Chapter 1: The Sidekick?

A girl sometimes seems interesting when she is, in fact, boring. We see things that are normally connected with things of interest and are fooled. Same goes for a man, a place, an event, a book, a movie, a quote, a bowl, a piece of clothing, a chair, a button, a universe.

I have met many boring girls who seemed interesting at first glance. I have dated quite a few as well. At one point, I figured perhaps a girl that seems completely boring would turn out to be interesting. She did not. Then I had a brief gay episode, but that ended as soon as physical closeness began. There is just something about a penis that does not appeal to me. Is it the smell?

Irregardless, I was really surprised to learn Sarah was actually an interesting person. Mind you, I did not learn it through our interactions, and I did not know it when we started going out either. It was my hero’s journey that made me realize. But I should have known from the start.

Sarah had all the signs of a girl who is only pretending to be interesting: short bleached hair, tattoos, being a poetess, having traveled the longer dimension of South America, a collection of vinyl, and more. And yet, there was another layer. A true depth of character.

Sarah went to a regular American high school, not an outlandish boarding school like me, and had a normal experience of being alienated, crushed, melted, and remolded to fit the norms of the society. She seemed perfectly aligned with what they were trying to do to her. She got with the program. She hitched her wagon onto the right star. She followed the drummer. She had good grades, dressed modestly, cooked with her mom, and went to church every Sunday. The teachers loved her and other parents always told their kids “Can’t you be more like that Sarah M____?”

She was such a beloved teacher’s pet that Mr. Cole, the science teacher, made her the lab assistant. She had the keys and unlimited access to his office where all the equipment was and it was her job to bring it to class when needed and then put it away.

One afternoon, she was putting microscopes back on the shelves. It was a late afternoon in springtime. The sun shone warmly through the open blinds making the office look like a noir detective’s office, except that Mr. Cole was sitting at his desk over his laptop. They worked peacefully side by side, like a pigeon and a sparrow.

”Sarah,” he said, “Have you chosen a college yet?”

She turned around to face him. He was holding his hands over the keyboard, like he stopped working unexpectedly. “I don’t know, Mr. Cole. I think either Brown or Stanford. They have such good science programs.”

He nodded, satisfied. “You know, I am a Brown man myself."

"Go Bears,” she said, throwing her fist into the air. He laughed. The little grey mouse looked nothing like a cheerleader. She reminded him of his daughter.

”I am willing to write you a letter of recommendation,” he said.

”Thank you, Mr. Cole. I was going to ask, but I,” she looked away, pretending to be shy. The truth was, she was not sure if she would choose Brown. She was not even sure if she was college material. Plus, she did the calculations and it would take her 17 years to re-pay the loans. She did not really have the courage to tell her parents. To disturb the evening in the living room with bad news like this. To be a bad example to her sisters.

”Well don’t worry about it. I’ll have it to you by Friday, what do you say?"

"I don’t want to be a bother."

"You’re not. No problem at all."

"Please, Mr. Cole, don’t inconvenience yourself.”

Mr. Cole’s phone began vibrating on his desk. “Nonsense, Sarah,” he said, “I’ll have it for you first thing Friday, and that is the end of the discussion. Now will you excuse me, I have to take this.” He left the office in a hurry, speaking to the phone in an annoyed voice.

Sarah finished putting the microscopes away and then twirled around the office a little bit like Tinkerbell. She ended up at Mr. Cole’s desk, looking at the screen of his laptop. It was the final test in one document, and the answer key in the other. She sat down and began reading.

She did not feel guilty. She thought a good scientist needed to be curious and that was more important than following the rules of some silly game. She believed school and tests were part of a game everybody played, for example when you had to pretend you had to study to get the answers right, or you had to show how you calculated something, even though you could do it in your head without a problem. Grades were a form of gamification, a clever incentive to get students hooked on work. Later, those grades would be replaced by yearly reviews that made one eligible for a raise or a promotion, and the game continued.

Sarah had just finished reading The Stranger by Camus, a rite of passage for angsty 17-year-olds. It was about a jaded young man who shot another man to see what it felt like to pull the trigger. The part the followed was his trial and (spoilers removed), and it was all to show a detached, dismissive anti-hero who refused to follow the rules of society. How silly! But it did inspire her to ask one question. “What would it feel like to pull the trigger?”

She did not hesitate any further, she just emailed the test and the results to herself.

”You did what?” asked her best friend Ella in a truly Hollywood transition.

”I have them all printed here,” said Sarah, pointing to a neat stack of papers on her desk. It was later that night in her room, she had called Ella to come and learn the secret.

”But that’s cheating,” said Ella.

Sarah put on a mischievous face. She pictured the guy from A Clockwork Orange, with the smirk and the one-eye makeup. It felt interesting to be in this role, but there was more to her plan than just cheating on a test.

”Are you going to sell them or what?"

"No point in selling, I don’t need the money. I will give them away."

"But why?"

"Chaos,” Sarah laughed. She pictured the Joker from Batman. A life of a crime lord would be interesting, but she was not really interested in being evil. Letting chaos reign, now that was something that seemed appealing to Sarah. “Chaos makes us deal with unexpected new situations. It doesn’t allow us to become complacent and grow old and fat. A wave of chaos can reforge an entire community. Make people reconsider their goals. Make the society progress.”

Ella nodded her head, perhaps the beginnings of tears appeared in her eyes. “This is so typical of you, Sarah. I wish people knew what you were really like.”

Sarah got closer, put her hands on Ella’s shoulders and looked her deep in the eye. She forgot all the images of heroes in pop culture, she focused on Ella. In this focus, she began to forge her true self.

”Listen, Ella, this is very important to me. Think of it as an experiment. I want to see it through. That is why I am telling you. You have always been my friend and I need you for this to work. I need you not to say anything to anybody. Can you promise me that?”

Ella nodded, the tears shining in her eyes.

”Say it, Ella. Say ‘I promise.‘"

"I promise I won’t tell anyone,” she said. That young woman on the verge of adulthood was trembling with fear and almost breaking under the weight of the secret. How could she live in the real world, where so much is based on lies and communal self-deception, where she could not even cheat at the the game of school? Sarah felt honestly and deeply sorry for her friend, but at the same time felt these events needed to transpire. She hugged Ella warmly, stroking her head gently.

”Shhhhhh, it will all be over soon. The test is the day after tomorrow. I will distribute the answers tomorrow. Nobody will know. I just need you to keep quiet. In the meantime, enjoy the pain and the fear. Pain and fear help us grow. Shhhhhhhh. My little Ella, it will be all better soon,” and so on. Sarah comforted and Ella sobbed.

If this was a movie, this would be the time for a montage. Joyful music playing while Sarah’s classmates pass on folded pieces of papers. Jock would pass it to a nerd, he would touch his glasses and then look in disbelief. Somebody would threaten him with a prematurely-developed fist to justify why the teachers did not find out about this before the test. The spirit of the class, the social contract, the just rebellion against the oppressor. A scruffy-looking kid would run up to a bunch of beautiful kids having lunch outdoors and they would all lean in to see a piece of paper he put on the table. There would be shots of photocopiers, a guy at Target nodding knowingly at customers who are barely a year younger than him. Somebody would be copying the answers to a tiny piece of paper that could easily be concealed. Fade to black on that scene, as the music comes to a conclusion.

Two days later, the results of the test were announced. It was a rainy springtime Friday morning and the school was in chaos. People screamed at each other, both teachers and students, and the entire microcosm reeled in a cyclone around a tiny frame or a girl, with no-color brown hair, wearing a loose grey cardigan, smiling like the guy from A Clockwork Orange. The eye of the storm is always quiet.

She was sitting in front of the principal.

”Sarah, Sarah, Sarah, what should I do about you? What can I do?” He paused for a moment, hoping she would break, show some remorse, or talk back. Either way would make it easier for him. But she just sat there, not even defiant. Just focused like somebody about to disarm an atomic bomb with ten seconds to go. “You just made ninety percent of your class fail the science test. They will all have to retake it. Then I’m going to have to figure out what to do about the fact they all cheated. And what do I tell the parents. I am so disappointed in you. Why, Sarah? Why did you give them the wrong answers?"

"Are you actually asking me?"

"Yes, please,” she shouted, raising his arms in the air, but then he calmed down. “Sorry. Please, tell me what this is all about?"

"Well, what would have happened if they just passed the final test?”

He rolled his eyes.

”Humor me, principal Jackson."

"Okay, you’re saying they wouldn’t have learned the important lesson. Is that what you were trying to do? Teach them something school would never teach them? And what is that? Not to trust the honor student when she encourages them to cheat? Not to cheat? That there are no shortcuts in life?” he stopped talking. He was breathing heavily. His heart was not what it used to be, struggling to pump the blood around his fat, out-of-shape, stressed body. He wiped the sweat off his brow.

The girl in front of him seemed not to blink. In some way, she looked elated. Like somebody who achieved the unachievable, or like a climber on the summit. The return back down would be a hell in itself, but the moment of being higher than anything else around, that was a reward worth dying for.

”I have to take disciplinary action against you. This will be in your permanent record. This has to follow you through the rest of your education. I am so sorry, Sarah, but this will greatly diminish your chances of getting into an Ivy League university. Mr. Cole will be so disappointed. I know he was writing a letter of recommendation for you. He will be heartbroken.” The principal bowed his head and shook it in disbelief. Then he was quiet for a few moments.

He wanted to tell her he admired what she did. She actually passed the test for adulthood by going outside of her comfort zone, way, way out of it, and not thoughtlessly, for a prank or anything else, but mindfully, with a purpose. Never mind if it was misguided or not. She took action instead of grinding on. He wanted to commend it, and he would many times after that, when he was just Wade entertaining his friends at a barbecue, or mingling at a party. As principal Jackson, he could not condone this kind of behavior. He had to fulfill the obligations of his role.

”I would expel you,” he said, “But it would not make any sense, one week before graduation. I still have to think about whether I want to make you repeat the year. Now go home, I don’t think you want to be seen around today."

"I can go to class,” she said.

”Go home, Sarah. You’ve done enough.”

She left the office, went down the empty hallway towards the exit. The last remark was probably supposed to be a blow. Like when you break a glass and your mom shows up, and you try to pick up the pieces, but she says “Go to your room. You’ve done enough.” But she did not feel remorse.

And she did not feel remorse when she saw Mr. Cole in the hallway. He looked so disappointed, but she just met his gaze until he looked away. She did not mean to be cruel. She probably did not feel better than anyone. She probably felt everybody benefited from what she did.

Later in the day, she would see a similar look on her mother’s and her father’s faces. They did not show any sign of understanding what a sacrifice this was for her.

”You do not understand the world, Sarah,” said her father at the kitchen table, “You do not know how hard it was for me or your mother. Without higher education, all you can hope for is a house like this, a dead-end job like mine, and a life by the grindstone.”

Her mother was standing by the kitchen sink “All your father and I wanted was for you girls to be happy. Wanted you to have a better life."

"Mom, that may not be the life I want. I do not know yet. But going to college would mean I have to keep this life up for almost twenty years to pay off the loans. That is longer than I have been alive so far. Would I be able to do anything else after that? I know I won’t be able to get a high-paying job now. I know I will have to struggle. But I will make my own way in the world. I will discover what my purpose is. Don’t you want me to?”

Her father wanted to scream at her, but he was too tired for that. He was always tired. He turned around to look at his wife. She came closer and put her hand on his shoulder. He looked towards the living room, his two younger daughters were sitting on the couch, looking at the kitchen scene. Their eyes were just like his wife’s eyes, and just like Sarah’s. They were so full of hope, looking at him for guidance and protection. He turned back to Sarah and reached out his hand.

She put her hand in his. Tears appeared in her eyes.

”So what do we do now?” he asked.

At least, that is how I imagine it happened. I was not there.

Posted by: Paweł Kowaluk