Dear Universe

by Florence Gonsalves

I drag my time capsule out from under my bed and run my fingers over its glow-in-the-dark stars. “What do you mean, what am I going to do?”

  “About English class and prom and Nicaragua and college and everything?”

  Uh, wait in my room with a box of canned goods in case the world ends and I’m still waiting for an answer to fall out of the sky?

  “I really don’t know,” I say, throwing the empty can of Red Bull by my foot into the mausoleum with its friends. After a second, I pick it up and add it to my time capsule. “As for prom, I’m just waiting for a couple to break up, and I’ll go with whoever is the most heartbroken-slash-desperate for a date.”

  “You and me and Hilary could go together,” Abigail offers, her voice groggy.

  “Thanks,” I say, but they never offered before, and it feels too late now. I get back into bed and roll over to look at the stars through my window.

  “That still doesn’t explain English class.” Abigail yawns loudly, creating a lot of static in the phone.

  “It’s okay, I’m gonna wing it.”

  “Wing it?” she says loudly, suddenly sounding awake. “What if she fails you, and you can’t go to Nicaragua?”

  At least I wouldn’t have to choose which world to let go on without me. I rub my eyes and pinch my left butt cheek, which has been going numb for the last hour. “Well, then nature can take its course and rearrange its shelves, and I’ll still be moseying down the tampon aisle trying to find God.”

  She laughs. “What the hell are you talking about?”

  I put my pillow over my face and breathe in its dead goose-iness. “Sorry, I’m literally so sleep deprived and so caffeinated.”

  Abigail sighs. “I’m worried, Cham. It feels like you’ve been so distant.”

  “Yeah, things are just kinda weird.”

  “Nicaragua might be good for you.” Silence. “Why are you so against it anyway?”

  I’m so tired that I don’t care when the truth comes out. I remove the pillow from my face. “Because I can’t be out of reach if something happens with my dad. I can’t go off on this big adventure while his world is getting smaller and smaller.”

  I hear her sharp intake of breath. “Oh, right, shit, I’m so sorry I didn’t put that together.”

  I wipe my eyes, which are not tearing up but rather producing salt water for shits and giggles. “It’s okay,” I say. “I didn’t put a lot of things together.” Brendan’s words come to mind and I decide to latch onto his reasoning. It’s less painful than my personal one. “Besides, I don’t know why we have to go on a disguised-vacation just to ‘do good.’ There are enough people suffering right here. Everyone’s doing it so they have something to tell college people. It’s a little bit disgusting.”

  “Isn’t it better to help someone for kinda shitty reasons than not to help someone at all?”

  I pick up the straw I just rolled over, remove a piece of lint from it, and blow air into my hand. “I guess? But maybe if we didn’t go on these fancy trips and stuff, we’d be forced to help the people we know who need it the most. You know, the people we’re always turning away from who are right here.”

  There’s a throat-clearing noise on her end. Then—

  “Shit, Cham, I’m sorry.”

  I close my eyes and rest my chin on my pillow.

  “I didn’t mean to say it like that.” I sigh and itch my eyes. “I guess I’m kinda delirious. What time is it?”

  She groans. “Three forty-five.”

  More silence. “I’m gonna try to sleep for the next two hours. See you soon?” I say to Abigail. “And text me about coordinating outfits. I won’t be that idiot who actually wears her uniform on the last day.”

  “Of course,” she says. “Next time I see you, we’ll be so close to the end!”

  “So close,” I agree. “Night, Abigail.”

  “Night, Cham.”

  I hang up hoping that over the next few days I can train the fear in my voice to sound like excitement. It’s finally actually really happening. Graduation. Life. Every. Freaking. Thing.

  Even after I hang up and brush my teeth and pet the objects in my senior year time capsule, I can’t sleep. I end up staying awake all night watching the stars move. Not that I can see them moving, but they are, and that’s reassuring.

  Dear Universe,

  I’m sorry for interrupting you with my presence. Again. I’m just wondering if you could have my back on this one. I had a massive chin zit three weeks ago and a period stain you could see from space, and also they ran out of tacos on Tuesday, in addition to all the shit that’s already happened to me this month. I’m not blaming you for any of these things, but if you could just like show up for me during my last English class so I can graduate and like achieve my potential or something, I’d greatly appreciate it.

  It’s a tradition at the Gill School that on the last day of school seniors get to go uniform-free. On this fateful culminating day that it’s finally happening to us, the weather is unseasonably warm, like climate change is breathing all over us. Abigail, Hilary, and I opt to wear the shortest jean skirts we own. It’s a bit of a screw-you to all the years we had to do the knee-length nunnery getup, but I’m a little concerned I’m gonna have a pube slip.

  It’s a day that’s full of lasts: the last lunch, the last time I poop in the second-floor bathroom during Calc, the last time I take anything from my locker, which happens to be a mighty tuna fish sandwich reeking of life past its expiration date. Every hallway is full of a loud giddiness, then occasionally some squealing that turns into tears. Most of the day actually feels like a show I’m watching; the characters’ lives are progressing, and they’re finally getting everything they want! But as the episode winds down, I remember I’m still where I started, but with a fresh drool stain on my person.

  “Holy shit, last class ever,” Abigail says as we walk into English with our arms linked, my knee-high combat boots in sync with her platform wedges.

  “Amen, hallelujah.”

  We sit down in our usual spot for the last time that it’s ours. Beyond us the hallway is loud and muggy. I have a feeling it can’t wait to get rid of us seniors so it can have some peace and quiet.

  “Last day, last day, last day,” Jared chants as he walks through the doorway. The rest of the class trickles in behind him with the sound of the bell. I think today we deserve a trumpet.

  “Yes, seniors, this is it,” Evelyn says, standing in front of us and admiring our various last-day-of-school looks: sunglasses on backward, shirts tied with hair-elastics because real crop-tops aren’t allowed, even on the last day. “Here you are in your final class before you head out to parts unknown. I know you’re eager to discuss the newfound responsibility accompanying this freedom, but we’ll save that for prom.” She grins and rubs her hands together. “Won’t you want to take a break from the dance floor and hang out with your supercool teacher while continuing to ponder the meaning of life?” The only sound in the room is the two flies getting it on in the corner windowsill. “Come on, guys, I’m messing around! Let’s have a little fun!”

  “I’ll have more fun when I’m not so nervous about this project presentation,” Abigail says matter-of-factly. I try to exchange a look with her, but she’s too busy rehearsing her presentation under her breath to an audience of none.

  “Okay, fair enough,” Evelyn says with a sigh. “I’m excited to hear what y’all have come up with, and I know you’re on the edge of your seats too. Who wants to start?”

  “I will,” Doug says, hopping up quickly. The sunglasses fall off the back of his head.

  “Great! Take it away!

  He jogs to the front of the room, and someone in the back gives him a cheer. “What makes life worthwhile,” he says, pausing dramatically, “starts and ends with the sneaker. Running.”

  Damn, why didn’t I think of that?

  “There’s nothing in the world like running next to my teammates, feeling the wind through my two-inch locks, and movi
ng my hot bod.” People laugh and he flexes a calf muscle. Evelyn makes a tsk-ing sound but lets him go on. And for the next few minutes he does, his concluding statement being that the mighty sneaker couldn’t do anything without its trusty partner, the other mighty sneaker. “So, that’s it, running is my philosophy.” He does a few high knees, then takes a bow. “Adidas, if you’re watching, please sponsor me.”

  We clap and he bows and sits back down in his seat in a much more relaxed fashion than before.

  “Shit, that was good,” Abigail whispers, looking at her notes worriedly. “Do you think I have time to change my project?”

  “What’s that, Abigail? You want to go next?” I say loudly.

  Evelyn looks over at us and points to the front of the room. “May as well get on up there, Abigail.”

  “Twat,” Abigail hisses at me, but I know she’ll thank me later.

  Once poised at the chalkboard, Abigail tucks her hair behind her ear, pulls her jean skirt down, and begins. “Aretē,” she says, picking up a piece of chalk and writing the word out, “refers to the highest human potential, the best that we can be.” Oh, how I’ll miss the sound of chalk on slate. “It’s a principle that dates back to ancient Greece and the writings of Plato, Homer, and other cool philosophers.…” Evelyn makes an affirming sound that must be the closest a teacher gets to an orgasm. The more Abigail name-drops philosophers, the more my chest swells with pride. Abigail’s presentation is good. Yes, it’s a little bit masturbatory for the valedictorian to argue that what makes life worthwhile is reaching one’s highest potential, but I have nothing against a girl feeling herself.

  “That was great, Abigail,” Evelyn says, with a vigorous round of applause. “Which brilliant philosopher-in-training do we have next?”

  For the next forty-five minutes, I labor to keep my head out of my ass so I can listen to what people have to say. And I’m not being a suck-up, I swear. (It’s a little late for that anyway.) It’s just kinda cool hearing about what rocks people’s socks. Travis finds fulfillment in the present moment, Josie says something about family, and Danika has a whole philosophy around a deep connection with animals. Maybe my dad would like a service dog? Or maybe I just want a puppy.

  Toward the end of class, Marquis lugs his tuba up to the front and inflicts a solo on us. He proceeds to sit down without any explanation of his personal philosophy. Someone starts slow clapping, and the rest of the class follows suit.

  “Very unique, Marquis,” Evelyn says, then checks the clock. “We have two people left. Brendan or Cham, who wants to go first?”

  “I’ll go,” Brendan says.

  “What he said,” I agree.

  Brendan walks up my row, no tutu on today, the one day we don’t have a uniform. When he passes me, he flicks my shoulder. I bite back a smile, relieved the year is ending, because I don’t know how to fit Brendan into this world when he seems to be part of another. (My personal history will show you I’m not very good at mergers.)

  Brendan faces us at the front of the room, with a triceratops staring mournfully from his T-shirt and lamenting, All my friends are dead.

  “Camus is one of my many dead friends,” he starts, and there’s a little bit of laughter. “He’s very dead. Way dead. But even if he weren’t, he’d be far away. I would never have known him… and he probably wouldn’t have wanted to meet me.” He gives me a wry smile. “But that doesn’t matter. We’re still friends because he wrote something I needed to read, and I read something he needed to write.”

  I stare at Brendan shamelessly because everyone else is. He’s presenting, okay? I get a free pass to take in the curl that’s fallen out of his bun, and the way his dinosaur T-shirt fits snugly around his arms.

  “Maybe it’s cheesy,” Brendan says, “but writing things down condenses what it means to be a person in the universe. When someone else reads that writing, a friendship is made.” He takes Caligula out of his pocket and flips through the pages. “If Camus hadn’t written and published his… unique perspective, we wouldn’t have had the pleasure of reading and discussing the meaninglessness of life ad nauseum.” He rolls his eyes slightly, and that gets a round of laughter from nearly everyone.

  “Caligula wants the moon because it’s out of his world. I think we all want that. When we connect with the honest written word, we can reach what’s in one another’s worlds.” Brendan looks right at me. “And maybe, just maybe, we can find the moon.”

  I hold his gaze, and then realize that I’m holding his gaze. I look down, my heart racing.

  “So yeah,” he says with a shrug. “My philosophy is to read books, or at least parts of them.”

  Abigail claps loudly, and the rest of the class joins her. Evelyn beams as Brendan takes his seat. “Wonderful,” she says once the applause has died down. “Really wonderful. Just what an English teacher wants to hear.” She looks at the clock and then at me. “Ten minutes left in senior year. You ready, Cham?”

  I pat my crown of frizzies down on my head. “So ready.”

  I walk toward Evelyn’s desk, careful not to take long strides in my mini skirt. I’d hate to expose myself and have my lasting legacy involve a pube. Before starting my presentation, I say a prayer to the stain on the ceiling that looks like a piece of toast with Jesus on it: Bombs away. I know it’s not a prayer prayer, but I kinda wanna go out with a splash.

  “Anytime you’re ready, Cham,” Evelyn says.

  “I just have to swallow my vomit,” I say. People laugh and that makes me relax a little. “Okay,” I say, feeling my armpit sweat seep and spread out halo-style into my shirt. “After staying up all night and consuming enough Red Bull to fill up an SUV, my philosophy is this.” I look at Abigail and smile mischievously. “I don’t have a philosophy.”

  It becomes very quiet in the room. Even the flies in the corner stop mating. Everyone’s eyes mirror confusion back at me. “I know that doesn’t bode too well for my grade on this project or my ability to go on Senior Volunteer Trip, but I don’t have a clue about what makes life worthwhile.” I look down at my combat boots, which give me both strength and blisters, depending on their mood. “Instead of making something up, like I tried to do for my college essay, I just want to finally own up to this in front of all of you fine people: I don’t know shit. My personal philosophy is a foreign language no one’s ever spoken yet.”

  I walk over to Abigail’s desk and take a sip from her water bottle. “If I do know one thing,” I say, wiping my mouth and grinning apologetically at Brendan, “it’s that Camus truly sucks.” Evelyn’s eyebrows shoot up. “Sorry, but c’mon, guy. Do better. I can think of a million people who had a shittier life than you, but they still managed to find something meaningful.” My dad’s face comes to mind. “Some things happened to me this year,” I continue. “Like my dad was in the hospital, and some of you might remember a certain lunch where I whipped Tater Tots at a certain someone’s head.…”

  Even Doug is laughing. I smile and indiscreetly hold my arms up so my pits will dry.

  “The end of this year really sucked, but it made me realize I’ve kind of been sleepwalking through life. This whole year I was obsessed with prom and graduation and just getting out of here. I bullshitted assignments that were supposed to be meaningful and—C’mon, don’t look at me like that! I know you guys fudged your college essays.” I’m getting a lot of blank stares in return. Assholes. “Anyway, instead of bullshitting this project too, I want to tell you guys the truth. I don’t want to be asleep anymore. I want to find out what makes life worthwhile. Like the dude in Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance kind of says, the real cycle you’re working on is the cycle called yourself.”

  I start to feel a little teary, and my voice wobbles. “In conclusion, I don’t have a philosophy. I also don’t have a college essay. I’m sorry, Evelyn. And I hope you all have fun in Nicaragua without me. What I do have is this moment in time where I ranted at you guys about two assignments I basically didn’t do.”


  Abigail’s looking at me like I’m living her nightmare, but it’s the opposite for me. “The crazy thing is, I feel like for the first time in the history of school, I learned something.”

  “Woo!” Brendan yells from the back. My face gets hot as pizza sauce.

  “Camus sucks. Evelyn, you’re dope, and you guys,” I say, looking at the clock and the fifteen seconds remaining in this era of our life, “we fucking did it.”

  20

  Days ’til graduation: Still 4

  THE SUN REFUSES TO GIVE ITSELF TO ANYONE ELSE. AT 2:05 IT shines strictly for us as we count down the seconds ’til the last bell, then burst out of the school and into the parking lot.

  “Hell-freaking-yeah!” Abigail yells in my ear, the warm air filling us up as the sounds of people cheering mingle with the sounds of cars blasting music. Everyone’s mood is overflowing, and I’m standing in the middle of it, taking notes.

  When Hilary comes over to us, we get into Abigail’s car and blast the music like everyone else. We don’t drive anywhere. We just occupy the parking lot once and for all. They commandeer the playlist and I commandeer the back seat, head leaning against the open window. No matter how tightly I grip the seat, I keep drifting farther and farther from everyone else in this world, and what alcohol they’re getting for the after-prom party, and whose house everyone’s meeting at to take group pictures before all the other group pictures at actual prom. Everyone has a date and a plan and a purpose. They have a place in this world, whereas I suspect I’ve left the world entirely. The next time a satellite goes by, I will take a selfie and caption it Girl in her own outer space waves to something far, far away.

  “Hey, guys!” I yell to Abigail and Hilary. “Turn down the music for a sec!”

  “Ugh, no fun, Cham,” Abigail says, but pauses it.

  “I gotta go,” I tell them, leaning forward and peeling my thighs from the seat.

  “What? Why?” Abigail asks. They turn around and look at me. Travis raps on the roof of Abigail’s car and she cheers.