We Do Not Talk About Eighth Grade

(4): lose that frown, ugly

Something jabbed at my back, breaking my focused concentration on the paper in front of me. The object felt like it was some sort of a stick—pretty sharp but not sharp enough to harm me in any way. But still, I nearly jumped five feet off my chair and instantly turned around.

Rangga stared at me expectantly, the pencil in his outstretched hand still pointing at me, the one that was jabbing at my back before.

I sighed. "Yes?"

"Can I borrow your eraser again?"

That was the third time in the span of thirty minutes. I searched for an expression on his face that said that he was joking or that he was just being annoying, but his dark brown eyes only blinked innocently. Well, maybe a bit too innocent. I turned back around and took my eraser, and then I broke it into half easily.

I put down one of the halves on his desk. "Keep it."

I heard him blow out air through his mouth in—what, exhaustion? Disappointment?—but I ignored him and returned my focus back on my sketchbook, finishing the assignment of the day with a little last touch, so I could spend the remaining five minutes of the class admiring my own work.

He didn't bother me to ask for an eraser again, of course.

But then, "That's pretty."

There he went again. Without turning around, I murmured, "Hm?"

"What does it mean?" he asked curiously.

Today was about representing what you're currently feeling, projecting the thoughts and emotions, and maybe wishes that are kept hidden within yourself. Or something dramatic like that. So I drew a silhouette of birds. A line of little birds, wings spread apart, freely flying from the bottom of the paper upwards, disappearing into the edges of the paper. There were probably twenty or so little birds there.

"Freedom," I answered, a bit unsurely. "I think."

Rangga didn't say anything at all, so I put down my sketchbook and took a deep breath before slightly turning around. His eyes were already on me, and I had to look away to fight off the intensity of his stare.

"What about yours?"

I snuck a little glance at his face—his cheeks were slightly red—before turning to look at his own work. "It's—stupid. I don't know if you remember, but I can't draw."

I do, I almost said. On his paper was two-dimensional steps leading up to a stairway, and a stick figure walking mid-way. And that was all.

He really couldn't draw at all.

"So I just—draw lines. Connect them." He shrugged and rubbed at his neck. "It looks weird."

"What's this supposed to represent?"

"Hah[1]?"

I held in a smile and rephrased my question, "What does it mean? Your drawing?"

"Oh." I looked up and there was a sheepish look on his face. "I don't know."

I was silent for a second, slightly tilting my head to the side as I kept looking at his work before looking back up again. "I think it means going into another level, a higher place," I told him. "Or maybe, like, taking a brave step towards something that's uncertain. Or whatever."

He held my gaze for a while, with his eyes so deep and intense, and I wondered if this guy before me was this the same boy I left with an open wound in the heart three years ago. His lips moved and he murmured, "Adri..."

The bell rang and the magic disappeared, replaced with the annoying blaring sound from the speakers on the wall ushering us out of the classroom. I turned around in a flash, collecting my things and standing up with the sketchbook in my hand. I tore out the drawing from my sketchbook and put it down on Mr. Foley's desk, and then I was gone like light, disappearing into the crowded hallway, the sight of his thin brown eyes like a ghost in the back of my mind.