Chapter 2: Rekindling Hopes
The door opened and a middle-aged man with white hair walked in. Neil stood up from where he'd been sitting, a look of mild surprise crossing his face.
"Father, I thought you'd gone" he said. All the other boys stood up, and I felt it only proper to do so.
"Keep your seats, keep your seats" Neil's father said. I knew he eyed me disapprovingly and I tried to make myself invisible.
"Neil, I just spoken to Mr. Nolan, and I think you're taking too many extracurricular activities this semester. I've decided you should drop the school annual" he continued.
A look of shock spread across Neil's face. "But I'm the assistant editor this year!"
"Well, I'm sorry, Neil" Mr. Perry said dispassionately.
"But father, I can't. It wouldn't be fair" Neil insisted.
"Would you excuse us for a moment?" his father said. Neil promptly left the room, and the rest of us settled into an uncomfortable silence as we tried to listen to what was transpiring outside the door.
I could barely hear something about 'wasn't disputing', 'medical school', 'sorry', 'you know how much this means to your mother', till Mr. Perry's footsteps faded away. Charlie and Knox got up and stepped outside. Meeks and I merely watched Todd unpacking.
"Where did you study before coming here?" Meeks asked, breaking the silence. I smoothed down my skirt nervously and looked at him.
"St. Mary's." I replied. I looked out the window, and could barely see our reflections in the glass. All I could see was the green now empty since everyone was inside the dorms.
I did spend a good part of that day unpacking, and I was finally finished when I heard the footsteps going down to the dining room. I slipped out of my room and went downstairs to the front hall, looking around for the seniors and my brother. After a while, I'd located my brother among a group of scared-looking freshmen, but no sign of my classmates.
I'd forgotten though, at least till I got to the dining hall, that almost all the other girls had been escorted by the boys to dinner. So about two teachers who saw me raised their eyebrows, and I heard some titters from the other girls, but that didn't matter at the moment.
"Vanessa!" I heard a voice call. Turning around, I saw Neil, Todd, Knox, Charlie, Meeks, and Cameron with another boy I hadn't met earlier.
"Oh thank God" I muttered under my breath as I went to them. I took the last free seat, which was across from Neil and right between Todd and Knox.
"Oh yes, Vanessa, this is Gerard Pitts" Knox said, introducing me to the boy on his other side.
"Pleased to meet you" I whispered, as a teacher went by.
The only sounds for some minutes after saying Grace were the sounds of cutlery and chewing. Finally, Cameron broke this maddening monotony by asking, "What is our first class tomorrow?"
"Chemistry" Meeks replied. I swallowed hard on what passed for mystery meat, dreading having to balance an equation when my brain was still asleep.
"At least it's not Latin" Charlie joked.
Neil almost snorted at this. "I'd rather have that than Trig any day" he said.
"Thank God for soccer" I grinned. I'd heard that almost everyone at this table had soccer as an extra-curricular activity.
The next morning, I awoke to what must've been footsteps hurrying to the bathroom. Groggily, I grabbed my clothes and a towel and opened the door to find the hallway as busy as an anthill. As I made my way like some zombie to the only girls' bathroom on the floor, I bumped into someone."Whoa...Vanessa…" I heard Neil say. I blinked my eyes open to see him and Charlie apparently just fresh out of the showers. I realized that my hair looked like a tangled bush and that I must've had circles under my eyes. Admittedly, I'd been a bit homesick and had cried myself to sleep.
'Hey, good morning" I managed to say, pushing my hair out of my eyes. "Had a good night's rest?"
"Surprisingly" Neil replied.
"Yeah…so we'll see you at breakfast, doll?" Charlie asked. I smirked at him and continued on my way to the bathroom.
I figured later that day that I must've been jinxed. By the time I'd been able to get down for breakfast, the bell had rung. There was just enough time to grab my books and hurry to Chemistry class.
"Starting off the day late are we, Miss O'Donnell?" the teacher said the second I burst into the room. Shamefaced, I took the last seat next to Todd, and was just in time to hear the teacher tell our class that we needed to pick an experiment to report on every five weeks…and that twenty questions on the first chapter were due the next day.
"He's calling the shots this year, I know it" Knox complained on our way to Trig.
"It can get better" I said, trying to cheer him up.
"In Hell-ton, nothing gets better" Charlie said. "You and Todd had better get used to it"
"Charlie, stop scaring them" Neil chided him.
By the end of the day, Todd and I had come to a conclusion that Charlie's warning had some truth to it, especially after Hager had told us that for every missed assignment in Trig, he'd deduct one point off our final grades.
"If you think he's joking, he really did that to Pitts last year" Meeks told me after the class.
"No kidding" Pitts said sardonically.
I made a resolution to ask anyone, Neil, Meeks, Knox or Cameron, for help later.
Last subject that day was English class, and the boys were wondering how the new teacher Mr. Keating would teach this class. I never voiced out my question too, but I was wondering whether English class ever did justice to the beauty of language. I never had been in a class, or met a teacher, that proved me wrong.
Surprisingly, when we entered the classroom, Mr. Keating didn't seem to be there yet. But when I turned around, I saw him peep out of a room just off the classroom. The whole class promptly quieted down as he walked out to the classroom door, whistling a tune. Neil, Todd and I exchanged surprised looks at this.
"Well, come on" he said. I simply picked up my books and followed the rest of the class out the door, getting the odd feeling that this was going to change things.
I'd lagged behind the class, and was only guided by the sound of Mr. Keating's voice saying, "Yes, that's the one".
"Gather ye rosebuds while ye may, old time is still a flying…" I heard Pitts read.
"To the Virgins, to Make Much of Time" I breathed as I hurried into the hall. I'd recognized that poem from a book I'd once read. I found a spot just near Knox and Charlie and squeezed into the group.
"'Gather ye rosebuds while ye may'. The Latin term for that sentiment is Carpe Diem. Now who knows what that means?" Mr. Keating asked.
I saw the rest of the boys trying to recall Latin; apparently we all had a problem dragging McAllister's lessons out into our conscious.
"Carpe Diem. Seize the day" I heard Meeks say from somewhere near the front.
"Very good, Mr-"
"Meeks"
By this time, I tried to get out of the back of the group, but it was nearly impossible.
"Why does the writer use these lines?" I heard Mr. Keating ask.
"Because he's in a hurry" Charlie called.
"No, ding!" Mr. Keating exclaimed, much to everyone's laughter.
He continued more seriously. "Thank you for playing anyway. Because we are food for worms, lads", and turning to me, "lady. Because, believe it or not, each and every one of us in this room is one day going to stop breathing, turn cold, and die"
I noticed that some of us, especially Neil, looked rather disturbed at this point. Even I felt a cold pit settle in my stomach at the thought.
Mr. Keating told us to step forward and look at the pictures in the cases, and I took the opportunity to get closer to the picture cases to see what he meant. Yeah, they were faces staring back at us, rather lifeless and mechanical in my opinion. To my mild amusement, some of the photos resembled my classmates.
"They're not that different from you, are they? Same haircuts. Full of hormones just like you. Invincible, just like you feel. The world is their oyster. They believe they're destined for great things, just like many of you. Their eyes are full of hope, just like you. Did they wait until it was too late to make from their lives even one iota of what they were capable?" Mr. Keating said as we stared at the photos. I felt every word resound in me with importance and what I'd been looking for but could never really place.
" Because you see gentlemen, lady, these boys are now fertilizing daffodils. But if you listen real close, you can hear them whisper their legacy to you. Go on, lean in" he continued.
Todd and I exchanged slightly perplexed looks. Back in our former schools, teachers weren't like this.
"Carpe…Carpe Diem! Seize the day….make your lives extraordinary" a voice, probably Mr. Keating's, whispered. The sound seemed to wander around the room...one mintue, next to my ear, the next so far away. Charlie and Neil smiled as if they'd hit some treasure. Todd and Knox looked creeped out, while Cameron was merely confused. I cannot remember if I smiled or shuddered, but I just knew that this was the beginning of the rest of my life.
After class, we hurried out to put away our books before gym class.
"That was weird" Pitts said, shivering slightly.
"But different" Neil pointed out.
"Spooky if you ask me" Knox said.
"Do you think he'll test us on that stuff?" Cameron asked. I flashed him an annoyed glare.
"Oh come on Cameron, don't you get anything?" Charlie scoffed.
"What? What?" Cameron said.
"Why did we even bother?!" I muttered to myself. Boys could be so dense sometimes.