1 Yesterday

The day was finally here. I was a senior.

The only problem was that I felt no different than the year before when I was a grade 11, standing in the exact spot. The difference between 11th and 12th grade was as profound as how you felt on your fourteenth birthday. The day itself offers no new insight into life. You are one day older and are given the gift of extra shit to add to your already overloaded box labelled "reasons for anxiety".

We met up at our usual spot. Our tree. It was a revered hangout spot that would cause any underclassman to salivate. It was the reserved property of seniors, and whilst the younger students could look at it, they remained unworthy of it.

The tree, in many ways, mirrored the life cycle of a Barbie doll. At six years old, it is a source of pride and boasted about endlessly, but as soon you outgrow it, ownership of it only serves to bring shame and embarrassment. We had moved up in the social hierarchy, and like a preteen discarding a Barbie doll we traded the tree for the most prestigious spot on the grounds: the cafeteria.

It was the most majestic of pigsties. We waltzed into the fluorescent-lit room filled with faded white benches. The smell of "slap chips' wafted through the air. It was the dank, old type of smell that could induce nausea. But not today. Not in the cafeteria we had longed to sit in since we first entered this school as wide-eyed eighth graders. We could have whichever bench we desired and have it be ours for the remainder of the year.

We practically floated to the bench on the far side of the room. It was right next to the window that overlooked the first-team Rugby field. Perfect! This was it – we were officially seniors sitting on the bench that would remain ours for the rest of our Matric year!

The rest of the day I have soared by on the back of the wind. I was practically a biological energy source as I took my prized seat at the back of the English class. It was something I took pride due - it was reserved for the star student of the course. I even smiled as we received our first mathematics class's many incomprehensible hieroglyphic equations.

With the first month of school in my rear-view window, I settled nicely into my classes and finally adjusted to my increased workload. Self-discipline and a few cups of coffee are essential parts of any senior's survival kit.

It didn't take long for the monotony of the daily routine to consume my friends' attention. Outside of academic check-ins, most of their conversations revolved around their latest gossip, hook-ups and kuiers. I settled comfortably into my usual spot as shoulder-to-cry-on/ comic relief. I was more than accustomed to my role in the group. I don't engage in the same activities as them. It made it so that I had to work harder to stake my claim to the group than everyone else. More often than not, my name was forgotten during an invitation session. Regardless, a pity invitation was always slid my way. Not that I'd be caught dead at one of their kuiers. Too ashamed to be a plus one instead of a guest, I often (always) decline in favour of studying or binge-watching for the time instead.

My friends were social butterflies whilst I played fly on the wall in the ecosystem of our school. My ability to speak was not the problem - it's more that I could not be heard or acknowledged. My friends and I had watched "The Duff" a few weeks before senior year, and I immediately related to the main character We had a lot in common. The only difference between us was that I was aware of my place in the world while she remained oblivious to hers. That ignorance turned to devastation and, eventually, outrage. That outrage fuelled her downfall, while my willingness to remain a shadow afforded me the right to keep my friends. I accepted myself as I was. I refused to envy my friends for being what I could never be.

I thought myself confident, maybe even brave, for having such a well-defined code of self. I was far too self-confident to bend to the whims and trends of those around me, I tell myself. Everyone else was just a pitiful bunch of sheep yearning that would shed their wool and walk naked across a frozen plain to buy a moment of popularity. I convinced myself I pitied them but knew that was a lie. The truth was that I envied them. I envied that they fit into their world so well. I was jealous that their presence meant something to the people around them. I envied that they were heard. A part of me would rather be a whisper in the choir than my mute self. They were missed on days when I slipped away so quickly. The ignored truth was that my self-awareness made me more complacent than empowered. At least I had people to call my friends; all it cost me was my daily dignity.

The walk home was not a long one. It was a clock 34 minutes from the main gate for the school to my house. I was quite a fan of the walks, especially in the summer breeze. I was lucky enough to share it with my favourite person for the last year and a half. Some would call her my girlfriend. I would call her that. She would not be one of those people. She claimed that our relationship was bad for our friendship. I disagreed and insisted that the opposite was true.

The last four months of semi-monogamous bliss were better than the three-year duration of a previously uncomplicated friendship. When we first started spending extra time together, I was positively surprised by her. It might be love talking, but she was more than I pegged her to be. She was a free spirit with a wound-up soul.

She was far from perfect, but at least she loved me. She listened to me when I spoke about her favourite things and looked at me when we were alone. It was inexplicable to be on the receiving end of someone's undivided attention. It was never for more than an hour, but that was more than someone like me could hope for. It was a mutually beneficial relationship. She made me feel seen, and I offered her a guaranteed shoulder to cry on. We were there for each other. The idea of that alone was enough to make me smile.

"I got you something," I told her once we reached my room. I pulled out the box and opened it in front of her.

"Why?" she asked without looking up from her phone. She giggled while reading something, then turned her attention to me finally.

"Well, um… we started getting closer four months ago today, so I figured I should get you something to celebrate that." To say I was nervous was an understatement. Sage normally shrunk away whenever I so much insinuated that we had a relationship. I tried to play it off as a friendly gift. She seemed to buy it.

I swallowed thickly and gave her the pendant that was in my hand. A rose. She examined her metallic rose with a look - equal parts confusion and wonder.

"It's from the little prince," I said while scratching, tapping my leg on the floor to calm my nerves.

"He had his rose, and you have yours," I finished just above a whisper.

Animation had been an integral part of our relationship. The idea one means nothing, unless another possesses them inspired me to ask Sage out. Of course, she rejected me, but at least she allowed me some intimacy now and again. I'd put that under the win column.

She twirled the pendant thrice in her palm and puzzled the grooves of the metal into that of her flesh. I felt so infinitely connected to her because of her action. I smiled proudly when she turned around; she wanted to wear it around her neck. She told me she would not hide it but instead wear it openly. I could barely contain my giddiness as I fixed the clasp gently against the nape of her neck before manoeuvring it so it lay perfectly in the hollow of her throat. She smiled at her reflection in the small mirror on the wall of my room as I smiled shyly at the evidence of me lying on her neck. This would not be like my routinely dismissed hickeys. This was far more intimate of a reminder of us. She couldn't hide this from the world.

The rose was a cheeky reference to the nickname she used for me in private. Giving her the rose was the symbolic equivalent of me giving myself to her. I was hers to claim, and she had many times. I hoped, however, that she would do so in Public. Not in the same fashion as she does in private, I acknowledged, but at least without shame this time.

I was, as always, incorrect. Painfully so. I would be impressed if I wasn't so hurt by her easy dismissal of me. I fooled myself into believing that I could be of the lucky ones who are loved ones publicly acknowledged their existence.

Silly me. Oh well, one can't have everything.

"A hidden treasure" from someone or another "thrift shop", she labelled my token. I was correct that she would wear it proudly. I was right that she would boast about it. I was correct on all fronts except the obvious – the part that involved me. I was hiding in plain sight, but I was still invisible. What is the invisible girl to do but smile and compliment her friend on her gorgeous discovery?

The first term had passed smoothly and unexceptionally. The second term was promising a new season altogether. With electricity buzzing in the air as we re-entered the second term this year, coming off a much-deserved break.

The relationship between Sage and I flourished into a full-blown romance over the break, with our intimacy reaching new levels almost every night. She would visit me after every kuier hosted over the weekend. We even spend time together outside of my bedroom. My days consisted of me listening to her explain how wonderful her life was, one moment to console her as she vented with raining eyes that her entire world was falling apart. Her problems usually centred around some girl or boy just out of her reach.

The irony was not lost on me.

They liked her. They made her feel special - like she had never felt before. They kissed her. They did more than kiss. She let them kiss her in ways that made her feel alive, and then she let them touch her in ways that made her feel on fire. She screamed. She cried. They'd leave, and she returns to me, used, unwashed and riddled with lies and open wounds left by people who never cared to hold her like I would every night. Idiots enjoyed touching and taking every piece of her but never noticed her eyes or appreciated how their names sounded on her lips. They were valiant in their conquest and dedicated to scrubbing away any evidence of her existence as soon as she left their sight. I held her each night as she cried and blamed the world for being cruel and denying her every chance at love as they presented themselves. I'd have her as she said these angry words and then offer her my heart-embroidered sleeve to dry her eyes.

--

Term two was a wonderfully exciting time of year. For the matrix, it was practically electricity. We walked into the final term of two of our lives and smoothly took seats. I noticed that the seat at the very back of the English class, my heart, was already occupied. This sculpted girl sat in my chair with a look of disinterest etched into her marble face. Without moving a muscle, she captured the attention of the entire class. That seemed to pass by her unnoticed as she looked through anyone brave enough to look her way. Her hazel eyes levelled everyone in her line of sight; I counted myself amongst the casualties.

My friends took their seats, and the teacher took her post. Everyone fell into place, everyone except me. I felt utterly out of place for the first time in my favourite class. I moved towards the front of the course. I sat beside Timothy, the least likely member of my class to have an original idea. He smiled at me and then asked me if I had a spare pen - of course, I did. With pen in hand, he returned to his blissfully complacent position in his seat, with my pen resting unattended. I ignored the excited chatter from my peers and the questioning looks from my silent friends. I looked straight ahead at the board while my teacher introduced the girl to my seat. I didn't care to look at her. Every other person did and seemed grateful for their opportunity to look upon the Trojan sculpture currently displayed in our class.

The usurper called herself Lara. From her brief introduction of herself, I learned that she transferred from a school in Rondebosch and played hockey. The fun fact that threw me for a loop was her casual mention of "Poe" being her favourite author. What infuriated me the most was the ease with which the literary legend's name fell from her mouth. She didn't even feel the need to utter his full name. She threw out the fact she "had a thing for (Edgar Allen) Poe" without feeling any need to embellish that factor, so much as taking pride in her excellent take on literature and poetry. She named dropped him casually as if it was an everyday occurrence that someone our age would take pleasure in the works of the most classic example of psychotic poetry. How could this girl not boast about his connection to such a brilliant, infectious literary fiend as Poe? How could she sit so casually with the cursed attachment to such a writer, knowing full well that she was condemning herself to social pariah status by claiming to be a fan of the dead writer's work? She didn't seem to care. She sat there, looked absentmindedly at her audience, and gave the teacher a lip curve that said, "Okay, I'm done now". That was it – not so much as a snide comment or petty whisper was aimed toward her for the full breadth of the class.

After enduring her intrusions in English, I was rid of her for the day. I had never been more wrong in my life. As luck would have it – she shared every one of my classes. And in each of them, she casually claimed my seat without fail or guilt. She sat quickly and without consequence in my place for the entire 50-minute duration of each place period. She did not attempt to answer a single question and warded off any attempt of a teacher to pose one to her with a single deflection of her eyes.

The whole day I was passed like this. I'd enter my class, and she'd sit in my seat. The last seat in the very back of the course. The seat is reserved for the best of the students in the class. She took a seat that took me four years to earn within a day. It seems to align with my life's theme so far, but that didn't make it easier to accept. She claimed it with impunities and a whisper of arrogance in her every move. To the rest of the student population, her confidence oozed out as she spoke and emitted from her every move like radioactive charisma. I, unlike my blind peers, saw straight through her arrogant core.

She was arrogant in knowing what you want, and pursuing it makes one complacent. Her arrogance also shone through in her refusal to bow down to social pressure. She seemed untouched by the things that plagued everyone else daily. She effortlessly struck up spontaneously spontaneous conversations with the prettiest girls in our class and made idle chit-chat with the captain of our first hockey team like they were childhood friends. She quickly sat next to the most revered amongst us during break and walked away from them without looking to see if they were following her. She knew they would follow her.

They welcomed her into their lives, into their group, as if she had always somehow been a part of their group, and they saved her spot until she showed up. Now she was here, and life could resume as it had before the long wait.

A few weeks passed, and I tried to put her in my blind spot. I tried very hard. I almost succeeded. I failed only when I had no choice but to listen to my girl gush about her latest crush. She went on about the softness of her crush's lips and how her hair felt like silk as she tugged her body closer to her own. She touched Sage more thoroughly than anyone had ever touched her. She said she had a beautiful voice when she would shyly moan out her name. Sage refused to pull any punches as she stressed how at home she felt in her new love's arms.

Apparently, my raven-haired girlfriend felt incredibly lonely during one of the many kuiers she lived for, and our resident heartthrob had offered her the most valuable thing in her world - attention. Her attention. They talked, and she laughed. She laughed at her jokes and offered her water when she complained of being drunk. They danced for hours, and she felt magic in her presence. Their first kiss was slow and calm. Sage was the one to increase the heat. She led Lara to a room on the top floor of the house they were at. I listened with a clenched heart as the girl I loved described how much care my replacement used when she undressed her. She said Lara's touch was delicate and mindful as if any hint of roughness would break my girl. Lara didn't know what my shattered soul was bearing the consequences of those stolen touches. She thinks Lara is the "One". They kissed afterwards, and the golden-locked Casanova opened her arms "wider and more warmly" than anyone Sage could recall. Those words felt like personalised daggers embedded in my carotid as I held her in my arms. I prayed that she wasn't comparing my embrace to Lara's. I prayed so hard that she wasn't. She might run back into her arms if she did because mine would only remind her of everything she was missing. I let myself hug her, though. Enjoy it while it lasts, I told myself.

I spent the remainder of the night memorising her scent, the feel of her skin and the taste of her lips. I tried to etch every molecule that comprised my love while I still had the chance to do so. I knew that before long, Lara would return to claim what was hers.

I was right.

It took her a mere five days to make Sage hers. My friends were all so happy for her. Our tables had fused with that of the kids who we peeked up at. I had never dared to give them a natural look, fearing they might look back. Now we shared a table, and my friends spoke to them as if they were friends. I tried to join the conversation, but everything I said or tried to say would always be a second too late to be relevant or a topic's length out of context. I realised quickly that I added nothing to the new group dynamic. The rest of my friends were oblivious to my lack of existence in the crowd. I suppose they felt more comfortable around them. They partied together. I stayed at home.

I resigned to watching my girlfriend exchange sloppy, sweet kisses with the intruder. I soon realised Lara had more of a right to be at the table than I did. I, a four-year student at this school, had less of an identity or a presence than someone who had arrived just two months prior. I was invisible and silent again - this time, not even the girl I loved could spare me a glance.

I stood up from the table and walked away.

By week's end, I had befriended new extracurriculars; Athletics club, Public speaking and Helping hand. Three different clubs focused on physical health, presenting yourself effectively and helping the less fortunate. They were distinct in what they taught and involved, but they had one thing in common. They took up time I would otherwise spend at that wretched table.

Athletics was after school.

Public speaking practices were held during the first break.

The charity club occupied me during second breaks on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays.

That enslaved me to suffer through 35 minutes every Tuesday and Thursday at a table surrounded by strangers. I tried to make up for this by either arriving at the table late, leaving early or wasting unnecessary time picking out my luck at the school café. I probably touched the wood of my bench at the formidable table for less than ten minutes out of the 35-minute break.

I was happy because being busy was an excuse not to have real friends to sit with during the break. I was lonely without looking like I was alone. That worked for now. The new additions to my extra-curriculum served me wonderfully as a distraction but also seemed to attract more attention. On my way to class, I received more "hey"s and "hi"s in the corridors. I was creating more of a presence at school, and I honestly couldn't have cared less if I tried. I was simply happy not to sit at that table with people I used to be my friend. I couldn't stomach the sight of my girlfriend making out with the embodiment of everything I was not and could never be.

I thought I could keep up my ghost act until the end of the year or at least the term. That changed when I saw Sage walk into school with a new pendant around her neck. It was a simple necklace with the word, name, "Lara" at its centre. She didn't try to explain it away or hide it. She wore it proudly and openly thanked her new girlfriend for her thoughtful gift; that alone was enough to break me.

It was official; I was forgotten.