Hypophrenia
Things Aren't Always As They Seem
We met in first period gym class at the beginning of my senior year. He was a little big shorter than me - though at that time I was a fairly tall girl; 5’7” - and had curly brown hair and dimples. In other words, totally adorable. I knew he wasn’t a senior so I assumed he was a junior and didn’t think much more on that subject. We also didn’t talk until two weeks into school, maybe three, at least nothing of merit. I’m pretty sure the first thing I ever said to him was, “I like your shoes”, to which he replied, “Thanks.” (They were dark gray Nike’s with orange accents and white soles).
Not particularly verbose.
In this first period gym class, there was a girl I’d run cross country and played school soccer with and who everyone - not an exaggeration, everyone liked. Not necessarily like liked, but even liked as a friend. It was kind of impossible not to, actually. She was about 5’4”, maybe 5’5”, with long medium brown hair, light hazel eyes and insanely prominent cheekbones. Not only this, but she was super skinny. Not nasty skinny, because then I’d have some imperfection to be able to zone in on, but healthy skinny - the kind of girl who could eat 30 hamburgers and ten pounds of fries and have lost weight by the next day. Thank the Lord she didn’t have boobs, I wouldn’t have been able to handle it, then. So she was gorgeous, hilarious, and we go to what was (at the beginning of the school year), the top public high school in the state. In other words, we were all smart. I know what you’re thinking - people like that don’t actually exist. But, apparently, they do. Real, life sized Barbie dolls.
We would all walk as a class to the nearby park to play games like ultimate, flag football or soccer, though my teacher for some reason hated soccer with a fiery passion. Though he seemed like a nice, funny guy and was obviously super cute, I knew I’d never stand a chance, especially when I was next to her. Even though she’d been dating her boyfriend for almost two years, I let them talk on the way to the park, deciding instead to walk ahead with my other friend, thankfully my best guy friend, though sometimes I’d join in on their conversations too.
I’ve gotten off track. Long story short, we got to that point where you talk in class and are pretty good friends in class but don’t talk much, if any, outside of school. This was by late November, early December. Somehow by Christmas break we had gotten to talking occasionally on Facebook, which naturally grew into actual texting. Then, after a month or so of texting, he seemed to let me in. He told me about his military dad who’s never there, and when he was, his dad would tell him that it was his fault his parents wanted to get a divorce. His older sisters always got all the attention and his girlfriend broke up with him because of his haircut in eighth grade. He’s too short to be able to play basketball for the club team that was run by the local college, and his friends told him he wasn’t good enough to play for them anyway. By then he had a pretty low self esteem - how could he not? - and wondered why we seniors cared anything about having him around, after all he was just a “stupid little sophomore”.
This surprised me a lot. Yes, that he was a sophomore, because he acted so much older than that, but also that he couldn’t see what was right in front of him. We all cared so much about him because of how fun and nice and happy he was, or seemed, at school. So when he told me all this, whereas I’d thought he was just a hypophreniac before, it turned out he was seriously depressed. No desire to do anything, he only wanted to stay home and be alone, and had absolutely no work ethic whatsoever. His grades were slipping and he didn’t care. Of course I tried to tell him he could do anything he wanted, especially because he had so much time left, not to mention the fact that he really and truly was intelligent and very talented at basketball, he didn’t believe me. I was only telling him that to be nice because I was his friend.
I’m not a liar. He was one of the most talented and genuinely caring people I’d ever met in my life.
Which is what proved to be his downfall.
Not particularly verbose.
In this first period gym class, there was a girl I’d run cross country and played school soccer with and who everyone - not an exaggeration, everyone liked. Not necessarily like liked, but even liked as a friend. It was kind of impossible not to, actually. She was about 5’4”, maybe 5’5”, with long medium brown hair, light hazel eyes and insanely prominent cheekbones. Not only this, but she was super skinny. Not nasty skinny, because then I’d have some imperfection to be able to zone in on, but healthy skinny - the kind of girl who could eat 30 hamburgers and ten pounds of fries and have lost weight by the next day. Thank the Lord she didn’t have boobs, I wouldn’t have been able to handle it, then. So she was gorgeous, hilarious, and we go to what was (at the beginning of the school year), the top public high school in the state. In other words, we were all smart. I know what you’re thinking - people like that don’t actually exist. But, apparently, they do. Real, life sized Barbie dolls.
We would all walk as a class to the nearby park to play games like ultimate, flag football or soccer, though my teacher for some reason hated soccer with a fiery passion. Though he seemed like a nice, funny guy and was obviously super cute, I knew I’d never stand a chance, especially when I was next to her. Even though she’d been dating her boyfriend for almost two years, I let them talk on the way to the park, deciding instead to walk ahead with my other friend, thankfully my best guy friend, though sometimes I’d join in on their conversations too.
I’ve gotten off track. Long story short, we got to that point where you talk in class and are pretty good friends in class but don’t talk much, if any, outside of school. This was by late November, early December. Somehow by Christmas break we had gotten to talking occasionally on Facebook, which naturally grew into actual texting. Then, after a month or so of texting, he seemed to let me in. He told me about his military dad who’s never there, and when he was, his dad would tell him that it was his fault his parents wanted to get a divorce. His older sisters always got all the attention and his girlfriend broke up with him because of his haircut in eighth grade. He’s too short to be able to play basketball for the club team that was run by the local college, and his friends told him he wasn’t good enough to play for them anyway. By then he had a pretty low self esteem - how could he not? - and wondered why we seniors cared anything about having him around, after all he was just a “stupid little sophomore”.
This surprised me a lot. Yes, that he was a sophomore, because he acted so much older than that, but also that he couldn’t see what was right in front of him. We all cared so much about him because of how fun and nice and happy he was, or seemed, at school. So when he told me all this, whereas I’d thought he was just a hypophreniac before, it turned out he was seriously depressed. No desire to do anything, he only wanted to stay home and be alone, and had absolutely no work ethic whatsoever. His grades were slipping and he didn’t care. Of course I tried to tell him he could do anything he wanted, especially because he had so much time left, not to mention the fact that he really and truly was intelligent and very talented at basketball, he didn’t believe me. I was only telling him that to be nice because I was his friend.
I’m not a liar. He was one of the most talented and genuinely caring people I’d ever met in my life.
Which is what proved to be his downfall.
♠ ♠ ♠
I've been meaning to write about this for a while and now I have even more reason to! Let me know what you guys think!Oh and I purposefully didn't put any names in it, in case you were wondering. There's a reason too :)