Chapter Sixteen: Sophistry and prophecy
The alarm screeched, a crow trapped in a cage, and it was too far away to slam the snooze bar so I rose out of the depths of warm sheets. As I became upright, all of the blood rushed to my feet and equilibrium failed. I crashed back into the bed in a violent heap. Entangled in sheets, I batted the clock. There was forty-five minutes until class and this professor took attendance like it was high school.
With the little soap I had in my possession, I rushed through a shower and decided to shave later. If I hurried, I might be able to get some coffee from the Kaf before it closed. I always missed by milliseconds and had to struggle through the haze of wandering thoughts so I tossed on a black oxford and thin billowy black pin striped pants. I craved stimulants, even the milder Colombian export.
Everywhere I turned after lumbering up the hill to the quad, students rushed along the crisscrossing sidewalks to reach the seven brick halls that outlined the main green of the campus. The oval quad started at a central hub and radiated outward like a cement spider’s web. Kids on rollerblades glide by cutting through lines of students with overburdened backpack. Pack mules hauling books. I had one notebook. It’s all I needed. I didn’t want to be late because some of the professors had egos larger than Narcissus in a hall of mirrors and took tardiness as a personal offense.
I had Introduction to Philosophy. There were a few kindred souls in this particular class but they were upper classmen suffering to complete their core credits. At least, I would be done with it and would never have a class before one o’clock ever again.
I made it on time and took in my chair in the back. The seat was missing a foot and wobbled. The guy next to me was a junior nicknamed Jinx but he wasn’t unlucky. The name stuck to him because he had a small head with a long neck balancing on a rotund body. There was a robot in a movie that looked like this unfortunate fellow and someone saw the flick and pinned Jinx on him at least that was what Tim told me.
“Jinx, you were at the party last night did they kick the second keg?” I asked.
“What are you talking about? You were there. Damn, what’d you get trampled by buffalos. Dude you should shower before you come to class. You smell like skunked beer,” he said.
“Fuck you man, I showered,” I said.
“Whatever. You finish the paper? I got an extension last week because of the trip with the history department to the National Archives,” he said with a finishing yawn.
I was doomed.
“Jinx, what can I tell Professor Altman to give me an extension? I spaced the paper, man. It is a sixth of our grade and I got nothing,” I asked in preparation for panic.
“You’re screwed. You should of called him last night with some bullshit story. He’s cool for a philosophy professor,” he said, looked up to the ceiling and added, “Didn’t you tell me ‘keeping attendance is bullshit because it is about the work’?”
He paused, shook his head and said, “Hypocrite.”
He was right. Professor Altman in his blue blazer and thinning gray hair bounced into the room and started lecturing on Hume before he put his briefcase down. I decided to play the good student so I propped up, paid attention and asked questions. The class dragged on with a static stress holding the hands of time back.
I thought I was in the clear when there were only a few minutes left because he asked for assignments in the beginning of class. The lectured ended and everyone got up to leave. A girl in the front row, plain as milk, yelled out, “Professor Altman, don’t you want our papers?”
His eyebrows lowered. He tilted his head upward and said, “Oh yes, sorry class. Up to me as you leave please.”
I waited for everyone to leave so I could plead my case.
The freshman confusion strategy seemed right. I shuffled head down and watched him close his brief case and said, “Hello Professor Altman, I have a slight problem.”
“Your paper, right? I saw you lurking in the back. No wonder you were so animated in class today. Let me see… you need an extension, so give me the reason and don’t insult my intelligence,” he said as he crossed his tweed bound arms.
His statement paralyzed me.
“I thought it was due next week and I have been putting it off. I am not completely into the groove with my work and I have been overwhelmed. I mean the social scene is hard to get accustomed to and really hard to resist. I have been going out too much and not spending the time studying and doing what I am here for,” I stopped, took a breath and continued, “it is just that this is a new place and I do not have that many friends. I am just not focusing. Please let me off this once and I will get it to you as soon as possible.”
He seemed either impressed or shocked by my honesty and granted me an extension of one week.
He then said as I was leaving, “It’s a difficult experience going away to school, but remember to take time to study every day. Then the work doesn’t seem to be such a great task. See you next class.”
I left feeling full of myself and learned a valuable lesson. Honesty is the best excuse in some cases. The next class was an half an hour away so I went to go recline on the sweeping granite front stairs of the Greek Revival building named Cerrone Hall and have a few smokes. The sun was an electric blanket turned on high and the stairs has a comfortable grade as the scent of freshly cut grass sifted over me.
I scanned a scribble of notes for the next class with Professor Campbell. The Corinthian columns at the top of the stairs cast a line of shadows across the stairs. Out over the mountains, the clouds swept to the West and a chill was lumbering through the unraveling deep blue sky. I closed my notebook and heard a familiar voice asking for a smoke. It was Dawn standing in a pack of fake blonde girls, a clutch of cawing preening canaries, who were wearing sweat pants and flip flops. She looked like a single black key on the piano surrounded by yellowing ivory.
She strutted over with a slinky club kid gait: a black skirt, a black t-shirt, black suspenders, a thin black Cardigan sweater around her shoulders and what looked like polished 14 or more hole Dr. Martins and silver knee high socks. I wondered why?
Then I looked at my clothes. Her black lipstick kissed the sky and her black fingernails ground into a leather strap as she hauled a huge black backpack.
She gave me the universal sign for I need a smoke as she tapped her lips and feigned to puff. Without looking, I pulled a smoke out of my crushed pack. The wind scattered her hair across her face. She brushed it back and rolled her eyes.
“So, what have you been up to Dawn?” I asked.
She ran her tar black finger nails through her hair again and said, “Nothing much but this boring stuff. You know some asshole stole like ten discs from me yesterday. Right out of my room, I couldn’t have been gone for more than five minutes. I heard that people stole books to return them when the school bookstore buys them back, but I didn’t expect so many jokers and thieves.”
I handed her the smoke as my hand shook. A pack of matches flipped through her fingers and she lit the smoke with a fluttering flame. The smoke blew back in her face as she exhaled and her backpack slid on her shoulder. She sat down and my stomach churned. I was prepared for class but not for this, I had nothing to say. The silence was worse than the tension of meaningless conversation.
“So, are you still playing music? Ever since I got here, I rarely touch my acoustic,” I said and slipped down on the stair.
The corner jabbed my tailbone sending a streak of pain up my back. She twisted at the waist and she stared dead straight into my eyes. Her lips stretched but stopped. The stuffed backpack fell off her shoulder in between us.
“I play all the time, trying to get a band together actually. Maybe play some parties for fun? Why are you asking now?” she asked and spread her lips part to receive the filter.
She puffed.
The smoke coiled away as she slid her granny glasses back.
“Honestly, I did not know you but that was then. Sorry if I
offended you,” I said as the queasiness in my stomach bubbled.
“That’s why you never talked to me all of those years when we had lessons right next to each other,” she said with a smirk.
My shoulders shrugged. Thwarted in my attempt to finish a smoke, I lit another butt and noticed her non-smoking hand was cupping a small purple Origami crane attached to a string on the backpack. She flicked it.
“So, what kind of style do you like?”
“I like to play the Blues because it’s emotional. I just play simple emotional stuff,” she said.
She slid away and her chin descended into her ample chest. This girl confused me and had nothing to gain this.
“Play what you feel,” I said.
“I overheard Michael talking about you with your guy,” she said. Anger slashed across my face.
“What the hell do you mean my guy? Why were you listening to a conversation about me?”
“No, no, I am talking about your guitar teacher at home, not here. Wow, ego much, you think I’d do a stalker move like that. Give me a break, your cute but not that cute,” she said, looked up and twisted her head away with a grin.
“I was trying to give you a compliment. You impressed my teacher Michael and he was talking to your guy. What was his name anyway? I always forgot everyone else but Mike,” she said and looked at me.
I was wood block stupid.
“His name is Jules,” I said and she looked as if a veil was removed and she continued, “Jules that’s right, like Jules Vern.”
“That is funny he told me once his nickname Vern, but I thought it was that movie character,” I said.
“You want to know what they said?” she asked as she put her right hand on her freckled cheek.
I nodded in sharp agreement.
“Okay but don’t freak out because it’s good. All right, Mike asked how long you had been playing and was astounded it was only a few years. Jules said you could just about play anything by ear and with more practice you could be better than he ever could,” she said and puffed.
I scratched my neck.
“He said you were gifted. But, they said some other things too. I wasn’t sure I believed them but it’s not important,” she said and stopped.
“Tell me what they said. Even if it is bad, I have been called a lot of things,” I said.
She rubbed the top of her cigarette holding hand and said, “All right, Jules said you hated studying theory and never practiced reading music. He said you lacked discipline because of your family. He thought all you did was learn songs and didn’t take it seriously, but if it helps I think he was jealous.”
She stopped and rubbed the paper crane.
The pigment in my skin felt like it was burned away. Her eyebrows lowered. She leaned in and resumed, “They said it outside the door so I didn’t hear everything. Don’t worry about it. They really were impressed.”
“Fuck them. They do not know anything about me. Thanks for telling me though. Class starts in few minutes,” I said and ground my cigarette into the granite below with a heavy heel.
“If you ever want to jam, go to dinner, study or anything like that I live two floors above Elyssa at 553, so stop by if you want, later,” she said and rejoined her friends. What?