The Way I Used to Be

Part 2 – Sophomore Year

IT’S SURPRISINGLY EASY TO completely transform yourself. I had my contacts. I had new clothes that my mom did not help me pick out at Kmart. I had finally figured out my hair, after fourteen years of frizz and headbands. Finally let my bangs grow out, instead of that perpetual in-between state they had been in for years. I pierced my ears at the mall during one of our back-to-school shopping trips, little rhinestone studs that sparkle just enough to be noticeable. Mara got her second holes done before it was my turn, just so I wouldn’t be afraid.

I don’t put on much makeup. Just enough. Lip gloss, mascara. I don’t look slutty or anything, just nice. Just normal. In my normal, fashionable jeans that fit me right. A simple T-shirt and cardigan that doesn’t hide the curves I finally seem to have grown into over the summer. I just look like someone who’s not a kid anymore and can make her own decisions, like someone about to start her sophomore year—someone who’s not hiding anymore.

I slip my new sandals onto my bare feet before I head out the door.

“Oh my Lord!” Mom shouts, pulling on my arm before I can leave. “I can’t believe how beautiful you look,” she squeals, holding me at arm’s length.

“You can’t?”

“No, I can. I just mean there’s something different. You look so . . . so confident.” She smiles as her eyes take me in. “Have a great first day, okay?”

Mara got a ride with Cameron, whom she started hanging out with again toward the end of the summer. So I wait for her on the front steps of the school. People look at me as they pass. It’s strange. I’ve never been seen like this. As a regular person. I test out a smile on this one girl I’ve never seen before. As an experiment. Not only does she smile back, but she even says “hey.”

I spot another lone girl walking up the steps. Just as I’m about to try it on a new test subject, I stop short as she looks up at me, her dark, dark eyes burning against her warm, tanned skin, her black hair shining in the morning sunlight.

“Amanda, hi,” I finally say, taken back by her presence—by the hot sinking feeling her presence leaves in my stomach—by all the memories of the past, of growing up together, of her and Kevin, and Kevin, and Kevin, and Kevin.

Stop, I command my brain.

It can’t quite stop, but it slows down just enough for me to try to smile anyway. Because all of that is in the past, I remind myself. It’s not something I need to think about ever again. And Amanda has nothing to do with it anyway.

“I guess I forgot you’d be going here this year.” Smile.

She moves in close to me, so close I want to back up. And then quietly, but firmly, she hisses, “You don’t have to talk to me.”

“No, I want to—”

“Ever,” she interrupts.

“I don’t—I don’t get it.”

She shakes her head ever so slightly, like I’m missing something completely obvious, and then smiles coolly before shoving past me. I turn around and watch in disbelief as she walks away. I hardly have time to worry about it, though, because the second I turn back there’s Mara, shouting, “Hey, girl!” with Cameron following along behind her. Mara kisses me on the cheek, and whispers in my ear, “You look A-MAZE-ING. Seriously.”

“Hey, Edy,” Cameron says, looking off somewhere past me.

“Hey,” I mumble back.

Mara frowns a little, but she’s used to it by now. Cameron and I are never going to be friends.

“All right, you ready?” she asks me, her face glowing with excitement, her short cranberry hair framing her features perfectly.

I take a deep breath. And exhale. I nod.

“Let’s do this,” she says, locking her arm with mine.

After homeroom, it’s trig, which makes me want to scream already. Then after trig, it’s bio. Stephen Reinheiser is in my class. I can feel him looking at me, staring with his glasses and his fresh haircut and his brand-new clothes—his trying too hard—craning his neck eagerly, begging for me to look up at him when it’s time to pick a lab partner. I quickly turn to the girl next to me and smile, as if to say: I’m friendly, I’m normal, smart—I’d be a great lab partner. She smiles back. And we exchange nods—done. The last thing in the world I need this year is another Columbus project with Stephen Reinheiser. The last thing I need in my new life is a Stephen Reinheiser. When the bell rings, I’m ready to bolt. Because I know he’s dying to say hello and ask me about my summer.

In the hall I hurry to my new study hall. I’ve never had one before because I’d always had band. There were always lessons, practice, rehearsals. Never just free time. As I walk I keep smiling at random people. And most of them smile back. I even thought I noticed a few guys smiling at me first. No, I definitely don’t need a Stephen Reinheiser holding me back this year.

Just as I’m floating along, I hear someone call my name. I stop and turn around. It’s Mr. Krause, my band teacher. Suddenly gravity drags me back down just a little.

“Edy, I’m glad I ran into you. I was really surprised not to see your name on my roster this year. What happened?” he asks, almost looking hurt that I’d dropped out.

“Oh, right. I just—” I search for the words. “I’ve been in band for so long. I just kind of wanted to branch out this year, I guess. Try some new things,” I tell him. He still looks at me like he doesn’t quite comprehend. So I test out my smile on him. And suddenly his face softens.

He nods his head. “Well, I guess I can understand that.” But just then the second bell rings. I open my mouth to tell him that I’m late, but he stops me. “Don’t worry, I’ll sign you a late pass.” And as he scribbles his signature on the slip of paper, he tells me “We’ll miss you. You’re welcome back anytime, you know.”

“Thank you, Mr. Krause.” I smile again.

He smiles back.

This is the way the world works, apparently. I can’t believe I’m only figuring this out now. I wonder, as I walk to my new study hall, if other people know about this. It’s simple really. All you have to do is act like you’re normal and okay, and people start treating you that way.

I arrive at my new study hall late. There’s a buzz of light chatter. Which is good. It’s never easy for me to study if it’s too quiet. I make my way to the front of the room to hand in my late pass.

Then I scan the room for an empty spot as I pace the aisles of desks. I see that guy—Number 12. He sits in the back of the room, at the tail end of a cluster of jock types, wearing his Number 12 jacket. There are no empty seats anywhere. I start to panic as I notice more and more eyes beginning to look up at me, afraid they might see that underneath my new outfit and hair and makeup and body, maybe I’m really not that normal or okay. I start up the next aisle when I hear a voice behind me: “There’s one back here.”

I turn around. It’s Number 12. He clears a stack of books off the top of the desk next to his, and looks up at me. And I actually have to look behind me to make sure he’s really talking to me. This is the same guy who so completely didn’t see me that day last year, he could’ve seriously injured me. He points at me and mouths the word you, with a small lopsided grin.

I walk toward him slowly, half wondering if this is some kind of sick joke to lure me into unfamiliar territory only to do something humiliating, like throw spitballs in my hair. I move into the seat cautiously, trying not to make any noise as I pull out my notebook and pen and planner. I open the planner to today’s date, and make a note: Smile.

“Eh-hem.” Number 12 clears his throat kind of loud next to me.

I just trace my pen over the word, over and over, branching out into designs that outline the letters until they’re barely visible. I consider taking out my trig homework, but that would just upset me, and I’m actually feeling okay—normal, almost.

“Eh-hem-hem.” Number 12 again.

I pivot away from him.

“Eh-hem.” He does it again. “Eh-hem!” I look up, wondering if he’s choking or something. And he’s turned toward me—facing me—smiling.

“Oh,” I say, not really knowing what else there is to say. “What?” I whisper. Maybe he said something to me and I just spaced.

“What?” he repeats.

“Oh. Did you say something?”

“No.”

“Oh, okay.” I start to go back to my doodling.

“I mean, I didn’t say anything,” he whispers.

I look at him. He leans toward me. So I lean toward him slightly and try to listen as hard as I can. That’s when I notice his eyes. They’re this intense brown, so deep it makes me want to just fall all the way into them. “What?” I ask again.

He laughs too loud. His jock people turn around and stare at me for a few seconds before returning to each other. “I said, I didn’t say anything. I was just trying to get your attention.”

“Oh.” I pause. “Why?”

“I don’t know.” He shrugs. “To say hi.”

“Oh. Hi?” I say it like a question, only because I’m really confused about what’s going on here.

“Hi,” he laughs the word.

I look down at my planner. The word “Smile” stares at me through the scribbles. So I look at him again, and give him the smile that had been working for me so far this year. He inches his whole desk closer to me, making a screeching noise against the floor, again drawing the attention of his friends.

“So,” he whispers. “Are you new?”

“New?” I repeat.

“New this year, I mean?” he asks.

“No.”

“Seriously?”

I nod.

“Oh. Wow, okay.” He narrows his eyes at me and turns his head slightly, like he doesn’t quite believe me.

That’s when I realize he has absolutely no idea who I am. No idea I was that girl he nearly ran over in the hall last year. No idea how he grabbed my arm and asked me if I was okay. No idea that I ever existed. And somehow, I really like the way that feels. I smile again.

He smiles back. “What’s your name?”

“E—den.” I almost say Edy but stop myself just in time. “Eden,” I repeat, clearer. Because I can be anyone to this guy. I can truly be this new person. Because he knows nothing different.

“Eden?” he verifies. And it suddenly sounds like the best name in the world.

“Yeah.” I smile. I start sifting through the collection of random facts—these small things that I know about him. Like his name and the fact that he’s a senior and a basketball star and has had previous cheerleader girlfriends. The term scholar-athlete comes to mind. I know who he is, of course; it would be impossible to not know something like that. Like when his name comes up in the morning announcements for leading the boys’ varsity team to victory over blah, blah, blah, or for scoring x number of points in whatever quarter in last night’s game against whomever, I obviously have an image in my head of who it is they’re talking about. But it’s different, somehow, actually sitting next to him.

His eyes meet mine. I’m staring. I look down and think: Chocolate. That’s what his eyes remind me of. I look up again. The color of dark chocolate. And I realize that those small random facts don’t really add up to anything when you’re up close like this. When someone like him is looking at you the way he’s looking at me.

“Josh,” he tells me. And then does something just . . . insane. He reaches across the aisle, extending his hand toward me for a handshake. It seems a little silly, but I raise my hand to meet his. His skin is warm, just like his voice and his eyes and his laugh. It seems like we’re holding each other’s hands for way too long, but he just smiles like there’s nothing weird about this at all.

But then the bell screams. I drop his hand, shocked back into a world not composed solely of this guy’s chocolate eyes. I gather my things quickly so I can get out of there, because I don’t know what just happened—what’s happening. I don’t know if it’s scary or exhilarating. I don’t dare look back at him. I rush for the door.