Mind and Matter

01 | Emerson

"There you are!" someone called from behind me, grabbing onto my shoulder.

I turned around and found my other friend Kalani there with a big smile on her face. She wore long hair in two French braids and a green romper that glued itself to her slim figure.

"I don't want to be all alone here."

"Well, I'm here aren't I?" I joked, and we weaved through the throng colonizing the front steps. "Where's Flynn?"

"He says he's gonna be a few minutes late," she answered, holding the door open for me. "He always takes so long to actually leave his house that I've given up walking to school with him."

"Oh Flynn," I said, shaking my head to myself.

As Kalani and I walked down the hallway past our lockers, I brushed shoulders with someone. When I turned my glance, I realized it was Neve—one half of the dynamic duo of Neve and Haley—busy yelling at the top of her lungs about a guy she met in Miami over the summer to a row of girls who looked more like quintuplets than best friends.

"Can you fucking watch where you're going?" Neve snapped, rolling her spider-lash-framed eyes.

"No need to be so rude, Neve," I heard her friend Haley mumble off to the side, her eyes idly on her phone screen. Neve didn't seem to hear her and went back to explaining exactly how gorgeous the guy was.

"Oh my god, I've seen identical twins look less alike than those five girls over there," Kalani remarked, dragging me in the direction of our homeroom.

In walked Mr. Clark, and everyone seemed to suck in a breath.

"Good morning, students," he grumbled, putting on his thick glasses and setting his bag down on his desk. He turned to all of us and folded his hands together, surveying with a squint the people he would have to deal with all year. "Welcome to your senior year, which should be a bunch of fun. For you at least."

Mr. Clark was a dry, emotionless man of around sixty, with a level of sarcasm that terrified some people. While many found him frightening and unapproachable, I, on the other hand, thought he was rather entertaining. He fascinated me because I knew there had to be a reason behind his demeanor, something he hid deep behind his sullen green eyes. For a man so detached, he kept an extensive amount of family photos on his desk, and I found him longingly staring at them at times he thought no one was looking.

We all mumbled back a good morning at different intervals.

Mr. Clark leaned back against the wooden desk and let out an inexpressive sigh, beginning to speak in one continuous monotone. "And here comes the—pardon my language, since you probably have never heard this word before—bullshit I am obligated to say every year. Today marks the beginning of your transition from childhood to magical adulthood because somehow each and every one of you will flip one-hundred-eighty degrees in maturity by June first. Senior year magic, am I right. Anyway, we hope we can work with you this year on achieving your post-high school dreams and let another graduating class walk out of these golden doors having no idea how to write a check or file taxes because the quadratic formula will save your lives as adults, mark my words. Thank you, and I hope we can start by sharing our enthusiasm about the rest of the school year together."

I had to bite the inside of my cheek to keep from laughing, while some other students failed to, bursting into snorts at his spiel. Never in my fourteen years of schooling had I heard something so beautifully realistic.

"Anyway, since we all know you won't be learning anything today besides what a syllabus is for the ten thousandth time, let's take a moment to get to know each other so we can empathize in our misery. Say your name and something about you."

"Um okay," the first kid at the far left of the classroom began. He was burly with buzzed hair and a voice like thunder. "I'm Brock. And I play defensive tackle for the football team."

"I couldn't tell," Mr. Clark remarked. Shockingly, Brock smiled at him.

"I'm Kelly, and I really just love socializing, to be honest," came the voice of our grade's walking chatterbox. In seconds, she leaned behind her to her best friend and resumed her loud conversation.

After around ten minutes, it was Kalani's turn, and she cleared her throat.

"I'm Kalani, and you know what I'm really tired of?" she began, and everyone turned their attention towards her. "It's my last year of high school, and people are still mispronouncing my name. It's not Kah-laney or Colony or Kelanie, it's Kuh-lani. Is it that hard for people to accept a name that's not straight out of 1800s Britain?"

"Valid point," Mr. Clark said, holding up his index finger, and people began to nod in agreement. He glanced at me. "Go ahead."

"I'm Emerson; most people call me Em," I said, folding my hands on my lap. My eyes darted to the board. "And that world map behind you, Mr. Clark, is about to fall in three, two, one—"

He spun around and grabbed it with two hands before it fell on top of his head. He grumbled something to himself and set it down on his desk before looking back at me. "Thank you, Em, very observant of you," he said, and for the first time in my life, I saw a microscopic trace of a smile on his face.

It was mind-blowing.

For the rest of homeroom, I nearly fell asleep listening to the generic answers of everyone else. I tried to keep myself awake by stealing glances at the unfamiliar faces in the back of the class. At the very far end of the classroom, a few feet away from the back door, sat a guy dressed in an all-black ensemble: shirt, jeans and shoes. He slouched in his seat, surveying the room with large, coffee-colored eyes. He came off as aloof from the way his arms were tightly folded across his chest and how he analyzed everyone with a hint of scrutiny.

He must have been the boy I saw down the street this morning.

"I'm Leo, and..." He paused for a few moments before saying anything else. "I really don't want to be here."

"Well that makes two of us," Mr. Clark answered him and turned his attention to the whole class again. "You may all head to your first periods now. Good luck, everyone."

As I got up, adjusting my dress and slinging my bag over my shoulder, my eyes roamed to the back of the classroom again. And for a single second, the guy—whose name I now knew was Leo—subtly made eye contact with me before we both headed our separate ways.