Chapter 2

The last few days before school started were miserable. It rained continuously so I didn’t get to go to the community swimming pool and revel in Tiffany’s near nudity. Or any other girl for that matter. My masturbation sessions suffered because of it. I may have been twenty years old and knew about sex, but self-pleasure was the extent of my sexual experience.

On the first day of school of my senior year, I took the same seat in every classroom. The one in the back corner, the last desk in the last row farthest from the door. Looking back, part of my invisibility was self-induced. I had shunned people. It was self-preservation. If I was invisible, I couldn’t be hurt.

But I couldn’t be loved, either.

When I got to my Science classroom, I stopped short as I entered the room. So suddenly the boy behind me collided into me. I guess I wasn’t really invisible, although he simply stepped around me as if I were a piece of furniture. The classroom wasn’t set up like all my others. Instead of individual desks and chairs in rows from front to back, with aisles between each pair of desks, there were tables where the pair of desks would have been. Each table had two chairs. I rushed to the last table in the back right corner and sat on the chair on the farthest end hoping no one would sit in the other one.

I had a minor panic attack as each classmate filed into the room and I held my breath until they chose a seat. It was obvious the pairing of chairs at a table was well received by the others. Friends sat next to each other. Anytime someone entered the room, I prayed they wouldn’t sit next to me. They didn’t. One by one, they found a chair at another table.

And then my breath caught. Tiffany strolled through the doorway while chatting with a girlfriend. She looked around and then grabbed her friend’s wrist and dragged her to an unoccupied table. It was in the middle of the classroom not far from where I was sitting. I’d be able to gaze at Tiffany in class without her knowing it. Things were looking up.

And then a girl weaved through the tables, coming closer and closer to mine. I held my breath. She stopped at the table next to mine and chatted with the two girls sitting there. But then she turned and headed right at me. My breathing stopped again. She reached the unoccupied chair at my table and grabbed the back of it. The one right next to me. She didn’t look at me. She didn’t say anything. After all, I was invisible. She slid the chair out from under the table. What should I say when she sat down? Beads of sweat formed on my upper lip. Blood throbbed in my temples. My hands trembled. Their palms got wet.

But the girl didn’t sit down. She dragged the chair away from my table to the next table where her two friends were sitting. They scooted over to make room and she squeezed in between them, three at a table made for two. I assumed that was better than sitting with the freak. But that was okay with me. I preferred to be alone. I let the air out of my lungs with a long sigh.

The teacher entered the room and stood behind his desk with his hands on the back of the chair, waiting for the everyone to quiet down. They did.

“My name is Mr. Frank,” the teacher said. “This is Science. It will not be like your other classes. We will supplement the instruction with lab work. Each of you will work with a lab partner.”

There was a hushed chattering in the classroom. Not me? Who would I talk to? Who would talk to me? I found it hard to breathe. I would be expected to work with a partner. Who would want to be my partner? Every table had two kids except for the one with three girls. That meant it would have to be one of them. A girl partner! One who didn’t want to sit next to me. I felt dizzy. Couldn’t breathe. I wanted to bolt from the classroom. But where would I go? And I needed to complete the Science class to graduate. I had promised my parents that I would graduate.

“Okay, listen up,” Mr. Frank said and waited for the room to quiet. “I’m sure you already know who you want to partner up with. Forget it. I have other plans. I will choose the partners.”

There was more chattering. This time louder. The teacher waited, but it didn’t stop.

“Quiet!” Mr. Frank shouted. “Listen up. When I tell you, everyone get out of your seats and stand wherever there is room. And take your belongings with you. You will most likely be sitting at a different table than you are now. I will call out the name of the person for each seat starting at the front left.”

He pointed to the chair at the first table. The one closest to the door.

“Whoever is sitting at the same table as you will be your partner for the entire semester. It will be random. I have all your names written on pieces of paper in this box.”

Mr. Frank lifted a box off his desk that I hadn’t noticed and held it up before putting it back down.

“I will choose the names blindly. Now, everyone, get up and take your belongings with you and, when I call your name, take your assigned seat.”

I scooped my books off the table and clutched them to my chest as I shoved my chair back and stood up. I shuffled backward to the farthest corner and waited while the classroom was filled with movement. I was afraid I was going to faint.