Stuck on the Puzzle ; a. irwin [coming soon]

ENTRY 2

August 15, 1992

I saw my friends again, since the end of classes at the beginning of summer. My friend Michael (he's the closest one to me out of all my friends) returned from visiting family in Ohio.

We asked him what he did during our breakfast period at school, and he explained that it was boring there. His grandmother didn't have a television or a walkman for his cassettes. He said he spent his time there reading his dad's old high school books to kill time.

My friend Luke had gone out of town to visit his older brother and his wife like they do every year. They go on this road trip around the state (California. His mom worries that something might happen to them if they go out to places their not familiar with) and go sightseeing. He said it stopped being excited after the fourth time they visited the same monuments they visit every year.

He always brought back something for all of us. He brought me film for my camera this time. Last summer, he had brought me a record and two cassettes. I always feel bad about it because I know it must have cost him a lot of money,

Calum, another one of my friends, "didn't do much this summer." he told us. He said he spent his summer doing nothing but watching television and going swimming in various lakes outside our town.

It seemed as if I was the only one that didn't leave the town or the state. Melroad isn't much unless you count the school's football team. There's only one high school in the town, and the football team causes quite the uproar when we win games with teams from other neighborhoods in the county.

My friends asked me what I did during the weekends, but I didn't know what to say. Their summer experiences were much better than mine.

"Oh, I just, uh, I stayed home. My mom didn't want to go anywhere this summer." I said. My mom didn't want to go anywhere this summer just like last summer, and the summer before that.

"You didn't do anything?" Michael asked.

"Relax guys; he probably went to the movies like four times a week. I heard Violet was working there over the summer," Calum said as he gulped down the last bit of water in the bottle he had bought earlier today.

My friends laughed at Calum's joke, and I lightly nudged him with my elbow, "I didn't go to the movies that much." That was a lie. "Besides, I told you guys I don't like her."

"Are you serious? Everyone likes her, Ashton, have you seen her?" Luke interjected, "You'd be lying to yourself if you said otherwise."

"I don't like her," Michael said.

Calum tossed Michael his bottle, hitting the pale boy in the shoulder with the plastic bottle, "That's because you're still not over Sam. You guys broke up at the beginning of June. She has a new boyfriend, Michael, move on."

"Jason isn't her boyfriend. He's her step-brother. That'd be disgusting. Besides, she said she wanted a break. We're on a break. We didn't break up," he said.

"I think she doesn't feel the same, Michael." I said, "You guys literally knew everything about each other. The relationship must have been annoying. Just be glad you guys are still friends."

And so we spent the entire breakfast period talking about how Michael's relationship with his childhood friend Samantha Harmon was bound to end, although they were adorable while it lasted.

Soon after the bell rang, we found ourselves walking to our first period with our schedules in our hands. We all went in different directions. Luke was a sophomore, so he had to leave us early, taking the second hallway instead of the third with the rest of us. We only saw him during lunch after this until after school later today.

Calum and Michael have first-period together, and like last year, we only had third-period study hall with the three of us together. I'm a senior, and they're juniors. Michael had two honor periods, but his classes were always after mine. Calum was in my AP English class, but that was it.

I held my backpack close as I walked down the hall towards my first period. It was elective; creative writing and I was one of the first people to enter the classroom.

Ms. Park was my teacher again, and she was happy to see me returning to creative writing this year as she recommended. She was more delighted, however, to see Violet enter the classroom. I didn't blame her, I was delighted too.

Violet was holding someone's hand, and as soon as she pointed towards her seat, the boy let her hand go and kissed her cheek in a rushed manner.

The smile on my face that I had when my eyes first landed on her faltered when I saw him kiss her. Her cheeks were flushed, and her pale skin turned a dark shade of pink. She kept picking at her black nail polish until the boy exited the classroom and waved goodbye.

I tried to look anywhere, but at her, so I averted my attention to the floor. I noticed her shoes, and how they were a new pair. They weren't the same ones as my own anymore, and instead of them being completely black, covered by white ink with song lyrics, they were a new pair of black shoes with a small heel at the end of them.

She was wearing her green army jacket, but her hair wasn't hanging by her ears or covering her eyes. Her hair was pulled into two loose ponytails, and her band shirt didn't have any holes anymore. She wore a plain white t-shirt.

I saw her approach me, and I quickly ducked my head, so I was staring at the cold wood of my desk. She took the seat behind me, her name written on a sticker on the top right corner of the bureau, the sides already beginning to lose its stick.

I was happy to see her but less glad to see him. It was only a matter of time, however, because a girl as beautiful as Violet shouldn't and wouldn't be alone. It seemed as if every boy in class was surprised, if not startled to see that she was no longer available.

The boys already in a relationship last year were no longer seeing anyone because they wanted a chance with Violet and the kids who weren't were holding onto any little shred of hope they had that convinced them they could be with her. (CORRECTION: they wanted to hook up with her. She wouldn't let them, but not because she was religious, but because she knew she didn't owe them shit).

I must have been daydreaming or contemplating for quite some time now because it wasn't until I felt someone poke my back that I turned around.

"Sorry, you looked like you were in deep thought, but, uh, I wanted to ask if you had a pencil that I could borrow. I seemed to have forgotten mine," She said. It was Violet, and she was playing with the corners of the sticker that didn't appear to stick to her desk anymore.

"Yeah, I do," I said, and without thinking, I handed her the pencil I had out in front of me.

"Thank you," She said, the corners of her mouth tilting into a smile. "I'll give it back at the end of class."

I nodded, and turned around again, facing the board, and, essentially, Ms. Park, as she explained what this semester of creative writing would be like.

I don't really remember much of what happened after that, but Violet did return my pencil, and just before the bell rang too. She held a copy of The Catcher in the Rye tightly in her arms, and her gray Walkman was sticking out from the pocket of her green army jacket. I could hear the sound of Nirvana's In Bloom from her walkman's earphones.

She must have noticed that I could hear her music, and she offered me one of the earphones. I wanted to decline, but when I tried, she pressed the little black ear bud into my right palm.

For the last four minutes of class, we listened to In Bloom together, and when the bell rang, I handed it back. She left first, her new boyfriend snaking his arms around her small waist as she opened her locker not far from Ms. Park's class.

Calum stood next to me and patted my shoulder as we passed by them and headed towards AP English.

I have never been this happy and this sad at the same time ever, and I'm still trying to figure out how one girl could make me feel this way.

Sincerely, Ashton