Remember Me (On Hold)

v

v.

On Mr. Thompson’s stereo, John Lennon and Paul McCartney are singing the word love over and over. He lowers the volume to let the song fade out, pushes the sleeves of his worn-out beige sweater up to his elbows.

“When I was a kid, my parents used o play ‘All You Need Is Love’ on our record player almost every night,” he says, perched on his desk, looking out at us. “At the time I thought it was just something to dance around to. I memorized the lyrics before I even considered what they meant. It was just a fun to sing along.” He reaches for a stack of papers next to him, and walks in between the rows of desks, handling the papers out to us. “But if you look here at the lyrics, you’ll see that it has many elements of a poem.”

He sets my copy on my table and I look at his wedding band and the little hairs below his knuckles. I wonder what his wife is like, and if they dance around their house at night listening to the Beatles or other bands. I try to imagine their house, how they have it decorated, and I think they probably have lots of plants, and real paintings on the wall painted by the people they’re friends with.

“Ara.” Mr. Thompson smiles at me, interrupting my thoughts.

“Show us one poetic element in this song.”

“Okay,” I say. I read it over quickly, but I’m so worried about taking forever to answer that I don’t really absorb anything.

“If you look at it,” I say, “you’ll see that there is a . . . pattern? Things repeat a lot?”

“Great, repetition. Benjamin, what else?”

“Uh, like a theme?”

“Of what?”

“Love, I guess.”

“Okay. What’s another theme of this song? Ruby?”

I glance at her and wonder if she really got kicked out her old school for making out with a girl. She’s wearing the same black jeans, but today with a light blue shirt with some words on it that I can’t read. She bulky leather bracelets on each wrist and she’s sitting with one elbow on the desk, holding her handout in front of her face.

“Human potential or identity,” she mutters.

“Wonderful,” Mr. Thompson says. He looks at one corner of the ceiling and hums a little bit of the song. He seems to forget where he is for a minute.

Then he returns to us.

He says, “For homework, please choose a song that matters to you. I want you to write a paper that first explains why the song is important to your life, and then analyzes the song’s lyrics as you would a poem. I’ll give you until Friday.”

͌

I’m getting my math book from my locker when Ruby comes up next to me and asks, “Is there anywhere good to eat around here?”

By now, the secret is out—almost all the lockers in the science hall have been claimed. Before school and after school, the hall echoes with locker doors groaning open and slamming shut, with forty people’s voices ringing cell phones and stomping feet. When I glance at Ruby, She’s staring like she did at first day. Her eyes are this clear blue green, surrounded by black smudged makeup.  She’s standing close to me, and it feels strange. Apart from being accosted by Elaine, I haven’t been letting people get near me.

“If you go down Webster” I say, “toward downtown, there are a few places.”

She looks at Harry’s hill stuck at the door of my locker, tilts her head, and squints at it. Then she nods her approval.