Alex ...
I am at the playground playing tug-of-war with Brad, Justin and Alisa I can't see who we are playing against, but we are pulling and having fun and winning. The sun is shining and there is not a cloud in the sky. Suddenly the playground disappears and is replaced by a hundred foot gorge and I see whom we are against. It looks as though we are up against a few hundred people, then a few thousand people, then suddenly it looks like everyone on the damn planet. The whole world in a line pulling the rope against us.
The line of people is endless. Some people we know some we don't. Were winning at first, then we start to lose ground as Alisa vanished. We lose more and more ground as Brad quickly fades away. Then it's only Justin and I, and we are being dragged on the ground toward the edge of the gorge and what looks like a hundred-foot drop. We quickly get to our feet and pull; the sky starts to turn gray. We keep on pulling and pulling, then without warning, Justin vanishes. It's just me all alone.
" COME ON" I yell.... "BRING IT"
Suddenly, one by one, the people on the other side start vanishing until I see only one person who is at the end of the rope. I am at the edge of the gorge I look down it now looks bottomless. I strain to see who the other person is across the gorge. I am frozen, as I realize who it is.
"Oh my god; It's me, it's me!" I say as I am pulled into the abyss by myself.
"Whoa", I say as I wake up at my computer desk. " Ouch " I say as I straighten out my neck. "That's the last time I fall asleep at my desk doing homework!" I reach into my book bag for a disk to save what I was working on and my letter from the school administrator falls onto the floor, I quickly try to put it under my computer as I see my little brother walking into my room.
"Hey, Buba", I say to him. That's my nickname for him. He's 11 years old.
"Hi" he says quietly after he sees the letter in my hand that I am trying to hide.
"Is that another letter from school...?", he asks
"C.J., YOU LITTLE SHIT, WHAT ARE YOU DOING GOING THROUGH MY STUFF" I scream as I stand up and grab him "
"I'm sorry, I wasn't going through your stuff, " he says as tears start to will in his eyes
"Last week I was checking out your hard drive when....," he said as I interrupted.
"And why were you checking out my drive?" I asked after seeing how I hurt his feelings and started calming down
"Well, I was going to use your computer to download a song," he says looking at his feet. "I know I am not to use your computer without your permission, but you know mom doesn't want anything on the family computer that isn't family or school things." He was still looking down at his feet.
He ended up telling me that my DSL line went down and somehow froze my computer, which then crashed. He had to go in after the restart and rewrite the Bios program, and as he was doing that he had to do a cold start and moved my computer. That's when he found the other letters. I asked him how he knew all that stuff and he said he had a good teacher, then smiled as he left the room. Before he left I told him that no matter how much of a pain he was sometimes, I still loved him.
"Alex? "
"Yeah?"
"Is high school that bad? "
"Yeah."
"Is that why you and the guys and Alisa broke up? "
I paused to think. "I don't know why we broke up, we all just changed. "
He was quiet for a while then said, "Nobody is ever going to make me change"
"I wish it was that easy."
"It is that easy. Just don't change." He smiled and walked out of my room.
I thought about it. "Out of the mouths of babes", I said with a smile.
Brad ...
The world is gray and foggy. I hear and see nothing, then faintly I hear my name being called. "Brad ..." One voice. "Brad ...", softly. I hear another voice. "Brad..." There it is again, the same familiar voices. "Brad..." I know those voices. Each one is different. "Brad..." One voice calling my name out of camaraderie. "Brad..." One voice calling my name in desperation. " Bradley... I love you." One voice calling in love.
"Whoa!" I jump up out of my dream state. I have been having the same dream for the past three months Those voices could only be three people, and I recognize the last voice, but wonder why I can't see their faces.
"BRADLEY THEODORE JAMES!" That's a voice I will never forget.
"Yes Mom...." I hate when she calls me that, knowing it means I'm in trouble.
"I've been calling for the last ten minutes." She walks into my room. "We are all waiting for you to come down and join us for breakfast." She walks over with a smile and kisses me on the for head." "Now up, sleepyhead. ", then she walks out the door. As I get out off bed I think about the dream. I haven't thought about those guys in over three years. Why now?
As I leave my room to head down the stairs to the kitchen, my mom is on the stairway stopped dead in her tracks. I hear her say something.
"Oh my!", my mother says. She is frozen in place and looks as though she's seen a ghost. I stop dead in my tracks as I see him through the window in the door.
"JUSTIN?", I called out. I can't believe it. I'm just as puzzled and shocked as my mother was. He's almost on my front door step, and I am looking right at him. The look on his face is as though he is in a trance, then suddenly he just snaps out of it. A look of sure panic takes over and he takes off. He has to have seen me.
I'm numb. After three years of no contact, not even a 'hello, how have you been?', bam! He ends up right on my doorstep.
"Brad, that....that was Justin, right?"
"Yes Mom, it was.", I said as I walked to the table to eat.
"What happened to you two, baby?" she asked.
"I don't know mom, I just don't know." I sat down, my thoughts on Justin and the look on his face. It was different than his normal look ... one of disgust and anger. Recently his look has changed to one of sorrow and fear.
(c) 2001, Alex Nelson Posted: February 1, 2001.