The heart of the ocean

🌌...See you again...🌌

First day of high school:

Finally I feel free, free to fly, to get on the carousel of my life. I will touch my star in the darkest days, and I will shine like a shooting star. Make a wish, hold my hand. And even though it's winter let's lie down on this sand dust, let's mirror ourselves in these dark waters, hoping that our soul reflects our appearance, waiting to grow old without ever forgetting nothing.
Fuck I woke up late... I have to run straight to school or I won't get there on time...

Mom: Mary come on, wake up, wake up... Run to school now that you are late. Here, drink some tea and eat some honey bread.

I: Mom no, I can't... I only eat a slice, but I have to run.

Mom: okay, so are you excited?

John : hei Mary good morning, how are you?! excited, excited ehhh....?

I: good morning John, yes I'm excited, now I go to high school too, now that Frank has gone to London to study at the university maybe in a few years I will go too...

John: I don't think this school is for you.

Mom: Stop! Don't say these things... Feel Mery don't be discouraged , now go that you are already late. Come here that I give you my blessing.

I: Mom pray for me, and that everything goes well.

Mom: God help you, and that hear my prayers.

John: give anyway good luck, see you when you come back, at most I'll make the wrap you like.

I: thank you, ah... remember to put some chili pepper and some slices of speck, please.

John: I am the chef in this house.
I: oh fly down, that here the chef is daddy.

Mom: come on, don't get lost in conversation, and don't get lost yourself.

John: but like ... hahahaha.... Imagine you if she don't remember the road , at most passes from the "Ipercoop" to eat a nice ice cream and then enters school hahahahha...

Mom: let's not start with this stuff, guys.

I: calm mom...

John: come on, you don't have to be a saint, now you'll learn so many things you don't even know. You're going to grow up a lot, you're going to become a big person.

I: it's okay now but so you're making me anxious. It's only the first day of school, I've been through so much you want it to be, it will never be worse than what I've been through... It's called the past for a reason, because I'm gonna be okay and I'm gonna pursue my dream, and I'm gonna show middle school teachers who I really am.

John: yes yes yes, walk...

I: Chuck (closing door) Fuck the bus is coming, I see it's there, fortunately the traffic light it's red, if I run faster I can reach it. Uf,uf,uf.... How much wheezing, do not close the door please.....
Oh finally inside.
I have to sit, or my head will start to spin. Wait, how many stops are? 3,4,5?
(I couldn't remember... Maybe it was the anxiety, or the too hot, even if we were in September.)
Once found the destination, I got off the bus and I ran like crazy to the school door. There were so many guys, I was pretty embarrassed, I felt so small when I saw the others of the fifth year with those cigarettes in their hand... Most of them were in company, but I had gone alone, there was no one with me. Once the bell rang, the various secretaries opened the gates and then the various entrance doors.

Only the guys of the first year got in, this for not crowd the corridors. I was so excited, climbing the stairs like I was on a catwalk, like I was the star of something that was about to start. I felt in the spotlight, maybe because I was finally chasing my dream and I was so close to it at the beginning. Suddenly, though, I stumbled through one of those bloody steps in the hall, I got up right away, I hoped no one had seen me, I didn't want everyone to start laughing at me, I had already suffered too much in previous years, I had enough of that. Once we entered, we all went to the auditorium where the classes would be assigned.

I didn't know where to sit, that auditorium was so big, it was like a big amphitheater, with various lofts. Red seats, floor and green walls. It was like the Scala of Milan . In the distance I saw Katty, she nodded at me, and waved her hand like it was a flag, the flag of my finish line...

I approached her making room between the legs of the various students already sitting. She greeted me, and she said: "Maria, so you’re here, I thought I’d never see you again."

I: "Yes, I finally did it, despite everything.... Good thing I met you, I thought I’d be alone all day. So you’ve already decided, will you do French, German and English?"

Katty: "Yeah, we’re not going to the same class, I never liked Spanish, you know... I didn’t even study it in middle school."

I: "I remember, so how did you spend your vacation?"

Katty: "I went to Egypt a few days after finishing the exam, you know there are my grandparents there, then my father had to worry about work things. He’s wasn't making as much money as he was at the butcher shop, so he thought about opening something down there..."

Me and my family used to go to buy meat from him, being our food composed mainly of it. My brothers always liked it, but I didn’t like it so much, maybe because of the fact that since I was a little girl with big tonsils I couldn’t swallow it, every time it was as if I was suffocating. It was almost suicide, so even though I feel better now, I still have this trauma.

His father made a lot of money, perhaps also because we always went to him, several times a week.

I: "Well come on, the important thing is that you finish high school here, maybe then you can join him in the next few years. For now you could stay with your mum and your brothers."

Katty: "Yes, but it’s not as simple as you think, my mother is alone, she would never be able to handle us all, many times I have to act like a mother to my younger brothers being the largest of the females in the family..."

I: " What about your older brother?"

Katty: "He is a man, I am a woman..."

I didn’t understand what it meant, I was used to seeing everyone with the same identical light, I didn’t notice differences in appearance, in the way I dressed, I put man and woman at the same level, in the color of skin, I was wrong... I was wrong, black sheep in a white flock, all sheep late at night, angels and devils in the sunlight. So I remained silent thinking about what it might mean.

Katty: I have to tell you something.
Did you hear what happened to Tashick?"

I: "No, did he recover? Poor, after all those cortisone ignetions... I remember he was a bit swollen in his face, I don’t know if all the medicines he takes are good for him, after all even the school stress didn’t help him, in my opinion they should had to give him the chance to take the exams at another time of year..."

Katty: "Well, however, the fact of give him the possibility to follow the lessons from the hospital, was a great thing. Led him to forget his illness, at least psychologically .... But that’s not what I wanted to tell you... Maria, look that..."

I: "But how do you do to make study a sick person? Rather you have to lead her to take some fresh air in some flowery meadow, you have to take him to places that he likes, show him the sunlight, make him listen her favorite songs, put them loud in the room and dance like crazy. He has to jump on the bed, play cards...

Not spend time studying books, sometimes life teaches you more things than a paper book, unless it’s an autobiography of someone important, like Michael Jackson. Sorry about that, but try to put yourself in his place... How would you have felt?

Bringing him to school wasn’t the best choice, we don’t know what he was feeling wearing that green mask to his face. I wonder how uncomfortable he must have felt seeing all of us so happy, poor thing. He closed himself in for fear of being judged, isolated himself from everyone... Do you remember? Everyone thought he didn’t speak Italian... But I heard him, he speak it very well..."

Katty: "He spoke very well, Maria, he died... He is dead..."

My blood froze, I felt shivers running through all the nerves of my brain until we reached my heart... We looked at each other in silence.

All of a sudden it was dark...