A Boy Named Pony - A Sequel to East West Sunset

Chapter Twenty - Betty

The first day Pony returned to school - a Monday - he met me as soon as I stepped off the bus in the morning. I hadn't heard from him all weekend, so I regarded his appearance with delighted surprise. 

"Hi, Pony!" I said. "You're here!"

"Well, sure I am. I've been thinking ever since we talked at the park on Friday," he replied, his voice bright, same as always. "And you know, I think I've been unfair to you lately, brooding and all that. So I'm going to make more of an effort to keep my spirits up, even with this whole draft thing. Sound good to you?"

"Well, that sounds wonderful." I couldn't help from grinning, happy to forget that troubling conversation in the park as just a meaningless fluke. "If you're sure?"

"Why wouldn't I be sure?"

"It's just, I don't want you exhausting yourself pretending to be happy if that's not how you really feel."

He sighed, chuckling lightly under his breath, and reached down to interlace his fingers with mine. "Don't you worry about me."

As heartened as I was by his promise of cheerfulness, I was still a little frustrated that he didn't want to tell me what was really going on. I fought back a frown as I squeezed his hand, pasting an encouraging grin on my face instead. He didn't need my prying right now - no matter that my intentions were good. It was much easier to assure myself that the world was level when his hair was greased back like normal and he had that customary twinkle in his greenish brown eyes.

"I'm not worried. I trust you," I assured him.

He sighed again, a happier sound, knocking me with his shoulder. "I sure do love having you as my girl, Betty Anne!"

The corners of my mouth curled up genuinely this time, and my cheeks felt overly warm as we strolled through the front doors and down the first floor hallway.

I felt heartened and considerably more inspired than I had felt for a while when I walked into first period Art. I even found the energy to flash Mrs. Lane a smile - which she returned, eyes widening almost imperceptibly with surprise - and pulled myself up onto my stool. I had a feeling I was going to get a lot of work done on my collage!

Things are finally looking up, I told myself brightly. My pencils were sharp, the page was empty. I flipped past the collection of dandelion sketches and racked my brain for something to draw. 

As the room filled with other students, the noise level rose steadily, so soon I was distracted by the cacophony of chatter. Notebooks flapped onto the tabletop all around me, pencils were brandished, gossip tossed across the desks like poker chips. For some reason, I felt very tense, and to my dismay, I felt nervousness seize my stomach. My fingers began to tap against the blank sketchbook page.

Maybe ... I would warm up by drawing the pile of books in front of me. Nothing for my collage, just something to get the nervous tremors out of my hands. Yeah, that's a good idea.

My pencil skimmed across the slightly rough paper as I sketched out the straight lines, adding the round curls of the spirals of my notebook as well. 

The shading distracted me from the overwhelming environment for a second. It was soothing to layer the marks of grey over each other, from the perfectly angled edge of pencil lead that I had created from the repeated strokes. I used the side of my pinky finger to blur certain patches together, to soften the contrast between the light and dark sections. It was satisfying, and for a moment, it made sense. This was what I needed to be doing, not be distracted by everything else that was happening. 

Even after Mrs. Lane cajoled everyone to be quieter, though, the trembles didn't leave my hand. My heart was trilling with nervousness as if I were still caught in an overwhelming situation - but that didn't make sense.