Meredith had piano lessons, and was picked up from school, so Sebastian and I went with a group of friends to Ada’s house. Ada was this insanely carefree, beautiful Native girl we knew whose parents were always away and didn’t have high expectations of her. She was a free spirit, but also a lucky one, at that. I think, at this point, it’s also pretty important for you to know that Sebastian and Meredith aren’t my only friends. In high school, you tend to have a lot of friends – a lot of people to say your name as you pass in the hallways. The thing is it’s just like Facebook: you do know these people, and you do talk to them sometimes or a lot, but they don’t know you as well as your close friends.

If it wasn’t for going over to other peoples’ houses to hang out after school, I’d come straight home and spend three full hours completely alone until my parents came home. I didn’t like being alone – when I was alone, I started to get really depressed. Not depressed as in clinically, but depressed as in really sad. I’d have no choice but to listen to my thoughts bouncing around my head. It was like the last few minutes before falling asleep where your mind just feels like going, “Hey, don’t you remember when you were really happy?” or “Suzy and John have a really cute relationship – don’t you wish you weren’t so lonely?” and I can’t help but wonder these thoughts and sometimes – rare occasions, I assure you – I end up crying to myself. I curl up in front of the television while I watch a cute show and just cry like a child who stubbed a toe.

They say that crying is a solid form of expressing emotion; that it is better to know you can feel something than to feel anything at all. In my opinion, I’d suppose that’s true, mainly because I believe that people will never be happy with anything they have. Normal people wish they were exciting and exciting people wish they were normal – it happens all the time. And maybe blame my extensive Doctor Who watching, but I sometimes pity the human race and all of its little worries; we’re capable of creating and understanding a myriad of languages, come up with scientific breakthroughs every day, perform the most brilliant of acts, yet we’re most ashamed of our emotions. If robots existed as a single race, they’d be able to do all the intelligent things we would – exponentially better, actually – and the one thing that they could never do is feel a thing. We should be proud of that ability, even if it hurts in every way.

Alas, who thinks such rational, soothing thoughts when they’re sad? Not me.

Spending unplanned time at a friend’s house is distracting though, and for that reason it’s great. We play video games, raid fridges, bake cakes, and laugh constantly. The things we do are always spontaneous and varied – like once, another friend of ours, Dean, came by where we were completely stoned and we spent a good hour freaking him out. Personally, I’d never done marijuana, so I didn’t know exactly how it all worked out. People made claims that they saw colours, while others said that it just slowed the world down so you could relax. And, quite frankly, when they put it in the latter terms, it makes more sense why people do it. Another time, we gathered a bunch of old papers in Ada’s recycling bin and set them on fire in her backyard. The flames got huge and I was terrified of accidentally setting her house on fire so I unravelled her hose and tried to put out the flames. In my panic, though, I didn’t aim for the base of the fire and it sparked, like what I’d imagine a few watts of electricity in a pond would do; Sebastian had to finish the job for me and take me home, I was so badly shaken. All in all, the times had with friends are grand, despite the traumatic events that may take place.

After about an hour or two, Seb and I would leave the crazy kids and get to our respective homes in time to tackle homework and let our parents know we hadn’t spent all that after-school time in a dark alley taking serious drugs, or robbing a convenience store. And in spite of the fact that homework is an initial priority to some people, as soon as I slip my shoes off and head up the stairs. I take a shower, slip on pyjamas, and by the time I’m comfortably watching a recorded episode of one of the few TV shows I actually watch, my parents are home and we have dinner. They’ll always ask how my day went, which is my cue to list out various (academic) highlights of my day before they go on to talk about the highlights of theirs.

My family is pretty balanced: my mum is an Irish psychologist who always understands exactly how I feel and my dad is a good-natured, French businessman. I was conceived at an optimal time, so my parents hadn’t so soon forgotten their teenage years —they were still quite in their prime. They had a lot of patience for teenage parents, but I suppose that was because I was a pretty independent kid who didn’t have terrible taste in anything. They’d always raised me right, so I had manners and common sense since I was a little doll – even I had to commend them on their amazing parental skills.

Ever since I was little, I’ve had complete and total respect for my parents. In the superficial way, I thought my mother’s long, soft red hair was beautiful and I envied her gorgeousness, and my dad’s bright green eyes were amazing to me. Dig deeper and they were generally just very nice people, and I was glad. All-in-all, I was lucky to have such understanding parents. Sure, we fight sometimes but everyone does – it’s practically impossible to be around people for so long without finding them totally irritating.

After dinner, I would go up to my room and I sit at my desk again, which was cluttered with textbooks, binders and remnants of my latest projects. I pushed away some Post-It notes and a notebook full of the birthdays of people I knew and started up my laptop. Logging into my account, my desktop appeared and everything began to load. I double-clicked the Internet browser, and my home page opened up, yielding a couple of the usual notifications.

It’s really funny how I spend so much time on the Internet. I don’t recall exactly what I do or what websites I go on, yet I can find so much interest in doing this. Maybe I’ll read a book, or do some creative writing, but I’ll definitely make sure to log onto a few social networks, first, just to make sure I’m not missing out on anything interesting (I never am). I opened up my Instant Messenger and briefly scrolled through the contacts. Before I could even get halfway, a new window opened up with a message from Sebastian.

SEBASTIAN | NATHANIEL | WILLIAMS -- [6:43PM] says: Hey there.

I brought my fingers to the keys and typed up a quick reply – the usual: hi, hello,not much, you? We went on to talk about somewhat more complex things (I say that with the most sarcasm intended), and I ended up in conversations with a few others at the same time, but then my conversation with Seb took a slight turn.

SEBASTIAN | NATHANIEL | WILLIAMS [6:57PM] says: So what about that new guy?

x - - - { charlie } | [6:58PM] says: What new guy?

SEBASTIAN | NATHANIEL | WILLIAMS [6:58PM] says: Mister Blue-Eyes-Hot-Skater.

x - - - { charlie } | [6:58PM] says: There’s nothing to say about that.

SEBASTIAN | NATHANIEL | WILLIAMS -- [6:59PM] says: Sure about that? ;)

x - - - { charlie } | [6:59PM] says: IDEK his name – there’s nothing going on!

SEBASTIAN | NATHANIEL | WILLIAMS -- [6:59PM] says: Ok, if you say so.

I kept my computer and all its windows on as I did my homework, only half of my attention spent on the novel-study homework before me. My eyes were constantly jumping from the words in my book to the blinking orange of a new response in an MSN conversation and the bright crimson of a new notification; what could have easily been half-an-hour’s work morphed and stretched, taking up almost two hours of my night. After scribbling down the last of my questions for the first excruciating chapter at around nine – which was a prime time to start surfing the net properly – I still had to read the next seven chapters, and answer fifteen questions for each part. Rest assured, I did not turn out my lights until well beyond eleven, I totally collapsed after describing the plot in about ten different ways, and none of the reading actually sank in. I brushed my teeth and went to bed, resenting how tired I was – staying up late strikes me more as a health issue than a cool sign of rebellion, so I rarely did it. I liked to sleep, I really did.

Labels: nanowrimo