First date, Part 1

It was May, I remember, and for Colorado, it was very green. The city smelled like dead cows and pigs, which wasn't very strange. The bright white-yellow ball of the sun burnt everything into a soft haze of happiness -- summer was close. It was so close we couldn't just taste it, we were practically eating it.

This was the atmosphere I should have known to avoid. Spring and summer, as most people know, are very dangerous times. You get the right types of people together, and they start thinking things and being sneaky, you know? But I really had no idea that I should have been more specific when talking to Kadey about Brad*. It's not really something you consider, when faced with the idea that the RA might have a crush on you. You don't think, 'Hm, I should be sure to be very clear, so nothing awkward happens.'

No. You think, 'Nothing will ever happen; he doesn't actually like me. Even if I were sure if I liked him...nah. Not possible.' That's what you think. Silly you.

So at the end of April, a week or two before finals started, when Kadey and I were hanging out in my room talking about our ridiculous roommates, I let her see the totality of my confusion.

"We're just really great friends," I said to open the conversation. First mistake, obviously. Classic. Kadey grinned at me.

"That's what they all say before they fall in love," she said. I whacked her with a book.
"Shut up. I mean, really. We just hang out and stuff. I don't think I like him."
"You don't think you like him?" I opened my mouth but no sound came out.

"He's really nice," I said, finally, and with only a little conviction. I suddenly felt as though I did like him, immensely, but the thought terrified me and seemed false. Kadey raised an eyebrow at me and looked down at the homework in her lap, pretending to work on it. "Oh shut up," I said, knowing what she was thinking. She tucked her short brown hair behind an ear and grinned like a second-grader.

"What're you gonna do when he confesses his love for you?" she asked. I scoffed. The nerve of her.
"Brad is not going to confess his love for me. I just happen to be the only sane girl in this whole dorm," I said. "Besides you, of course. But you don't talk to boys." This time I was the one who had to dodge a book, and I did so while laughing.
"I do too! I just only talk to the intelligent ones. Plus Brad doesn't think I'm pretty like he thinks you are," she said. She had to have been taunting me. I rolled my eyes and chose not to say anything in reply. The conversation continued in much the same vein, and in the end I was more unsure of whether I really liked Brad or not, or if the thought of Damien not being there was messing me up.

Damien was...that boy. That one that you think about all the time even though you hate yourself for it. He was charming and detested it. He was cooler than me, so of course I was charmed. But he was gone, and Brad wasn't. I did eventually stop dreaming about Damien, but in this moment, I thought I could never truly like someone like Brad with Damien's promise lurking in the air:
"I'll be back this summer."

A week after talking to me, Kadey was hanging out with the RAs at the coffee shoppe. She didn't tell me where she was; I'm pretty sure I was chilling with Jack or Lilie or both. Who knows. So I didn't find out anything about the following until after what happened after the next thing. The coffee outing was apparently spontaneous, and in the midst of the other RAs, Brad nudged Kadey with his elbow and bent his head down to say something in a low sort of voice.

"Hey, so, I was wondering. Does Genevieve... I mean... do you think she would go out with me?"
"Are you asking me to ask her?" Brad, I guess, had smiled at this point, as he briefly considered the suggestion.
"No," he said. "I just wanted to, you know, make sure." The other RAs turned and paid attention. Alexis had heard my name and motioned for the others to pay attention. Everyone knew that Kadey was my best friend on campus. She (of all people) would know if I had a crush on Brad or not. I like to imagine that at this point, Kadey paused and gathered her thoughts before saying anything. I like to think that she took her time, drawing the possibilities out into the air with her loaded silence.

"You're going to ask her out?" she asked.
"I think so," Brad said. Maybe he was watching his fingers, maybe he was looking into Kadey's eyes.
"You could ask her to coffee," Kadey said. Alexis agreed. Even thinking about it now, coffee is such a good first date. Public place, everyone likes drinking things, and they have a bathroom. I really can't think of anything better.

Finals came and went; I honestly don't remember them, it was so many years ago. And then came the final day of everything, and we were all being kicked out of the dorm. My clothes and books and piles of junk were stuffed into boxes and squished into my mom's van next to the conversation starter chair and my cylindrical pillows. I hugged Jack and Kadey and a couple of others and waved and said I'd see them when we moved into our house in August, and then my mom drove me to the Humanities building to pick up my French final.

I was planning to be out of the vehicle such a short time that I left the door open. Two minutes later I plopped back into the seat and dropped the stapled pages onto the floor. "Your phone rang while you were gone," my mom said. "I didn't answer it."
"Oh," I said when I saw that Brad had called. "I must have forgotten something. Wait a sec, we might have to go back to the dorm." Silly girl, I can say that now that I look back on it. I held my hand out toward her, letting it over in the air while I listened to the message.

"Hey, Genevieve, it's Brad. Um, I just wanted to talk to you, and yeah, call me back." It was very short. I couldn't figure out why he had called, so I pushed the call button, found his name, and soon it was connecting. Beep. Beep. Beee-

"Hi."
"Hey," I said. "Did I forget something in my room?"
"Oh, uh, no. I actually... well... I was wondering, now that I'm not your RA, if you would wanna go out to coffee sometime?" I couldn't help it, one of my hands clapped itself to my mouth and wouldn't move. I smiled, hugely, and at first forgot I was supposed to say something. This boy really didn't lose any time.
"I...sure," I said, remembering a conversation I'd had with Lilie a few months before about just giving guys at least a first date, it took them so much courage sometimes to just ask. We kind of felt like we owed it to them for being so brave. Or stupid. "Yeah, that'd be cool."

"OK, awesome," he said. I could hear him smiling. "So...how about next Monday? I can drive down to you."
"Cool. Sure, that'd work fine. See you then." He said goodbye and hung up, and I snapped my phone shut and looked at my mom. She wasn't looking at me. "I'm going to coffee with Brad on Monday," I said.
"Brad-the-RA Brad?"
"Yup."
"Really."
"Yup."
"You like him?"
"Uh... I'll figure it out later?" I laughed, feeling a little giddy. I couldn't stop smiling. Suddenly I really did like him, and it was amusing that he had waited maybe two minutes after un-becoming my RA before asking me out. That was worth something, right?



*Names changed, of course. It's more fun that way.

Mort de francais

Walking into the small library where the ceremony was going to be was like walking into an international party in which no one knew what they were supposed to be doing. Rather, that's exactly what it was. The group of French graduates was small, and the library was even smaller. Of the French majors graduating -- there were seven or eight of us -- only three had shown up. It was combined with the Classics department to add a few more bodies to the entire thing.

I came in wearing my black gown over my dress, but once there for a few minutes I took it off. Only the three Classics graduates were wearing their caps and gowns, and who wants to look like one of them, anyhow? Maybe I shouldn't make fun of them too much; I did take a semester of Latin once upon a time in high school...

So we entered and no one really did anything. The cliques stood in their circles and stared at eachother, and every once in a while one of them would venture a glance at the table in the middle of the room, whose aroma of colors was enticing everybody. The food in the middle of the room was calling my name, too. Marshmallows, hors d'oeuvres, fondue, strawberries...it was all just sitting there, waiting. But no one was eating any of it; none of us were sure if it was open to eat or not.

Then one of the Dean dudes (no idea what his name is, oh well) told us to hurry up and start eating. Can I just say, fondue is awesome? Melting delicious things and pouring them on top of other delicious things is rather a brilliant idea, if I do say so myself. And I do.

Of all the moments that happened after trying to look like I wasn't hoarding food, I believe my favorite was the instant the French Dean dude informed us that he wanted the graduates to tell the room about our senior capstone theses. Hm. The Classics Dean dude had known everything about his students--where they were from, where they were going, that sort of thing. You can imagine how much his French Dean dude counterpart knew about me, considering that I still don't know his name.

After he announced that he'd like us all to share about our papers, I glanced around the room and found my acquaintances, whose faces were suddenly in contortions of pain, fear, and a little bit of annoyance. It was a little silly; they'd only written 15 pages or so on their respective topics, and there I was, 45 pages floating somewhere in my mind, and they had the nerve to pretend to complain. I glanced at the list of alphabetical graduates in my hand. I would be second to speak, and with this in mind, I gathered my thoughts as succinctly as possible.

All I did next was lift my chin, square my shoulders, and speak a little above my normal volume. Apparently the effect was commanding, because the whispered side conversations stopped and everyone I looked at was looking right back at me. Does this mean that I'm a good public speaker? Maybe. Think of it this way: I like showing off, and being praised. I'm trying very hard not to brag. And now this blog has turned completely away from my intent of telling stories. Well, I mean, minor intent, anyways.

Before we left I rethanked my French advisor/prof for helping me this past semester. She told my dad that I was a hard worker. Thinking about that thesis now....well...let's just say that I'm ecstatically happy that it happened. Emphasis on the past tense.

Now

Now that it has been decided that I'm not getting honors, I'm finding it more than difficult to actually sit down and finish my paper. I just rewrote a few introductory paragraphs, one for each of my four-ish sections, and now...oh, now. Now I need to just finish the lot.

It's funny, a week and a half ago, I was in terrifying freak-out mode. I was scaring my friends and family, I'm pretty sure. I couldn't be awake without spending almost every moment thinking about my paper, and what I had left to do, and how much time a day I had to spend on it to keep the world from combusting. And now... It's like in the Bible, when people were kept from seeing things, and suddenly they were allowed to see and understand them, and it says, "And the scales fell from his/her eyes..."

I seem to have lost my scales, but I don't know that I'm going to go looking for them. I'm having quite the difficulty remembering a time when I really enjoyed writing my thesis. I love research (I'm good at it) and I love writing (again, small, albeit subjective, talent). But it seems that writing in English and writing in French have only the use of words in common. I should have known that. It was always so frustrating in France trying to explain things. Simple things like the story of my life, to complicated things about my emotions, were blown so completely and amazingly out of proportion that they became indistinguishable from near insanity.

So I should have known that French was going to kick my... butt. And I suppose God did try to tell me. It was hard enough convincing Elise to be my thesis adviser and to let me do credits over the summer. I can't even begin to explain the other hoops I had to jump through to find a committee. It was stressful even from Day One. And now... less immediate stress, I guess. I find myself hovering above a creepy pool of dampened emotions. I know they're there. They always are, no matter how much I try to ignore them.

I don't care to know exactly what is in the pool, but I have a feeling that if something else not-so-happy happens, I'm going to splash right in and be forced to find out how deep it really is. That's the now. The later, well, I'll worry about that later. Rather, I'll not worry about it later, because I'm tired of worrying. I'm tired of pushing myself to my limits. Just because Michaux did it (the subject of my thesis), doesn't mean I have to. I used to think that at least creatively, I was a little like him. He pushed himself, he wrote strange things that only a few truly loved. But he was trying to break himself up, pouring fragments of himself into an abyss that he imagined was in his mind.

Now I know better.
Why did I enjoy this past summer and all the work I did? I was spending 2 to 4 hours every morning after my run writing a story about a girl named Aralie who saves a dying magical forest.

"It's not honors, but..."

I had a birthday this week. I'm old and young now, and it's actually the first time in years that it actually occurred to me that I am no longer 19 or 20. It's strange how that pseudo-teenage feeling stuck around for so long. Wishful thinking, perhaps? Who knows.

I had a meeting with my thesis advisor on that day. It was a busy day with work and going to the photo lab to turn in other homework, and when I got to her office, there was another student in there, also talking about some sort of thesis. Her French is beautiful, I thought to myself. Much more refined than mine. I waited, slightly awkardly. My insides churned a little; the deadline for my thesis is very soon, it should be done, but life, as I should have known, never runs the way I want it to. I'm not done.

I peered in the crack of the door, debating. Knock? Loud cough? I knew whoever was in there also needed the time to talk. I didn't technically have to talk to my advisor right away. Twenty minutes of stepping up to the door, lifting my hand and hesitating went by much quicker than I thought they would. Then suddenly they switched to English, talking about some format changes, and I heard my advisor exclaim that she'd forgotten about her other appointment: me. The door was yanked open and her head was there, just at my level, and I tried my best to grin and not look exhausted. "You should have knocked, or something!"

"Désolée," the other student said when she left, smiling conciliatorily at me. I shrugged. "Ben, ça va." I went inside and put my bag and waterbottle down on one end of the gold couch. It hugged my legs and sucked me down, making it hard to sit up straight. My shoulders squared, we began. The format was better, the phrasing had improved. Little things, all of them, but together it was a huge improvement. Ten minutes, fifteen, twenty, and then she leaned back in her chair and said, "I spoke with Chris Braider this week."

I nodded. I took a Lit Theory class with him a while ago. Pseudo-atheistic Quaker who grew up in Ireland and went to Trinity College. One of the best profs, and the most fascinating, I've had. He's now the French Honors Department chair.
"I wanted to check on the deadlines with him; I've been concerned with our speed of progress." The final copy is due on October 27. Defenses must be made by November 6. "But we spoke and no matter what happens, you'll be able to graduate."
I cocked my head, probably also squinting a little. "What do you mean?"
"If you truly only have until the 27th or 28th, we don't have enough time. We still have to correct the French." My advisor raises her eyebrows in that French way, making my insides churn once again. I feel for an instant like I'm about to hit the floor, but it passes and I smile. "I can do it," I hear myself saying.

"Well no matter what, if we do not make the deadline, Chris says you may present your paper as a senior essay. It's not honors, but..." she trails into oblivion, which also seems to be where I am going.
"But we can still try?"
"Of course. We will still work toward honors. And if it doesn't happen, well, it was just honors." I laugh a little, like the sad thing she just said was a joke about my life, which I suddenly realise it was. She laughs too, caught in the same sort of realisation. I look at her, and at the large calendar behind her. Dates and weeks twist in my head.
"So you don't think I have enough time?"
"Not if the date is truly the 27th, no. But..."
"I'll call tomorrow and double check."
"Ok," she says, looking at me strangely. I can't tell if it's pity or a milder sentiment. "Let's keep in touch, then, let me know what you find out."
"Of course. And I'll work this weekend using this new draft for a foundation."
"Good. Well, bon week-end!"
"Merci! A vous aussi."

I leave, she locks her door behind us, pausing to wave a little. I don't know if she's just waiting a while so we don't have to awkwardly walk down the stairs together, or if she is really going the other way, but it doesn't matter. I catch my breath, stop for a second in a dark corner, and breathe out. I feel sick and thirsty. Laughing, I shake my head and head down the stairs, focusing on the sound of my flats slapping the treated concrete. No one else is in the stair well, and the lump in my throat is getting larger. By the time I get down the three floors to the doors leading outside, I can barely swallow, and I'm hiding well behind my black sunglasses.

A girl looks at me strangely; she is entering the building through the door next to mine as I leave. I look back at her, about to challenge, when I realise my cheek is wet. I toss my head and lift my chin, at least superiority is easy to assume behind disks of anti-light. Fixing my cheek is easy; going to pick up my check from work and joking with my co-workers is the hard part.