Whispers

Part Five, by Michelle Wilder

Leaves of grass...

(This is almost the first story I ever wrote. It's the apple seed from which many grew. Reposted with grammatical revision only.)

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He made us stop for meals and we still finished just before nine.

We sat on my bed most of the morning, and then moved to the couch in the hall, and then ended up on a sectional on the big balcony in the student union building that was really comfortable, and it was quiet up there too. He said he liked reading there in between classes, like it was all quiet and private in a crowded place.

We were leaning back in the corner and he turned the page and it just ended...

It was over. I mean it was one of the best books I ever read. It was so funny and tragic and smart, and about the real world but really about this fantasy, magic world... and love and... and I wanted to know more about the people, about all of them.

“It’s...”

I looked up and Dennis was smiling, I guess ‘cause I was holding my book like I was afraid it would run away. I just looked back at it.
I didn’t know what to say.

I wanted it to be new so I could read it again and I was sad too 'cause it never would be again. I looked at the cover, and thought it was beautiful, too...

“It’s beautiful...”

And I started to cry ‘cause it was, and ‘cause I’d never get to read it again, ever, like that...

Dennis put his arm around me and just sat with me.

“It *is* beautiful.”

I wiped my face and looked at him, at the way he said it. He was still looking at my book, in my hands. But he looked at me too, and he was smiling.

“That was fun, wasn't it?”

I nodded and looked at it again and wished. My eyes were still running.

“Want to do the next one the same?”

I looked at him like he was crazy, or an angel. He smiled really big and hugged his arm around me harder.

“There are two more in the story.” He *really* smiled big, at my face, I think.

“Two more?”

He nodded.

I had to look at the book and think how good it was, and that it wasn’t over.

I wasn’t even embarrassed.

-

I woke up *way* past breakfastime and Dennis was already gone, maybe to breakfast, or lunch, even...

I put on my oldest jeans and a baggy tee and went to wash up a bit, and wake up. I’d taken a long, loud shower before bed.

I took the book too, so I could look at it during breakfast. And while I brushed my teeth. I had to stop at the door and go back and get my toothbrush after I thought that. And then my towel.

Outside our room, Jarrod was asleep on one of the hall sofas, from down the hall, I guessed, and there was a cafeteria tray with a couple of coffee cups and fruit peels and stuff on the floor.

He looked like he’d been up late, and then I thought that eleven wasn’t really *that* late... but then I thought that I didn’t know if he was up to eleven... after eleven... when I went to sleep...

I... I was still asleep.

I thought about asking if he wanted to go to breakfast too, but I wanted to be alone and look at the book some more.

I decided I wouldn’t wake him up, even if he would’ve been more comfortable in bed. He looked like he would've been more comfortable on the floor, too....

And why he wasn't in his room, just down the hall..? And why wasn't the couch down the hall, like usual?

And besides, he was asleep.

I was too, still, from the way I was thinking. Again.

-

I went to the cafeteria straight from the washrooms. Way more awake.

I looked at the book as I walked, at the way the cover picture made sense after we read it, little pieces like stained glass, all broken up and complicated, but like parts of the story.... It was more like a painting, though, or like those rubber-stamp pictures, and really simple, but it was beautiful.

There’s a big entrance/lobby/waiting area on the way, with the elevator and stairs to the girls-only tower, and doors for the student housing offices, and past them the cafeteria building.

When I came down the three little steps from our dorm hall, there were a lot of people there.

A couple of campus police and a city policeman were talking with the rez manager, who I vaguely remembered from September. They were over by the glass doors to the outside that were all covered up with cardboard that looked like it came from packing boxes and I figured they must’ve been smashed or something. There was a lot of cardboard. Both sets of doors.

Some of the proctors were there too, beside the elevators, talking really seriously to a short old guy who I thought was the Dean of residences or something. I remembered him in a suit.

“Hey, Bobby!”

Anne was with the proctors, and waving, so I waved hi back.

They all stopped talking and looked at who she was waving at, I guess, and I turned red, like usual, but I kept on going to the cafeteria. But she came over, so I stopped.

“Hey, Bobby.” She smiled a bit, like she knew she just said that. “How’re you doing?”

She talked quiet but normal, and I was glad she was ‘cause it made me feel like it was okay to see her. I mean, like it was normal again, after. I smiled more. Maybe different, but way more. I was still happy from the book.

“I’m really great, thanks.” I didn’t know how to say thanks more and I didn't want to get emotional so I kinda tried to change the subject.

“What happened?” I looked over at the police and the door.

The Dean and the rest of the proctors had gone over and were looking at the door too, or something. The cardboard, anyway. Talking and looking.

“Someone wrote... marked up the doors... and the police... well, Haroldson, wants them to treat it like a crime and they want it to be an incident or something...” Anne sounded tense.

The talking got way louder and more confused. Even the campus policemen were talking loud, and *all* of them were angry.

“Hey, guys.” Jarrod was right behind me. I almost jumped but I guess he was making sure I wasn’t going to jump or something, and he kinda touched my arm as he said it.

I smiled after I knew it was him, like right away, and almost made a joke about him on the couch, but when I looked he was looking at the argument by the door. He looked all awake too.

One of the girl proctors by the door was getting really mad and was like *hissing* and I heard her say “It’s *not* just about goddamn *defacing*!”

The Dean guy stepped right between her and us and said something quiet that made all the arguments kinda just *stop* and the girl who was so mad stood around him and looked right at me.

She got red and turned her back and said *really* mad, “FUCK!”

She quiet-shouted it at the floor, like a yard away from the dean and then jerked away and ran around us to the stairs, back the way I'd come from, and pounded out of sight.

I was shocked. I didn’t even know her and it was so scary that she was mad at me...

One of the other girls ran and chased her and the Dean and police started whisper-arguing more then, but really quiet.

And *everyone* had their backs to us.

“C’mon...” Jarrod kinda took my arm. He put his arm in mine and held it with his other hand too, and led the way towards the cafeteria doors.

He sounded really odd, and looked really, really tired. More than before, seconds before.

Anne angled over behind us and ran her shoulder into his other arm.

“Sucks.”

“Yeah. That’s the word...” He led us into the cafeteria and Anne closed the door even though it was usually left open.

-

They didn't talk in the line. I didn't either. It was too weird to understand anything, even enough to ask.

I got some breakfast, and Anne too, but Jarrod just got a juice he had to pay for ‘cause he’d already got his card punched that morning and said it wasn’t worth it to get another punch.

He kinda joked that the most important thing he’d learned at school was how to manage his cafeteria account. But I think he was trying not to talk about what happened in the lobby.

Almost as soon as we were seated there was louder shouting outside and one of the proctors who'd been arguing, a guy from the floor right above ours, I thought, a really huge, fat guy, came in. He didn't look happy.

He stopped, holding the doors open, and everyone looked at him and he looked all around the room and then at us, and stomped over to our table.

“Jar, Anne. Can you...” He stopped for a sec and looked at me, like he was maybe trying to remember my name, but we never really met.

“I’ll come.” Jarrod drank his juice in one gulp and stood up. He put his juice glass on my tray and looked at Anne and me. “See you later?”

We said bye and sure and stuff, but it was weird. It was like he was getting the experts or something...

Anne looked across at me, weirded out too, and made it unanimous.

“Drama...” She kinda sighed and looked tired too, like Jarrod. And she’d looked better just a minute ago, too.

I thought I should say something, but I didn’t know what. I tried to smile like it would be okay, but since I had no idea what, I didn’t really think it would work.

I felt like Anne was a real friend after yesterday, after she kinda understood what I meant without me having to say all of everything. But all the complicated feelings I had seemed like totally different than the complicated things in her eyes... I felt like I was no help and I'd just stumbled into something and made it worse.

So she kinda surprised me when she reached over and put her hand on mine and squeezed it.

“Thanks. It’ll be alright.” But she looked worse. “Do you have any time, after breakfast?”

I said sure, just study stuff... not even.... I hadn't planned my day.

I looked at my book and showed it to her and said it was the best book I ever read and I was going over to the book store after lunch to get the sequels and I had to write a paper on it but she could borrow it, after...

But she’d already read it and laughed and said stuff like “No, really, did you like it?”

She said she’d read it a few years ago, when she was in the same English Lit, and I guess I’d forgotten she was a senior.

And then for some reason I thought about what Gary said about the... rape. About how so many girls were so scared, and just then I figured out that Anne was here... then.

And Jarrod.

All the proctors. They all were, and all in residence ‘cause they had to be fourth or fifth years...

All the complicate feelings came together. I got tired too.

-

After we finished eating, and really didn’t say anything more, she took my hand again and walked to the cafeteria doors.

The campus police and the Dean guy, Haroldson, were watching a couple of guys who were taking the doors right off their hinges, still covered with cardboard. There were old wooden doors leaning on the wall.

Anne led me over to the elevator to the girl’s dorm that I wasn’t supposed to go in. There was a sign, right there, and the dean guy was right there, too.

I was going to say something like that but I guess Anne was thinking the same thing. She pushed the button and leaned against the wall by the door.

“It’s okay if you’re with me, okay?”

I nodded, but I was still nervous. The doors dinged open and Ann pulled me in, and as the doors closed I looked out and the dean guy was looking right at me. He looked mad. I thought I was in trouble, even with what Anne said.

-

The top floor of the girls' rez tower was a really bright, big room, with almost all-glass walls on two sides and low couches and armchairs here and there and a kind of kitchen over on one wall.

“This’s the girls’ party room for all the dorms.” Anne went over to a couch right in the corner of the two window walls and flopped down, and after a minute I sat on the same couch too.

We could see most of the campus, and the city too, miles away. She looked out the window with me for a bit and then kinda flopped her head back and rolled it over to look at me. She still looked really tired.

“I hate this.” She closed her eyes and looked almost sick.

I was going to say something, like “What?” but she opened her eyes again and skooched over a bit and took my hand.

“The... door, stuff..." She leaned over and held it really hard. She had the saddest eyes.

"It was about you... and Dennis, probably...”

I looked at it and couldn’t think except... Dennis? The dean so angry. Police. I almost couldn't even whisper.

“What stuff?”

She tried to look calm or something. Less tired. Less sad. She sat up a little and turned more towards me so our knees touched.

“Someone wrote... umm... homophobic and, um... threat stuff on the doors with, some kinda glass paint, etching stuff, so they can’t wash off...”

She looked at me more... not seriously, ‘cause she was really serious before... but more intensely, I guess.

I was trying so hard to figure out what she meant, and was thinking. “Homo...”

I wasn't really thinking. I was panicking. Like all, everything I'd been afraid of, all the laughs and looks...

Like everything was real and hard and as big as those huge doors and everyone reading them and...

“Sometime... before five...” Anne closed her eyes. Her voice was painful.

“They don’t, they didn't really know..." She swallowed and talked better.

"Anyway... a girl from here found it and, and she called the campus, the cops and they called Baens, tthe manager, and he called Jarrod.”

She opened her eyes and looked like twenty years older, and I knew she was going to cry so I slid over and hugged her.

She kinda shook and kept talking, really low, but she cried too.

“He woke me and we came to see the, the... the doors... and he made Haroldson come to the rez too, called him, I think...”

She stopped for a while. I thought about what she said about it being about me, and police, and homophobic... Mom and Dad...

“Dennis saw it and he freaked.” She moved a bit, but kept hugging me. Holding on.

“He came to see, after... some... student I guess, someone... told him... this morning...” She stopped for a moment and calmed. She nodded on my shoulder and then sat up a little. So I could see her face. She kept my hands. Or we grabbed each others'.

“His father’s coming, I think... an' he’s over at the admin building... until he gets here...”

I stopped holding. She grabbed my hands harder, though, and looked at them, and me.

“Jarrod made him go.” She must’ve seen how confused I got at that.

“He was being... I mean, he was really angry and...” She thought a bit. “Jar thought he was going to scare you... we thought, he was so mad, and we knew you were having a hard time, and we, I mean Jarrod and me, thought Dennis would still be too mad, if you got up then, when he was really scary...”

I thought really fast. Got it all at once.

Homophobic. He thought I was gay and so then he wanted to hurt me, or hated me... or something... Or. Friends with the fag... He touched the fag. In the campo he sat...

But he was so nice, and yesterday, and last night, even about me crying, and...

It was because people were saying *he* was gay. The graffiti. I looked at my hands. As big as all the doors. Where everyone saw it.

Anne held my hands more, harder. I still knew.

“It’s... it was what people are saying, isn’t it?” I kept looking down. “About me, I mean...” I was gonna cry again, and feel like a sissy.

Dennis wasn’t my friend.

“He doesn’t want... he didn't want them to see him too...”

"No."

I looked up a bit. She was really tired looking, still, but she was almost smiling, too.

“No. It’s *not* because of you... I mean, I guess, it is, but not that way...” She squeezed my hand more.

“Bobby, the only problem is the... asshole, or whoever, who wrote on the doors, or... *anyone* who says anything, bad...”

“But Dennis...”

“Is mad that anyone would do that.”

She must have seen that I didn’t really understand.

“To you.”

I had to think for a second more.

“He’s not mad at me?”

She smiled, at my face I guess.

“No. He’s not mad at you at all.” She smiled more at me. “He really, really likes you. That’s why he’s mad. Because you’d be scared.”

I guess I looked stupid then. Or funny.

“And he wants to protect you.”

She laughed a tiny bit ‘cause I made even more fish face.

Then she got more serious, but still smiled. I think I looked totally, completely confused, because I was.

“He *knows* you’re scared about how people are talking about you, and you’re afraid everybody will hate you or something...” She leaned a bit closer and pulled my hand more in her lap. She looked a million percent better, all of a sudden.

“He just wants to make it better for you and he doesn’t know how... He was talking to Jarrod about it, Friday. And then this morning... He was all angry that he couldn’t do anything... about the door... and got really worked up and almost got arrested.”

She smiled again at my face.

“Cal, the big guy? kinda had to drag him away from the campus police when he thought they weren’t doing anything.” She smiled like it was a good thing.

“I know you haven’t known each other for long, but he really, really likes you. And he’s one of the good ones.”

I knew what she was talking about, that he at least wasn’t disgusted with me for what people were probably saying, or my crying. But... we sat, touching, where people could see... and he read to me...

And he let me cry and even smiled at me...

“He was... mad?”

Right away I knew I sounded even more like a sissy than crying would, but Anne smiled really big and looked less tired, and a *lot* happier.

“Yes! He was yelling and all red and made them put up the paper on the doors and kept saying what if you came by and *saw* it, huh? Huh!?” She did the huh really in my face and laughed.

“Cal hauled him away about the same time the city cop looked like he was gonna cuff him or something.” She laughed really loud for a second and then smiled more normally.

“Haroldson told us to get him away too so Jarrod took him over to the UC to get him to eat or something.” She stopped, like the story was over. Then she added, or really finished it.

“That was about three hours ago... You really slept in. But that's what happened.”

I thought of something else.

“How come Jarrod asked you...” I thought some more. “How come they even called Jarrod?”

She made a bad smile.

“Because it was about you, and he's your proctor. And Baens knew he could help because they learned a lot after, well, there was a rape here, and when the, the...”

She looked at me all tired again all of a sudden. I thought it wasn’t tired... More like really sad.

“Some...” She held my hands really tighter. She thought a bit more and then looked in my eyes.

“No one wanted you to get scared or hurt by some jerk...” She looked like she was checking me or something.

“Baens' a smart man. The stuff on the door....” Her eyes teared up.

“He didn’t know for sure, so he called Jarrod, and he... tried to do his best. And Jarrod knew it was gonna... it was more serious, and called Haroldson..." She looked down.

“But Dennis was the one who made them cover it, he was so mad like the instant he saw it, and we were talking so much about everything else, for, for...”

She shusshed me, sort of, when she stopped and breathed deep and thought some more. She started talking again after almost a minute.

“Two years ago there was a sexual assault in... in... in the... residences.” She looked relieved that I just nodded.

“The girl it happened to... got help, like right away... and really good help, like counseling and stuff...” She looked in my eyes again, to see if I understood, I think.

“But seventeen girls left the residences, and we think three boys, because of it, almost right after, and some just ran away, almost the next day, and most of them dropped out...”

She was crying, all of a sudden, and looked at our hands.

“They said one girl, Tyra, tried to... to kill herself... because of it.” She sniffed.

“After she was gone for four months, after she left, she... she... and she never said why, I mean, before...” She looked up again, and was crying hard.

“But... but she was scared at what... what happened... really scared...”
She hugged me hard.

“The girl it happened to got so much help, and the ones we forgot about... for...”

She just stopped. Sniffed.

“We *didn’t* forget... but we didn’t know how bad it was!”

I tried to hold her but she had my hands and I was afraid to say anything or pull away while she was shaking.

She finally slowed down and sat up a bit and leaned back a bit. And let go of my hands. They were numb.

“I’m sorry, I shouldn’t tell you this stuff...” She kissed my cheek and sat back, and kept hold of my closer arm.

“So, anyway we know how it can be bad to be so afraid, but it was Dennis who knew it would be *you* that was afraid and made us stop being stupid experts.”

I think I understood, then, what she had been telling me. What she was talking about. All, how it connected.

“Then how come Dennis, I mean, then how come he’s leaving?” I really wanted to know why he didn’t tell me... about what he did. Why he didn't come back to our room, even...

“He’s not leaving!? Oh! Oh! Jarrod said he just shouldn’t *be* here... when he was so mad, or... upset, anyway.”

“But his father’s coming!”

She tried to make a smile.

“He called home and his father’s coming but that's just 'cause he was mad and what happened, not to leave! I think he’ll still stay for sure.” She looked much better.

“He made Jarrod watch out for for you, outside your room. He wanted to make sure you were safe and didn't want to wake you up and make a bigger deal of it... We didn't think you'd walk right by Jarrod.”

I started to shake. I didn’t feel safe or anything normal right then. Like a hundred feelings all catching up and rushing around in my chest.

Anne and Jarrod and... a lot of them didn't hate me for... for what was on the doors. They thought the guys who'd *write* were wrong!

Dennis was... mad. But he was okay, and not mad at *me*. And he wasn't leaving.

And he liked me. Still. Even with what was there.

He held me, yesterday, and he still liked me.

-

I asked Anne to walk with me back to my room and I think I was afraid I’d cry in front of the men in the lobby but she said it was okay and put her arm around my shoulders in the elevator before I even said that and kinda blocked me from even seeing them and we walked out really fast.

I didn’t even look who was there.

-

Dennis wasn’t in our room and I was afraid again that he wasn’t coming back, even if Anne said.

I looked as calm as I could and thanked Anne and said I really needed to have a nap, or study... I can’t remember what I said, exactly. But she hugged me again and let me close the door.

I sat and looked at Dennis’ bed and started to cry, ‘cause I was a fag and a sissy and now people knew it for sure, and I was crying ‘cause Dennis wasn’t coming back, and he’d rubbed my back... and held me... And Anne said he was, but he wouldn’t... ‘cause he found out...

And she said he was mad *for* me, to protect me, and he liked me and *wasn't* leaving... but his father was coming, driving down because of the doors and then *he'd* know and make Dennis leave, even if...

I wanted him to rub my back again.

-

And I forgot my stupid book upstairs. I started sobbing.

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End of Part Five