Fruit of a Poison Tree

II

I was angry with my foe:

I told it not, my wrath did grow.

I watch Adam move across the field, his pads bouncing against his broad shoulders as he jogs away from me. I wonder what is going through his head, if he is still thinking of the girl who used to mean something to him, sitting in the bleachers, watching. Maybe he thinks I am there to see him, or to see someone else. In the end, it does not matter. I am not here for any of those reasons. I am there to sit in the sun, have something to watch, something to do away from...whatever it is I am trying to keep away from.

Coming to the sidelines, Adam pulled off his helmet and dumped water over his jet black hair, splashing into his light brown eyes. Something about Adam makes him stand out in a crowd, more than just his six-foot-two-inches and handsome face. It is a kind of natural authority, inherent leadership that made everyone sit up and listen. But for those who know him better, those like me, there is something behind his eyes which can only be seen as captive. He looks like he is imprisoned within himself, trapped in the gilded cage he made for himself.

Crossing my legs, I fold my hands in my lap and squint against the sinking sun once again. At the far end of the field, I spot our pathetic excuse for a cheerleading squad: six girls who have run off everyone else remotely good and denied a try to anyone who was not them. The only one who seemed to have a heart and soul is the girl who dates Adam, Lucy Spears. She wears her strawberry blond ponytail high on her head, smiles with the light of a thousand suns, cries herself to sleep at night, and turns her head to the side while Adam makes love to her. Something about her stirs up sympathy deep in me, making me feel for the girl who, from the outside, seems to have everything, and somehow, on the inside, is hollow.

I have never been truly popular, and I wonder if it is hard. It probably is not for people like Amanda Bernard, the queen of all queen bees. Someone who spends three hours a day on her appearance and the other twenty-one on expanding and capitalizing on her social circle has to be inexhaustible, and has to be very determined. But someone like Lucy? Someone who is popular almost by default because she is beautiful and participates in a "popular" activity such as cheerleading, she has the misfortune of having a shining but surprisingly heavy tiara placed on her lovely head.

Or I could be completely incorrect. She may revel in the adoration, bask in the adulation, of all the people she and her friends have deemed lesser. I like to think that I know Lucy, but we are not particularly close. In fact, I like to think that I know most people, but I really am just shooting out my best guess. Sometimes I am dead on, other times, I am just dead wrong. That's the beauty of being human, I suppose, that we can look at a situation, walk into it believing firmly in one reality and walk out knowing fact or fiction, deciding to tell ourselves the truth or another lie, and still hold up our heads and walk in the sun the very next day. And the tragedy of being human is that, one day, we all must face the music, face the reality of our own truths and lies, what we said to others and to ourselves...

...Which is all a little too philosophical for my taste. I slide down off the bleachers and down to the paved ground. The boys will be done with practice in a moment and I do not want to be around when they do. Walking around the outbuilding, I find all of their bags stacked around each other and on top of each other. A number 28 jumped out at me, his bag sticking out in the front.

With one swift move, I open up the side pocket and find a half-full orange bottle of thick white pills, a labeled reading PATRICIA L. HOWELL, Adam's mother. Tucking them back inside, I zip up the pocket and pat it lightly. Hearing Coach blow the whistle to call the boys in, I turn quickly to go. I break into a jog, not because I am worried I will get caught but that I want to run toward something. What I am running to I have no idea, but the beauty of it lies in that.