My birthday came faster than I thought, but with no wistful notes or phone calls congratulating me on successfully reaching my sixteenth year. It didn't bother me; I was expecting a pretty dry birthday anyway. I didn't tell any of the guys when the day dawned. Fridays always made me tired; they were the longest days of the week, just trying to get to Saturday. Unfortunately that was the day of the week my birthday fell on this year.
I love mornings where you wake up, and the sun is completely drowned out by the rain. Usually daybreaks are too harsh for me. It seems as though the day will never end. But mornings when rain drenches the ground and soaks into your mind and skin, those are the kinds I wake for.
I lay in bed extra long that day. I shifted my weight between the sheets. For some odd reason, this birthday morning didn't seem as bad as the others. It had been so long since I felt content on this day, much less civil. I hated this date, and that loathing had branded my soul at an early age. But today I was different and I didn't know why. Maybe it was my dream. Reminiscences of it kissed my memory as I sat up on my elbows and looked out the window. Silver droplet after silver droplet fell outside the clear pane, silver like my ring on my index finger, my hand. He had held my hand, and my face cradled in his palms. Maybe it was that, maybe Neil was the reason for my ecstasy this morning.
I dropped myself back down into the sheets with a timid grin as an answer to the thoughts that entered my mind. I rolled over onto my face and laughed into the pillow, hugging it close to me. Was I crazy? I didn't know, maybe it had to do with nothing, and everything at the same time. Maybe it was stupid, but if this was stupidity, than God let me feel this way forever. I threw the covers back and stretched to the ceiling, the floor cold under the bare soles of my feet, November cold.
Walking over to the window I stared down into the mist. It covered the courtyard like confused spirits. There were probably many ghosts clinging to these halls and rooms. Thoughts and laughter never to be heard again by bodies that had long been sucked in by the earth, but spirits that couldn't let go of life, of stars and rain, of the sun and moon, of hot coffee and cigarettes, yet couldn't even exist. Morning thoughts are always the funniest and foggiest of the day.
I took the morning slow, the clouds not clearing up till mid afternoon which was about the time I went down to the library. The day went by quickly, and Meeks was the only one who made it to the dusty tomb of forgotten volumes to tell me about that night's meeting. I kept expecting Charlie to come down and wish me a happy birthday like he always did, but he never did. I blew it off with a smile, thinking either he had gotten in trouble again or had gone for extra help to a teacher. I nixed the latter idea and wondered when I would hear about his latest caper that terrorized the school. Nothing came, nobody came, but I didn't let it bother, or I tried to keep it from bothering me.
I stayed in my room for dinner, wishing to have some time alone. The library had been exceptionally busy that afternoon, which I found to be quite a surprise. I guessed it was because it was a Friday and the students wanted to get their homework out of the way for the weekend. I didn't blame them, considering the amount of slave labor they were given each week. I'd want a break too, even if it was just for two days.
I read a little while I waited for the clock to strike 10:00. Pulling my thick dark blue sweater on over my blouse and lacing up my high tops, I remembered that Knox's party was this evening. I said a quick prayer for him, than ran out the door, grabbing my coat as I closed the door behind me. The loud echoing vocals of the impatient clock, that was fast two minutes I noted, sounded through the halls, like funeral bells. I quickened my pace down the steps and out into the night air that hit me over the head hard. Puffs of transparent white escaped my lips, my feet shuffled against the ground as I waited for the guys.
One by one, the shimmering shadows of black against the grey emerged from the building and I ran up to meet them. Like the other times, we were as silent as the clock was loud, till we were out of ear shot. We whooped and hollered our way to the cave. Though I could not distinguish between the figures, I could tell who yelled what. It's funny how familiar you get with the characteristics of people. I immediately recognized Pittsy's deep bellow, rising above the tenor yell of Meeks. Cameron's high, shrill call had me smiling while Neil seemed to call out to the night in short, yet loud roars. My own breathy yet lengthy shrieks covered over Todd who would let out a barely audible shout among the myriad of howls and hoots that serenaded the stars in a noisy hymn. But Charlie's wasn't sounded, and I wondered where he was once we got to the cave and started the meeting.
"To live deep and suck out all the marrow of life, to put to rout all that was not life," We spoke, when foreign giggles came from outside. Foreign, female giggles.
"Oh my god," Cameron spoke, his cheeks almost matching his hair in a bright crimson.
My brow furrowed, as I watched the entrance to the cave. Two frilly voices sounded, and took me by surprise, along with my brother's voice.
"Is this it?" Asked one girl.
"Yeah, this is it. Go ahead, go on in." Came Charlie as he helped the girls into the cave, "It's my cave. Watch your step."
I snorted a laugh at that comment and looked around at my comrades to see if they had anything to say to Charlie claiming the cave as his own, but they were all dumbstruck when the two broads walked in. I didn't have to admit they were prettier than me, and older, and had a few feminine qualities I lacked terrible, like a chest, but still they hadn't acted like this when I was introduced. Maybe it was because I was Charlie Dalton's kid sister. I looked over at Neil who had a bemused grin on his face, but it was obvious he was equally as struck as the other boys around us. His eyes pierced my heart, and they weren't even looking at me.
The two blondes stumbled in, friendly and flaky as expected in the girls my brother chased. He was one of those boys who went after girls who were in essence, as stupid as they came. My brother liked being the smart one, which was hard to do.
"Hello," They spoke, their voices like those songs on the radio. They're eyes expertly skipped over my own figure in the corner and I knew what they had come for. Not poetry, not companionship, but to satisfy their little Friday night by playing with a few boarding school girl deprived boys, and I was in their territory. I backed up and watched the scene.
"Hey, you guys," My brother said, not in his normal tone I noted, "This is Gloria, and uh,"
"Tina," The girl in blue corrected, she was obviously the tagalong.
"Tina," My brother repeated, turning back to the group, "This is the pledge class of the Dead Poets Society."
Pledge class? What the hell was he talking about? The boys muttered hellos and welcomes, their eyes as big as the girl Gloria's obvious assets and I rolled my eyes. They moved out of the way as they headed over to sit down.
"Guys, I have an announcement to make," He stated and I waited for a good one, "In keeping with the spirit of passionate experimentation of the Dead Poets, I'm giving up the name Charlie Dalton. From now on, call me Nuwanda."
Oh my god. Nuwanda was the name of his stuffed giraffe that he used to sleep with. Whenever he wet the bed as a kid, he would blame it on Nuwanda. Nuwanda did it, dad. I chuckled in the corner, he had yet to even notice my presence, or he had already and was choosing to pretend to ignore me. I watched as he took the Barbie doll Tina's lipstick and proceeded to draw on his face like a kid who had gotten into his mother's make up. And the girls ate it up. That was typical.
"So are we gonna have a meeting or what?" Charlie asked after his little spectacle.
"Yeah. If you guys don't have a meeting, how do we know if we wanna join?" Gloria asked, making me let out an amused chuckle.
Gloria looked over at me indifferently and her eyebrows rose with her lips, "Whos she?"
Charlie finally looked over at me in the corner like I was some hobo on the street, "Oh that's just my kid sister,"
"Oh," Tina said looking me up and down. I crossed my arms in front of my chest uncomfortably.
Either Neil noticed my agitation or he was just as uncertain as me but he broke the silence, "Wait, join?"
Charlie disregarded Neil's comment and leaned over to Tina, "Shall I compare thee to a summer's day? Thou art more lovely and more temperate." He spoke as sweetly as any idiot with lipstick on his cheeks calling himself Nuwanda could. And any idiot out there also knows who wrote that verse, but not good ol' Tina.
"That's so sweet," She cooed.
"Made that up just for you," He played along, "I'll write one for you too, Gloria." He said walking over to where she had situated herself, "She walks in beauty like the night. She walks in beauty like the night. Of cloudless climes and starry skies. All that's best, dark and bright, meet in her aspect and her eyes."
"That's beautiful." Gloria purred in return.
"There's plenty more where that came from," Charlie replied.
That was it I couldn't hold my tongue anymore, we didn't come here to flirt or spout poetry and call it our own for dumb broads who couldn't tell Elvis from Emerson.
"Yeah," I spoke spitefully, drawing all the eyes in the cave toward me, "And you can find it all in a copy of Shakespeare's sonnets."
I earned a chuckle from the boys, looks of utter stupidity from the girls and the hairy eyeball from my brother. I smirked back. I was not happy with dear Charles at that moment.
"Ah haul off, Rachael," He replied, "The only reason why you know that is because you have nothing better to do with your time that read books. How about getting some friends, huh?"
The girls giggled and looked over at me with mocking eyes as I sunk into the shadows. So what? It was true I was better friends with the Bronte sisters, Jane Austen, and Jonathan Swift, but whose business was it other than my own? What's more was that it was coming from my big brother. Sure we had our tiffs sometimes, but he never had humiliated me like that. Especially on my birthday of all days. He knew this day was hard for me. He knew.
Tina conveniently situated herself next to Neil, whom she'd been eyeing all night. She took out a little bottle she had in her coat and took a dainty swig, passing it on to Neil. He took a drink as well, no surprise to me, and by this point I didn't care and ignored the conversation, trying to ignore the persistent envy that I had toward these girls. There was a small strangled part of me that would have given anything to be one of them at that moment, but I brushed it aside as best as possible.
Suddenly a part of the conversation caught my interest and not in a good way.
"In fact, I'd like to announce I published an article in the school paper, in the name of the Dead Poets." Charlie stated casually.
I looked up in alarm. An article? Charlie? This would not end well, I could tell.
"Demanding girls be admitted to Wellton." He proclaimed like Caesar himself.
My mouth dropped several feet to the ground, as did everybody else's.
"How did you do that?" Neil questioned, everybody else too numb to say anything.
"I'm one of the proofers. I slipped the article in." He said, proudly, "And why should we worry? Nobody knows who we are,"
"Well, don't you think they're gonna figure out who wrote it? They're gonna come to you and ask to know what the Dead Poets Society is. Charlie, you had no right to do something like that." Cameron chided what everybody else wanted to say.
"Are we just playing around out here, or do we mean what we say? For all we do is come together and reach a bunch of poems to each other. What the hell are we doing?" He said, brushing Cameron off.
"All right, but you still shouldn't have done it, Charlie. This could mean trouble. You don't speak for the club." Neil spoke, standing up and facing Charlie.
"Hey, would you not worry about your precious little neck?" Charlie spat, "If they catch me, I'll tell them I made it up."
"It's not that easy," I found myself saying as I jumped into the conversation, "If your headmaster if anything like my headmistress, he won't let this slip. He'll get to the bottom of this; I've seen it at my school-"
"Isn't that nice Rachael?" Charlie said turning to me, "Well, why don't you skip back over to your little girl's school and leave us alone? You're not even involved, just go crawl into a hole or something,"
"Charlie-" I started, trying to reason with him.
"It's Nuwanda, Rachael," He corrected taking a swig from the bottle.
"Yeah, it's Nuwanda," echoed Gloria looking over at me condescendingly.
Charlie arched his eyebrows, "Why don't you just go home to daddy, Rachael," He spit, "He seems to like you a whole lot better than me, but don't fuck up because you're just bragging rights to him and nothing more," Silence descended, and I saw Charlie bite his tongue.
I stood and walked out, running down the hill.
"Damnit Charlie," I heard Neil mutter and soon footsteps echoed behind me.