Losing Hope

Wherever you go, there you are.

"Hope is the hat rack upon which I hang my dreams…"? Oh, please! I crumpled up the paper and fling it across my bedroom. I can't believe I kept my hopeless seventh-grade attempts at poetry. I thought I was a poet that year. Obviously I wasn't, and will never be.

"Here they are," I mutter, pulling a stack of yearbooks from the depths of the drawer. They go all the way back to elementary school. Lauren will like these. Best friends since first grade, she's not talking to me now, but I'm sure she'll want these…after…

"You're hopeless, Carrie," she yelled at me over the phone Friday night. Because I don't see everything exactly her way, because I tell her things she doesn't want to hear. The way I think best friends should. Now I don't even have a best friend. And I can't stand losing her friendship.

I peer into the drawer, empty of yearbooks but still containing the debris of my life. Now what would Josh want from me? According to him, nothing. "There's no hope, Carrie," he told me that night two weekends ago. The night be broke up with me, practically pushing me away as I begged him for another chance. No, he shook his head at me. No, it's over. No hope for us. He hasn't spoken to me since. I can't stand losing him, either.

I slip my hand into the pocket of my robe and finger the little container of pills. My stepfather takes these for his back, and I've heard his repeated warnings to my little brothers never to touch them, how dangerous pills like these can be. He never warned me, knowing that I'm old enough, knowing that I understand about things like dangerous pills.

A knock on my door makes my hand fly from the pocket. Of course, my mother barges right I before I can respond.

"Carrie," she says in her exasperated tone, "we're all waiting for you out by the tree. You know we can't open the presents until we're all together." The faint melody of a Christmas carol and the scent of hot cocoa waft into my room through the open door.

"Honestly, Carrie, can't you dress up a little for eyes," she continues. "Sometimes I think you're hopeless." She sighs- loudly, dramatically as if otherwise I wouldn't understand the depths of my hopelessness. "Well, hurry up."

With that, she closes the door and leaves me screaming silently after her: yes, mom, I know I 'm hopeless, like you always tell me. Every time I forget to empty the dishwasher, fold the laundry, get the hair out of my eyes, whatever.

So they're all waiting for me. Mom, my stepfather, Dave, and Aaron and Mark. Waiting for me to join in the singing carols and unwrapping of gifts. Sure, I'll go. I'll unwrap a few presents. Not that they'll mean a thing to me. But it's Christmas. I'm suppose to be happy. I can pretend. After all, I took drama class last semester.

Ah, school. Another one of the victorious arenas of my life.

"I'm sorry, Carry, but it's hopeless," Ms. Boggio told me the last day before winter break. "You'd have to get an A on every test for the rest of the year to raise the D to a C." then she left me alone in the biology lab, staring at my latest test, the latest record of my failures.

I tossed the test way. I won't even have to show mom, I thought. I won't have to hear that lecture again. The one about how I'm ruining my chances for college. That there will be no hope for my future if I keep going on this way. In fact, I'll never have to hear another lecture again. the problem will be solved before school starts in January.

How about a notes? Would they want one? I used to think I was some great writer. I'd spend hours filling notebook after notebook with my stories and poems, sometimes just my thought and ideas. That's when I felt most alive- writing and dreaming of being good at it, of having other people read my words. And having my words mean something to them. But that was before the hopelessness of being Carrie Brock swallowed me up.

"Just a lousy notes, "I remind myself. That's all a I have to write now. Or ever. I've lost everything: my best friend and my boyfriend. Or I've messed it up: my grades, even my hair. I can't do anything right, and I can't stand facing the reminders of my failures anymore.

"Come on, Carrie," Aaron's voice cries through the door. "I want to open my presents."

Oh, all right. I'll do the note later. I drag myself up and tighten the belt on my robe. As I walk down the hall, the pills make a satisfying clicking noise in my pocket.

I sink into the couch and watch as Mark, my younger brother, tears open his gifts, flinging wrapping paper everywhere. The it's Aaron's turn. That's the tradition in our family. Youngest to oldest. Everyone oohs and aahs over Aaron's gifts.

"Your turn, Carrie," Mark informs me.

"Can you bring them?" I ask. "I'm tired."

Mark carries over a rectangular box. Clothes, of course. From mom. I mumble the appropriate thanks. My gifts are few this year. Nothing form Lauren or Josh, of course. Trinkets from Aaron and Mark.

"Okay, I'm done," I say.

"No, wait, here's another one," Mark says, handing me a small package.

"Who's it form?

"Me." My stepfather speaks up. Dave, the man who resides I the background of my life. A good guy, he treats me well. I've never regretted my mom marrying him.

I rear off the paper revealing a book. But opening it, I find there are no words inside.

"It's blank," I say, looking up at Dave.

"Well, no quite. There's an inscription up from. But it's a journal, Carrie. For your words.

I flip to the front and find Dave's handwriting in one corner. I read the inscription silently.

To Carrie:

Go for your dreams. I believe in you.

Dave

I look up at Dave again. he shrugs slightly, as if embarrassed. "Well, I know you want to be a writer, Carrie," he explains. "and I know you can do it."

His last words are almost lost in the noise my brothers are making, digging under the tree ad coming up with mother's presents. But Dave's words are not lost on me.

Somebody believe in me and in my dream, even when I've stopped believing in them myself. When I thought I was beyond all hope. I clutch the journal to my chest and a feeling I've haven't felt for a long time returns. I do want to be a writer. Ut most of all, I want to just be.

I watch the rest of the presents being opened, thinking there's something I need to do, but I can't quite figure out what. I can slip the pills back into the cabinet later, so that's not it. Then I know.

I grab a pen form the coffee table and open my journal. On that first blank page I write my words: "Hope is the hat rack I hang my dreams upon."

H'mm, I think. Kind of sounds like a country song. Maybe it's not that bad after all. I look up and smile at Dave, even though he's not looking my way. He's just given me the best Christmas present ever. I've gotten my dreams back. Maybe there's hope for me, after all.