In Plain Sight

The next morning I pull on my light jeans and one of my mom’s old Ramones t-shirts and a pair of beat up old Vans. I am bringing in a picture of her so I want to look just like her or as close as I can. My dad says I look like my mother. I don’t believe him but I lie to myself so much that I am starting to actually see her in my features.

I walk up to the attic and open the trunk. I search for the best picture of her. I find one of her sitting next to a boy. It is the most beautiful picture of my mother that I’ve ever seen in my life. Her brown hair is blowing in the wind and she has this great smile that is making me smile even though that smile is twenty-five years old. She looks about sixteen and the boy looks her age. He is smiling and his blonde hair looks so surfer like. So I pocket the picture in the back of my jeans. I get up but then I notice the letter. The letter that describes me and my mother. It is my only link left of that amazingly beautiful person; so I take it with me.

Last period of my day is Psychology and I love it that way. I walk into the class room looking so unlike me. I’m wearing my mother’s shirt and have my hair down like hers is in the picture. I like it because I want to try to feel like I know what it was like to be her. I sit down in my seat in the front row and instantly turn around to talk to one of the guys behind me who tells me that I don’t look like myself. I don’t feel like myself and I love this feeling.

“Alright class shut your traps so we can begin,” Mr. Bastow laughs as he walks into the classroom closing the door behind him. “I want to see what is most important to you people. Jason Tallmadge you’re up.”

I look at Mr. Bastow and he looks at me. But his look is enough to tell me that he doesn’t recognize me. I listen respectively as everyone else in the class goes before me. Mr. Bastow keeps stealing glances at me like it isn’t me inside those clothes but someone else. He finally looks at me and says it my turn. I pull the letter out of my backpack and take the picture from my pocket.

“Well,” I begin. “A lot of things are important to me but this picture and this letter are the most important. Mostly because I don’t know what they mean but both are truly beautiful.”

“Why are you dressed like that?” One guy asks from the back. It’s a valid question so I answer it.

“To look like my mother when she was young because I need to try to understand her.” I try to explain as I know I accidently am letting down my shield.

“Your mother, why? You can just go home and see her.” The same stupid guy asks.

“I just can’t go home and see her because she isn’t there. She’s dead.” I give them a minute to gasp and a apologize but then I continue, “So I’m going to read you a letter that I found and I have no idea who this ‘Jesse’ is that wrote it but it was next to a picture that gave it more meaning so here it goes.”

“ Ashley,

People don’t understand the difference between you and me. I don’t understand it myself. But that doesn’t mean we can’t be friends. It feels as if I’m playing the girl’s role and you’re playing the boy’s. Ash, when people switch their roles or act out of character total chaos will ensue but I like it and so do you. You hide in plain sight but no one notices. If you don’t understand what I mean it is that you act all collected on the outside but on the inside you’re a time bomb just waiting for someone to press the detonator. I need to you to talk to me. I need you to listen to me. I need you back Ashley. Not the Ashley who is cheer captain but the Ashley who use to lie in my backyard with me and dream about what we could become. I miss her. I want her back and I’ll wait but I don’t know how long I will be able to. I miss you.

All my love, Jesse.”

“It sounds like a love letter but I know that it isn’t. It is way more than that. I know it is—

Mr. Bastow cut me off, “Where did you find that?” He was trying to be calm but he was failing.

“Buried with this picture in a chest of my mother’s.” I take out the picture and look at it then at him.

The entire room was silent. Mr. Bastow is never sharp with anyone and we all are waiting for an explanation. I hand him both the letter and the picture.

I watch him study them and laugh then look sullen as if he lost someone. Almost as if he is sad about knowing my mother is dead. “What?” I ask him.

“You look like her. Class, this is important. Not those comic books that your older brother gave you or the new ring your father got you but these documents of the past.”

The bell rings and while everyone else was leaving Mr. Bastow held my things to make me stay late.

“I’m sorry Sydney.”

I hate sorrow, no pity. I am the only one who can pity me. “No you’re not.”

“Yes, I am. You were spot on with that letter. It wasn’t a love letter but an explanation.”

“How would you know?” I ask but I think I already know the answer.

“I wrote it. If you’re wondering, that is me in the picture as well. Your mother and I were best friends.” I am silent so he continues, “You look like her. Act like her too. All in control and balanced and seemingly perfect but you’re not.”

“I know.” But I didn’t know that he knew me that well.

“How’d she die?” He asked quietly.

I shake my head as I answer, “Cancer, four and a half years ago.”

We just stare at each other because male teachers just can’t hug seventeen year old female students. I start to cry and I watch as he tries not to cry but he is losing the battle. I grab the letter and picture and take my bag. I turn to him and say, “See you Mr. Bastow.” I run out of the classroom that holds the one man that can shed some light on my mother’s childhood. I’ll ask him about it another day because I know he is crying in his room. He is mourning the loss of a best friend. His mourning the loss of a first love that got away because she only knew how to hide in plain sight.