A Little Something Different (4 page)

I take a deep breath. “Well, it’s good to find critique partners. We’ll be talking about that more soon.”

“All right,” she says, standing up.

“Is that all? You didn’t need anything specific?”

“No, mostly I just wanted to make sure I was on point with everything and you cleared that up pretty quickly. So, thanks.”

“Excellent.” Then I have a bit of a lightbulb moment. “Can you send Gabe in?” Now she has no choice but to talk to him.

She opens the door and gestures for him to come in without saying a word. I suppose at least she smiles at him. These two and their nonloquacious natures are going to be the death of me.

He scrambles into the seat across from me and dives right in without so much as a greeting, like he’s been rehearsing these words over and over again. Like if he doesn’t get them out he might just explode.

“I’ve been having trouble with writing too many words,” he explains quickly, wiping his hands on his jeans.

“That’s not necessarily a problem,” I say, my words slow, hoping to calm him down a bit.

“Even for these more limited short stories?”

“I mean, try not to write five thousand words for a two-thousand-word assignment, but if you want, bring this one in and we’ll work on phrasing together,” I offer. “It’s amazing how many writers could chop down their word count by using more precise vocabulary or getting rid of unnecessary descriptors.”

He smiles and nods.

“Any other questions?”

“It’s not so much a question. It’s more like a concern. I’m going to have to read an assignment in front of the class, right?”

“Yes. More than one, probably.”

“There’s no getting out of that?”

I smile sympathetically, but shake my head.

“I feel like I’m going to end up editing myself a lot, because, I don’t know, the idea of sharing some of this stuff with strangers makes me feel…”

“Vulnerable?” I suggest. I get this concern a lot.

“Yeah,” he says with a sigh, his ears turning red.

“That’s a little tougher. I’m not going to tell you to ignore the way you’re feeling or try to forget it, but writing about something that makes you feel emotional isn’t necessary for this course. If you find that the idea of presenting something you’ve written is out of the question, come see Cole or me, and we’ll be happy to help you out without you losing any points.”

“All right,” he says, nodding.

“Is that all?”

“Yes.”

“Jeez, you kids are making life easier and easier these days.”

“I could make something up?”

“Nah, I’ll just get home earlier than usual.”

“Thanks for your help,” he says, standing, smiling, and slipping out the door.

I sit back in my office chair and spin around. It’s not much, but I think there was at least a tiny bit of progress made today.

Sam
(Gabe’s brother)

The girl Gabe knows from creative writing is wandering around the library stacks looking increasingly lost. To be more specific, it’s the girl Gabe has a
crush
on from creative writing.

“Hey,” I say, approaching her when I see her for the third or fourth time.

“Hi,” she breathes, looking from me to the shelf label and back again.

“Do you need help?”

“Do you work here?”

“Yes.”

“Oh, then sure, maybe you can help me.”

She shows me the slip of paper she’s holding.

“You’re one level too high,” I say. I push the cart of books I’m supposed to be shelving out of the way and I lead her down the back staircase to the floor below us, bringing her to the right section.

“Thank you so much,” she says, sliding the book off the shelf and hugging it to her.

“No problem. I’m Sam,” I say, extending my hand to shake.

“Lea,” she says. She has a decent grip. I’m impressed.

“You know my brother, Gabe, don’t you?”

She looks back up at me from the book. “What? No. I mean…” She pauses, obviously flustered. She and Gabe would seriously be a match made in heaven. “We have a class together, but I don’t know him. Not, I don’t
know him
know him. We don’t … we aren’t friends.”

I nod and try not to smile too much, even though I’m holding back a laugh. “I’ll tell him you said that.”

“No!” she says.

“I was joking,” I promise, putting a hand on her arm.

“Thanks again,” she says, holding up the book and backing away.

I watch her walk away and spend the rest of my shift trying to think of scenarios to get those two crazy kids together. At least it makes the hours move faster.

Squirrel!

The best part of this time of year is all the acorns. Acorns are delicious and amazing and the best thing that anyone could ever eat. If you’re not eating acorns you are seriously missing out. I tell all my friends about the amazingness of acorns and sometimes they just stare at me like I’m crazy. But I’m only crazy for acorns.

I see a boy and a girl. The girl gave me peanuts once and she always looks at the boy a lot. He looks at her too. But they always look at each other at the wrong second. But today they look at each other at the right second and they both smile so wide it looks like they’re laughing.

I hope they’re laughing.

I hope they like acorns. Maybe I’ll throw some acorns at them. No, that’s a bad idea. I don’t want to lose my acorns. I don’t want to share. Call me a bad squirrel, but I do not like to share my acorns.

Maybe that makes me a good squirrel. The consummate squirrel. The very definition of a squirrel.

Hillary
(creative writing classmate)

“We’re going to be starting on our first long-term critiquing assignment,” Call-me-Inga declares one rainy October day. She says it like she is so thrilled, like it’s the best thing to happen since movable type was invented or whatever English professors get excited about.

“We’re going to be doing a series of simple stories, a thousand words give or take, and then sharing them with a partner over the next few weeks. It will give you both a chance to see firsthand how someone else works on these assignments, and then we’ll switch around. I think it’s important that we all learn from each other.”

I sit up straight and raise my hand, not bothering to be called on before speaking. “What topics will we be writing about?”

“I think something simple like a particular childhood memory that stands out to you would be a good place to start. It can be sad, happy, funny, but get it to a thousand words. It doesn’t have to be extremely personal. If you feel like this topic might tap into something like that, come see me in office hours. You don’t have to give any specifics, but we can work something out.”

Truth be told, that’s part of what I respect about Call-me-Inga, even if she can be sort of a tool. She’s realistic about limitations people might have when it comes to topics. Like what if I was abused as a kid and everything about my childhood makes me think of that? Although I feel like if you’re having those kinds of problems you’re probably not in college taking creative writing. You’re probably like in prison making toilet wine.

These are the kinds of thoughts I really need to keep to myself.

I probably don’t want to think too hard about toilet wine, either. One time my roommate and I made a huge tub of punch in a Rubbermaid storage bin and used grape Kool-Aid and all the guys said it looked like toilet wine. But how would frat boys even know what toilet wine looks like?

“Was there something else?” Call-me-Inga asks me. I must have zoned out thinking about toilet wine.

“We can pick partners?”

“Of course. This isn’t kindergarten.” She smiles like she said something super clever and I go back to disliking her even if I do respect her.

I run my hands through my hair and look around at the class. There are an even number of kids so that’s good news. But I don’t want to get stuck with that snoozefest Victor. I’ve had my eye on cutie pie Gabe all semester, so I lean across the empty chair in between us. He kind of looks like this guy my sister dated who drove a motorcycle. He was hot. She was too stupid to hang on to him though.

“Gabe!” I say, like we’re old friends.

He doesn’t respond. I ball up a piece of paper and throw it at him. He jumps and looks over at me. I toss off my most seductive “come be my creative writing partner” finger wave.

He raises his eyebrows.

“We should work together,” I say, leaning my hand on my chin. I’m almost annoyed at myself for using all my best stuff on this semi-loser in class, but he’s not really a semi-loser. He’s particularly cute when he doesn’t shave and he gets all flustered when he has to talk to the class. If only he would wear cooler shoes. Maybe while we work together on this assignment I can coach him on different footwear. They’re always slip-ons, never anything with laces. And they’re always kind of cheap looking. At least they’re not Crocs.

“So?” I prod.

“Oh.” He glances away. “Um, I guess.” He turns to me and nods.

Score.

We drag our chairs together.

“Before we start, I have to ask. Are you Italian? I love Italian guys.”

“Um. I’m mostly Portuguese and Welsh.”

“South American, even better.”

He gives me a weird look. “You do know that Portugal isn’t in South America, right?”

“Of course, silly,” I say, touching his arm. “I was joking!”

Where the eff is Portugal?

Inga
(creative writing professor)

I finish giving the assignment and I watch as Lea makes a note and Gabe stares at the back of her head. It’s perfect timing for them to finally become friends. I hope neither of them had a painful childhood. I find that this is the best assignment to get my couple of the semester to really engage with each other. There’s something about having to share childhood memories that always brings people closer.

And time is ticking for Gabe and Lea. I haven’t even seen them talk to each other yet. They spend plenty of time staring dreamily at each other, so there’s obviously an attraction there. It’s like they’ve formed a covert mutual-admiration society, and now it’s time for them to share it with each other.

Lea looks up from her notebook and smiles at me. But then we both notice at the same moment that Gabe is talking to Hillary.

Dammit, Hillary! You are cordially uninvited from the covert mutual-admiration society. It’s like I can see all of my hopes and dreams of Gabe and Lea falling in love go out the window with each toss of Hillary’s long overly highlighted mousy brown hair. I know that it’s mouse brown under those expensive shades of ash and honey. Not that I think Gabe is the kind of boy who’s particularly susceptible to hair tossing, but I don’t know him very well and therefore cannot give him the benefit of the doubt.

I sigh so loudly that I feel like half the first row notices, so instead of actually wringing Hillary’s neck I smile and turn away for a moment, regaining my composure. Pam is going to hate hearing about this. In part because it emphasizes how emotionally invested I am in this nonrelationship.

I turn back to check on Lea and she looks okay. The girl who was sitting on the other side of her seems to be engaging her. But I wanted Gabe and Lea to fall in love while talking about his tenth birthday party, or her using the quilt her grandmother made her to build the world’s best blanket fort. Or that time that Lea got her head stuck in between the rungs of a chair and Gabe fell off a roof because his older sister told him that he’d be able to fly. These are the kinds of stories that bond people together. These are all examples of actual essays that students have written in the past.

Now that’s never going to happen because of Hillary’s existence.

I didn’t know I could hate the name Hillary quite this much. I am seething with almost as much rage as Victor experiences in this classroom on a daily basis.

I look at Lea sympathetically and she smiles back, her usual smile. This is not over though between Hillary and me. She has poked the bear.

Sam
(Gabe’s brother)

I’m about to leave the student center when I notice Gabe hiding in the corner in the back, almost out of sight behind the stairs. Our mom keeps bugging me to keep an eye on him, even though I keep telling her that he’s fine.

I sit down opposite him. “I didn’t even realize there were seats back here.”

He doesn’t seem to notice, so I knock on the table and he startles, pulling out his earbuds and looking over at me.

“Hey,” he says. “I didn’t hear you.”

“Shocker. I was just saying that I didn’t even know there were seats back here.”

He looks around like he had no idea where he was sitting. “I think they must have added them recently. I like it though. Out of the way.”

I nod. “How’s it going?”

“All right.”

“What are you up to?”

“I’m supposed to meet up with my creative writing critique partner.”

“Are you working with that chick Lea?”

“Nah, with the most annoying girl in the world. I wish it was Lea.” And from the face he’s making I believe him. Unfortunately, the older brother in me rears its ugly head.

“So you do like her!”

He rolls his eyes.

“Have you talked to her yet?”

“No.”

“I talked to her the other day.”

That gets his attention. “What? What did you say to her, Sam?”

“Nothing, I swear!” I hold up my hands in surrender.

He glares at me. “You promise you weren’t an ass?”

“Promise.”

“I don’t believe you.”

“Fine.”

“Fine.”

We’ve come to a stalemate, but I decide to proceed anyway.

“You should talk to her. She’s nice.”

He shrugs.

“Come on, man, why not?”

“You know why,” he says. And I do know why, but it seems to me that all of his issues are kind of dumb, and I’m allowed to think that because I’m his brother. “Let’s talk about something else, anything else.”

“How’s the life of an academic residence mentor, or whatever word-salad title you have?”

“It’s not easy. I had this girl come see me crying the other night about her calc class. I’ve never taken calc; precalc was more than enough for me. So I kind of had no advice to give her.”