One Year (New & Lengthened Edition)

by Charlotte Byrd

  “So what’s up with you?” Tristan asks. “We haven’t really spoken in ages.”

  “Well, I just got divorced,” I joke. He smiles. And we both laugh about the situation. I figured that it would be years before this happened, but apparently I didn’t have to wait that long.

  “Actually, there is something I’ve been meaning to ask you. I have to do this final speech in public speaking class. It’s going to be in a big auditorium in front of all the sessions of the class. I’m terrified, of course, to say the least.”

  “So you want help with the speech?” he asks, his eyes light up.

  “No.” I shake my head. It hadn’t even occurred to me that he would want to help. “I just wanted to invite you to it. I have something important to say and, if I can get it out, I’d like for you to hear it.”

  “Oh, wow, okay,” he says. “Let me know the time and place and I’ll try to make it then.”

  “Try?” I ask.

  “I’ve disappointed you enough this semester. I don’t want to make yet another promise I can’t keep,” he says.

  “Okay, fair enough.”

  “Wow, look at us,” Tristan says after a moment. “I guess it is possible to be friends even after all that has happened this semester. Hey, here’s a wild idea, want to be roommates again next year?”

  I stare at him. It suddenly occurs to me that he doesn’t know about my plans for USC. I thought that he would find out eventually, given the rumor mill that Juliet and Dylan usually operate, but I guess this one fell through the cracks.

  “What? What’s wrong?” Tristan asks me.

  “Well, I thought that you knew already, but I’m not going to be here next year.”

  “What?”

  All the color in his face disappears. His lips start to turn an awful blue tint as if he’s been swimming in freezing water for an hour.

  “I’m thinking about going to USC,” I say. Why do I always do that? Use qualifiers where they don’t belong. “Well, no, not thinking. I’m going to transfer to USC for next year,” I clarify.

  “Why?”

  “Because…because of a variety of reasons. I just think it’s for the best.”

  “How can you say that? Are you doing this because of what happened between us? And you and Dylan? Well, that’s all over. It’s in the past. Let bygones be bygones. You don’t have to go all the way clear across the country because of that.”

  Tristan rambles on for close to twenty minutes about all the reasons that I shouldn’t leave New York City. I listen carefully and not. I’m afraid that if I actually engage in this discussion, I’ll never get to bed tonight. I look at him trying to convince me, fighting for me to stay, and a big portion of me loves it. He’s actually passionate and animated about something and not so reserved and calculated. I can see that he cares about me. I can see it in the way that he’s fighting for me to stay. And I appreciate it, really. But it doesn’t change my mind. It’s all too little, too late.

  28

  “So, why did you invite Tristan to your final speech?” Dr. Greyson asks me at our next and final meeting.

  The weather has turned from cold to wet, but remains just as grey. It has been drizzling all day today. It feels like each raindrop that falls from the sky sucks me of a little bit of my energy. Dr. Greyson is wearing bright red heels, which compliment her bright red lipstick and stand out nicely against the greyness of her suit. Looking at that splash of color gives me a little bit of a boost.

  “I’m not sure,” I say. “I guess I’m looking for a little closure.”

  “What is the speech about?” Dr. Greyson asks.

  “It’s free form. It can be about anything. So I decided to write something about him. About us. But I don’t even know if he’ll show up.”

  “And if he doesn’t?” she asks.

  I think about that for a moment.

  “You know what?” I say. “It’ll be okay. If he doesn’t show up, that’s fine. This speech isn’t really for him. It’s sort of for me.”

  Dr. Greyson’s face explodes in a wide smile.

  “I’m very proud of you, Alice. You’ve come a long way.”

  “What do you mean?” I ask.

  “Well, I don’t make it a habit to comment like this,” she says, “but since this is our last meeting and you’ve made plans to go elsewhere next year, I might as well go ahead and tell you.”

  I take a deep breath and brace myself. Dr. Greyson is not one to offer up compliments easily. In fact, everything with her is all about being a work in progress. But I guess that’s what life is, isn’t it? A work in progress? You’re never done growing or changing and there’s always room for improvement until that moment when you’re no more. I’ve never thought about it, but that perspective makes Dr. Greyson quite an optimist about humanity. More of an optimist than I am, probably.

  “When you first came here, Alice, I saw a broken, hurt little girl. Someone who was afraid to own her feelings. Someone who was afraid to listen to her heart. Someone who was, to a large extent, not very true to herself. And now, you’re a different person altogether. You have grown into yourself. You have gained self-esteem. You believe that you have worth and your feelings have worth. That makes me very proud, Alice. You’ve become quite a young woman, my dear.”

  I smile. I want to jump out of my seat and hug her. And then…I do. I wrap my arms around her shoulders in a warm embrace.

  “Oh my,” she laughs in surprise. And then hugs me back.

  “I hate to say it, but I think I’m going to miss you,” I say, sitting back down across from her. “Coming here hasn’t always been my favorite time of the week. But I think I really learned a lot from you.”

  “I’m happy to hear that,” Dr. Greyson says. “But I want you to remember that it’s not me that you have learned a lot from in this office. It’s through the process of reflection. I don’t mean to undermine my own credibility, of course, but it was you who has done all the work. All the work of looking back and examining your feelings and actions.”

  I nod. She’s right, of course. Yet again.

  “Well, I’m going to miss you anyway,” I say with a shrug.

  “And I’ll miss you.”

  I look at the clock. Our last meeting has come to a close.

  “I hope that USC ends up being everything you’re looking for,” she says at the end of our session. “And if you ever find yourself in New York City again, don’t be a stranger.”

  Walking back home from Dr. Greyson’s office, I feel like I’m floating on a cloud. My feet don’t seem to be connected to the ground. It’s an amazing feeling to feel like someone, a stranger, is proud of you. My parents have always told me that they loved me and were proud of me, but now hearing it from a complete stranger, I beam with self-confidence. Dr. Greyson is right. I have made a lot of progress this semester. Everything that has happened has made me a stronger and more self-assured person at the end. And that, somehow, made it all worthwhile.

  * * *

  I arrive at the auditorium where I’m supposed to give my speech early, as usual. There’s a line of nervous students backstage waiting to go on. The auditorium is filled with five classes of public speaking students. There have been two sessions of this particular kind of torture and this is the second one. Everyone backstage has been assigned an earlier time. And the rest of the people who are going today are waiting in the audience. I make small talk with some of the others, but we’re all focused and not really into it. We’re all too focused and too nervous about the speech that we’re about to make. I’m the third one up and I look over my flash cards. I’ve written the speech in big letters with a lot of spacing in the words to make sure that I could see it well when I’m up there. I did not take anything to calm my nerves and I’m jealous of the two girls and guy behind me who are talking about the anti-anxiety meds that they took to calm theirs.

  “I can do this,” I whisper to myself. “I can do this. I’m going to be fine.”

 
Finally, it’s my turn. Everyone is still clapping for the last person who went up. I didn’t hear a word of what he said. I walk out onto the stage and force myself to smile. The lights are blinding and I can’t see a soul. Something about this experience feels different than the intimacy of my previous speeches. They were all in a room of about thirty people where I could see every set of eyes. Here, there are no individuals in the room. They’re just a sea of people. I take a deep breath and clear my throat, quietly. I open the lid of my water bottle so that I don’t have to fumble with it during the speech if my mouth runs dry.

  “Ladies and gentlemen, I am extremely honored to be here and for this opportunity to speak about my friend, Tristan Hilton. For many years, Tristan and I were very close friends. We did everything together. Played with light sabers in our own third-grade version of Star Wars, played endless games of Release and tag, and slept over at each other’s houses until our moms grew concerned that we were getting too close for ten-year-olds. They had nothing to worry about, of course; we were only kids, and then we turned 13. Our feelings for each other grew and, eventually, during our junior year in high school, we started dating.

  “Dating in high school can be a complicated thing for many. There are a lot of letdowns and mixed feelings, but Tristan and I never experienced these things. Once we were together, we were together for good. We were best friends and nothing could break us up. But then we got to college. Things were more complicated for us in college. For one thing, we broke up right before we got here and then found out that we were going to be roommates.”

  I pause for effect at the end of the sentence and let the crowd take that line in. There’s a gasp that emanates from them. I smile, turn a flash card, and continue.

  “Not the easiest thing to go through, as many of you can imagine. College was a time of change. Both for us individually and for us as a couple. We weren’t a couple for a long time, and then we were a couple again. But our togetherness didn’t last either. I won’t bore you with the details, but I’m sure that many of you either heard me relay some of the more sordid ones in one of my unfortunate speeches in class or at least heard about it.”

  The crowd laughs. I thought that maybe only a few of them would laugh, the people from my class. But the laughter spreads throughout the room. Juicy rumors do fly rampant.

  “Well, anyway,” I say with a smile, “what I really want to talk to you about is not really our history, but friendship. In college, friends come so easily. You meet someone in class, they like the same music as you, they also like to go out on Thursday nights, and you’re friends. And because they come so easily, it’s easy to take them for granted. You think that it’s no problem; you’ll just make more friends. But what my relationship with my friend Tristan taught me is that it’s not that easy to make friends. And it’s way too easy to lose friends. And so, to close, I just want to ask you all to look at the people in your own life who you care about and give them value. Don’t fight over stupid things, and if you fight, at least forgive easily. Friendships are important because they define who you are. The people you meet here will be the people who will forever know you as a nineteen or a twenty-year-old. So, when you’re an old fifty-seven-year-old, there will still be people in your life who knew you when you were fun and vibrant and full of life. No offense, of course, to all the fifty-year-olds out there. I hope you know I’m kidding.

  “And so, in closing, I want to say thank you to my friend, Tristan. No matter what happens to us in the future, you will always be special to me because you’re my oldest friend. You knew me even before college. You knew me as a third grader and I knew you. And I will always value that. Thank you.”

  The auditorium explodes in applause. I smile and nod and smile again. I can’t believe that I actually did that. I gather my notecards, which are limp with sweat, grab my water bottle, and walk backstage. A warm sensation spreads throughout my whole body. Relief. My heartbeat returns to its normal rhythm.

  “You were great,” someone tells me.

  “Thank you.”

  “Yeah, that was really good,” someone else says. I’m not paying attention to anyone who’s talking to me. I’m simply nodding and smiling and walking further backstage, toward the exit.

  I take a big sip of my water. But I don’t stop at one gulp. Suddenly, I’m thirstier than I’ve ever been. And I drink the entire bottle without stopping.

  “You were amazing,” someone says.

  “Thank you,” I mumble and walk past him.

  “Alice?” the voice says again. It’s mildly familiar.

  “Yeah?” I turn around and see Tristan.

  29

  Tristan is standing backstage with his foot propped up on the wall. There are wires and poles all around him, but he’s standing so casually that it looks as if he’s back in our dorm. His arms are by his sides and his face is tilted slightly toward me.

  “You came,” I say. Still on a high from my performance and the crowd’s response, I throw my arms around him. “Thank you.”

  For a second, he seems surprised by my exuberance, but then quickly wraps his arms around me too.

  “You were wonderful,” Tristan whispers into my ear.

  “Thanks,” I say when I pull away. “I was super nervous, as you can imagine. But I got through it. I can’t believe I got through it.”

  I’m keenly aware of the fact that I can’t stop smiling. I try to press my lips together, but they just won’t budge.

  “I can’t believe you said all those things,” Tristan says.

  “Oh, yeah, well…I don’t know,” I say. I don’t really know what to say. “That’s how I feel and I just wanted you to know that.”

  I’m owning my words. I’m being honest to my true feelings. Wow. This is a whole new world. A whole new me.

  “Well, thank you,” Tristan says. “Thank you for saying those things and thank you for inviting me.”

  “Sure, anytime,” I say jokingly. “Actually, no, not anytime. This is the last time. I’m surprised I didn’t have a heart attack leading up to this.”

  “I thought that, given how well this went, you’d be considering a career in public service. Somewhere where you can make speeches all the time,” Tristan jokes.

  “Hell no!”

  We share an awkward moment of silence. Tristan takes a step closer to me. I look up at him.

  “Well, thanks for coming,” I say. “I really appreciate it.”

  “No, thank you for inviting me,” he says. “I had no idea that you were going to do a whole speech about me.”

  “What can I say? You are sort of an important person in my life. And I want you to know that I meant what I said. I’m really grateful for our friendship.”

  He nods his head, hanging his shoulders. Then he looks up at me. His eyes sparkle in the dim light. And suddenly, the moment changes. We are friends one second and more than that the next. Nothing changes except that I know, I can sense, that he wants to kiss me. I want to kiss him, too. He takes my hand in his and looks carefully at each of my fingers, as if he’s seeing them for the very first time. Slowly, he brings them up to his lips and gives me a light peck. I know what’s coming next. I want it to happen, but I don’t let it.

  Instead, I take a step back.

  “I have to go,” I say. “Thanks for coming again.”

  I walk back home in a daze. I’m on a high from my speech and from the moment with Tristan. I did not give my speech or invite him to it for that to happen. And I pulled away because I don’t want to spend the rest of my time here and the summer wondering about the kiss. No, it’s time for me to move on. Tristan will be in my life as a friend only. And that’s enough. That was the whole freakin’ point of the speech. So why can’t I get him out of my head?

  * * *

  Finals finally come to an end. It’s funny how you wait for this one week each semester, dreading it, hating it, and each day of the week passes ever so slowly. But then it’s Friday and you look back and bam!
Finals week is over. This time I didn’t procrastinate until the last possible minute to study for any of my classes and was able to get a proper night of sleep every night. Unlike Juliet, of course. She stayed up all night for what seemed like three days straight.

  “Did you end up getting any sleep at all this week?” I ask her, packing up the disaster that is my desk.

  I’m not so much packing up as going through all the junk that has piled up in there and throwing almost all of it out. Why didn’t I do this earlier again? Why did I think that I would need to hold on to all of this junk mail? Juliet doesn’t keep anything and calls me a hoarder.

  “Not really.” She shrugs. “A few hours here and there in the afternoon.”

  “I don’t know how you’re still functioning,” I joke.

  “Red Bull, baby! Red Bull and about fifty pots of coffee.”

  “So, what are your plans for the summer?” I ask.

  “Oh my God! I completely forgot to tell you,” she says, jumping up and down. Her eyes light up like a Christmas tree.

  “I’m going to the Hamptons! Well, not just me. A bunch of people I know are pulling together and getting a place there. It’s not cheap, but it’s going to be epic!!”

  “Oh wow, that sounds exciting,” I say unenthusiastically.

  “You’re a West Coast girl, so I’m not sure you’re quite getting the significance of this. This is the Hamptons. The Hamptons are the place to be in the summer. There’s like a million parties every day.”

  “No, I get it. I’m sure you’ll have a blast,” I say, trying to infuse my voice with more excitement.

  “And of course, you have to come!”

  “What?”

  “Yes! Please, c’mon. It won’t be the same without you,” Juliet pleads. Juliet is an expert in pleading. This is probably the exact same voice she uses to plead for things from her father. Its high pitch makes her sound completely helpless, when in reality, she’s the only one in control.