I Know How You Feel

The CAT scan didn’t show anything. My answers didn’t seem to help them either and after a discussion with my parents about the possibility of epilepsy, they decided to wait until another day to take the tests given at the hospital. Everyone in my family wanted to get out of there as much as I did.

Thankfully, they let me go to school but I had to be walked to class just in case I had another seizure because someone could be around to call 911 or something. I guess that wouldn’t be too bad since today was career scheduling and I only had to go two different places.

My school, John Cabot High School, was a little bit different with their scheduling than most schools around New Jersey. We get four classes on A days and three classes on B days and then we have Career Days, which were one Friday out of the month. We went to trade classes and selected a career to learn about.

Today we had careers. It felt weird on a Monday but that’s what happened after spring break.

My sister drove me to school and walked me into the office where I was assigned the person I had to walk with. To my surprise, the paper said, “Samantha Muse, 9th grade.”

Samantha, or Sam, is my best friend. I have other friends but she’s stuck with me since the wee years of elementary. It was actually amazing that we stayed together through those years considering we’re completely opposite in our personalities.

I waited for Sam in the nurse’s office after the first bell rang, and when she arrived, she signed in. Sam had signed up to be a nurse for her career. The school nurse, Ms. Gerd, explained what she’d have to do. Sam nodded her head and looked at me.

I tried not to stare at her appearance with my new eyes. She could easily be a model considering she was five foot, seven inches and had some curves. You could give her a potato sack and she’d pull it off. She had a slight tan from the beach but that wasn’t what stunned me. The effects of the seizure still seemed to be holding strong. I decided I’d just have to deal with it. I wasn’t going back to that hospital. Even so, she did look different to me. Her hair was wavy and reached down to her mid-back. I’d originally thought it was just a yellow-blonde but now, with my stronger vision, I could see brown and even reddish colors in her hair. I blinked and realized she had asked me a question.

“You wanna go now?” she asked.

“Sure.”

We walked out of the office and as soon as we were out of earshot of Ms. Gerd, she stopped.

“Can you explain to me why I’m walking you to class instead of helping the morning diabetes kids?” she asked sternly but I could hear some worry in her tone.

Which was weird; Sam’s voice usually lacked emotion. Glancing into her eyes, I was surprised to realize that I could see it there too.

“I, um, had a seizure, over Spring Break,” I mumbled.

I looked at the spot on her nose and noticed a thin scar that went down to the top of her lip. She told everyone close enough to notice that she had fallen off her bike when she was younger. I knew the real story. She used to think it was the reason her mom left her dad but as we grew up, Sam realized they’d had trouble long before that.

“What? Why?”

I blinked and focused again. “I have no idea. I’m drinking grape soda and the next thing I know, three days later, I wake up in a hospital bed with needles in my arm,” I explained showing the marks to her.

“Whoa, why three days?” she asked. “I’m pretty sure that seizures only last about a minute.”

“I don’t know. They said I blacked out or something,” I paused. “But I’m fine now. My mom is a worrywart.”

“Well, it makes sense!” Sam scoffed, “You could have, like, been hurt really bad.”

“Right,” I mumbled. I walked up the stairs to the Journalism room, noticing at least a hundred things--Did they ever clean the ceiling tiles?--that I’d never seen before, and Sam followed.

“So, are you sure you’re okay now?” she asked looking me in the eye. Sam had this weird way of getting the truth out of somebody by making direct eye contact. I could never lie to her when she did that. I still can’t.

“I’m ok… but I feel weird and different. Like somebody pumped coffee into my brain.” I started getting used to the feeling today but it was pretty weird when I ate my breakfast in the morning. It felt like I could taste the farm along with the eggs or name all the flavors added in the bacon.

Of course, I didn’t say any of this out loud. If I myself thought it was strange, then everyone else would just think I’m crazy.

“Oh, well, I don’t want Ms. Gerd getting mad at me so I’m gonna go. Text me when you’re taking pictures,” she said walking away.

I knocked on the Journalism room door. For my career I was studying photography and worked for the school magazine. I wasn’t exactly passionate about photography or journalism, but musician wasn’t considered a practical career.

The door opened and I walked in. Everyone was typing on their laptops so I walked over to the box with all of my assignments in it to figure out what I had to do this month. Most of it was taking and editing pictures but sometimes they got specific. I pulled up the folder marked “Photos Needed”, and saw one sticky note on the upper left corner:

Take some photos of the new blooming flowers outside at eye level for the Spring Cleaning article.

That sounded easy enough. I walked to the computer to edit some pictures and got my camera warmed up. I needed to edit a few from last month before I could turn them in. The colors weren’t as bright as I wanted them to be.

After I finished that, I changed my camera battery and waited for the bell to ring for field work. I looked through my last couple of pictures and saw my boyfriend, Tyler, in one of the pictures. His light brown hair hung in his hazel eyes. He wasn’t model gorgeous but seeing him still made my heart skip a beat.

Tyler was, as usual, grinning evilly into the camera. I could never get him to smile for a picture unless I was in it. I guess that’s sweet. We met through some friends and hit it off after our first date. He was so sweet to me and really funny. I sometimes got cramps from how much he made me laugh. When we were alone, he was so romantic. He was not afraid to do anything to make me smile and his spontaneous acts of love always caught me by surprise. I know I’m getting all sappy but I almost felt like I loved him. Granted, we’d only been dating for five months, but I really felt like we had a connection.

The bell rang and pulled me from my thoughts.

“Okay, everyone, to your assigned tasks,” our supervisor said for the umpteenth time this year. I opened the door and found Sam waiting for me.

“Hey, so where to?” she asked excitedly.

Sam probably liked photography more than I did, but her mom wanted her to choose something that could “pay the bills”, so she chose the medical field instead. On a few rare occasions where the nurse let her roam, she’d come hang out with me and watch me take pictures.

“We’re going outside today!” I answered.

“Woo!” she cheered.

She walked quickly—she never runs—to the steps and I followed the sound of her many, shiny, metal bracelets clanging together. We walked down the steps and headed out the double doors to the sunny but chilly weather of spring. The grass was green and new and lots of flowers were just blooming from the recently defrosted earth. My favorites were daffodils.

“Yes, sun.” I grinned, looking up into the clear blue skies; a rare happening for early April. I let the warmth hit me and soak my olive-toned skin as we emerged from the shadows.

“It’s nice out,” Sam acknowledged.

“Yep, perfect day for some shots of spring flowers,” I replied.

I turned on the camera and headed towards the nearest flower bed. When I got close enough I laid down flat on my stomach in the grass and looked through the lens. I wasn’t worried about getting dirty. I never wore anything too fancy to school anyway.

“Olive?”

I could hear an audible cringe in her voice. Sam wasn’t much for dirt and grass stains. I could also hear a bit of worry.

“I’m fine. I’m doing this for the angle.”

“Right.”

After few snapshots of a daffodil and some budding tulips, I rolled on my back and took some of the blue sky just for good measure.

“What about a dandelion?” Sam asked pointing some out.

“Don’t people consider those weeds?”

“Yeah but they’re still pretty,” she mumbled.

“True,” I jumped down again and took more pictures.

It continued like this for fifteen minutes until I peeked into the camera lens and saw big hazel eyes instead. I took a picture and laughed. “Tyler!” I squealed. I got up and gave him a quick hug. “Why aren’t you with the little kids?”

His chosen career was childcare. Cute, right?

“Well, they have art today so they’ve got enough teachers watching them for now,” he answered putting his arms around my waist.

His warm hug was relaxing and comfy as always. I smiled. He looked different too. I could see more emotion in his eyes and flaws on his face but with him and me, looks weren’t really a big thing. Right now, he was wearing basketball shorts and a hoodie. I always loved stealing one of his many hoodies and wearing it. They smelled like him and I always stayed warm. I took a deep breath and slowly let it go. It wasn’t until I realized we weren’t exactly alone that I felt a bit uncomfortable.

I looked over at Sam and gave her my camera. Her eyes practically fell out of the sockets as she grabbed the equipment eagerly.

“I’ll let you take some pictures if you don’t tell my supervisor,” I whispered.

“I won’t,” she said pulling the thick, black strap over her head. Before I could say anything else, she left with it.

I turned around and gave my boyfriend a hug before he let go and we sat down in the grass. He picked a dandelion and put it in my hair, lightly stroking my cheek. I smiled and grabbed his hand.

“When I got back from Boston, I heard you were in the hospital a few days ago,” his voice got serious and filled with worry. “It scared the shit out of me that I couldn’t be there. What happened?”

I blushed, wondering why I didn’t call him and explain everything.

I looked down at the grass and didn’t meet his gaze. His emotion was easily read most of the time. Whenever he was sad or upset, it showed plainly on his face. I never could look at him in the eye, when I was causing the distress.

“A seizure?” he said in a low voice. “Like John Grengry?”

“Yea,” I said to the ground, ripping up some of the new grass. That’s what the kid’s name had been.

He tilted his head and craned his neck to look at me. “Are you okay now?” he asked with child-like eyes.

“I think so.”

“Enough to give me a kiss?” he asked, still looking innocent but hesitant.

I laughed and my heart sped up. I loved that feeling.

“Of course,” I said quickly.

As our lips touched he pulled me closer to him and I felt a spark run through me. A deep feeling of want caused a weird, empty feeling in my chest. I pulled back and my lips were tingling pleasantly. I had felt like this before, but not with this much intensity.

“What?” he blinked.

“That was,” I tried to think of a word to explain it but I couldn’t, “different.”

“Different good?” he asked softly.

“I don’t know,” I said, “Maybe. Remind me?”

His evil, little smile flared up and Tyler stroked my cheek before he leaned in and kissed me again. The same feelings shot through me and I found myself wrapping my arms around his neck and pressing my lips hard against his. I wasn’t until I heard a whistle from the football field that I snapped out of it. I had never done that before. Tyler and I usually kept it light on the kissing. I pulled back and tried to decipher his conflicted expression.

“Whoa,” he said in a low voice, “What was that?”

“I—I don’t know,” I smiled, “but it was definitely different good.”

“You can say that again,” he said softly. Guilt showed on his face for a few seconds and confused me. After all, I had been the cause of this.

I put my head in his lap and saw Sam walking back to us. I sat up quickly and a blush came over my face. I hoped it didn’t show up as well as Sam’s do.

“Hey Sammy, you take any good pictures?” Tyler asked in a cheerful tone.

Sam glared at Tyler—she hated being called Sammy about as much as I hate being called Livi—and stuck her tongue out at him, “As a matter of fact, I did… I think,” she said, unsure of herself.

She handed the camera to me and began to nervously babble, “I wasn’t sure exactly what setting to use but I tried my best. There was a landscape and since I was taking pictures of nature that made more sense to use. There was something that made the focus better so I clicked that on also. Oh! And I turned the flash off because the lighting looked fine without it.”

I nodded and began to look through the pictures.

“They’re probably not as good as yours because you’ve used it longer, and you’re a better photo taking person than I am but I tried,” she went on.

“You mean photographer?” Tyler snickered.

“Yeah, whatever,” she snapped, “Photographer.”

I looked up at her and smiled, “These are amazing Sam!” and I meant it.

The girl could really use a camera. She should have been the one on the Journalism career, not me. Parents ruin everything.

“Really?” she sat down in the grass, “You like them?”

“Um, yes,” I said letting my voice take a snobby tone. “They’re way better than mine.”

“No, way. Yours are, like, perfect,” she argued.

I rolled my eyes and stood up. “Quit. You mind if I use these and say you helped me?”

“Sure!” she chirped, “My mom doesn’t read the magazine anyway. She says it’s a waste of taxpayer money.”

I laughed.

Tyler checked his phone and leaned in to whisper in my ear.

“Babe, I gotta go. The kinders are probably done finger painting now.”

“Okay, Ty, see you at lunch.” I said kissing him on the cheek.

“M’ kay.” He gave me a hug and walked away. He wasn’t much for kissing me in front of friends.

I looked at the ground and waited for my cheeks to stop burning. When I looked up again, he was gone.

“So back to class then?” Sam asked into the silence.

“Right,” I said, leading the way.