Whispers

Part Two, by Michelle Wilder

Fire sears the wood
and pine cones open

(This is almost the first story I ever wrote. It's the apple seed from which many grew. Reposted with grammatical revision only.)

-----

The next night we stayed in again and talked more about our best friends. Barry, and a bit about Carol, and his friend Justin, so mostly our guy friends, about the stuff we’d done with them, and the things they did.

At the end, like after hours of laughing and telling stories, Dennis got all serious and quiet.

He said he was worried he’d never see Justin ever again ‘cause he’d gone to a college in Washington and he thought they might never manage to get together.

He said he knew it was stupid, but he was still afraid. He wasn’t at home any more, and neither was Justin, and their visits might not ever match up, and then they’d just stop being friends.

I was pretty quiet.

Then he said, hey, remember how Barry helped with my stuff when I arrived and how he’d laughed at me, or Barry, maybe, or at both of us, when he’d hugged me goodbye, because I’d been so stiff?

I remembered. That Barry hugged me is what I remembered.

I really missed him. We used to do everything. And Carol, and before, Janice. I just missed Barry most....

After a long time Dennis was so quiet I almost couldn’t hear.

“I wish I'd hugged Just more, goodbye...”

I didn’t know what I could say, but I knew what he meant.

I hated it there. I wanted to go home so bad. But Barry wasn’t there anymore, either.

A long time after he turned the lights out I could tell Dennis was still awake and I turned over on my side towards him and whispered.

“Hey, Dennis?”

As soon as I said it, I wished I hadn’t.

“Hmm?”

I didn’t want to ask anymore.

“Nothing...”

He turned on his bed too, I could hear.

“No, really, it’s okay.... What?”

He didn’t sound mad. Or anything. I thought what I could say, or how.
After a long time, I breathed louder.

“Barry kinda... let me talk about things... and... didn’t laugh at... stuff...”

He didn’t say anything and was quiet for a long time too, almost a minute, maybe.

“I promise I won’t laugh either.”

“Okay. Thanks. Me either.”

It was quiet again.

“Do you want to talk about things tonight?”

I thought about it, but was scared.

“No.”

Then I thought that sounded rude, after.

“But thanks?”

“It’s okay, Bobby. Any time.”

It was quiet again, for a long, long time.

“Bobby?”

“Yeah?”

“Thanks for asking me.”

-

The next week I started seeing Ben, my counselor.

We’d set up the next appointments each time we finished so they wouldn’t interfere with other stuff we both had. I’d see him twice a week for about a half hour, or sometimes an hour once a week, too. Or more, if I wanted.

He was a grad student and counseling was part of his degree work, he said, but he’d been doing it since he started school, like a peer advisor and stuff. Like Dennis.

The first time, we talked about what school was like mostly, and how I was doing and stuff. The same kinds of things I'd talked about with Dennis. We talked about Dennis too. He said he sounded really nice. Well, he said Dennis sounded “like a good friend.”

And he said he never told Viola or the study people anything, and our talks were private, and he’d only tell anyone anything else if I was “at serious risk.”

That’s just the way he said it. It was on the confidentiality form I’d signed when we started, too. If I was going to kill myself. I guess that made sense.

-

Late September one night, after he turned out the light and I was really sad because I’d been talking with Mom and Dad on the phone and was really missing home, I got the courage up to talk to Dennis about what I was thinking.

“Dennis?”

I was pretty quiet. Maybe he was asleep or something, and maybe he wouldn’t hear and then I wouldn’t have to.

“Yeah?” He answered right away, almost as quiet.

“Are you asleep?” Maybe he wanted to sleep.

“Not really.” He waited a tiny bit. “You wanna talk?”

I did, but I was too embarrassed to start. I just made a mmmm sound.

After a long time, maybe a minute, he made a sound.

“Bobby?”

“Yeah?”

“What do you miss most?”

I really had to think what I could say. It was almost what I wanted to talk about.

I wanted to say sitting with Mom and drinking tea and watching the late news, like we did sometimes. I missed walking with Carol and Barry and studying with Janice and talking and laughing. Sitting with Dad at little league games in the park and telling him about my week and what I wished and stuff like that.

-

I couldn’t tell Dennis anything or I’d’ve cried.

-

I told Ben about how I kept seeing people looking at me, and I think I even saw some laughing at me, but I never was sure. I told him about the hallway thing that happened the first day too. Again.

He said he didn’t know, but did I feel like I should do something? I said no, I think I was just paranoid, but he said I wasn’t.

We talked a lot about it. But I’d been getting more and more anxious, all the first month. I tried to pretend I was okay because I couldn’t say why I was so afraid. I just said I saw people looking.

I didn’t even have any stuff for anyone to find anymore. I didn’t do anything anymore, either. I just thought about it all the time. And that people could see.

Viola did all the weekly project stuff, and asked how I was feeling too. But she didn’t see me much ‘cause we mostly talked on the phone.

She asked me if I was happy at university. And I really wasn’t, but I didn’t say that to her. I said it was okay.

I talked to Ben about it, though, after she asked. We talked about it a lot, with the other stuff.

Dennis noticed I was getting stressed, I guess, ‘cause he asked if I was okay lots of times, but I always said I was.

I was missing a ton of dorm things that were supposed to get us socializing or something ‘cause I was becoming afraid to go out. Not just shy, like I told people.

Dennis missed them too, I guess, when he stayed in, just for the company, he said. He said he knew everyone anyway. And he still went to some things.

-

I tried to remember as much as I could about home, and Barry and everyone, and not feel bad, but I almost couldn’t remember feeling good. Ben said that once, too. That I never talked about good stuff anymore.

September was awful, all in all.

-

After supper one Friday I felt like going out, for the first time in weeks. Dennis wanted to go with me but I really wanted to just walk.

I wandered around and kicked some leaves and it was really a pretty night. Or evening, I guess. I felt better than I had in a long time, and I didn’t know why, but I thought of the student newspaper.

I’d really wanted to volunteer there, like in high school, but I had had so much to do and was tired so often.

It was too late to go to their offices, I figured, but I was near the student union building anyway where I thought they were and went to find it and it turned out they were still open, and really busy, just like it was noon or something.

There were about a dozen computers all around the walls and people typing on most of them, and music from an old stereo cabinet and this *huge* printer was slowly rolling out a sheet about a yard square with four people standing looking at it and they seemed to be really tense.
It looked like a real newspaper office, just like in the movies. Way more than high school anyway.

A tall, skinny lady with really long brown hair looked at me from the group around the big printer.

“Can I help you?” She sounded busy, or maybe tired, like she looked.

If I ran out they’d remember it was me who was there before. . .so I couldn’t even just leave. . .“Umm.. I was. . .I wanted to ask about volunteering. . .or, anything..?”

She stood up then, more, and smiled.

“Cool!” She looked a lot younger than a second ago, too. Like a student instead of a teacher, maybe. She had her hair in a long, low pony tail and was really skinny and way taller than me. More than six feet. She looked about fifteen.

“I’m Ellen Saunders, editor.” She came over and held out her hand.

I shook her hand and even *it* felt skinny. She didn’t look sick or anything, but was she *ever* thin.

“Bobby Johanson.” I tried to smile better.

She had a really nice smile then, and looked at me more, like she was memorizing me or something. She looked like she hadn’t slept in a week too.

I didn’t know what to do. I was scared she was watching me, even if she was smiling, and I think I’d been kinda expecting to maybe find a secretary or personnel department or something. I really thought they’d be closed...

“Are you free right now for an hour or so?” She looked like she was really sincere, too. I nodded.

“We’re printing layout drafts of the week’s paper and could use all the help we can get?” She smiled like I was really welcome. And it felt kinda more like high school, sorta. Better.

“Okay,” I smiled back. “I, um... only worked... I mean, volunteered... on our school paper, one year, though?”

She smiled even more and led the way over to a big group of tables all pushed together in the middle of the room and pulled over about a dozen big sheets and I saw they were newspaper pages, all in one printout. Two pages on a sheet.

“Can you read these? We need them to be, um, looked at... for stuff - anything that’s not right? Copy edited?”

I guess I looked like I was worried or something so she speeded up and tried to look better, I think.

“Look, you don’t have to be a pro editor or expert or anything and we’ll be going over them too, but every pair of eyes speeds things up, y’know?”
I guess she answered my questions, or at least some of them, and I didn’t feel like an idiot, so I nodded a bit.

“Okay!” She turned around to the two guys and girl who were still watching the sheet still coming out of the printer. And everyone, I guess.

“Guys! *This* is Bobby Johanson and he’s volunteering and he’s gonna do read-throughs, so no stupid stuff! Trevor!!”

A big guy typing at a computer looked around and looked mad at her. “What??!”

“NO stupid stuff!”

He kinda flipped his hand at her, like some of the fingers shoulda been down. He was scary-looking, but he just barely glanced at me and turned around again and looked at his screen.

Two of the printer group, a short, heavy guy who was almost bald even though he looked young, and a tiny dark-haired girl, did kinda “who, us?” faces and acted stupid, I think to make Ellen happier again.

The third guy hardly looked at me and just looked worried about something on the printing sheet, or something. He was looking all over it and kinda moving it around in the light, I think. Then he nodded, like to the printer, and looked around at me. I was watching what he was doing with the paper.

“Bobby Johanson?”

I nodded, and Ellen nodded too, and he smiled at me. I was a bit embarrassed that I’d been looking at him and he saw me, but he didn’t seem to notice or anything.

“Good to meet you.” He smiled really nice. I mean, he had a nice smile.
The other two with him looked back at me again and it was like they were seeing me the first time. I guess they were really busy.

After Ellen explained a bit more what she wanted I chose a pink highlighter off the table and smiled at her like I was ready to start and she shuffled the pages into the order she wanted them, and I started in.

They argued and swore at some computer problem, and typed and edited and phoned, and sat at the same table as me sometimes and even did the same stuff as I was doing, and I marked a few things on most pages and even found a thing on one page where the font looked sorta different and they were really happy ‘cause Ellen said it was the kind of thing that was a huge pain and cost money to fix if they only found it at the last minute.

On the last sheet in the pile, the back and front pages of the paper, there was a story about a meeting about safety on campus and gay students and stuff.

I really noticed it because the picture and lots of the quotes were from my psych teacher, Professor Hawkins.

I was thinking that I’d be able to tell her I saw her in the paper and that I thought she’d said good things. I didn’t know if I could, but I wished I could.

“Gary wrote that.”

I jumped. Ellen was looking over the table at me and I almost fainted I was so scared that she saw me looking at it. He was the guy from over by the printer, the one who said hi and smiled. But I almost fainted just because I was reading it.

“He’s a really good writer.” She smiled again.

Right then someone poked their head in the office and said the coffee place was closing and I realized it was eleven o’clock and I’d been there almost four hours and I was *really* later than I’d planned, but I’d finished the whole pile of pages and... it felt good.

I said I had to head out. Ellen looked like she was more than tired, but she smiled and said thanks a whole lot for my help and I felt like I did something great.

But then after a second she asked if I was in rez like she knew and she said there were two muggings on campus over the summer and she hated to lose volunteers, so she made Gary walk with me.

Well, she asked him, and he whined and she did ‘mad mom’ at him and he smiled at me and made it a joke, so I wasn’t so embarrassed.

He was like six-four and one hundred pounds and one big freckle and really smart. And he was finishing his masters and had even written a book, or a big essay that was printed anyways. On microeconomics, whatever that is, and it was used as a reference for some courses! And he was just 23.

Ellen told me about the book and stuff, he didn’t. She'd kinda told me a lot about the paper and who they all were ‘cause she’d come over more times tan anyone else to see how I was doing and to get the papers I’d already done and ask what my notes were and stuff.

But I hadn’t talked to Gary and he turned out to be a pretty funny guy, and kinda quiet at the same time. We talked at his desk while he did some finishing-up stuff on his computer he said he had to do before we went.

He said that nobody’d attack him for fear of being killed when he died and fell over, ‘cause his heart barely managed to get blood to his brain at the best of times.

He said there was a safe-walk thing with volunteers, so people didn’t have to cross the campus alone after dark and didn’t I know about it?! And that I should use it, but at the paper I could ask him or anyone else, and two were always safer than one.

I said I would, but I really didn’t think I needed it, and he snorted at me and said “Just *who* did you think it was for?” and stood up and headed for the door, so I went too.

Once we were in the hallways (the paper was *way* in the back of the building) and I didn’t know what else to say, I asked him about the article, and my professor.

He looked at me kinda sideways and down ‘cause he’s that tall. He looked like he was thinking what to say.

“Sheila’s great. She made a really strong case for the campus becoming, and I quote, ‘a place for people to live, a home instead of just a workplace.’ She calls it community consciousness.”

He thought some more. I was thinking that it was cool that he really did think about what he said. His eyes looked different when he was like that.

“Y'know, she’s worried that students, especially in the residences, aren’t as safe as they should be.”

I guess I looked at him different at that. I think he said it so I would.

“There was a really bad harassment thing last winter... three students were expelled and one was charged. And there was a sexual assault, two years back.”

I didn’t know what to say.

“She says this is a home for hundreds of students, and we’re responsible to make it better every year, not just start each year in the same place and hope, and then react if something bad happens. That that was *real* affirmative action.”

He nodded, like he was listening to her, and I guess he had the story in his head, and a lot more. It wasn’t all in the one I read, anyway. I said that, about things that weren’t in what I read and he smiled.

“I’m going to do a bigger feature... next week is the main stuff.” He smiled more at me.

“I guess it was a good story if you remembered it?”

I had to smile, ‘cause he was digging for a compliment, but I put on a serious face.

“I found it... trenchant....”

He broke up a bit. It was one of my high school paper’s favorite inside jokes.

“Damn! And I was *so* going for pithy!”

He held the dorm main door after I carded it and followed me in and I guess I looked a question.

“I’ll stay right to your room, okay? Remember the... thing...?” He looked a bit odd, or mad. I figured he meant the assault. The rape. It was. He was.

He stopped and looked down the stairwell we were near. “I covered that one. It was pretty bad... awful. Lots of students moved out, and I can’t blame them.”

I stopped and looked over the rail too. It went down just one floor from there, but it was all old white tiles and grey marble and dark oak and looked scary all of a sudden and I took a bit of a step back. The rail looked too low.

I wondered what he was thinking, and then thought maybe I didn’t want to know, ‘cause he looked like he wanted to hit something.

“Sorry.” He kinda stood up more. “I hated that story. It...”

He looked in the stairwell, at the walls. “Everything was bad.” He took a breath.

“Except the safewalk program was started and I guess it’s better here now, and the proctors are better trained, and what the board’s doing...” He looked down again.

“But it was still bad.”

He turned around and leaned back on the railing, which gave me a real chill. He looked at me really square.

“I still have nightmares sometimes, not about that, I mean directly, but about... about the girls.... They were really scared.” He looked kinda under his arm at the stairs again and kept looking down there. His voice got deeper.

“They talked to me at a floor meeting, almost a month after, and some of them were crying they were still so scared when they talked about it, and they still had to live here...”

He coughed a sound and looked at me. He looked so serious.

“So *ask* if you’re walking around late, okay? Or even earlier, if no-one’s around, okay?” He looked like he wasn’t mad, but he would be if I didn’t.
I nodded okay. I didn’t know what to say.

So we went up to my room and there was a light on so Dennis was probably still up and I said thanks to Gary.

He said it was no problem, and *remember,* and even if I needed to walk alone *to* the paper, he practically lived there, so call, hey?

He waited until I opened the door and then he waved ‘bye, at Dennis too, I think, and walked away.

I shut the door, quiet so I wouldn’t wake anyone up on the floor.

Dennis was reading, and waited a sec before saying another “Hi.”

I said hi too and sat down on my bed and told him who Gary was, and that I was at the paper, and I was glad I didn’t wake him up getting in late.

He said it was okay, and went to bed right away, too. He looked tired.

I didn’t get to sleep for a long time. I kept imagining what Gary saw down the stairs. I pretended Dennis’ pajama top was a real nightie.

I really wanted to call Mom and Dad, but it was too late and I was too scared to go into the hall.

-

End of Part Two