'll fill it out as far as I can, but I really don't want to be in that class, Ms. Beaumont."
I stare at the same few words that were on the last form—volunteerism, clubs, philanthropy—while she stares at the top of my head. We're at a standoff, and she knows she can't make me do anything, really. My mom could force me into the class, but even she knows that forcing me won't make me happy, and I'll just quit showing up. Me finishing school is a big deal to my mom—for me it's only leverage.
"How about...for two weeks..." I glance up into her waiting eyes and hopeful, but faint, smile. "You just try it. We'll talk again after two weeks, and if you're just as unhappy being in there as you say you are now, I'll put you back on your old schedule."
