April 12, 2011
Under the Sakura Trees
I was running out of the back and he was running into the back when *SMACK* we literally ran into each other.
“Hi, I’m Zane,” he said as he held out his hand.
“I’m Rabo… Rebe… Roxx… Rebecca.” I had forgotten my name.
How embarrassing. This gorgeous guy was standing in front of me, waiting for me to introduce myself, and I couldn’t pull myself together to remember my name. I felt like a fool. It was only my second shift at Jimmy John’s and I wasn’t even supposed to be working. Izzy needed me to cover her shift that morning and I took it- not knowing I’d meet fate at the end of it. Needless to say, I wasn’t prepared for this- I wasn’t prepared for Zane.
I had put my head down and said, “Rebecca” almost so quietly I could barely hear myself. I immediately walked past him- faster than I had ever walked before.
“You’re leaving already?!”
“Yeah. I only worked til five. I was covering someone…” My voice trailed off as I turned and ran outside to the car, utterly mortified.
Did I really just forget my name? Nothing like that had ever happened to me before. It then occurred to me that I recognized this boy, Zane. I saw him in the hallways of my high school everyday and never spoke to him. It was normal for me to randomly approach people I didn’t know in school and to introduce myself. Usually I only did this to people who caught my interest. People who I wanted to befriend because they were interesting to me. People with odd hairstyles or piercings, like me. However, he was something I had never encountered before. I had always wanted to talk to him but never did. He intimidated me.
Zane. Was that his real name? I had never known or heard of a Zane. It seemed too great a name to be true. The more I thought about him, the more the name fit. The reason I had never stopped him in the halls was because he always looked very serious, very angry. It was as if he would blow me off or try to kill me if I stopped him to say hello. He walked with a strength and determination that was out of this world. He walked with anger. He scared me every day. Every. Single. Day. Yet I had never noticed, until now.
A part of me hoped I would never see him again. The other part hoped I would land a shift with him at Jimmy John’s. He scared me. But no one had ever scared me before. I was intrigued to know him; to befriend him. I wrote him a note that night.
For the next week it seemed the part of me that hoped to never see him again had won. I went from seeing him every day to not seeing him at all. Did I imagine him? Had I really never seen him before? Was meeting him at Jimmy John’s an illusion? Now I wished to see him. I wanted him to be real.
Thursday came and I was ready to give up in believing this “Zane” character had ever even existed. Walking through Main Hall I decided he hadn’t existed at all and was someone I had made up to entertain myself. Then I looked up and saw him. He was walking towards me, staring at me. My heart started pounding and I thought my knees were going to let out. He walked by me with a smile and waved.
“Hey,” he said.
All I could manage to let out was a quiet “hi”.
No. I wouldn’t let this happen. I hadn’t seen him in nearly a week. Who knew when the next time I would see him would be. I needed courage.
“Hey!” I yelled after him.
He was almost down the hall but he turned around and started walking back towards me.
“Here.”
I pulled out the note I had written him after our first meeting that Saturday and gave it to him.
“What’s this?” He looked surprised but as if he were expecting it.
“Just read it.”
I was embarrassed but managed a quick smile before turning away from him and heading off in the opposite direction. I felt sick. I wanted to throw up and my head was spinning. Who was this boy? What was happening to me? I wondered if he would read the note or if he would just laugh and throw it away. It wasn’t a love letter or anything. Just me introducing myself and giving him my number… for “work purposes” of course. I hoped he would call me that night. I had no idea what we would talk about but I didn’t care. I just wanted him to call. I wanted to hear his voice. I wanted to know him.
He didn’t call. I ran to the phone every time it rang. It was never him.
The next day at school was miserable. All my classmates were so happy that it was Friday while I was embarrassed and depressed that some boy didn’t call me. School ended and I was ecstatic to be out of the place.
“Hey!” It was him. I turned my head so quickly I’m surprised I didn’t get whiplash.
“Hi!”
“Did you want a ride home?”
A quiet “yes” was all I managed to get out. My heart was racing and I thought I was going to have a heart attack.
I followed him to his car and got in. I had never been so nervous in my life than I was that day when we drove out of the parking lot.
“So how old are you?” I asked while admiring his little blue car. He drove a blue Honda Fit with cute little touches here and there that made it personal. It had a robot Hello Kitty steering wheel cover and Invader Zim seat covers with Gir and cupcakes all over them. It was really cute and made me really happy to know we had things in common.
“How old do I look?” He gave an off grin as he asked the question.
While thinking about him over the past week, I had come to the conclusion that he was 17 years old and a junior. I figured that was good for me since I was 16 and a fresh-more. I had failed freshman year out of stupidity but was now on the border and almost able to be considered a sophomore.
“Seventeen? I’m guessing you’re a junior.” His off grin turned into a smile and he continued to drive.
“I’m nineteen.” He looked at me for my reaction.
I began to laugh and looked at him.
“You’re joking right? You are not nineteen.”
He couldn’t be nineteen. He was still in high school. He was just messing with me and would tell me his real age when I asked him again. I was sure of it.
“Seriously, how old are you?”
“I’m nineteen. Seriously.”
His face was now serious as he looked at me and I knew this wasn’t a joke. He was a nineteen year old senior. What in the world had I gotten myself into?
“Where do you live?” He broke my train of thought and the silence in the car.
I didn’t want to go home. I was scared I would never see him again.
”Can you not take me home right now? I don’t want to be home this early.”
He shrugged. “We can go to my house.”
“Yes.” I said it without hesitation and was appalled at what I was doing. I didn’t know this guy at all. He was three years older than me and I was letting him take me to his house and accepting a ride from him. What in the world was I doing?
He turned into a neighborhood I recognized. My mom and stepdad had found a house on Wellesley Boulevard in this neighborhood and we were moving there in a few weeks. He pulled on to Wellesley Boulevard and parked in front of the second house on the left.
“You seriously live here?!” He had to have been stalking me and was just trying to freak me out.
“Yeah. Why?”
“I’m moving to that house right there in a few weeks!” I pointed to the house for sale a few houses down from him.
“No way? That’s really weird,” he said with a chuckle.
He got out and opened my door for me. No one had ever opened my door for me before. I liked him more already. He was cute. He had black hair that had a blonde streak in it and green eyes. The brightest green eyes I had ever seen. His hair was longer with a fringe bang that fell over his right eye. He was a little taller than me. He was perfect.
I followed him into his house and his dad met us in the living room.
“Popz, this is Rebecca.”
His father looked me up and down with his arms crossed.
“Did you get hit by a truck?”
I quickly turned to Zane out of embarrassment and let out a quiet, forced chuckle.
His father shocked me. Did I get hit by a truck? I knew this was a jab at all my piercings but how rude!
I stood there awkwardly not knowing what to do.
“Thanks, Popz. You’re so sweet,” Zane said sarcastically as he grabbed my hand and led me to his room.
“I can’t believe he just did that! The first girl I bring home and he embarrasses me like that!”
I sat on the edge of his bed trying to get what his father said out of my head. It was hard to embarrass me or make me feel awkward and Zane’s father had done both in less than five minutes.
I looked behind me and found myself transfixed by the wall my back was against. There were masks lining the entire wall. They were bizarre and from all over the world.
Zane finished fiddling with his computer and threw himself on to the bed. He sat with his back against his wall of masks and pulled me over to where my head was resting on his chest. I enjoyed him. He seemed confident. He had put on a movie- a comedy. Idiocracy was the name. It was funny in a stupid way and I had a difficult time paying attention to it. I was more focused on my head on his chest and the steady movements it did as he breathed, his scent and his hand running up and down my back. I was nervous.
The half an hour I was there with him felt like an eternity, but not long enough.
“I have to go home and get my stuff for work,” I said as I sat up.
“Alright.”
Zane reached for the remote and turned his system off then let out a yawn. I got up to put my shoes on when he suddenly grabbed my hand.
“Where are you going?” He pulled me down and kissed me. I kissed him back. Again, I was shocked at what I was doing. He knew it too. He saw it in my face when the kiss ended and smiled.
“Come on.” He grabbed my hand again and we walked out of his house. As we got to his car, he opened the passenger door for me.
The ride home felt like a two minute ride. It went too quickly. He pulled into my apartment complex and parked in front of my building. I didn’t want to leave him.
He broke the silence again. “I texted you the other day.”
So that’s why I didn’t get a call! He thought I had a cell phone! I felt pretty dumb for assuming he’d know I was the only girl in school without a cell phone. This guy was totally up to date on technology. He had a cool car, the latest iPhone, a flat screen TV in his room that had a connection to his $3,000 laptop. He was a nerd. A very hot nerd who smelled really good and didn’t have an acne problem. He was pale as paper but I liked it. His black hair looked good with it and it made his green eyes pop. I had to stop daydreaming. He was waiting for an answer as to why I “ignored” him.
“It’s a house phone. I don’t have a cell phone,” I said almost embarrassed at the fact that I didn’t have one.
“Oh! Yeah I realized that a little later.”
He did try to get in contact with me. I was miserable all that day because I thought he wasn’t interested. I loved being with him.
He pulled me closer to him and kissed me again. I smiled and said good bye before grabbing my binder and getting out of the car. I walked into the apartment as calmly as I could and ran up the stairs into my room. I proceeded to jump up and down and grabbed my journal to jot down a summary of the day before work. I wrote down what I could, changed into my work clothes and ran downstairs.
“I have work,” I said to my stepdad.
“Alright. Are you ready?” He asked in a very bored manner.
“Yes.”
My stepdad was a very simple, nice man named Harry. Harry and my mom had been together somewhere around three years by now. He cooked, cleaned, worked and was quiet. He was twenty-four years older than my mom but no one really cared. He was good to her. Her parents had an age difference between them that was over twenty as well. Now I was also seeing an older guy. Weird how family and genetics work.
Harry dropped me off at work and I went in the back to clock in. Todd greeted me.
“Hey Roxx!”
“Hey Todd. Who else is working tonight?” I didn’t really care- I was just making conversation.
“You, me, Elizabeth and Jessica.”
I had had my first shift exactly a week ago and had worked the same shift with the same people. I kind of liked this job’s schedule. You always worked the same days, same hours and with the same people. I liked that my schedule wouldn’t change every week and surprise me like in other places.
An hour passed. A boring hour of me being quiet, running the register and being told to seem more happy by Todd.
“You know, you can smile and greet the customers…” he would say.
This was my first job. I had no idea what I was doing and felt out of place. I thought about how I had gotten hired at the movie theatre and quit when they told me to dye my hair a natural color and to get rid of my piercings. I though black and blue hair and piercings would be fine, but it wasn’t. In a way, I was glad I picked Jimmy John’s- or that Jimmy John’s picked me.
I leaned against the Coke machine as Elizabeth went on about how cool a manager Todd was and how I’d grow to love the place. “We’re all like a family,” is what she’d say. I wanted to stay in my little area against the Coke machine for the rest of the shift and began to zone out thinking about what I could be doing if I wasn’t at work. I could be at home writing poetry or listening to music, I could be watching Wheel of Fortune, hell, I could still be with Zane!
I immediately snapped out of my daydreaming when Elizabeth looked over my shoulder and smiled.
I tried to turn around but felt a hand touch my arm before I could. A quiet “hey” was all I heard before Zane disappeared into the back. Elizabeth looked at me with a raised eyebrow that said, “What is going on?” and I responded with a shrug and wide eyes. After about five minutes of what I assumed was spent talking to Todd, Zane came out from the back and grabbed my hand.
“Come here. Let me show you something cool in the bathroom.”
I shot a quick look at Liz that said, “I swear I have no idea what’s going on!” and disappeared with Zane behind the wall. Without warning I was dragged into the dark bathroom and thrown against the sink. Zane locked the door, threw his body against mine and began to kiss me very roughly.
His hands were wondering everywhere. Up my shirt, through my hair- he even tried going down my pants, but I stopped him. I lost track of time, where I was and reality in general. His hands were all over me, his body against my body and his lips were pressed hard to mine. This was what I wanted. I barely knew him- but it felt right.
Just then I came back to reality and realized what was happening. I quickly turned the light on, startling him.
“Wait… Does this mean we’re together?” I liked things to be official. It gave me a sense of security and routine.
He smiled and turned the light back off.
“What do you think?” He whispered to me as he pulled my face closer to his.
I imagined he had said it with that off grin and smiled when he kissed me again and I completely lost myself. I kissed him back and meant it. All my worries melted with me while in his arms. He was all I wanted.
After a good fifteen to twenty minute make out session in the bathroom, he led me outside and behind Jimmy John’s on to a hill. It was actually an old lady’s front yard- but it was a hill none-the-less. He put his foot between mine and tripped me so I’d fall on to the grass. I let myself fall and feel the grass. It was dark and warm outside. Unusually warm for February. I felt him carefully lay his body down on mine and he kissed me again. He got up and gave me a hand. As soon as I got to my feet, he pulled me close to him and resituated me to where we were both looking at the moon. He pointed towards the sky.
“Your light inside is like the moon’s light, wanting to come forth and burst out to show everyone else. And my influence is like the surrounding stars, helping your inner light shine true,” he said as he swept my hair away from my face and kissed me.
All I could do was look at him and smile. He was so gorgeous, so poetic, so perfect. I was great with writing but terrible with speaking. I could never say something so beautiful- but I could sure write it.
He helped me down from the hill and we walked to his car. He opened the passenger side door for me and walked around to the driver’s side as soon as I had gotten in. I layed across the car with my head on his lap and couldn’t believe how comfortable I was with him. I wanted to know more.
“I can’t believe you’re nineteen,” I said still appalled that he was so old.
“Yeah. You’re my first girlfriend too.”
He was stroking my hair and making me feel so relaxed- I forgot I was actually at work and still clocked in.
“Your first girlfriend?! That’s impossible!”
“No, really. You’re my first.”
“Mhm. Sure,” I said apathetically. I couldn’t believe him. He was nineteen and gorgeous. Surely he had had a girlfriend before.
“I’ve never had the courage I had with you today. I’ve never even thought to pull a girl down and kiss her like that. I was always too afraid. With you, I don’t know how, but I got that courage that I needed. I’m glad I did it too.”
I blushed and looked away. He was way too good to be true. Maybe I was still imagining him. An hour had passed since he stole me away from Jimmy John’s and Elizabeth finally came out and waved me in. Zane’s phone vibrated and he checked the text message.
“I need her back.” It was from Todd.
I was surprised he had let me just disappear for an hour.
“Looks like I gotta give you back,” Zane said with a smile.
“Yeah, I guess so.” I tried not to frown. I didn’t want this night to end.
I got out of the car and went around to the driver’s side.
“See you tomorrow,” he said after a quick kiss.
“Wait! How will I see you tomorrow?”
“What do you mean?” He looked a little confused.
“My mom’s a Nazi. She lets me out for two hours on Friday to go to The Quarry. That’s all the time out of the house I have.”
“Let’s go see Fired Up. It’s just a movie, I’m sure she’ll let you out.”
“Alright. I’ll try.” I was so mad. I knew she’d say no. Once he realized I’d never be able to see him outside of school, he would dump me. I had to lie to my mom. If I told her I was going to a movie with a boy I barely knew who was nineteen, she’d say hell no. But if I was going with a girlfriend I’d known for years, she wouldn’t care.
One last kiss and he was off heading home and I was walking back into Jimmy John’s.
The rest of the night went by very quickly and I couldn’t wait to see Zane the next day. Ten o’ clock hit and my shift at Jimmy John’s was over and Harry came to pick me up. Finally I could go home and get some sleep! I was exhausted and my being excited for the next day was making me even more tired. I passed out early that night and was so happy the week was finally over. A break from school, a break from work and a chance to see Zane outside of both.
Saturday morning arrived and I woke up as I always did- tired, pushing myself to get up, eventually giving up and laying in bed for another hour. Then I remembered. This wasn’t just any Saturday… This was the Saturday I would go out with Zane.
I quickly ran downstairs to find my mom. What would I tell her? She probably wouldn’t even let me go. I more than likely got out of bed and excited for no reason. I decided I’d ask Harry. He always said yes.
“Harry, can I go to the movies later?”
My mom heard me ask him and intercepted.
“Who are you going to the movies with?” She asked in a very uncaring way.
“Zane. He’s from work. We’re going to see ‘Fired Up’ at The Quarry. Can he pick me up?”
“No! Me or Harry will drive you. You’re not getting in a car with him! I don’t even know this boy!”
She was ridiculous. She yelled about everything and never allowed me to go over to anyone’s house. They had to come to ours. I also could never hang out with a friend unless she knew them and their parents. That’s why Harry was the person to ask. Rachel was a Nazi and Harry knew it so he’d let me do what I wanted so long as I didn’t get caught. I would stay after school everyday just so I could hang out with friends. I had it timed out perfectly so I would know when to start walking home to get there before she did. It was a beautiful secret. I payed no mind as she kept droning on about things I couldn’t do and looked at Harry for help. I questioned myself as to why I didn’t lie about who I was going with and why I had told her the truth.
“I’ll drive her.”
