Date: Fri, 15 Aug 2003 19:40:07 -0500 From: Karla Schulz Subject: Carrots and Celery Part Three Chapter Three There's only one to say, and it's this: Booooog. --- The next day is a Monday, but when I go downstairs for breakfast in the morning, I have to do a double take and check my internal calendar. The kitchen's filled with family like I can't remember it being on a weekday since Kara was first starting school. I enter the kitchen not knowing what to expect as silence falls and all eyes look to me. "Uh, hey everybody," I say uncertainly. Mom's leaning against the counter, I think up until a minute ago she might have been packing Kara a lunch. Haven't seen that in years either. With the craziness of Mom and Dad's work schedules, lunches have been all about cafeteria food pretty much for as long as I can remember. Except for the occasional first day stuff and back in the early days, like grade one and two. After that you're on your own in this family. "Hi sweetie," she says to me, and smiles. I smile back, but like, nervously. "Are you back for real?" Jon asks bluntly, looking at me with a surprising amount of intensity. Waves of guilt threaten to knock me down, but I struggle against them. I go over to the table and crouch down on the floor at his feet. "I'm back. I'm sorry for the way I've been acting," he nods. "Okay," he stays sitting down but I stretch up and hug him. Then I knee over and hug Dave. "I'm really sorry, guys," I tell them again. Dave smiles, Jon is a bit more reserved, but I guess I'm forgiven. I stand again. "Why didn't you tell us you were so sad?" Kara asks, in the innocent manner I guess only such a young girl can. I smile. "Probably 'cause I didn't want to admit that I was," she nods. "But you're better now?" I nod. She smiles wide and, anticipating, I bend to catch her in an embrace. She's still all forest nymphy, so I can hold her easily. She wraps her little arms around my neck, and I secure her against me. "Have you called Celery?" Mom asks after awhile. I nod, still with Kara snuggled in my arms. I feel more pangs of guilt as I think about how quick the kid's growing up, me missing most of it, but deal by resolving to hang with her more. That Sue kid too if I can get her to stop being scared of me. All of them really. I'm going to do better at the whole brother/son thing from now on. I really am. "Put Kara down for a minute," Dad instructs. Huh? "Okay, ready, sis?" She nods and I place her gently back on her chair. "Carrots--" "Maybe he should sit down too," my mom cuts Dad off gently. Huh again. "What's going on?" I ask. "We're thinking about flying Celery in for the weekend, after your exams. You have a couple days off," I blink a few times. I let my jaw hang open. My brain frantically tries to push out some kind of response to this. "What?" Well worth the wait. "Or you could ever go down there if you wanted." "Jonas and me would come along of course," Kyle makes sure I've got that little detail clear. "I don't..." know what to say would be the rest of that. I figured it was fairly obvious though. "Happy?" Mom teases. My head bobs up and down, mostly out of its own free will, as I stutter repeatedly, failing miserably at word formation. "Can I call him right now?" I all but beg. I can't remember the last time I was this excited. "He'll probably still be asleep," damnit. Stupid time zones. "Fine. Ruin all my fun," I glare at Kyle. "No one ever learns not to shoot the messenger," he said, shaking his head sadly. "We can really do this? We can afford it and everything?" Mom and Dad nod, big smiles on both of their faces. "When did you say he can come?" "When you're done exams," they remind me, also, humour me. I mean, they did just tell me like five seconds ago. But the way my mind's racing, you'd think it happened hours ago. This weekend. After my exams. That's days away. Did you hear me? DAYS! "I don't suppose you'd just let me drop all the classes I have exams in so I can see him longer, would you?" "Not even a little bit," Mom shoots down that dream pretty quick. "Still, this is excellent," I grin at Jonas and Kyle. "What do we think of the road trip idea?" Kyle (our driver) shrugs. "Well, it's January. And it's a long drive. I was thinking we could save the trip of road for Spring Break. I mean, that's what Spring Break's supposed to be all about, right? The open road and lots of drunk chicks?" I laugh. "Check yes for the open road. None of us are in the market for the other thing anymore," Jonas sighs all mock sadly. "Ah, the good old days." "Shut-up. You never had it so good," Kyle says grumpily, hitting Jonas in the stomach with the back of his hand. It being Monday and all, pretty soon after that, Jonas and I have to head off to school. School. Yeah. I know I haven't exactly talked about it much lately, but there really hasn't been a lot to tell that's of the good variety, and this has been depressing enough as it is, so I figured I'd just spare you the unpleasant details. But, since I guess I'm going to have to tell you eventually anyway, it might as well be now. Since Celery left, nothing's been the same. But after graciously accepting the giver of the most obvious statement of the year award, I actually have a point to get back to. It's more than just me personally that's changed. More than my like attitude and everything I mean. 'Cause that's starting to get back on track. I know we've done all this before, but really this time. Hopefully anyway. But the bad about school has been there since the first day back. It was there during my depressed empty like death period of September and October, it was there from Thanksgiving through Christmas when I was finally showing signs of life again, and it's there now. I guess I never truly knew how much Celery looked after me. How much shit and just life garbage he managed to shield me from. There are so many assholes in the world. I'm serious. I had like no idea. I mean, sure, I knew some people sucked, but I had no idea how high the suck numbers were. Maybe it's a teenager thing or maybe it's a general humanity thing, but man. People are dumb and mean and really, really annoying. I think Celery just sort of made all that crap go away by being so awesome. Like his presence was enough to overpower and overshadow all that the jerk world had to offer. I'm on my own with the dealing with jerks now, and like most of the other on my own things, I'm not doing so great with it. I get a lot of extra flak now too. You know. 'Cause like, I'm alone or whatever. It's safe to make fun of me now that the constant threat of death by Celery is far from view. No one messes with me physically (and I guess I should be grateful for that) cause I guess his memory still inspires that degree of fear, but the verbal is pretty annoying. It's doesn' t even like hurt me, it just pisses me off. And like, I'm dealing with enough anger as is it. It's not something I need more of on a daily basis. But thank goodness for Jonas and Kaleb 'cause if they weren't around, I swear, I would have snapped by now. Adding to my current school-sucks frustration is the alone factor. Alone in the `available' sense. It's like, now that Celery's gone, I'm supposedly open for business or something. I feel really, really uncomfortable when people express non-platonic interest in me. But, at least with the couple guys that have sniffed around, I know where they're coming from. And Kaleb is on active duty, taking guys aside and letting them know it's not a good idea. I've seen him at work. Giving them the `I explored the places you are and I know you can return, please take my word' speech and sending them off on their way. So that's not my biggest problem. It's girls. Evidently, Cherrie never really forgot about me as much as I thought she did. Actually going out with me again herself seems to be beneath her, but she like sends out scouts every once in awhile. Like they're testing the gay waters or something to see if the temperature's changed back to hetero. I think it may be some kind of delayed revenge. Back when we did the fake dates thing and they dumped us, word sort of got around that the whole thing was a joke. The way me and Celery went straight back to being ultra affectionate right away didn't exactly help their rep. Both Cherrie and Meghan are too powerful to ever get too trashed by anyone, and their social standing is pretty much set in stone, but their time with us has become a blemish on their once flawless records. And maybe that's just not something Cherrie could forget, though god, it seems like a lifetime ago. I have to give Cherrie credit though. She's figured out what bothers me most and now she's working it. I honestly prefer being called a faggot over having some girl put her hand on my shoulder and smile at me. I'm not talking about normal, funny, cool, nice girls. 'Cause I don't want to sound like I'm this sexist girl-hating pig. I'm talking about the kind of girls who follow girls like Cherrie around and do everything they say. They're like even WORSE than the Cherrie and Meghans of the high school world. At least Cherrie thinks for herself. She's a twisted bitch, but she came into that on her own. The further and final weirdness that is vexing me to date is the insane new kid I got stuck with for my lab partner in biology this term. You do know about terms, don't you? We have four a year, two every semester. Second term starts after Thanksgiving. Got that? No? Great. Anyway, the point was, I didn't get to choose mine this past term, like I did the first time around. Naturally I wanted to go with Jonas again, but like, so much for that dream. Apparently we have a reputation that proceeds us now. Like, no one even bothered to try and separate me and Celery in the classes we shared over the years 'cause they knew how utterly pointless it would be, but I guess Mrs. Shord figured she still had a chance with me and Jonas. That' s how I ended up with this kid Colin Mayz. You should know by now that as a rule I'm a lover of all that is weird and strange. But people who never talk, except to randomly blurt strange comments that make like NO sense whatsoever like once every three days, that I can't deal with. Don't even look at me like that and say that sounds exactly like me. I'm not like that at all. For one thing, I talk all the time. And for another thing, shut up. This Colin Mayz is like, not fun weird. He's, well, he's a weird I don't get. Sometimes he seems really happy and even like normal, but then, the random blurting. And I get this weird feeling he's getting like, frustrated or something. Like I'm supposed to be responding somehow I just totally haven't figured out yet and he's running out of patience. He gives me funny looks all the time too. Sometimes they're the ones of frustration and near annoyance, but other times, his eyes just full up with concern and empathy, and let me tell you, that freaks me out most of all. If he acted weird to me, but I still got a friendly vibe from him, maybe it'd be okay. But the vibe I get is something very different than a friendly one. It's not bad necessarily, just really confusing. Sometimes I almost f feel like I've reached some kind of breakthrough, some epiphany moment, and then I'll lose it. It's like he'd this mystery I really want to solve, one I feel strangely compelled to try and solve, but that I just can't seem to. The way he acts doesn't exactly help matters. Like today. I was just sitting in class minding my own business, trying to take notes and keep my head down, and out of nowhere (and I mean NOWHERE) Colin turns to me and goes, "Have you ever thought about what it would be like to just fall asleep and melt away?" in this bizarrely cheerful voice. Who says stuff like that? I mean - come on! And give me a smile after that - something! Something to let me know it's some bizarre joke I just don't get. But no. All the weirdo did was turn around and go back to his work like nothing happened. I'm starting to wonder if he's like, insane. I mean, REALLY insane. Not in the joking around me way. Maybe it's all some bizarre cry for help, you know? 'Cause, something's definitely missing. He never listens in class either. That's another beef I have with having him for a lab partner. We have to work together occasionally, you know? But all he does all through class is listen to music on his like tiny mp3 player with the super little ear pieces you can barely see. But like, it' s obvious what he's doing. No one ever tries to stop him though, which is weird. The creepiest thing is that one time, I heard what he was listening too, and it was like, Christina Aguilera,. I swear. Scary, huh? "Dude, are you spacing out again about that weird lab partner of yours?" Jonas and I are walking home at the moment. And as you well know, the answer to his question is yes. I just shrug. "What's up with him anyway? Is he like nice or what?" "I honestly don't know what he is. So far the only category I've been able to label him under is weird and strange with repeated question marks." "I heard he doesn't talk much." "You heard right." "That can be cool though, like, word is Celery was practically mute until like junior high," another bit of high school gossip proves true. So that's two at least in the history of teenage gossip. "Again with the true. He was just so shy, plus he was all with the not liking anyone but me." "It's a rough life," Jonas says with mock sympathy. "Don't I know it." "So getting back to your mysterious lab partner, have you at least tried to talk to him?" I did. It didn't go every well. "Welll, see, I gave that a shot, didn't really work out." "How so?" "He threatened me with the pointy end of his compass," Jonas laughs. "I'm serious." "I know. It's still funny," he's grinning. "I wouldn't laugh if you'd gotten threatened with a sharp object." "Sure you would," okay. So maybe I would. "Let's move on." "Afraid to admit it?" "Quiet. I said we were moving on?" He's still smirking at me, but nevertheless. "Do you think it's all like, some kind of act? Maybe he's like really depressed or something." "Maybe he's just weird," Jonas counters. "Maybe people just bother him, so he acts totally freaky just to get them to leave him alone." "Maybe he just likes to say strange stuff and listen to weird music." "Maybe it's all a cover." "Maybe you're both insane," can't argue with that. "Do you think I should try talking to him again?" Jonas shrugs. "I don't know, man. Do what you want. Maybe he'll turn out to be really cool. But prepare for him to stay a dick, okay? Not all of the strange and weird question mark people in the world are also the cool and fun to hang out with kind." "I'll be sure to remember that advice." "You do that." Home doesn't take us much longer to get to, and when we do, Kyle' s in the kitchen waiting for us with open arms. Well, the open arms are for Jonas, but the welcoming smile was for both of us. "Hey guys, how was school?" Normally of course, that's not something Kyle would ask. But now that we're all admitting I'm not really okay and banding together to try to do something about that, that type of question is gonna be asked. "It was okay. Nothing spectacular, but okay." Kyle looks to Jonas to check my honesty. "You don't have to do that," I protest softly in my own defence. Kyle smiles, sadness mixing in. "Yeah I do," I sigh. "It was fine, Kyle," Jonas says and gives me a little downward push, encouraging me to sit down. I suddenly feel very tired. School takes a lot out of me these days, especially now with the whole trying to be real again thing. Who knew expressing genuine emotion could take so much out of a guy. "How about your crazy lab partner?" Colin's become something of a family legend. It was Jonas who first brought him up, but I figured faking aggravation about my often disturbing lab partner would be a good addition to my happiness act. Now I'll just have to give talking about him for real a try. "He didn't say anything to me, okay, although when the teacher asked him a question he gave her a really blank look and said, `why did you ask me that? It's not as if you thought I was listening. You know I wasn't. You never do anything about it, so don't try to play some kind of power game with me. I don't know the answer. I didn't even hear the question. My deskmate here just poked me and I got the impression you were talking to me'." "You remember all that?" I shrug. "It kinda stuck in my mind, you know what I mean?" Kyle nods. "What kind of tone did he use?" "Well that was the weirdest part. He wasn't like hostile or anything. He was just stating facts, in a really normal, neutral voice, like he was giving a totally expected traditional answer." Nobody says anything. We all just stare at each other, not really knowing how to keep talking about something none of us understand. "Is anyone else like really weirded right now?" Jonas says. He's official moment breaker after all. I have a bit of trouble with it, but I smile. So does Kyle, a second after. "There was a definite heavy and disturbing silence there for a minute." "But it's better now, right?" Jonas has got the wonky uncertain grin. "Yep," assures the still off-colour Kyle. "Let's just, uh, do our work," Jonas suggests kinda helplessly. We do and eventually the weird mood goes away on its own. In the evening I try to call Celery to tell him the awesomely good news, but he doesn't answer his cell. It freaks me out for a second or two before I realize he's probably just at basketball practice. His coach is like insane apparently. Like, a good guy and a good coach, but just very driven and like, pushes them hard. I don't think Celery minds though. It's something to keep him busy, at the very least. I notice some puzzled looks. What's that? No don't tell me, I can guess. You don't know what I was talking about back there, do you? You're all scratching your heads going - good news? What good news? Well, get with the program. The good news about him getting to come here for a couple days at the end of the month. The good - we don't have to wait until March to see each other - news. You know, every once in awhile I feel like I'm making progress with you people, and then something like this happens. Honestly. I call him back again later that night, at a time I'm sure he'll be back from practice and drum my fingers anxiously as I wait for him to pick up his cell. It takes longer than usual (two whole rings!) "Hey, Carrots," he says without me ever identifying myself. Not that it's necessary. "Hey, sweetness - guess what?" I jump right in without any of that like patience, masking the excitement in my voice thing. "What?" I gotta say, he isn't sounding that enthused. "Are you okay?" "What? Sure," just weirdly distant and uninterested. Other than that, perfectly fine. "Celery, is something wrong?" "No. Didn't you have something to tell me?" Oh yeah, now pretend like you care. "I did, but first I want to know what your problem is." "I don't have a problem." "Celery, you're lying to me. I can tell. You don't do it very well." He sighs. And says nothing. "Cel?" "They told you, right?" "Huh?" "Your parents?" "Told me what?" I've like completely lost track of this conversation. "Well, why were you calling me? To tell me about my visit in at the end of the week, right?" Right... so why is this suddenly a BAD thing? "Yeah, and I was really excited to tell you about it. I didn't know you knew." "Well I do, they checked with me beforehand to see if I'd be okay with school and everything." "Celery, why are you so... I don't know, like not excited? We get to see each other." "We were going to see each other in March anyway." "That's months away!" What the hell is going on? "I know." "So what the hell, Celery? Why don't you want to come?" 'Cause, basically, that's what this is boiling down to. He just really doesn't want to come. And it is beyond my depth to try to understand why. "Its not that I don't want to, I just... I think it'd be better if I didn't." "Is this the same shit as what stopped you from telling me about my parents' idea for me to move to Calgary with you in the summer?" "Not exactly, I just think we need..." "WHAT?" You'll notice I'm starting to get slightly upset. "Baby, calm down, I don't want to fight." "Then explain to me why the hell you don't want to see me as much as I want to see you," going from angry upset to sad whimpery upset. Not much of an improvement. "Carrots, of course I want to see you. And if I knew I was going to at the end of the month, I'd be able to be blissfully happy the entire week no problem." "So?" I don't know about you, but I still haven't spotted the problem. "So I don't want that for either of us. Always just riding one high after another. We have to learn to stand on our own two feet a little, baby. Not just for ourselves, for the other people around us. We have to find happiness that doesn't come just from each other. Let's say I decided to come, and it put you in a great mood all week. So you'd be laughing and spending quality time with people, and everyone would be happy. But they'd know, baby, wouldn't they? Or they'd at least wonder. Wouldn't they wonder if you were happy 'cause I was coming or just plain happy? Happy to be with THEM? Valuing them as people? What about the twins, baby? You're their brother. They're just starting to think they've gotten you back, do you want to take that away from them? Another week of false happiness and then the aftermath of Christmas all over again once I'm gone? This is a bad cycle we've got going on, Care, someone has to break it." "And you think this is the way to do it." "It's the only way I can think of." "So why does it get to be only your decision? Why don't I get a say in all this? It's my life you're making decisions about, Celery. Telling me what's best for me. I want you here. That' s what I need for me to be happy. I don't think there's anything wrong with that." I'm fuming, and this close to breaking down. "You don't understand--" "You're right. I don't. I don't understand how you could do this," I choke on the words. "You're... you don't, I just can't--" "Care," he pleads. "No." Pulling myself together, well, sort of. Shutting off is more like it. "I can't deal with it. I can't even think. But it's fine. You don' t have to come. I'm not going to pressure you. I'm hanging up now, Celery," and I do, cutting off his protests half voiced. Kyle comes in a few minutes later, looking extremely concerned. "Are you okay?" "We heard yelling," Jonas is with him. I don't reply. They watch me stare at the phone. "Were you talking to Celery?" I nod. "What happened?" Jonas this time. "He's not coming," dead. "What?" "He isn't coming. He doesn't want to." "What do you mean? Didn't he explain anything? I'm sure that's not what he meant." "It's what he meant," I assure them. "Couldn't you, like, talk about it?" "I hung up." "What?" "You hung up on Celery?" Kyle is stricken. "Yeah." "Carrots, talk to us," Jonas begs when I say nothing more. "No," They look at each other, helplessly. "I'm sorry, guys. But I can't. I just need to be alone." Jonas raises his eyebrows in a very `that's the last thing you need' sort of way, but Kyle places a hand his shoulder and starts steering Jonas out of the room. "We're here if you need us, Care," he adds, just before they leave. Again, I make no response. --- Edited by Ed.