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Old Friends -- E
May. 19th, 2005 08:53 amEmily was odd in a way that I never quite figured out. There were rumors from people she went to grade school with about an "accident" but no one really had any details. Long absences, changed behavior, a knew personality upon return. But these were all vague in an untantalizing way and I never really pursued it, though I am a gossip by nature.
We were thrown together by a quirk of scheduling. Somehow we managed to have six of seven classes together senior year in high school. We hadn’t known each other at all before that. I went to a big high school where I sat next to people at graduation who I’d never met, so that wasn’t really a surprise. In fact, I think it took a few weeks before I noticed we were in almost all the same classes. Emily was very quiet that way.
Before I heard rumors of the "accident", I attributed her quietness to her slight Russian accent. There weren’t many Russian immigrants in our school and though she’d pretty much grown up there, it was still the Cold War and Eastern European accents were something to mock. Kids have trouble with the logic that if someone is speaking that way 65 years after the October Revolution, that their family probably fled for a reason.
We became friends by proximity but it never ceased being a little difficult to communicate with her. Not because of her accent, but because her answers to routine questions did not take the most direct path. Answering whether or not she did her homework took her describing her trip home from school on the bus, piano practice, what her mom cooked for dinner and whatever unexpected events (phone call from a relative, what book she was reading etc.) occurred.
Often that kind of thing would bother me but with Emily it didn’t. It was part of her charm. There’s a reason the phrase "I haven’t got all day" is a part of speech, but in this case, I actually did have all day thanks to the school scheduling computers. Our conversations would stop and start unhurriedly through the breaks between classes and the lulls in lectures. It was a really nice part of my school day and I missed her presence when she was out sick. Which was fairly frequent.
When she invited me to her classical piano recital, I wasn’t really surprised. It had dominated, as much as anything could, our conversations for the couple of weeks beforehand. Even though I was a snotty punk rocker with no interest in classical music, I accepted because it was obviously a big deal to her and I, in that semester, probably spent more time with her than anyone else in the world. And hell, I liked her.
I didn’t, however, expect to be the only other teenager there. I knew Emily wasn’t a big crowd kind of person, but I did know I wasn’t her only friend. She defied cliques, but she was friendly with the hippies, accepted by the smart kids, and had conversations with the other independent, slightly-odd teens. Though she loved playing the piano, this event seemed geared towards her parents. It was at a friend of her dad’s house, a huge home on top of a hill with a California glassed-in living room that held, what even I could tell, was a super-expensive piano. Everyone else besides me was adults: friends and business associates of her dad and mom.
It was uncomfortable to say the least. The adults checked me out since many had never met a friend of Emily’s before. They also all treated me like Emily’s boyfriend and I didn’t know whether that was just their universal assumption or whether this idea came from Emily. While Emily and I certainly spent a lot of time together, none of it until that moment was outside of school. But I think I was a more-clueless-than-average teenage boy in that respect and I could have missed the signals. I hadn’t even thought of the possibility of dating her until that moment, but that also speaks more of my fucked up teen boy stuff than anything else.
I didn’t know anyone in the room and I hadn’t learned yet how to hide my anxiety in those types of situations. I drank fruit juices and nervously bounced my knee waiting for the recital to start. I was underdressed and didn’t know how I was supposed to act. Emily was too nervous and busy preparing to do more than give me an enthusiastic "Hi" when I walked in the door so I sat alone depending on the prurient interest or pity of the adults to have someone to talk to.
Finally her father announced her and what pieces we would be playing. Everyone clapped politely and she appeared wearing an adult, but modest, black cocktail dress. She played and was mostly amazing to me though I had no way to gauge the difficulty level of the pieces she performed. She did have trouble with one piece though. She stopped and started it three times as her father glowered in the closest seat to the piano. But she eventually got it going. She played for a long time, long enough that at some point I realized I would be late for my family Sunday night dinner and there was nothing I could do about it without being rude.
When she finished she was surrounded and well-wished by the attendees but I could tell something was wrong. I hung back, not wanted to compete for attention. When the crowd cleared, I complimented her performance but all she could talk about was the one she messed up. I tried to comfort her a little but didn’t have the words. Finally I explained that I had to go and she seemed disappointed. Whether that was because she wanted to hang out more or because the whole night had become a disappointment, I didn’t know.
I figured we’d have plenty of time to discuss the whole thing and I did have to get home. But we didn’t. Emily didn’t come back to school the next day or the next week. After another week passed, I called her house, having the number from the recital invitation she had sent me, not because I’d ever called before. Her mother answered and kindly, because she had met me at the recital, but firmly told me that Emily was not available and wouldn’t be back at school for the rest of the semester. Her tone did not invite further questioning.
Rumors of illness spread from her longest term friends. But the rumors were vague and the illness seemed to preclude visitors. I missed her, but we were still relatively new friends so the year moved on. I stopped asking our mutual friends for news because they either had no information or wouldn’t tell me.
She returned part way through the next semester but the scheduling quirk wasn’t in our favor this time and we only saw each other occasionally in the halls. Our relationship had lost its delicate balance and luxury of unlimited time and it never recovered.
We were thrown together by a quirk of scheduling. Somehow we managed to have six of seven classes together senior year in high school. We hadn’t known each other at all before that. I went to a big high school where I sat next to people at graduation who I’d never met, so that wasn’t really a surprise. In fact, I think it took a few weeks before I noticed we were in almost all the same classes. Emily was very quiet that way.
Before I heard rumors of the "accident", I attributed her quietness to her slight Russian accent. There weren’t many Russian immigrants in our school and though she’d pretty much grown up there, it was still the Cold War and Eastern European accents were something to mock. Kids have trouble with the logic that if someone is speaking that way 65 years after the October Revolution, that their family probably fled for a reason.
We became friends by proximity but it never ceased being a little difficult to communicate with her. Not because of her accent, but because her answers to routine questions did not take the most direct path. Answering whether or not she did her homework took her describing her trip home from school on the bus, piano practice, what her mom cooked for dinner and whatever unexpected events (phone call from a relative, what book she was reading etc.) occurred.
Often that kind of thing would bother me but with Emily it didn’t. It was part of her charm. There’s a reason the phrase "I haven’t got all day" is a part of speech, but in this case, I actually did have all day thanks to the school scheduling computers. Our conversations would stop and start unhurriedly through the breaks between classes and the lulls in lectures. It was a really nice part of my school day and I missed her presence when she was out sick. Which was fairly frequent.
When she invited me to her classical piano recital, I wasn’t really surprised. It had dominated, as much as anything could, our conversations for the couple of weeks beforehand. Even though I was a snotty punk rocker with no interest in classical music, I accepted because it was obviously a big deal to her and I, in that semester, probably spent more time with her than anyone else in the world. And hell, I liked her.
I didn’t, however, expect to be the only other teenager there. I knew Emily wasn’t a big crowd kind of person, but I did know I wasn’t her only friend. She defied cliques, but she was friendly with the hippies, accepted by the smart kids, and had conversations with the other independent, slightly-odd teens. Though she loved playing the piano, this event seemed geared towards her parents. It was at a friend of her dad’s house, a huge home on top of a hill with a California glassed-in living room that held, what even I could tell, was a super-expensive piano. Everyone else besides me was adults: friends and business associates of her dad and mom.
It was uncomfortable to say the least. The adults checked me out since many had never met a friend of Emily’s before. They also all treated me like Emily’s boyfriend and I didn’t know whether that was just their universal assumption or whether this idea came from Emily. While Emily and I certainly spent a lot of time together, none of it until that moment was outside of school. But I think I was a more-clueless-than-average teenage boy in that respect and I could have missed the signals. I hadn’t even thought of the possibility of dating her until that moment, but that also speaks more of my fucked up teen boy stuff than anything else.
I didn’t know anyone in the room and I hadn’t learned yet how to hide my anxiety in those types of situations. I drank fruit juices and nervously bounced my knee waiting for the recital to start. I was underdressed and didn’t know how I was supposed to act. Emily was too nervous and busy preparing to do more than give me an enthusiastic "Hi" when I walked in the door so I sat alone depending on the prurient interest or pity of the adults to have someone to talk to.
Finally her father announced her and what pieces we would be playing. Everyone clapped politely and she appeared wearing an adult, but modest, black cocktail dress. She played and was mostly amazing to me though I had no way to gauge the difficulty level of the pieces she performed. She did have trouble with one piece though. She stopped and started it three times as her father glowered in the closest seat to the piano. But she eventually got it going. She played for a long time, long enough that at some point I realized I would be late for my family Sunday night dinner and there was nothing I could do about it without being rude.
When she finished she was surrounded and well-wished by the attendees but I could tell something was wrong. I hung back, not wanted to compete for attention. When the crowd cleared, I complimented her performance but all she could talk about was the one she messed up. I tried to comfort her a little but didn’t have the words. Finally I explained that I had to go and she seemed disappointed. Whether that was because she wanted to hang out more or because the whole night had become a disappointment, I didn’t know.
I figured we’d have plenty of time to discuss the whole thing and I did have to get home. But we didn’t. Emily didn’t come back to school the next day or the next week. After another week passed, I called her house, having the number from the recital invitation she had sent me, not because I’d ever called before. Her mother answered and kindly, because she had met me at the recital, but firmly told me that Emily was not available and wouldn’t be back at school for the rest of the semester. Her tone did not invite further questioning.
Rumors of illness spread from her longest term friends. But the rumors were vague and the illness seemed to preclude visitors. I missed her, but we were still relatively new friends so the year moved on. I stopped asking our mutual friends for news because they either had no information or wouldn’t tell me.
She returned part way through the next semester but the scheduling quirk wasn’t in our favor this time and we only saw each other occasionally in the halls. Our relationship had lost its delicate balance and luxury of unlimited time and it never recovered.
