I Wrote This for You

“Now, are you sure you have everything? You didn’t forget your binder, did you?”

“No, Mom, I have everything,” Charlotte assured her mother, smiling brightly as she looked out at the passing scenery. When she’d heard that her mom intended to move them back to Chicago after living in the foresty part of Pennsylvania, Charlotte had been worried that she’d be trapped in a concrete jungle for the rest of her teenage life. So she’d been pleasantly surprised when her mom showed her pictures of a house just outside of Chicago, in an area that actually allowed for breathing room between houses and decent-sized yards.

“Are you nervous? I remember how nervous you were your first day of school. And it’s okay to be nervous, sweetie, if you—”

“Mom, I’m fine,” the young blonde insisted. “I’m not a little kid anymore.”

Charlotte’s mom sighed and nodded, “I guess that’s right. Why’d you have to grow up so fast? Just yesterday I was wrestling you off my leg outside the preschool, and now you’re a senior in high school. Where’d the time go?”

“You blinked.”

You blinked. It was a common expression in the Scott household, spurning from the frequent occasions where Melody, Charlotte’s mother, would look over at her 17-year-old daughter and ask how time had passes so quickly. Now they used it for every instance when time got away from them, such as forgetting to call or taking too long in the shower.

They didn’t speak again until the high school wound into sight and the car came to a stop in front of it. Charlotte’s mom, being completely unable to overlook any opportunity for a monologue, straightened up in her seat and said firmly, “Now, Charlotte, I know you’re nervous beneath that calm exterior, and I want you to know that that’s okay. I know you’ll have a great first day and make lots and lots of friends.”

Charlotte gaped at her mother, shook her head, and said a quick bye before climbing out of the car. She was, of course, used to her mother’s odd monologues, but they still caught her off guard every now and then. Despite her assurances, Charlotte actually was nervous. Not as cripplingly frightened as she had been of school when she was little, but still frightened enough to make her walk slowly up the front steps and hesitate at the door.

They’d arrived late so, of course, the hallways were completely deserted and there was no one to ask for directions to the office. Not that she was entirely unfamiliar with the school; she and her childhood friend had come here more than once to see his brother play trumpet in the band. But that had been years ago, and those memories had mostly faded.

Charlotte was just about to poke her head into a classroom for a teacher when she turned a corner and ran headlong into someone. Of course she’d run into someone; that was just her luck. She managed to stay on her feet, although the same couldn’t be said for the person she’d run into. He fell hard onto the linoleum, his backpack hitting the floor with a thud and an armful of papers scattering across the hall.

“I am so sorry!” Charlotte exclaimed, trying to drag him up by his shirt while simultaneously grabbing at some of the fallen papers. This resulted in her slipping on a sheet and tumbling to the floor herself, knocking her elbow hard and landing with half her torso on the guy’s chest.

There was a long, awkward moment where neither of them seemed to know what to do, then the stranger cleared his throat and said, “Um, hi.”

Her proper sense kicking in, Charlotte jumped up and, ducking to hide her face, began to snatch up as many of the fallen papers as she could. It took her a moment to realize they weren’t school papers – they were pages of sheet music.

“You’re a musician?” she asked, immediately forgetting their awkward meeting. “That’s so cool.”

“Um, sure. I mean, yes. Yes, I am a musician. And you...must be new.”

Her eyebrows rose quickly. “How can you tell?”

“Well, because...” He paused as he stooped to pick up some papers I’d missed. “Because I’m on the Freshman Welcome Committee and you weren’t there and I’m on the yearbook, too, so I know all the upper classmen so, um, yeah.”

There was something oddly comforting about his awkwardness, Charlotte thought. Something familiar, almost.

“That’s great, actually. So you definitely know where I can go to get my class list and stuff?”

“Actually, I have it,” he said quickly, shuffling through his thoroughly mixed up papers until, after several minutes of mumbling and flipping sheets, he produced a few papers printed on thick, off-white paper. “Yeah, here it is. I was actually supposed to meet you out front, but you weren’t there so I went to talk to my teacher and she sent me back and, of course, I ran into you and...well, it’d be really cool if you didn’t tell anyone I got knocked down by a girl.”

Charlotte laughed. “Oh, don’t feel bad. I’m pretty tough for a girl, you know. Five feet of pure muscle here,” she said, flexing her right arm, which was as thin as a baseball bat. Still, she wasn’t surprised that she’d bowled this kid over – he was only half a head taller than her and just as skinny. In fact, lookwise, they had a lot of similarities: green eyes, blonde hair (although, from the tufts of it Charlotte could see sticking out beneath the brim of his hat, his was significantly darker than hers), and the same short, slender build.

She realized she was staring at him just as he seemed to realize that he was staring at her and they both looked away quickly. Charlotte took this time to look over her schedule. Six 45-minute classes a day starting with Algebra II, which was where Charlotte should have been twenty minutes ago.

“Crap, I’m late. Can you show me how to get to this classroom?” Charlotte asked, pointing to the class on her schedule.

“Sure. That’s where I’m supposed to be, anyway. Um...follow me, I guess.”

So the two teenagers set off down the narrow hallway, taking two right turns and a left before the blond boy led the way into a classroom to their left. The room was a typical high school classroom – chalkboard on one wall, marker board on the other; twenty or so desks facing the front; an exterior wall practically made of windows; and a stereotypical high school math teacher, dressed in unflattering clothes and wearing an all-knowing scowl.

“Not a very good first impression, Miss Scott,” the teacher said, glaring at Charlotte over the top of her glasses. “Let’s try to do better in the future, shall we?”

“Try, we shall,” Charlotte replied, her sarcasm barely masked within the cooperative attitude.

“Show her to a seat, Patrick.”

“Yes, ma’am,” said the blond boy, leading the way to the back of the classroom.

“And lose the hat. I’d hate to have to confiscate another one.”

Charlotte fought off a giggle as Patrick sat down at his desk and quickly stuffed the gray baseball cap into his backpack, a hurt-puppy sort of expression on his face. When he caught her staring, Patrick’s cheeks went red and he said in an undertone, “She’s got, like, a dozen of my hats locked in her desk until the end of the year.”

She gawked. “It’s only the third week.”

“I know,” Patrick said miserably before crossing his arms on the desk and burying his face in their simple shelter.



The remainder of the day was much less entertaining than the first half-hour of it. Charlotte didn’t get to do much socializing because she was trying to catch up with her classmates, so she kept her nose buried in her notebook through Algebra, English, Parenting, and Chemistry. Having separate classes, she had to leave Patrick after Math with a rather subdued, “Catch you later, Patrick.”

Lunch was uneventful, as Charlotte got lost on the way there and had to wolf down her lunch in ten minutes after going through the line and finding an empty spot. There was no sign of Patrick in the cafeteria, so she sat at a table with several freshman who wanted to do nothing but chatter about what cute boys they were crushing on.

Then, after lunch, it was a quick trip to the gym for P.E., which Charlotte was rather looking forward to...although she could have done without the navy and gold uniforms. She was pleased when she stepped out of the locker room and saw Patrick sitting on the narrow bleachers on the right side of the gym. Unfortunately, she didn’t get to talk to him because, as she was halfway across the gym, the coach blew a sharp blast on his whistle and called for everyone to line up; boys on the left, girls on the right.

As it turned out, Wednesdays were measurement days, where they made students do a million pointless tests to see if they’d gotten any more fit since the previous Wednesday. Charlotte enjoyed the workout, but was bummed she hadn’t gotten to talk to Patrick; she found his awkwardness entertaining, to say the least. He reminded her of herself when she was just starting school. Luckily, she’d had a bold best friend to lead her from her shyness. Maybe she could do the same for Patrick.

Although, at high school age, how much impact could you really have on a guy’s life?

Charlotte got in a friendly, “Hello, Patrick,” as they were leaving the gym a half-hour later, but then they had to go in opposite directions. She kept an eye out for him after Civics, but saw no sign of him again.

Disappointed, but not overly concerned about it, Charlotte left school just after 3 o’clock and climbed into the passenger seat of her mother’s new company car.

“How was your first day?” her mother immediately asked. “Did you make any friends?”

Charlotte, busy pulling out the first page of her Algebra homework, replied distractedly, “Too soon to tell,” then got straight to work on dividing polynomials.