Being at school but not with Cris seems surreal, I see her walking through the halls and I know she turns to look at me too but she keeps her distance, we run into each other at the lockers a couple of times still without saying anything and I let her cut in front of me at lunch where she smiles at me without saying a word, we avoid each other when its time to leave school and not text each other for the rest of the day; I get to my house, close my bedroom door and browse Cris’ Instagram until its time for dinner and then sleep.
And so, Tuesday goes by complicated, hard, tiring… but its nothing compared to what Wednesday would be like. Wednesday starts just like the day before and keeps on being like that… until its time for Lit class.
I walk into the classroom just before the bell rings in hopes that my usual seat will be taken by that time, but its not. I walk into the classroom and there she is, in our bench in the corner of the classroom and she is sitting by herself looking at the door probably hoping I will actually come to class this time. I sit next to her and poke her leg to make her stop moving it, I am doing my best to stay calm as it is and Cris jumping her leg is not helping at all. Thankfully, she does stop moving her leg and she turns her head slightly in my direction, without actually looking at me fully, just enough so that I can see a small smile meant for me and, then, she looks back just as fast.
“Hello kids.”
Pedro walks in and closes the door behind him, he walks to the front of the classroom providing me the perfect distraction from staring at Cris’ profile.
“I hope you all have the assignment I asked on Monday because we will be reading them out loud today.”
Homework? Fuck. I have no idea what he’s talking about but out of the corner of my eye I can see Cris opening her binder and taking out a sheet of paper folded in half.
“I will be calling you one by one so you can read your poems in front of the class.”
Poems? Well, I guess I can try writing one on the spot.
“Joana, can you come here for a moment?”
I look up at Pedro and then I turn to look at Cris, who is still looking down at her binder, I stand up and walk to Pedro’s desk looking back just once and I catch Cris looking at me.
“Yeah?”
“You didn’t come to class on Monday.”
“I expect your poem for Monday, okay? No later than that.”
“Alright.”
Pedro sends me one final warning look and signals me to go back to my seat.
“Alright” Let’s begin.”
He starts calling everyone inverting the order in the assistance list, starting at the bottom and making his way to the first one, and I sit back in my hair, legs stretched out and I try my best to get a glimpse of what Cris has written but she’s basically lying on top of her binder and I can’t see a thing.
