My Teacher My Love

Part 8 - Back To School

Monday morning, I have never been so excited and nervous about going to school. It was just after 6, sleep had not gone well. Part of me missed Amy but another was anticipating what would happen at school. Yesterday had been a sad day and also a fun day. Sad when Amy was not there and when we tided Sally's room. But mom, dad and I had fun when we went to the bed store and i got the most beautiful bed I had ever seen. I had tried to find a cheaper one, but I could not stop looking at this lovely wooden bed. It was beautifully crafted; the headboard had flowers engraved into it. My dad joked when he paid for it that I could consider it an early wedding present, part of me believed him, but I did let him buy it for us. Mom also purchased some new bedding. Once we were home, mom helped me tidy Sally's old room; it was a very emotional time as we packed away her clothes and other personal possessions. We spent along time remembering the happy times we spent with Sally, as we looked at photos and objects she had collected over the years, triggering memories. Once the room was emptied, dusted and vacuumed, dad brought my old bed into Sally's old room, or Amy's spare room, so he had room to put mine and Amy's new king-size bed into our bedroom. Mom and I left dad putting my bed together, while we made dinner. By the time dad had finished, dinner was ready and we chatted about stuff. Not discussing either Amy or school. It was hard not to wonder what Amy was doing, what Amy was thinking. I so wanted to phone her, but just tried to distract myself with chores. It was nearly 7pm before I decided to get a start on my school work and clothes ready for tomorrow. I tried reading a book before I slept but I was just stuck on the same page for 15 minutes, before I decided to just try and sleep, even if it was early.

So now after a rough nights sleep, the day I had dreaded for the last few days was finally here. I showered, brushed my teeth and was soon dressed for school. I picked up my backpack and headed downstairs. I could hear movement in the kitchen so went to investigate. Mom was making breakfast, dad was reading the morning paper. A place was set for me along with the phone.

"Morning pumpkin, how did you sleep?" Asked dad.

"Not well, pretty nervous about today." I replied. Mom served me some granola which I usually have for breakfast before school, where as mom and dad like a fry up, which I have on weekends.

"Whatever happens today happens. You both have our numbers if you need either of us." Said mom.

"Thanks mom and thanks dad, I'm sure I am just worrying about nothing, it's just the unknown of it all, like how will we react or if people can tell by just looking at us that there is something going on."

"I guess you've thought about it a lot?" Asked mom

"Yes, while I was trying to sleep I was thinking about making friends, and then remembered stories of students who were gay, and how it showed when they were sub consciously looking at the same sex. Maybe it will be different as my eyes will only be on Amy, but then again, maybe I will do it without realising. I am going to ask Amy when she rings, because I had no idea she was gay in the last few years I have known her. And I have never noticed girls at school checking other girls out. I have kind of done that, but I just hid in a corner when I did it."

"Sophie, you are over thinking things again. I think you need to take time to just start living life; it is good that you study hard and like to understand things better. But as you found with Amy, you have missed certain aspects of growing up, maybe when you find some friends and start to live a little as an adult should, you may start to worry less. Life is about learning from your mistakes, to learn to pick up after yourself better, to cope with the harshness of what life may deal you. Over analyzing everything will make you question every decision you make. I mean look at you and Amy, you had a moment, and you took it and kissed for the first time. Now look where you are, you have a wonderful partner, we have a wonderful new daughter and you are going to live together, then marry. All the stuff that you should have analyzed after you fell in love, like that fact she was your teacher, you ignored it and just lived it, because it was too important to ignore. Love is a powerful emotion and it will be your love for Amy that will get you through this period of adjustment. Sophie, you are so smart, you know I am right, but believe in yourself to make the right choices without reading about it first. Just let your good judgement let you decide. You and Amy can deal with anything that goes wrong together, and you have our support no matter what." Well I listened to all that and you know what, I wasn't worried anymore. Mom is right and Amy has been telling me the same thing. We just need to continue as normal, and no matter what, things will happen as they happen. We cannot control how things will turn out. So now I just wanted to go to school, see Amy, and just continue as we should, when at school, she is my teacher, until we both get home.

"Thank you mom, that was really great advice, I think I just have to remember that at school, Amy is simply Miss Taylor, and as long as I remember that, school should just be a normal place and I have a great teacher 3 times a week."

"I am so happy I could help, well enjoy breakfast, your dad and I are off to work now, have fun at school." Mom and dad both kissed my cheek as they left. It was just after 7am and Amy would hopefully ring soon. Ring.

"Hello?"

"Hi honey, it so good to hear your voice."

"Yours too Amy, I miss you and I must tell you I love you so much."

"Missing you too Sophie. How did you sleep because I just couldn't settle?"

"The same, but I had a talk with mom this morning; she said that I should not worry about today and just treat it as any other school day. As long as I remember that at school you are just my teacher, Miss Taylor."

"She is right, but I must tell you that after 3 days, I can't sleep properly now without you by my side."

"I know I couldn't either, if you had been here last night I would have definitely slept better."

"Well I have packed my stuff and after work I will go to my house, pack the car and be at home for about 7pm."

"Wait till you see the bed, its beautiful, dad said it was a future wedding present."

"Sounds nice, can't wait to see it, and I especially can't wait to see you. I want to kiss you so much, but I will be counting the hours until tonight."

"I am trying to feel your lips on mine now, but I need the real thing so much. I will see you in class, I love you Amy."

"Love you too Sophie, will see you later." She kissed down the phone, as did I in reply and the call was over. I was ready to cry but it was less than 12 hours before I would be alone with her, and at least I would see her in just under 2. So stiff upper lip and all that, I held my head up high grabbed my bag and headed off to school.

When I usually walked to school, it took about 20 minutes. But it took about twice that long this morning. But I was psyching myself up, while still trying to remember it would just be Miss Taylor today and not to worry too much, just see how the day goes. As I entered the school grounds I looked around, see if could see Amy, but also spotting out potential friends. I had friends when I was younger of course, but when I started high school I felt I was too bright and mature for friends, and I just fazed them out. I never had friends whose house I went to or that came to my house. I also knew that friends I had when I was 11 would be different from the friends I made now, in my adult years. But for now I just had to see who was interested. Making friends would be new to me but I am sure it could not be that hard, so I just had to wait and see what happened. I was going to start in the library, because I should at least try to make friends with people who felt learning was important. When in the library there were a few people that I sometimes would say hello to or we would ask each other questions, but nobody I would call a friend. So that was where I was headed. I think if I stood outside Miss Taylor's door for the next 40 minutes it would seem odd, no matter how smart, so I thought a bit of time in the library would be good. As I entered there were only a few students around, but there was one I saw who I noticed a lot in the library. Her name was Melissa; we were in some of the same classes, but not Miss Taylor's. So she seemed the perfect candidate. She seemed nice, was an inch taller than me, with jet black hair. She was a great student like me, but also seemed like a loner. I approached her cautiously, I do think I wanted to be friends anyway with her, but I also had my ulterior motive.

"Hi." She looked around then at me; I was smiling kindly at her. "Do you mind if I sit here?" And I pointed to the chair next to her. She was reading a book but I could not see the cover. She just shrugged her shoulders, which I assumed meant OK and sat down. "My name is Sophie, and your's is Melissa isn't it?"

"I know who you are." It sounded dark the way she said it, but at least she spoke to me, it's at least a start.

"You do, how do you know me?" I was trying my best to get her to engage in conversation.

"I just know who you are, didn't mean anything by it."

"Well I was just trying to talk if you want. I have seen you around the library a lot and so you seemed like an interesting person to get to know."

"Why would you want to know about me, what have you heard?" Now she was being very defensive. This intrigued me, obviously she had misgivings about people and it seemed like she needed a friend, so I was going to try my hardest to help her.

"I have heard nothing about you, but from observations, I know that you are very bright, especially at maths and that you come to the library a lot to study and read a lot of books. I like reading also, what are you reading at the moment?"

"Stop, what do you want?"

"Well I am honest, so I will tell you the truth. I have no friends my own age at school and my mom suggested that I needed to make friends. I have never needed a friend because I felt I never needed one, I just wanted to do my own thing and concentrate on school, getting good grades. But my mom is correct, people need friends, it is a way of learning about life. So what do you think, can we be friends?"

"Well people have never bothered before, so why should I be interested in being friends with you?"

"I can't answer that, but if you have never had a real friend, how do you know that not having one will be good for you?"

"I don't know and I don't care." Well this was certainly more difficult than originally anticipated. Just then I felt someone looking at me, I looked up and spotted Amy, she was looking straight at me. She looked so beautiful, wearing a summer dress with a cardigan hanging off her shoulders. She was wearing her glasses and was smiling brightly. I smiled back, nudged my head towards the girl I was talking too, to indicate I was making a friend, she nodded slightly to continue.

"Well, Melissa, I do care about people, even though I have never tried to make friends, I am the type to help whenever I can. Now it sounds like you are very careful about letting people too close to you, it seems to me that a friend is just what you need."

"Well I don't Sophie, so please go away."

"Please let me say this last thing. Trust is a very hard thing to earn and to give. It seems people close to you have hurt you, and you are bitter towards anybody that gets close. I just want to be your friend, I too need to trust more people myself, and I need someone to confide in and to be there for me when I need a friend. You sound like your bottling up a lot of anger and have no one to talk to about it. I would like to be that person, it would be nice to help someone and just be relied upon, and it is the one thing I have been missing in my life. I learnt that from talking to my mom and dad this weekend, I needed someone my own age to talk to, because I was keeping secrets from them, and I did not know how to deal with it."

"You really want to me my friend?" I could see a smile forming, giving her gentler appearance.

"Yes, I mean if you want we could start by helping each other at school or we could just talk if there is anything you want to say or tell me. I am happy to just listen, I can't make you trust me or believe what I say, there is nothing you could tell me that I would ever tell anyone else. I want to be your confidant, because I have seen first hand the effects of what happens when people don't talk about there thoughts and feelings. My sister died a few years ago, and she had led a very secretive life and it was only on her deathbed that she talked to me and my family. She told me that we have to be who we are and to be honest. So I will be honest with you and hopefully you can learn to trust me."

"I have never really had a friend before. So what you are telling me is that because of something you told your parents this weekend, you now want to make friends?"

"Yes, I do."

"Will you tell me that secret too?"

"One day, but you have to earn my trust, but that is not to say I will not tell you other things, my secret, was for family only and it took a year to talk about it, so I hope I trust you enough one day to tell you."

"I have secrets too, but no one to tell them too." The bitterness had left and now it seemed she wanted to make an effort to be my friend.

"Well if you want any advice you can ask me?"

"Why did you wait a year? Do your parents scare you?"

"No, it was just that I wanted to understand myself better before I was truthful with them. I was always going to tell them, I just wanted to understand it better, that is why my mom said I should have had a friend, it may have been easier."

"Oh, it sounds like your parents really care, mine treat me like shit. I only study or read so I can stay out of there way."

"I am sorry to hear that, it was my sister that helped them believe in me more, if she had not spoken to them when she died, I may not have told them. So maybe one day you can hope your parents will care, or at least take notice of your high achievements at school."

"I hope one day they do to, I suppose hope is an emotion I am lacking a lot of lately. Do you really want to be my friend?"

"Yes Melissa, I really do, I hope you can believe that, you said you know who I am, so you must know that I have no other friends, that I study and work hard and that I would not be the type of person to come up to people and lie about making friends with them?"

"I do, but part of me doesn't trust you."

"I do not expect you to trust me, that is earned. But if you are at least willing to try and be my friend, it is a very good start."

"I am really sorry I was such a bitch earlier, I just get shit on by most people."

"It seems that you have a lot of issues with people, but as friends we can help each other to overcome your fears."

"I would like that, thank you Sophie." She held out her hand, but I felt a hug moment, so I did just that.

"I would like that too, but friends hug." I let her go after a moment. "I read that human contact is important for people. It helps heal all wounds. So if you ever need one, I am here." She was crying. So I opened my arms and she hugged me this time. She cried for only a few minutes. But it did wonders for her smile. "I am sorry I upset you, but you seem happier."

"I am, I feel happier than I have in a long time. I cannot believe how nice you have been. Just being with you has helped me feel better."

"Were friends now, this is how it is; we support each other and try to make each other happy."

"So do you want to do something together or do you need help with homework or anything?"

"I usually eat lunch alone, maybe we could sit together?"

"I bring my own lunch, so I sit outside. But I suppose I could sit with you in the canteen."

"I could get a sandwich and take it outside, what do you want to do?"

"Well it looks like it is a nice day and it might be more private to talk, would that be ok?"

"Fine, we have the same maths class, so you come with me to get a sandwich and then you can take me to your spot."

"I will see you later then, Sophie. Thank you again, it has been lovely to make friends with you." And with that she left to go to class. I waited a few minutes to think about everything that had happened. Melissa was a really great person once she had someone to talk to who cared; it made me happy that I brought a smile to her face. I smiled to myself, I felt wonderful, and maybe having a friend will mean more than a distraction. Not that I had forgotten about Amy, but I realised I was looking forward to lunchtime, rather than watching the clock tick away to 7pm when I could be alone with Amy. So now I had my own class to go to. I would spend the next hour with Miss Taylor as any normal student. When I saw her earlier in the library, I was happy, but it was easy not to rush to her, even though I knew her intimately, I saw her as my teacher and my friend, so it was easy to just act like we did before Friday. All this worrying about making friends and finding ways to avoid showing my feelings for Amy seemed to be a waste, none of my worries had surfaced and everything did seem normal. The final test though was to see how class went. So I picked up my backpack and headed towards English class with Miss Taylor.