The Golden Chamber of His Heart

The left atrium receives oxygen-rich blood from the lungs and pumps it to the left ventricle, the left ventricle pumps the oxygen-rich blood to the body, the right atr…

Hold on! What was the word for that? Cramming!

That is how many of us would pass biology tests with high grades although we barely understood what was being taught all term long. If some hours after the test, the teacher gave the same paper for the marking guide, who could dare give answers? Only Andy, also known as Mr. Ice, could; everyone believed so. Nevertheless, not a single person had ever seen him raise his hand to give answers, or expected him to do so. Wondering how we could be so sure? The teacher would be so angry when no one gave answers that he ended up asking everyone to take the paper and answer the same question, and guess who would always get it right? 

Andy, the tall, smart, and handsome, but stony-hearted, as many said, used to sit at the very front, all alone. He passed most of his school life sitting at the first bench with his head bent into the textbooks. In case of any incident, like students fighting or an unusual noise coming from the outside, he never bothered turning his head back to see what would be going on. Everyone was scared by the basilisk look he gave whenever someone would tend to talk to him. No one had ever seen his teeth. Girls could define him using words such as icy, detached, unsympathetic, stony-hearted, and many others like that. Even though we used such words while gossiping about him, deep inside everyone was praying that they could catch a chance to talk to him and get to know more about him, I could tell, for that was my prayer too. I wanted to probe into his personal life so badly that nothing could stop me, it was a do or die. 

Every Saturday, students joined different clubs and movements that included the languages club, environment club, Anti-AIDS club, RedCross, Scouts and Guides, and many more. In those clubs and movements, students would meet, have conversations, most importantly they would organize some trips to help the community outside. Every student was obliged to join at least one club or movement. That was a great opportunity to see Andy somewhere else other than the first bench of the classroom. At that time I was a member of the RedCross, but I was allowed to visit other clubs and movements. I decided to visit all of them one by one, with a purpose, find Andy. I did not want to write a scenario in my mind of how our conversation would start and end, I just wanted everything to run so naturally.

The day I was visiting the last club, I was so sure that he would be there no matter what. It was a big day for me and for other classmates who knew about my intention. Getting into the classroom where the club members met, I was shocked! Andy was not there either. But how could that be, was it not a school rule to belong to at least one club? I started surmising that he must be a relative of the headmaster because there could not be any other explanation for that; basically, breaking school rules would not be tolerated. 

Even after the failure of my plan that I had called flawless, I did not concede; I wanted to go to all lengths. I consulted different internet websites that appeared after my search “how to talk to someone with a cold heart?” One of the comments said that being cold-hearted was just a defense mechanism. Was Andy trying to protect himself from something? What did he experience in the past? Is he entirely emotionless? My interest in studying Andy’s life was growing every day. Alas, I had no more plans on my mind, an air of despondency had set in.

After a few silent days, a girl from my class came to me saying that she had some breaking news. I was not listening to her until the word “Mr. Ice” passed. She said she had heard on the grapevine that Andy spent all his weekends outside. Now it was clear to me that Andy was closely related to the headmaster or somebody else very important. But what was this information going to help me with? I was not going to follow him at any rate. 

Every third week of the month, RedCross members would visit hospitalized patients in different hospitals of the city. My team headed to a nearby hospital where we distributed the victuals that we had brought specifically for patients who did not have companions. At last, a student said she would like to visit children with leukemia in the pediatric hematology-oncology department. We were a team, so we went with her. Right there, Andy was. I swear I could see his 32 teeth! With the kids, he was not the Andy we all knew. Everyone there was utterly dumbfounded! Nonetheless, no one was brave enough to step inside and say hi to Andy; we returned without letting him know that we were there. 

How could someone be so stony-hearted but golden-hearted? Could that boy we saw at the hospital be Andy’s twin? Nobody knew for certain. To find an answer on my own, I decided to go to the same place we had seen Andy. Howbeit, it was not easy to get permission from the discipline office, for there was no trip organized on that day. I had to find a way out, so I malingered. It was not something I had not done before, I knew it would work. After getting the permission slip, I rushed to the hospital. First, I had to see a doctor because the discipline officer would sometimes request to see the prescribed medications. In normal conditions, the next thing would be finding a restaurant to eat the food I would be missing, but this time it did not even cross my mind. I was focused on one thing, find Andy! Getting there, I saw Andy with the children the same way I saw him the other time. I stepped in without having to think much. When he saw me he suddenly stopped smiling and rose from where he was sitting with the kids. 

Ba- what are you doing in here? Wow, so he even knew my name, which meant he knew his classmates, even that was something. My fear was deadened when he spoke to me because I had never heard him speak before. Wait, I even had lately learned that he had teeth. I was not sure if he was going to give answers to my questions but I asked anyway. From there I could learn that he got special permission to go out on weekends because he had told the headmaster about the story of his untimely departed little brother who had leukemia. By helping those kids, he felt relieved because he had always been blaming himself for not having done anything the time he was suffering to death. 

Andy never wanted us to know about his torment which would make us feel pity for him, and he tried to avoid this by showing us the other face, which was not real. To us, he was the most stony-hearted and unapproachable person in the school while to those kids and their families, he was the most warm-hearted person they had ever known. From Andy’s story, I deduced that Andy’s heart had a golden chamber where all his love and compassion lay.