Before I Break (2 page)

“As I was saying,” Ms. Benson went on, “I would like all of you to go around and introduce yourselves, especially now that we have a new student in the room. So we’ll start on this side of the room with the new kid. Tell us your name?”

“Avery Branson,” he said as he pulled out a notebook to begin writing in. It looked expensive and was a nice leather-bound that looked like it was maybe a journal. He didn’t look up as he said his name, almost like he felt like he didn’t need to.

“Nice name,” the teacher said, and then glanced at me. “You?”

“Cyril Hayes,” I said, smiling back at Avery. “Nice to meet you.”

Avery ignored my comment. I do have to admit, I didn’t understand why at the time, but he outright didn’t pay any attention to me, leaving me stunned. As everyone went around the room telling their names, I sat there looking at Avery, wondering if he was trying to be rude or if he was just shy.

The rest of the class period went by kind of slowly as Ms. Benson explained all of the things she was going to teach us, going over the syllabus, and trying to get our names right. The last thing I was thinking about was AP Bio, because all I could replay in my mind was the way that kid just ignored me. A lot of people would normally think of me as a not talkative type of guy, but really, I tried my best to be nice to everyone. Well, almost everyone. When the bell rang, dismissing us from the long class period, everyone began to pile out of the room except Melissa and me.

And Avery.

“Hey,” I said to him, trying to spark a conversation. “are you okay?”

Avery nodded but didn’t look in my direction as he packed up his bag. “I’m fine, I guess. What about you?”

I definitely felt a little better knowing he wasn’t a complete jerk. “I’m good. Where are you headed now?”

“Class,” he said, standing up and throwing his bag over his shoulder. “Nice to meet you, Cyril, but I have to go.”

Avery left quickly, making me feel as though I did something wrong. Melissa came up behind me, taking a hold of my hand. “Hey, don’t worry about it. I’m sure it’s just hard for him to be new and all, you know? I think he may need a friend.”

I nodded but didn’t say a word. There was something interesting about Avery that I couldn’t quite put my finger on, but I had no idea that when I figured it out, my whole life would change.

No one knows what I don’t show,

A pain so deep and down below.

I push through the suffering every day,

Only to find that there’s no other way.

How can I be the way that I am--

When everyone will hate me no matter where I am?

The scars on my heart won’t ever go away,

The scars on my arms will never fade away.

My soul is so broken that I think there’s no choice

To do anything other than hide my weak voice.

I spent the next two class period learning about themes in literature and the amount of water that makes up the Earth. AP Language and Marine Biology were fun classes, but after the thing with Avery, I just wasn’t really feeling it. Maybe he just wasn’t really a nice person. That was always a possibility, but I doubted it for some reason. Being the new kid couldn’t be easy--not that I expect it would be--but if someone was trying to be friends with him, why would he be an ass?

After those two classes were finally over, I could get to lunch. My insides were turning with hunger, and as I walked down the hallway to the cafeteria, I searched for my best friend, Jake. Maybe, I thought, he was already in the cafeteria. As I headed on in, I was overwhelmed with the amount of people.

I had to give East Hill some credit. When it first started, it only had a couple hundred students, and now, five years later, it was almost at two thousand. There were talks of renovating the school to make it fit more people, but I had a feeling it wasn’t going to happen until after I graduated. The cafeteria was full and I had to squeeze my way through the crowd to get to my table, where Melissa sat, laughing with the girls about some possible cheerleader joke, and the guys were talking about sports.

Jake and I were the only two guys at the table that didn’t play sports, and we were told during registration that we needed something on our college applications that would make us look different than other applicants. They handed us a list of clubs that we completely ignored, but I was beginning to wonder if I’d really need it for college. There had to be some sort of club that would look good, something that didn’t require sports. While I liked watching them, playing them was not my forte.

I squeezed in between some cheerleader named Claire and my girlfriend. Melissa smiled at me, wrapping her arms tightly around my waist and said, “Hey baby, how are you?”

“I’m alright,” I replied. “Have you seen Jake? Or Avery?”

She shook her head. “I haven’t seen Jake all day. And I haven’t seen that Avery kid since first period. Why? Are you looking to try and talk to him again?”

I shrugged. “I was just curious, that’s all. I’m going to find Jake, I’ll be right back.” I got up from the table and went to go see if I could find Jake anywhere nearby. I pulled out my phone and texted him, asking if he was coming to lunch, and waited for a response. His text came through a couple minutes later and he said,

Why would Jake be in the courtyard? There was only one reason for that, and if he was doing what I thought, I was going to be pissed beyond belief. Stomping down the hall and throwing open the
door to the courtyard, I found him over in one of the corners. He was wearing sunglasses and had a beanie hat on top of his head, and he looked relaxed. When I glanced at his hand, I saw that he had a joint.

I walked on over and snatched it out of his hand. He met my eyes and smiled. “Hey man, how are you doing today?”

“I was doing fine until I just found you smoking pot in the middle of the courtyard,” I explained. “Are you trying to get yourself expelled?”

It took a moment for Jake to answer. Finally, he said, “I…was just looking for some relaxation time…and thought you’d want some with me.” He reached to grab the joint out of my hand and I pulled it from his reach. “What…the fuck, man…”

I really couldn’t believe I had to sit here and do this with him right now. “Keep the sunglasses on and come with me inside. I have some cologne in my bag that I can spray you with to get rid of the smell, which by the way, resembles something similar to armpit.”

“Thanks, Cy,” he said softly. “All this shit’s hazy…I think I need a break.”

This was exactly why I hated the idea of him doing weed. Jake has always proven himself to be a mess. I threw the joint of the ground and stepped on it, refusing to let the lit joint burn out. “Jake, let’s go.” I grabbed him and picked up the remnants of the joint, shoving it in my pocket, and heading toward the cafeteria.

When Jake and I began our sixth grade year, I had my time period where I experimented with weed. The thing for me was that I just really didn’t like it and hoped that Jake wouldn’t do it either. After a few weeks, Jake refused to give it up, and has been smoking it ever since. Not once has he ever abused it like this in a public area such as school. Either school was getting to him or something was seriously wrong with his head.

I dragged my best friend to my table and sat him next to me, between Claire and me, and Melissa gave me a questioning look when she saw him. “Are you okay, Jake?”

“He’s fine,” I lied. Normally I wouldn’t be one to lie to Melissa, but the truth was, she hated the idea of weed just as much as I did. When she found out that I used to do it, she was very happy that I’d quit, but I never told her that Jake still continued to use it. I really wanted to keep it a secret because I was not big on the whole weed thing either, and knew it would just make her mad that he did it. Sometimes with her it was all or nothing.

I reached into my bag and gave him some of my cologne, hoping to get rid of the smell. Sometimes being the responsible one in the friendship was hard. The truth was, if I knew what I knew now, I probably would have been able to stop the tragedy that was emerging.

When I arrived home later that evening, I went straight into my room and logged onto my computer. The first thing I wanted to do was check to see if this Avery guy had a Facebook. As I clicked on the search and typed in his name, I smiled in relief.

There he was. His profile was set on private, but I didn’t want to be creepy and send a request right away, did I? Deciding he would probably like a friend, I sent him a friend request and went to my bed to rest my head.

Thinking back to my conversation with my father earlier that morning, I was still trying to make sense of it. Mom seemed pretty upset that my dad, who was a lawyer, was going to do exactly what she was hoping he wouldn’t.

When I woke up that morning, mom and dad were sitting at the kitchen table. Dad was reading his newspaper and drinking his coffee while mom made breakfast.

“Hey, sweetie,” my mom said. “Do you want some eggs?”

“Sure,” I said, taking the seat next to my father. “How’s work going for you, Dad?”