Unfortunately Unromantic

Prepare yourself for a cliche, dear reader. My alarm clock is about to go off.

Three… two… one…

There it is, my obnoxious alarm, at 7:15 in the morning. 

“7:15?!” you ask, outraged. I can’t tell if you’re upset that I consider 7:15 early, or if you’re indignant that anyone would have to get up as early as 7:15. If you’re the latter, thank you! We think alike. If you’re the former, well, you disgust me.

I clumsily make it down my loft bed’s ladder and hit the snooze button to shut up the alarm, then flip it over to officially turn it off. 

I look out the window for Sam’s car. It isn’t in the driveway yet. Could I maybe get away with going back to bed until 7:45? Oh, wouldn’t that be lovely! I’m about ready to set the alarm back on for 7:45 when I hear the gravel driveway crunch.

I know I should be excited to see Sam, but really all I am is tired. I stayed up until his lunch break last night, which was at 2 in the morning, and now here I am, greeting him at my house this morning. I dress myself reluctantly: much as I want to crawl back in bed, I’ll have to greet him, and look somewhat alive while doing it. He knocks at the door. Shoot! I didn’t ask my mom if he could come over!

I run lightly down the hall to my parents’ room. 

“Mama, Sam’s here, can he come in?” I whisper. She makes some sort of acknowledgement— I’ll take it as a yes. I scamper down the stairs, through the dining room, through the kitchen, to the door. 

“Hi,” he says. “Want a donut?” 

I hadn’t planned on eating breakfast until after our nap, but a donut kind of sounded good. We go out to his car to get the donut, stealing kisses on the way. Morning kisses. Sweet and all, but without brushing my teeth? I hate to admit it, but I wish he would stop.

Finally we crash on the couch, leaning on each other’s shoulders. It’s pretty comfortable, at least for a couch nap, but I’m still awake enough to hear my little sisters asking why Sam is at our house so early. 

Here in Sam’s arms, the morning is more beautiful for some reason. I can see the sun streaming in through the curtains in the living room, reflecting off the TV and my sisters’ fish tank. I’m a little chilly in my short shorts and light t-shirt, but Sam is warm, so warm, and soft, too. 

Eventually Sam says, “we should probably get ready to go.”

Ready to go? Oh right, ready to go. We’d agreed to meet Jimmy and Elena at the Ashland Dairy Queen at 10 this morning. 

We pull in the lot, and Sam grins. I know he’s excited about Jimmy’s Challenger, which is apparently a “cool car”. Jimmy and Elena stand next to the car, his arms around her. It reminds me of when Sam and I would hug in the band room before school, back when we were first dating my sophomore year. I’m surprised by the hint of nostalgia that brings back. Oh, to be young and in love again!

What a sickening statement. Sam and I are young and in love, right? After all, I don’t get up at 7:15 in the morning for just anyone. But Jimmy and Elena, they look young and in love, and in their reflection I see me and Sam— but it’s a reflection of us from over a year ago! What right do I have to feel this old and wise? None! But there I stand, knowing that what I see is a two-month-old relationship, in the depths of the “in love experience”. 

With a pang, I realize what this means. If I see Jimmy and Elena “in love” and I acknowledge that Sam and I have moved on from there, this means that Sam and I aren’t in love anymore. We’re at the point when we make a choice to love each other. 

We get out of the car and Jimmy comes toward us.

“They don’t open until 10:30,” he says, laughing. Sam laughs, Elena laughs. I force up a laugh. Oh yes, how humorous. Someone ought to have checked what time DQ opens. 

There we stand, Jimmy and Elena holding hands, Sam and I both with our arms crossed. The boys are talking about cars. I don’t follow the conversation, but Elena does. I study her cute outfit, a wrap-tank with a knit cardigan, rolled-up jeans, and trendy shoes. I almost compliment her, but I don’t want to interrupt their conversation. 

Finally, DQ opens. We put our face masks on and go in, one couple at a time. I order a small Blizzard, hoping it won’t make my stomach upset. I shouldn’t be eating ice cream this early in the morning, especially not after having a donut for breakfast, but everyone else is getting something. How uncomfortable it would be if I didn’t get anything! For the first time in my life, I’m painfully conscious of something like conformity.

There I sit, a lonely seventeen-year-old in the company of these three adults (well, eighteen-year-olds, but technically they’re adults) talking about their full time jobs at the Ashland Walmart and their video game habits. I work four hours a week coaching preschool gymnastics at the YMCA (though classes only just started back up since the shutdown) and have never played a game in my life. I have nothing to add to this conversation. For me, as someone who loves talking but hates to be a bore, there aren’t many things worse than being in a conversation, and knowing I ought to contribute something, but knowing that if I did, the other people would be uninterested at best and annoyed at worst. It’s painfully obvious to me that I don’t belong here. 

“Oh my goodness!” I say for what must be the twentieth time. Elena has just finished a story about some poor trainee dumping an entire load of totes in the grocery-pickup parking lot. The boys are laughing: they know this trainee, and apparently wish they’d been there to see the mess. I can’t help but think that that’s awfully mean of them. 

I laugh when the others laugh, I make generic “wow!” and “imagine that!” interjections when they fit. Sam won’t know how uncomfortable I am unless I tell him. I don’t know if that speaks to my acting abilities, or just makes him sound terribly oblivious. Maybe both. 

Sam drops me off back at home with more hugs and kisses. The poor man looks so tired after his night shift stocking. I send him home after making him promise to text me when he arrives home safely.

That evening I lay on the grass at band camp, on our fifteen minute break. It feels so good, just laying there, looking up into the sky and letting my back rest from carrying my drum this whole time. 

I’m happy, until for some reason I remember that Sam used to be here by my side. It feels like he should be here still, him and all the other seniors who graduated. “Graduated”, more like. Oh, they “graduated” on a Facebook livestream, but there was no band, no choir, no speeches. It didn’t really feel like they graduated, after all. I close my eyes.

Sam reminds me of Laura, my sister, a year younger than me. She should be here too, but she decided to quit band. I know I shouldn’t be mad at her, and I know band was her choice and that she’s allowed to choose to play or not. My mind knows this, but my heart has yet to catch up. Oh, Laura, we were going to go all the way together. Couldn’t you have given me my senior year? 

To my surprise, a tear escapes my closed eyes and falls to the grass. I feel its trail down the side of my face and hate it.

Oh dear, why must I have emotions now, of all times? Alone in my room would be fine, but here on the field? Embarrassing. Especially if I get caught. 

We’re supposed to be socially distanced, but to my right I can hear the rest of the seniors talking and laughing in close quarters. Part of me wants to join them, but I’m lonely and for some reason I don’t want to get un-lonely. It’s easier to lay here by myself than to make a place for myself over there.

 I used to belong here. I belonged in a circle between my boyfriend, my little sister, her boyfriend, and various other members of the band. Graduated, quit, graduated, and far away. Far away on the grass, to my right. Yes, they belonged in our circle too, but now I don’t know if I belong in theirs.

Oh no, more tears. This isn’t right. I’ve always been my happiest at band camp, but here I am. Almost crying, alone on the grass. Pathetic, I know. Now that I’ve admitted that I’m not happy, it’s hard to stop seeing just how bad everything is. We’re standing sixteen paces apart on the field when we used to stand eight. My drumline is down from thirteen people to just seven. I’m missing my sister and my boyfriend and all the graduated seniors. I’m wearing a hot and sweaty face mask that fogs my glasses and never leaves my peripheral vision. We don’t even know if we’ll ever perform for an audience. Do you know how demoralizing it is to work to prepare something nobody will ever see? Let me tell you, nothing is sadder than a group of usually hard-working and determined band kids becoming apathetic and losing motivation, because what’s the point if we won’t have an audience? Oh, if only Sam could be here!

“Noelle!”

It’s Haley, calling my name from the group of seniors, my friends, to my right. 

“What do you think we should play for the senior show?”

“La Suerte or nothin’!” is my answer, and it’s met with enthusiastic agreement. Suddenly I’m pulled into a whirling conversation about marching in 6/8 time, the merits of Beth and Detroit Rock City, the difficulty level of the trumpet part for La Suerte De Los Tontos, and the number of drummers we would need to do a convincing rendition of Mr. Roboto.

So I do fit in here, after all. Of course I do! It was silly of me to pretend I didn’t. Just because this morning, this week, this month, this year have been off kilter and feeling wrong, doesn’t mean I have to be off kilter and feeling wrong. I’ll hold on to band and to Sam. After all, one ought to hold on to the things they love.