One Shot Entries for Various Challenges

AmbassadorsUK Contest - True Road Trip Story

Transferring schools is usually made out to be a distressing ordeal, especially in your last year of high school. It wasn't like that for me. I'd been suspended from my last school, but that was the best thing that had ever happened to me. It was a liberation. An escape from a sickly sweet, toxic boarding school environment that ran on the fuel of chipping off any and all sense of individuality or difference. However, while my exit was a boon to my mental health, it's always difficult joining a new school. Especially in the final year when the pecking order is well and truly established.

I decided I'd take on a new persona. I'd been the "popular jock" since my first year of high school, so I chose the "fairly quiet bookworm" for this final year. After my crazy suspension, which involved therapists and almost involved the cops, I'd lost plenty. I'd lost my friends from the last three of my formative adolescent years; I'd lost the approval from my parents; and worst of all, I'd lost my first girlfriend in a horrible, crash and burn breakup, which actually played a huge part in my suspension. Having already lost such a large chunk of my identity, it was more than easy to slip into a new persona in my new school, a fairly laid back, co-ed institution where we went back home at the end of each day.

My new identity worked for a while, but there's something about unresolved issues that give them incredible energy and power, which compounds every day they stay unresolved. By taking on a new skin, I was determined to leave everything that had happened in the recent past right where it was, the past. I worked really hard on that. I couldn't help my love for sports, which meant I became an athlete again before I could stop myself, but that was the only concession I gave myself. I was going to be the best fairly quiet bookworm, who occasionally played sports, that there ever was. However, every now and then I'd find myself completely breaking down in the privacy of a shower at home, or in a school bathroom stall. I had no idea why I'd spontaneously burst into a sobbing mess, or how to stop it.

A few weeks into the term, we were set to go on a school trip. It would be an eight-hour road trip. I was pretty pumped. I've always loved travelling and especially liked long car journeys past beautiful scenery compared to a quick airplane ride. Maybe it's because I'm fairly short and thus comfortable in any car or bus. My taller friends don't like having to be folded into small seating compartments for hours on end. Anyway, on the bus I ended up sitting with, let's call him Trey. Compared to my diminutive stature, he was a beast, with a filled out muscular frame and over six foot and a half inches to my five foot three. Trey also had the sweetest, kindest soul and was a gooey marshmallow on the inside. To this day, I don't know if Trey had a thing for me. Maybe. I was in too messed up a mental space to notice at that point in time.

Speaking of having a thing for someone, I had noticed, from back when I was about eight or nine, that I liked both girls and boys. It would be much, much later in the future when I would learn the label biromantic, and figure out that I landed somewhere in the asexual spectrum, but back then, all I knew was that I "like liked" boys and I also "like liked" girls. However, being brought up in an ultra-religious home, where this was tantamount to a death sentence type of crime, I had to be careful. God didn't make mistakes, but I knew he'd made one with me, so I had to be careful not to let anyone know. Lest his name be tarnished because of me. When my parents insisted that I join a girls' boarding school, despite my reservations and vehement rebuttals, it was like being inflicted by a thousand razor thin cuts and then thrown into a shark tank.

Surrounded by girls twenty-four seven, and in the throes of hormonal fuelled adolescence, while struggling and exploring my sexuality, I fell in love. Gasp. As with most young love, it burned hot and fast, its flames swallowing everything in its path that I valued. It brought everything it touched down with it, until it all lay in smouldering, smoky pieces around me. This was my state of mind as I took the window seat next to Trey. So, you see, I was stuck in a world of pain and loss that cut so deep, I barely remember anything about my other school mates on that bus.

We were about two hours into the trip. Trey and I had been talking. He was getting a bit tired and wanted to doze off. He asked if I wanted to listen to some music on his iPod, so I wouldn't be bored while he slept. He was such a sweetheart. Probably still is. I accepted the kind gesture, not knowing that my life was about to completely change.

"Do you ever feel like breaking down? / Do you ever feel out of place? / Like somehow you just don't belong, / Like no one understands you..."

Simple Plan's lyrics were pouring out of the ear buds and filling me up to the point of spilling over. I could feel the tears stinging my eyes. I could feel the vindication. That I wasn't alone. That I wasn't going crazy. That people did feel this way. Lost. In the dark. On the edge of breaking down. I finally had words to my feelings, and it was glorious. Welcome to my life. I played that song on repeat for almost an hour, just soaking it in and letting it wash away this black and white filter that had covered everything in my field of vision for so long. This song bled colour back into my life.

"8 o'clock Monday night and I'm waitin' / to finally talk to a girl a little cooler than me... and when she walks / all the wind blows and the angels sing / but she doesn't notice me..."

I could finally laugh at myself along with Bowling for Soup as they laid out their predicament at getting the attention of the Girl all the Bad Guys Want. Surrounded by pretty girls everyday and getting crushes had been my torturous life for a long time. It was something I couldn't accept in myself. I had to fight tooth and nail to fend off these feelings. This song made that whole situation seem as ridiculous as ridiculous situations could. That guilt I'd held for years thanks to my feeling and beliefs from my upbringing was power washed from my soul, and I've made sure that grimy scum didn't attach itself to me ever again.

"Here I am, once again, I'm torn into pieces / can't deny it, can't pretend / just thought you were the one / broken up, deep inside / but you won't get to see the tears I cry / behind these hazel eyes..."

Kelly Clarkson had me in an out of body experience, looking in from the outside. I heard her words, but they weren't mine. They were coming from my ex's mouth. I closed my eyes and saw her. I saw the moments when she was hurt. Moments when she was side lined. Moments when she was outcast. Moments that I had created. I saw my part in the shit show that was our insane relationship. I was just as toxic as I'd thought she was, if not more. And it was a bolt of lightning that reached to the core of my being; learning that I was capable of evil.

"...You touched my heart you touched my soul / you changed my life and all my goals / and love is blind and that I knew when / my heart was blinded..."

Driving past the desert scenery, looking out at the scattered homes built of mud and straw, at the zebras and antelopes grazing and lolling in the shade to escape the lazy afternoon sun, I watched the last few years I'd lived through stretched out in front of my mind's eye. Parts of it were hidden in shadow, and I would only be able to deal with those hidden sections later, but the large beats were crystal clear. I could almost understand what went on there. And, most important of all, I was ready to let go of a big chunk of it. I was able to finally say goodbye.

"Someday I'm gonna find it, wish I knew what I was looking for / it's such a disarray / I woke up this morning, don't know where I'm going, but it's alright / I wouldn't have it any other way..."

Arriving at the hotel we'd be staying at, I handed back Trey's iPod having gone through a spiritual journey. I don't think he ever knew what that simple act of kindness had done. And there's no way I'm going to tell him. Back home, a week later, I remember downloading a boatload of music from LimeWire and continuing that therapeutic musical journey. There was a lot of healing to be done, but that road trip was where it all started. Thank you, Trey.

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A/N: I'd like to thank the @AmbassadorsUK profile for picking this entry as the winner to 'The Great (and true) British Road Trip' contest.