Dreaming of Daisy

Chapter 8 - Flashback to Gym Class Freshman Year

"Romeo, take me somewhere we can be alone
I'll be waiting, all there's left to do is run
You'll be the prince and I'll be the princess
It's a love story, baby, just say, "Yes"

(Love Story  -Taylor Swift)

James had always been a respectively average athlete. Even still, school gym class was always awkward. A bunch of self-conscious teens stuck together in forced competition. What could be a better self-esteem builder than being pitted against superior athletes in co-ed competition? It is one of the strangest parts of adolescent schooling. Sure, a healthy body, a healthy mind, and all that, but nobody can deny it's a bit weird.

In the final semester of freshman year, James had gym first period. Nothing like putting on a school uniform, only to change into athletic clothes once school started. Then, subsequently put that uniform back on after getting all sweaty, and remain in that gross state for the rest of the day. To make matters worse, it wasn't just a simple matter of changing your clothes, like at home, in the comfort of your own room. You had to change in a roomful of other adolescent dorks, bullies, and jokesters, comparing changing bodies in tight quarters. James absolutely hated locker rooms by his nature as a shy kid. The best thing to do was find a corner and change fast. That was the strategy. Attention was the enemy.

They walked into the gym, and quietly milled around in early morning disorientation. Some kids shot hoops. Some talked in small circles. James stood, arms folded near the bleachers looking over the crowd. He didn't have many friends in gym class, and was no pro in social situations. So he kept to himself mostly. If he was shy, Daisy was a ladybug on the wall. She was huddled among quiet girls, yet looked his way. James didn't quite understand what she was looking at, and didn't think too much into it.

Gym class started with a few warm up laps. It then moved into group stretching. It looked like a communist public square, or a Japanese corporation before work. Students with assigned positions, stood in rows spaced equally apart that stretched across the gym floor. One of the gym teachers led the stretching. While group stretching may not be a staple of the free world, gym classes filled with teenagers respond much better to authoritarian rule, as opposed to a self-guided stretching experience. If the goal of stretching was socializing, then self-guided would have worked fine. But since the goal was stretching, Mr. K. gave no liberties.

As a Catholic school, before political correctness had swept like locust across the county, picking partners was easy. Line up the boys, and line up the girls next to the boys. It was really that simple. The game was badminton, and James was partnered with Riley. She was a basketball player, and together they played well. At least, as far as two freshmen forcibly paired together at 8:30 a.m., can shyly play badminton together.

They rotated through games, and eventually James played Daisy. She wasn't a superstar, but she tried. Despite the skills gap, James was impressed. He just hoped Riley didn't see he was going easy on her. Daisy served to him, and he underhanded it into the net. "Why was she looking at me," thought James? She had a boyfriend according to Matt and Emily. James and Riley won, although the game was closer than it should have been. It was the last game of the period.

They hurriedly turned in their rackets, then went into the locker rooms to change, and lopped on their deodorant. The cloud of deodorizing body spray that seeped out of that locker room was like the cloud that came from three-mile island. It wasn't visible, and supposedly wasn't dangerous, but it made some people uneasy. Some of the more intense gym class heroes wiped the sweat from their brows. James went out and as was custom, sat in the hallway until the bell rang. He sat quietly by himself, studying his English note cards, hoping he would stop sweating before the next period began. Having gym first period was awesome, he thought to himself. He wished he studied more too.

Next up he had a vocabulary quiz, and last night he was playing video games with his neighbor instead of studying. That morning, the bus dropped him off an hour early, and he had talked to Allen while doing laps around the hallway for an hour, again instead of studying. Now he had reached his last chance. The hallway after gym class, while still trying to urge his sweat glands to cease and desist. He shuffled the note cards absently.

Out walked Daisy. She took her blue striped bag off her shoulder and set it on the floor next to two other girls across from him. School uniforms aren't always flattering, but with her it was the exact opposite. She was gorgeous and she didn't even try. Some girls hiked up their skirts, caked on the makeup, and did up their hair. She was just sitting there, with those beautiful blue eyes, staring right at him. James didn't know what to do, so as he met her eyes, he continued to turn his head away. His mind buzzed. He flipped another vocab card.

Did she like him now? Why on earth, would she like me, he thought to himself. She was too pretty. He was too shy, and only talked to her twice. Just like welcome week, and homeroom, he couldn't think of a single word to say to her. High school had quickly taught James he didn't know how to talk to people. He was about as good at gossiping as a priest after confession, more hesitant talking to girls than a bad swimmer in the deep end, and had about as much confidence as a southerner driving in the snow.

He looked up from his note card, and turned his head from left to right, pretending to survey the crowd again. In mid turn, his eyes connected with hers, and as they begged to stay and look longer, his brain panicked and told his head to keep moving along. He was a bit surprised now. She wasn't engaging him with the small arms fire of subtle eyelash fluttering or passing glances. She was firing for effect with full salvos of bunker busting stares. The reasonable thing to do would have been to at least say hello, offer a simple complement, or even a smile. James however, looked back down at his note cards. She had a boyfriend he told himself, and she is way too pretty. And besides, he liked Allie.

He did have a crush on Allie now, but that wasn't why he wasn't talking to Daisy. He was making up excuses. In reality, he was intimidated by her. She was the most beautiful thing to ever look at him. Her rustled dirty blonde hair flowed down over her cheeks. Her blue eyes tore right through him. She was cute, fit, and mind numbingly beautiful. It was like looking at a brand new corvette sitting on the lot, and being afraid to touch it. Or standing at the foot of beautiful mountain before a breathtaking climb.

Eventually the bell rang, and James and Daisy left their duel. English class came and went that day. So did the days of the school year. Daisy continued to look his way, and James continued to let Allie occupy his thoughts. Yet, Daisy was so determined, it almost disturbed him. She didn't say a single word to him, or approach him once. She just quietly looked his way in a determined sort of way for the rest of that semester. As if she were in it for the long haul, and not looking at him as some fleeting crush.

James wasn't sure why he couldn't bring himself to talk with Daisy Tanner that year. He had been immediately drawn to her from the moment he first saw her, but his first few attempts at casual conversation had been a bust. He was a shy kid at heart, but so was she. He didn't think he was anything special, but she didn't carry herself like she was either.

When the Queen calls for you, you put on your nicest pair of pants. When the Powerball is up to a billion dollars, you buy a ticket. When the British Army is coming, you hop on your horse and tell everyone about it. When you're one step away from a giant leap for mankind, you take that step. But here was James, with the prettiest girl in school looking at him, and doing nothing about it. Instead of scoring a game winning touchdown, he was throwing the ball to the other team.

That year, James never did well with the English quizzes, or with Allie. Allen would be crowned the word wizard. A title reverently reserved for the highest test average holder in those English vocab quizzes. He was given a hat that bore more resemblance to a dunce than Dumbledore. Besides the self-fulfilling prize of an expanded vocabulary, he was given a gift card or something. Gym classes also drew to an end and so did Daisy's penetrating stares. He never enjoyed such an enchanting experience in a hallway ever again.

Despite his inexplicable deterrence from speaking to Daisy that year, in his mind things were far from over. James had come around to the idea that Daisy might in fact like him. Even with his preoccupation with Allie, with his mind numbing shyness, and with the close of the year, somewhere deep inside him he knew this was not the end of the race for him and Daisy.  Their legs were tied together on that fateful day, and he wasn't ready to loosen the knot.