Last night I got inspired to read back in my seventh grade journal to get a sense of just how awkward things were. I found the following entry. It's a little embarassing, but also pretty amusing. So I figured, what the hell? I don't know you people anyway. Everything is copied word for word from my journal except for what's in parentheses. (And names, of course.)
2/14/02
So, Valentine's day. The most uncomfortable day of the year. This morning Jessica arrived at the bus stop with a giant card about half her size. On the front, it said, "Want to know how much I love you?" and on the inside was a giant teddy bear with it's arms outstretched and a banner saying "this much." Jessica in in 6th grade and has a boyfriend. I'm not sure how THAT works.
Anyway, I got to school and paced around the hallways. I SHOULD get something for Tom. But #1, I didn't have the guts, and #2, I didn't buy anything. I could MAKE something, I thought, but would that be too wierd? And I could steal some candy from the guidence office. No, that's stupid. I ended up grabbing a piece of paper and cutting out a slightly lopsided heart. Then I decorated it really fast and wrote inside, after lots of consideration, "Be my valentine. I hope I'll see you at the dance." I erased that and wrote it back a few times before I realized that that was as good as it was going to get. I tried to put my name, but somehow I couldn't. So I wrote, "I don't think I even need to say who this is. I'll give you three guesses." Then I folded it back up and jammed it inside my purse.
Throughout the day people had all kinds of wierd things that they were carrying around. A lot of people had candy necklaces. Others had cards or the remnants of candy. Some people also had magnetic kissing bears. Janelle Littlefield had kissing pigs. I wonder where one finds those. I got stuff from Emma and Amy, who were giving them to everyone they even knew. And then, before lunch, Tom just stopped me in the hallway, handed me a card and a plastic bag, and said "Happy Valentine's day."
I don't think I've ever had the particular emotion I had there. I might have been happy, but it was hard to tell. My hearing was blurred, I could no longer feel my legs, and my sight was gone altogether as I walked down the hallway. Maybe I was skipping or something. I don't know. All I know is that when my sight returned I was downstairs at my locker. In the plastic bag were those little candy hearts. The front of the card was a 16th century-looking guy with little hearts all over the floor around him. He's writing on one and saying "A rose by any other... Drat! These things are tiny!" and the caption is "Shakespear's first failed career: Candy heart writer." I think that's hilarious. On the inside in moderately legible handwriting, it says:
Happy Valentine's Day Aidan. I wanted to get you a card that said something, so this one says, "enjoy the candy." I don't want to write too much because I'll start to babble like an idiot, so again happy Valentine's Day. -T. Rousseau
(Honest to God, that's how he signed it.)
This time I could definately tell I was happy. I was happy for about 30 seconds, and then some little voice inside my brain goes "You idiot! You didn't get him anything! You can't give him that card in person!" Then I was happy on and off for the next period or so. I read it over and over again. Then slowly reality dawned on me. I had to do something about it. But what could I possibly do? I didn't really think of anything, but passing him in the hallway, I said, "Are you going to the dance?"
"Yeah."
"Oh, me too! So maybe I'll see... you... or something," I mumbled as I walked right by. It seems like my confidence just randomly falls out from under me sometimes.
So I went to the dance. For a while I just hung around with Cassandra and Jenn Dooley while loud music played. We had to yell just to hear each other. Everyone kept asking me if I was going to dance with Tom. I said maybe. Then all of a sudden the DJ says, "Okay, first slow song - ladies' choice." And, well... I don't know what came over me. I figured, "Hey, it's now or never." So I walked up to Tom, tapped him on the shoulder, and said, "Do you wanna dance?" As soon as I said that, I thought, "Oh God! What did I do THAT for? He's going to say no! Even worse, he's going to say yes! And then what the hell am I going to do?" My stomach had wings.
He said, "Uh - okay. I'm probably bad at it."
So we just stood there, not doing anything. We waved our hands around a little, not knowing where to put them or what to do with our feet or whether it was too late, or what.
"Um... What do we do now?" I said finally.
"I have no idea." So then we just started laughing. Really hard.
"That was really embarassing," I said.
"Okay, let's just forget it ever happened," he said. We were both still hysterical. I walked out into the hallway and started to bang my head against the wall. Only once or twice, and not real hard. But I still felt like a moron.
Jenn came out after a while. "What... In the HELL... was THAT?!" This sent me off again laughing, even though at the same time I felt like crying. "Why did you even come here if you don't know how to dance? It's not even that hard! Alright. Do you like him?"
"Well - yeah," I said.
"And does he like you?"
"Well... I guess... I dunno. He gave me a card for Valentine's Day."
"Of COURSE he likes you you dolt! You like him and he likes you - do you know how RARE that is?"
"I hope not as rare as you think, or I'm -"
"It's VERY rare! I cannot believe this. I seriously envy you. And YOU can't even dance with him."
Well, for the next dance we got a little "help" from Cassandra and Sam Thompson. Then instructed us on how to do it the right way, and then assured us that "no one was watching." So we kind of lightly held onto each other and stepped back and forth, going nowhere. Sam stepped in again, saying "don't hold her SHIRT you idiot!" He adjusted both our grips and then assured as again that no one was watching. We moved back and forth some more.
"Look at them," I said, nodding over to where Justin Yu and Sarah Birmingham were swaying, both looking quite happy and comfortable. "It looks like they're BORN with it."
"...I mean, we could just do what they're doing. It can't be that hard."
"Yeah. We'll just do it like them." For about forty seconds we got a little more rhythmic and hugging before we stopped. Immediately, "No one" turned around and said, "Hey! What'd you stop for?"
"Well," said Tom, "It's no fun when no one's watching."
I chickened out for the last dance. So I just walked out into the hallway and stood against the wall where all the boys who got rejected stood. It wasn't on purpose, it was the only wall there! David Garret came out and starting talking to Greg Odechowski. "You didn't ASK her?" said David. Greg shook his head. "Alright - I have three words for you: 'Pathetic.'"
Greg looked up and raised an eyebrow. "Dude - That's one word."
David thought about it for a while, then said, "Oh yeah. Well, I could have said, 'You're pathetic.' That would have been two words."
"Or 'You are pathetic,'" I jumped in. "That's three."
They looked over at me.
"Okay, I'm not a loser. I WAS dancing with someone, but I decided not to this time," I said, mostly to reassure myself.
"So you chickened out," said Dave.
"Yeah," I said.
"Well, join the club," the kid muttered into his knees. And that's the way the night left most people: chickens or losers. But I did dance. And Jenn's right. I like Tom, and he likes me, and that should count for something.
I read the card about a million times when I got home, even though I'd memorized it. I needed the handwriting - the exact puntuation... So I could hear his voice.
This IS pathetic. And I'm going to have to put up with it for the rest of my life.
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