Chapter 3

The next morning, they were halfway through breakfast before anyone said anything. Annalise asked Mona if she wanted to use David’s computer to contact friends or anything like that. Mona looked over at David, who said that he didn’t care. He was curious to see what kinds of weird things she liked on the Internet.
He led her into the office and turned on his computer for her and then watched as she checked her emails and then exited out of the browser.
“Is that all you do on the Internet?” He asked as she was standing up. She raised an eyebrow at him.
“It depends,” She said, “ and I didn’t really know if you wanted me messing around on your computer.”
“Oh, no, feel free.” He said gesturing to the computer. Then he grabbed the extra folding chair that he kept behind the door, set it up, and sat down.
“Your going to watch?” She asked skeptically.
“Yup. I want to know what teenagers do on the Internet.”
“Ooookay, then.” She sat back down and clicked on the short cut to the browser and waited as it appeared. Her fingers hovered over the keyboard for a moment, then typed in a URL. “Um, how about we watch some Youtube videos?” David didn’t say anything. He didn’t know what to expect and suddenly felt uncomfortable. The page took a moment to load the window, and when it came up, Mona paused the video that was there immediately. She sat back to wait for something.
“What are you waiting for?” David asked. She glanced over at him.
“For the video to load.” She said. This made sense to David, and he was surprised that something made sense. They sat for a while, and then David asked.
“What’s the video about?” Mona smiled, a little mischievously.
“Sing-A-Ma-Jigs.” She answered. Well that makes sense. He thought sarcastically. He was beginning to regret his attempt at appearing to care. When the video had finished loading, Mona turned the laptops a little more toward David so that he could see and then hit play.
The man in the video was sitting in front of a large bookshelf and bright green walls. He said good morning to “Hank” which seemed to click in David’s mind as something that he’d heard before. He talked about a lot of things that David didn’t understand, and then he introduced the sing-a-ma-jigs. They were something like little stuffed monkeys that, when squeezed, they made random noises. The man in the video proceeded to squeeze more than one sing-a-ma-jig at a time.
When the video was over, Mona looked at him for a moment, but he didn’t say anything, so she scrolled up a list of videos and selected one entitled “Phineus Gage; a song”. David could only imagine what kind of video this would be, so he leaned forward a little to see better as Mona pressed play.
This video was about someone different. He talked very quickly and waved his arms around animatedly. The first little bit of the video, he talked about train tracks and other things that, once again didn’t make any sense. Then, he started to sing. The words were so fast that David had no hope of keeping up with what it was talking about. He finally held up his hand and Mona hit the space bar, which paused the video.
“Wait… I’m confused.” He said, furrowing his eyebrows. Mona laughed for a moment, and when she was finished she smiled and said,
“That’s pretty much the general response to the Vlogbrothers. It took me months to get to a point where I could keep up with what was going on. I don’t know if you’d remember them, but you just met John and Hank Green; founders of the Nerdfighters.”
David did remember. Their conversation at the library. He immediately felt suspicious. What is she trying to say here? He asked himself.
“This is Hank,” Mona said, gesturing to the man singing. “And the other one is John. He wrote An Abundance of Katherines.”
“What is he singing about?” David asked pointing to the computer screen.
“A man named Phineus Gage.” She said. She looked as if she were enjoying this immensely. “He was working for a railroad company and he accidentally blew a metal rod up through his brain, but he lived for years afterward.” David sat for a minutes, trying to find the relevancy.
“So… Why did he write a song about that?” He asked.
“Because it was a Wednesday.” Mona explained. “It it’s his day to make a video and that day is a Wednesday, then he has to write a song. That’s just what the song happened to be about, there wasn’t a particular reason.”
“He didn’t have to.” David was tired of being confused. Why couldn’t she be normal? He understood normal.
“Yes. There are certain rules they have to go by or they are punished.”
“By whom?!”
“The other brother, or other Nerdfighters, besides, this is something that they both enjoy. They aren’t forced to do this, and they made up most of the rules themselves.”
“Why?”
“Because they’re awesome!”
David sat, shaking his head for a moment, trying to find words to say.
“People waste their time like that? The internet is supposed to be this wonderfully useful thing, that we can use to learn or be productive.” He shook his head again.
“It is!” Mona opened a new tab in the browser and typed something in. it took her to a Website with a search bar, into which she typed something very quickly. “Here I can learn about the entire life of Queen Elizabeth II.” There was a picture at the top of the page of a woman that David assumed was the queen.
“And here,” Mona went back to Youtube and clicked on another video. “is a video entirely about the French Revolution.” David opened his mouth to argue, but Mona wasn’t finished presenting her proof. She opened yet another tab and went to another Website.
“This,” She said, her finger pointing at the screen, “Is how I got an A in both Orchestra and Choir last year.” she got onto some school district’s web page. “This is where I can check my grades so that I don’t fail school.” The last place she went was a blow to David that he wasn’t expecting. “And THIS is where you go to get teaching material for your classes.” The last Website was the church’s Website. David knew it pretty well, because Mona was right. He went there quite a bit. He didn’t say anything, because he was a sour loser, and he didn’t want to get seriously angry. He’d been beat.
Mona stared at him for a minute before exiting out of the browser and leaving the room. David slowly stood up and put his chair away. Then, he sat down in the chair and got back onto the Internet. He typed in the URL for his favorite search engine and then searched “Nerdfighters John Hank Green”. The first result was entitled “We’re Nerdfighters” and underneath it said: “…We fight against suck… we fight for awesome… We fight using our brains.”
“Oookay.” David said to himself. Then he thought for a second. He went to Facebook and searched Mona’s name. Her profile picture was of her peeking out from behind some grass. There were a lot of things on the page, but David focused on the most recent thing she had said. At the top of the page, with a little picture of her next to it, it read, “We’re soooo close to school! :D I can’t wait for high School level music!” Underneath a few people had commented.
One girl, Cassandra, had written, “Ooh, yes, yay for challenging, and yay for cool friends in the high school orchestra! It’s going to be a great year!!”
The comment dated about a week earlier. There was another that said: “So, are your parents going to get you a viola, do you think?” Mona’s reply to that was: “Ha” Right, I couldn’t convince them to come to our final concert and they’re still making me walk home from quartet practice.” David stared at this one, thinking that her parents should have supported her a little more, especially in something that she was so obviously passionate about. Then, he thought about how skeptical she’d been about them getting her a viola, when she had to have gotten her violin from somewhere.
He exited the browser and went out into the front room, looking for Mona, but not seeing her. He found her in her room, and was surprised to see that she was in the process of getting her violin out. She looked up when he opened her door.
“Oh, sorry if I’m interrupting you.” He said in a conversational tone. “Your violin is lovely, did your parents get that for you?” Mona glanced at the gleaming violin that sat wrapped in handkerchiefs for protection, David guesses. She scoffed.
“No. They disapproved of my playing.” David raised his eyebrows.
“Oh, then where did you get it?” He asked.
“My old orchestra bought it for me.” She said, almost embarrassed.
“How nice of them.” He said raising his eyebrows questioningly.
“I had one before this one. It cost me $300 and I worked for a year to save up for it. Then, one day someone accidentally tripped over a chair and fell on the chair where it was sitting. Both ended up on the floor and my instrument was crushed.” She said. She didn’t let any emotion show in her voice. “I cried and this kid felt bad, so he started a secret fundraiser so that he could buy me a new one. When my Orchestra teacher found out about it, she talked to some people and got this one. In the end this kid raised over $800 for my new instrument.”
“Oh.” was all David could say. He quietly closed the door.
* * *
Mona stared at her violin after David had left and pushed down the emotion that she felt for her Orchestra. They had been her family, and she had lost them as well, but she wasn’t going to cry over things that she couldn’t fix. She put her instrument away and said aloud to herself,
“I need to shower.” She went downstairs and talked to Annalise, then grabbed some clean clothes.
After her shower she ate some lunch and then, sat at the piano to play a song.
David left shortly after lunch because he had to go and do something. Mona was working out some snags in a song, when Annalise joined her, watching carefully as Mona tried to get her fingers to move correctly. She asked Mona to show her what notes to play so that she could try. They worked it out together.
“You know,” Annalise said, “I think I have a cool piano duet in here somewhere that we could play.” She had Mona move and took a folder out of the piano bench. It was completely filled with music. Annalise ruffled through the music until she found a very long looking song. Mona played the top line and Annalise took the bottom line, and soon they got into the rhythm of moving at the same time. The song started sounding more smooth, but at the end they got horribly off and stumbled along until they hit the last note at different times.
“Ha. That was good.” Mona said grinning. Annalise nodded her agreement
“Yes. Ha, I played piano for my high school and college Jazz Bands. By far the coolest thing I even did. Music people are the best to hang out with.” She said.
“Yes! Most of my best friends were in Orchestra, and we were basically family. They were my absolute favorite!” Annalise smiled happily.
“There are those moments when you are playing that you feel like you’re going to burst into uncontrollable laughter because you’re so happy. The rising notes or a crescendo makes your emotion rise. It makes you sit up a little straighter.” Mona laughed, delightedly.
“Yes, yes! And you feel so connected and in harmony with everyone else. I always loved playing with a group, like being a part of a whole. It’s the best!”
“Exactly!” They grinned at each other, until Annalise got a thoughtful look on her face. “I’ve never really thought about it, but that’s sort of how the spirit feels sometimes. Happiness.” Mona thought about that. She wasn’t really quite sure what the spirit felt like for her. She was pretty sure that she had felt it before, but she couldn’t really trust her emotions. She’d gotten so used to blocking them out, because of how negative they always seemed. Her anxiety was an emotion that she had been forced to learn to block, but, when she was feeling the sort of fear that her anxiety brought on, she could hardly feel anything else, and was used to feeling totally confused. She didn’t like the conflict, so she blocked it out.
Orchestra was her only exception. She had never felt afraid or even mildly anxious when she was going to Orchestra, even when it was a concert or something she had to perform in front of the class. She always felt peace there, and when it was hectic and chaotic, she felt content just being a part of it.
That’s what they said the spirit felt like, peace. Mona supposed that her head and heart were clearer in music related situations (good music related situations, like Orchestra), allowing her to feel the spirit more strongly. She smiled slowly.
“Yes.” She said, truthfully. The phone ringing ruined the moment. Annalise stood up to answer it and Mona went to sit on the couch. One of her books was still sitting n the coffee table, so she picked it up and read until dinnertime.
After dinner, they watched TV again and then went to bed.
* * *
It took David almost all the rest of the week to realize that he wasn’t getting awoke in the night by a distressed Mona. He didn’t really think about it, though, because mostly, during the day, she was either reading, playing music, or disagreeing with him. There were several times that Annalise had to change the subject before an argument got too heated, or scold them for being so disagreeable.
On Saturday, Alexandra came by and they talked about the past week. They had been unsuccessful in finding any relatives for Mona to stay with, so The Department had permanently stationed Mona at the Sandson’s house. They had the option to adopt, but Alexandra told them that they didn’t have to think about it for a few months if they didn’t want to. David felt a little guilty for being relieved that they didn’t have to decide anything now. He had his doubts.
That Sunday was Stake Conference, but Annalise was feeling pretty ill, so she made David and Mona promise that they would play nicely and then went back up to bad. Of course they didn’t get along very well. They got into several disagreements while watching TV. None of them ever got loud or hurtful, but they were never resolved and David felt like she wasn’t even trying to get along with him.
They also got into an argument over musical interests. Mona’s MP3 needed charging, and they started talking about what kinds of music they liked. They got into a disagreement about The Beatles and The Beach Boys. David liked The Beach Boys, but Mona thought that their music sounded too “beachy”. She liked The Beatles and their mild, classic rock sound. Then she made some ridiculous argument about a magical number for people in a band was four, so The Beach Boys had too many people to be a good band.
After dinner, they went to bed a little early.
The next morning, David informed Mona that school registration was that afternoon. Al Mona did was nod and go back to eating her cereal.
When it was time to go, she came downstairs with her headphones in. They got into David’s car and started the drive three miles to the High School. David wasn’t sure if Mona would be able to him if he talked to her, but his end of the silence was uncomfortable. He didn’t like silences.
“What are you listening to?” He figured that it was a pretty safe question to ask. Also, if she couldn’t hear him, he didn’t have to worry about looking like dork. He’d probably still feel like a dork, but just needed to break the silence.
“Music.” She said, evasively. She was still staring out her window. David was not deterred.
“You know, you can listen to it on the car speakers.” He said, gently taking the MP3 player out of her hand. She didn’t resist, so he decided that she wasn’t too reluctant to share her music. He plugged it into an audio cable that was attached to the car. He didn’t know what to expect as he plugged it in and turned the volume on, but what he heard was not anything like he would have thought.
“Is this Riverdance?” He asked, shocked. He hadn’t watched it for a while, but Annalise loved it. She had the VHS of it and everything. He recognized it after only a few seconds.
“Yes.” David couldn’t help but notice the bitterness in her voice. “Were you expecting screamo? Not all depressed, emotional teenagers listen to screamo, you know.” She had never sounded so hostile. David guessed she was sensitive about her music.
“No need to be snappy.” He said defensively.
“No need to be cynical of every shocking thing you find out about me.” She countered. David didn’t want to be drawn into the argument, but he didn’t like her negativity.
“No offense, but is there a reason why you need to be so pessimistic all the time? You’re always trying to find something negative in what I say.” Mona looked at him incredulously.
“Oh, of course I won’t take offense as you insult me.” She said her voice dripping with sarcasm. “I like how it’s completely my fault. You don’t realize it, but it does take two to have an argument, and I do not try to find something negative in everything you say, I’m just not afraid to confront you when you do say something negative, because that negative thing is usually directed at me. Just because I won’t take your criticism doesn’t mean that I’m being pessimistic.”
“Now you’re just being overdramatic.”
“No I’m not. And I’m not a pessimist, I’m a realist. I’ve been acting the same way my whole life and I’ve hardly ever been labeled as having a bad attitude. I might not be happy all the time, but that does not make me negative. Maybe you only see me as negative because of your own negativity.”
“Oh, so it’s all my fault!”
“No, I’m not going to say that I have no part in the problem, but you need to understand that you’re not blameless either. Just because you‘re a teacher, doesn‘t mean you know everything and it doesn‘t mean that you know everything better than teenagers all the time or that it‘s all their fault when there‘s a problem.”
“You make it sound like I have a superiority complex.” David scoffed.
“Adults have this illusion of complete intellectual superiority over kids, but I don’t think that adults understand that they may not be superior all the time. Sometimes they help cause the problem without realizing it.”
“So you’re saying that I’m letting my standing as a teacher and an adult go to my head, and that I should be using my superiority over children to help them realize that we are just as messed up as they are.”
“No. I’m saying that your goal in shouldn’t be to help kids know how messed up they are, your supposed to be helping them find their identity. If you’re making them feel inferior all the time you’ll just make them bitter and resentful. As a teacher, especially. So many people look up to you for inspiration and help in finding themselves. You can’t let your potential illusion of superiority ruin that. You can retain some of your superiority, because you are their teacher and they will respect you for making them feel like you think of them as equals, but you won’t know how many people’s admiration for you has been crushed because you squished them under your feet.”
“Don’t tell me that you’re depending on me for your identity.”
“You’d better be glad that I’m not. Teenagers look to the adults in their lives for their identity. If I were depending on you for my identity, I would have to give up everything that I like, and I would begin to not trust my own judgment or opinion because I’ve been told that it was stupid so much. Be careful with telling someone that something they may like is stupid, because either their admiration for you will be dashed away or their self-esteem will. Don’t make people hate themselves and you because of something they like.”
David scowled. He hated giving her the last word, because he disagreed, but he couldn’t think of anything clever to say. They had arrived at the school, which was a long, thin building with two long stretches of road in front, which were meant for buses, and separated in the middle by the front doors and an expanse of cement. The campus was only about 400 yards wide. At the northernmost end was the Seminary building, separated from the main building by the seminary parking lot and another, small side parking lot.
David parked in the seminary parking lot and they both just sat there staring out the front window. The music was still on, playing some classical piece that he‘d heard tons of times before, but would never be able to guess the name of. He’d never really been able to get into classical music. A lot of it just seemed so dry. Annalise was pretty into classical music. Finally, Mona reached over and turned it off. She re-wrapped the headphones around the MP3 player and stuck it in her jacket pocket.
“Well, let’s get this over with.” Mona said, opening her door. David got out as well and led the way across the parking lots and along the sidewalk that led to the main doors. He held the door open for Mona, and they walked inside. The main office was on the right and the councilors’ office was on the left. In front of them was a huge commons area and a cafeteria on the other side. There were columns evenly spaced around the part of the common’s area that the second floor also occupied, and the stairs were on the right.
David held the door open to the councilors’ office for Mona and ten followed her inside. The woman at the front desk was on the phone, but she waved them to an open door behind her. A man sat at the large desk that dominated the room. He stood when David and Mona entered. He held his hand out for David to shake and said,
“Good afternoon, Sir, Miss.”
* * *
Almost immediately, Mona’s bad mood went away. The councilor had the coolest British accent she’d ever heard. She shook his hand when he offered it, after he’d shaken David’s hand.
“Come in, have a seat.” The man said, indicating two comfortable looking chairs that sat on the opposite side of the huge desk ad his chair. Mona sat next to David, attentively. She did not want to miss anything he said, although she had to pay attention to keep herself from laughing out loud. She allowed a small smile. The man circled his desk and then sat down in his chair, adjusting his tie.
“My name is Henry Wiatt, I am one of the councilors… obviously” He took some papers from a drawer and handed them to Mona, with a pen, to fill out. They were just papers that required her general information and then a list of classes for her selection. It didn’t take long for her to fill them out and for Mr. Wiatt to enter them into his computer. He printed out her schedule (She had to keep from showing her glee when he said it) and handed it to her with a piece of paper that had her locker number and combination on it.
“Now,” Mr. Wiatt said, “why don’t you go find all of your classes and your locker. The Gym hall is that way,” he pointed. “and all of the rooms in this part of the building are 100s and 200s. The science and Language Arts buildings are in the opposite direction, try not to get lost.” He smiled and winked as Mona stood up and walked out of the room.
The commons area seemed huge to her as she walked along the edge of it, moving in the direction that Mr. Wiatt had indicated for her to get to the Gym hall. She walked out of the office and turned left toward the commons area and then left again down a wide hallway branching off of the commons area. Mona figured that she should at least go and take a look at where her locker was, even though she was never going to use it. She detested lockers because it gave you another thing to memorize and worry about, and it was almost always out of the way.
The hallway was long and there was a turn that Mona had to make, but she found her locker (out of the way, of course). As Mona walked back up the side hallway to get to the other hallway, she noticed that across the hall from the turn was her orchestra room. She took the time to peer through the glass, but it just looked like an empty room. There were stairs on the other side of the hall just after the side hallway, which she climbed to get to the second level, where she found her Photography and math classes.
The Science and Language Arts building was easy enough to navigate and she already knew where the Seminary building was. She’d barely been gone for fifteen minutes, according to her watch, so she walked slowly back to the councilors office. Whatever conversation they were having stopped as she walked back into the room.
“Ah,” Mr. Wiatt said, “Back already? You’re a quick learner!” David seemed fascinated by some of the stuff he had on his walls.
“The rooms are numbered and there are maps everywhere.” Mona said, going for modestly, and not bluntness.
There was absolutely no conversation between David and Mona from the time they left the school to the time they finished dinner. Mona was sure that Annalise noticed, but she didn’t confront them. Mona did feel that she might have gone a little too far with their latest argument, but she didn’t think it would have made any difference if she had been less confrontational.
After dinner, she went to her room and read a little, but decided to go to bed early. She stared up at her ceiling for a while, looking at her watch every few minutes. 9:30 came and went, and she heard David and Annalise getting ready for bed, but they didn’t call her in for prayers. This hurt her, because she didn’t want them to skip prayers just because they were mad at each other. When she and her siblings were arguing before prayers, her father used to tell her that they might get struck by lightning because they were fighting before praying, but Mona didn’t agree. She thought that if you hated each other, then the best thing you could do was pray. It forced you to humble yourself.
The glow from the light across the hall disappeared and Mona sighed. She felt lonely at night, because she was usually the last one to fall asleep, so it didn’t seem like there was anyone there. Her pesky emotions were trying to find stability. She felt suspended in time. Floating in a mixture of sadness and fear. She tried to close her eyes an clear her mind so that she could fall asleep, but whenever she tried that, she thought about the moment of falling asleep.
She’d thought about it before, how you never remember the moment you fell asleep. It terrified and fascinated Mona, because she was afraid of going unconscious, but she also found it amazing a person’s mind shuts off the body when it gets tired. That was one of the original things that had caused Mona to have sleep problems. She felt an almost impending doom at the prospect of falling asleep, and that didn’t help her to be able to fall asleep. Then, she had started trying to distract herself from thinking about falling asleep, but she would get distracted by her thoughts, and wouldn’t be able to stop thinking enough to go to sleep.
Thinking about this completely blew Mona’s mind, so she decided to stop and think of something else. She found herself anticipating school. It would be something to distract her, and she would also get that small amount of interaction with other adults and people possibly like her. Teachers were usually pretty cool, even the ones that most people thought of as boring or mean. If you were paying attention they could be pretty amusing and sometimes brilliant. You also had to get past that popular opinion of teenagers that all teachers were stupid (which was ironic) and that they were all trying to undermine you freedom somehow.
At around midnight, Mona had the classic dream that you were falling, and then woke up to find that you had fallen out of bed. She had taken her pillow with her, so she was just going to curl up and go back to sleep, too lazy to get up and back into bed; but David and Annalise came in to inspect the source of the noise. Mona didn’t really want any interaction, so she just pretended to still be asleep.
She was a little embarrassed when David lifted her up off the floor and tucked her back into bed. Someone smoothed the hair back from her face and they left. Mona felt very tired. Not just physically, but mentally and emotionally.
The week before school started, David was gone a lot in preparation. Annalise took Mona clothes shopping one afternoon, but other than that she did almost nothing to pass the time besides read and occasionally play music.
On Sunday morning, Mona put on a skirt that Annalise had bought for her. She wore her jacket (Annalise had washed it the night before, so it smelled all clean) over the plain black shirt that she was wearing. She put a pencil in her pocket and a notebook in her shoulder bag with her scriptures.
David and Annalise introduced her to the bishop and his councilors and then they sat through Sacrament meeting. Mona’s Sunday-school class was very vocal and inviting. They were mostly a grade higher than her because of her late birthday, but there were a few in her grade.
Annalise was a Laurel advisor, so Mona sat next to her during Young Women’s. There were only three other laurels in her class, so their lesson was very quiet, but the three were still answering questions, and they weren’t just textbook either. Mona immediately liked them.
After church was over, they found David waiting for them out in the car. They discussed what they had learned on the car ride home, but not much else was said the rest of the day. They were all a bit anxious about school starting the next day.
When Mona went to bed that night, she took extra time on her knees, praying. She knew that she wouldn’t be able to sleep very well, because she would be dreaming about all the bad things that could happen.
* * *
David drove Mona to school at 7:30. School didn’t start until 8:00 but he was a teacher and he had to be there earlier. He showed her where his classroom was and then told her that she had to go find her classroom and socialize with some people. Mona had absolutely no intention doing this. Instead, she went directly to her first hour and read.
Her first class, Algebra 2, didn’t make much of an impression on her. She liked math, but she didn’t like how repetitive it was. Her problem was that she was not motivated to do something unless it had foreseeable value. While math was interesting, she couldn’t see herself gaining anything (except for a grade) by doing it unless her life was threatened and she would die unless she could solve a math problem. She did well on the tests and she understood everything, but she wasn’t able to motivate herself to do all of those tedious worksheets.
The teacher seemed pretty normal, not overly amazing, but he was a pretty good-tempered guy.
She enjoyed English immensely. Her teacher was a chubby man who joked sarcastically while he read his disclosure. His name was Mr. Pythagoras, which Mona thought was pretty ironic, considering that he was an English teacher and Pythagoras was a math guy. He had to explain the irony to the rest of the class, which of course made it less funny.
When he was finished with his disclosure, he, very seriously said,
“Now, children, my goal in this class, is to make your lives miserable.” HE said, some of the kids groaned. “The stuff that you will do in this class will be so mind-blowingly hard, that you won’t be able to think at the end of the day.” Mona laughed and all eyes zeroed in on her.
“What’s so funny?” Mr. Pythagoras laughed. He had a childish grin on his face.
“If by mind-blowingly hard and absolute misery, you meant that we’re going to learn something, then you’re using the wrong tactics.” She said, and most of the kids stared at her. Mr. Pythagoras laughed.
“You mean that if I want to make you miserable, I need to do absolutely nothing in here?”
“I’d rather waste an hour of my life learning something than wasting it doing nothing.” She said. Mr. Pythagoras thought that this was particularly amusing, especially when one of the kids asked,
“Why do we have to learn anything? I can speak English.” Mr. Pythagoras stared at the kid in disbelief.
“English is such a bad name for this class. Language Arts is a little better, but this class should really be called Communications, or something.” He said, passionately, “because you aren’t learning how to speak English, you’re learning how to communicate more effectively using English.” As he said it he shook his fist in the air.
The rest of the class was filled with a discussion about all of the stupid questions that Mr. Pythagoras had been asked by students.
In her photography class, the teacher, a man by the name of Mr. Zeek, talked for almost the whole hour on the beauty of being able to capture the world as it is. He talked about art and the importance of the artist’s interpretation, and that you didn’t need to be painting or drawing the picture to influence how people looked at it. He also talked about the freedom that art presented. That everything to captured in art was a part of you in some way and that, no matter what the assignment was, you were always going to be able to find yourself in the picture.
Unfortunately, the whole class decided to take that literally and deciding that they should see if they could get themselves in every picture they took.
Mona’s next class was Human Biology. She had only decided to take this class over normal Biology, because Mr. Wiatt told her that the class sizes were significantly smaller. Her teacher’s name was Mr. Snow, but a few of the kids who had had him before called him Mr. Snow Globe. He was just about as geeky as you would expect for a science teacher.
He was excited about all of the “cool” things that they were going to learn about. He had also made a slideshow about himself. He said that it was because he had finally learned how to make them.
When it was time for lunch, Mona walked slowly back to the Seminary building. Annalise had made David and her lunch the night before, but she had given both their lunches to David so that Mona wouldn’t have to carry hers around. She found him in his office making a slideshow. He looked up when she walked in and stared at her a little blankly before the light bulb came on.
“Oh, yeah… food…” He said, twisting around in his chair and grabbing the container that held their food. He handed her two peanut butter and jam sandwiches and a water bottle filled with orange juice. Mona took a bite of a sandwich and was pleased that there was more jam than peanut butter. He turned back to the computer screen and began typing something that seemed very long.
“So,” He said, not taking his eyes off the screen. “How’s it going so far?” Mona figured that he must have been having a good day because he wasn’t trying purposefully to be nice to her, but because he just felt like conversation. Mona noticed that about him. He didn’t really like silences. There were people, like Annalise, that Mona was comfortable sitting in silence with, but David wasn’t the kind of person who could handle silence as a form of communication, atmospherically.
“It has potential to be a good trimester.” She said, taking a bite of her sandwich. David glanced over at her from his computer screen.
“Really?” He nodded politely. “ You have Seminary… sixth hour, right?” She nodded because her mouth was full. She took a drink of her juice.
“So, what’s next?” He asked. She swallowed and said,
“Orchestra.” There was another silence. David was still typing. He typed consistently, unlike Mona who was a sprinter, typing in short bursts of speed.
“I don’t know much about the music program here.” He stated into the silence. He was still going for polite conversation so Mona tried to go for humor.
“Neither do I.” She didn’t know whether or not to laugh first, so she just sat staring at her sandwich. She looked up to see that David was looking at her, trying to detect a hint of sarcasm in her voice.
“It was a joke.” she said quietly. He looked away. Mona pushed the sliver of hurt that she felt away and concentrated on her food.
When she was finished she decided that, rather than look for another place to read, she would stay there and read. She got her book out and sat there until the bell rang. David waved as she left.
She walked a little faster going to class, because she had to walk all the way across campus to get to the Orchestra room. When she got there, there were about 25 people sitting in a lose semicircle on the floor. Some were reading or doing homework and others were playing cards; all looked very comfortable. There was a good amount of talking going on as well.
When she opened the door, a boy with a blue jacket and blue earrings, who had been talking with a few girls, jumped up and came over to her.
“Are you a new girl? What’s your name?” He talked quickly.
“Mona.” Mona said.
“My name is Dallas. Guess what month it is, Mona.” He said
“September?” She guessed.
“Nope,” He said. “it’s ‘poke Mona month’” He poked her in the stomach, not hard but Mona wasn’t expecting it. He giggled evilly and ran back to join his friends.
Another voice hailed her from among the people. Mona recognized the girl from her laurel class. She was sitting with two boys playing cards. Mona went over to them and sat. Mona vaguely remembered the girl’s name being ‘Maureen’.
Maureen was shuffling a deck of cards as Mona sat. She pointed at Mona.
“Mona. Harry, Ginge.” She pointed to the two guys who waved, dorkily. She continued to shuffle the cards. “Harry is actually Harold and Ginge is actually Gingivere. Harry is a violin and Ginge is a viola. Mona is an everything. You know how to play bluff, right?” Mona nodded and Maureen dealt the cards and they started.
In the game, the deck was split evenly between all of the players and the object of the game was to get rid of all of your cards. To do so, the players, in turn, laid down cards, face down, in order of numeric value and stated which card and how many there were that they were playing. So, the first person put down all of their aces, the next player put down all twos and so on until someone had rid themselves of all of their cards. The game’s name came into play (quite literally) when a player didn’t have any of the cards that it was their turn to play. In this situation a player may put down a different card or cards, but proclaim that it was, in fact, the card or cards that they were supposed to play originally. Any time during the game if a player felt (or knew) that another player was ‘bluffing’ then they could call them on it. If that player was bluffing, then they had to take all of the cards in the pile. However, if the person wasn’t bluffing, then the person who had called the bluff had to take all the cards in the pile.
Mona’s personal strategy was to not bluff at all unless necessary. She would have thought that this would be the case all the time, but she had known some people that bluffed for fun or called people on their supposed bluffs all the time.
Mona was doing quite well, but unfortunately, the orchestra instructor, Miss Dunne, called for their attention. First, she talked about the disclosure, the schedule, and concerts. Mona immediately liked her because she was nice and enthusiastic, and she also joked around a bit, but Mona could tell, and appreciate, that she knew when to be serious. Then she talked about seating. She asked some of the people who could play multiple instruments what they were going to play. Mona’s name was on the list as unsure.
“Mona Carter.” Miss Dunne called and Mona raised her hand, “What instrument do you play?” Mona cleared her throat, before answering.
“Mainly I play violin or viola, but I can play cello if needed.” She said.
“What do you want to play?” Miss Dunne asked,
“Well, right now I have a violin, so I guess I’ll stick with that.”
Miss Dunne nodded and then told the group that they could have free time for the rest of the hour. Maureen started a different card game that Mona had never heard of and therefore opted out of. She sat with her back to a wall and watched the people milling about the room. Her first impulse would have been to be uncomfortable in the large noisy room, but, for her, Orchestra rooms all seemed comfortable. She was usually a bit self-conscious when there were this many people in the room, but here she felt relaxed. The overall feeling of childishness that emanating from orchestras in general made her feel happy. They universally seemed to have an almost family-like closeness. She was a loner usually, but orchestra’s made her want to be part of the group.
She was fairly content on watching the closeness that these people shared. Halfway through the hour, they started playing the laughing game, which would be awkward with any other group of people, but off course everyone was completely comfortable with lying on each other’s stomachs. They didn’t really play the game much, because they we couldn’t stop laughing. Maureen sat with Mona and they laughed at the people lying on the floor together.
Mona was sad to go when the bell rang and people skipped (literally) out of the room. Maureen was headed to Seminary as well, but she had to run to her locker first, so Mona walked back across campus alone. She walked through the doors to the Seminary building and immediately a teacher (Mona could tell, because he was wearing a suit) came up to her, shook her hand and said,
“Welcome to the Seminary Bubble: Your escape from the world!” Several guys in suits were ushering kids into the largest of all the rooms. Mona made her way in and sat on the on the back row off desks and chairs that were completely crammed into the room.
She was pulling out her book to read until class started, when one of the seminary teachers stuck his head in the door closest to Mona and said, inquisitively,
“Are you reading a book?” Mona couldn’t tell if he was surprised because she was reading in general or if it was because she was reading a book specifically. He emphasized his words in a strange way.
“Yup.” she said, holding the book up in the air a little and wiggling it as if to prove that she was actually going to read it. He laughed and let go of the doorframe that he was holding onto in order to keep himself from falling over. Being a Seminary teacher, naturally, the first thing he did was stick his hand out.
“I’m Brother White, what’s your name?” He asked, as he shook Mona’s hand.
“Mona Carter.” She said. His jaw dropped (well, didn‘t really drop but he opened his mouth in surprise) and he raised one of his eyebrows.
“Oh, YOU’RE Mona?” He said, his strange way of emphasizing words distracted Mona for a few seconds again. “Yeah, Brother Sandson was telling me about you this morning! It is very nice to meet you!” He said, grinning, though Mona couldn’t possibly see why it would be if he’d heard about her from David.
“I can’t imagine he said anything good.” Mona said. Brother White’s eyebrows sank below his glasses frames (which were almost identical to hers, black and rectangular) as he frowned.
“Nah, he said that he was sure you were a very intelligent individual.”
“You can’t take his words out of context. I’m sure there was a ‘but’ at the end of that statement. ‘I’m sure she’s a very intelligent individual, BUT…’” Mona said raising both her eyebrows, lacking the ability to raise just one. Brother White sat down on top of the desk that was two away from the one that Mona was sitting at, and folded his arms.
“Ah, come on.” He said in what Mona was sure was supposed to be a reassuring tone. “He acknowledged your considerable intelligence. He considers you smarter than average.” Mona didn’t doubt that he thought she was smart, but he just couldn’t get over her weirdness. She shook her head.
“I doubt he said that with much admiration. Generally when you admire someone, you are nice to them.”
“Oh.” He scratched his face. “Well, Brother Sandson is young, and new at the delving deeply into teenage emotions. He’s got a long way to go, but he’ll reach a level of understanding someday. Give him time.” The tardy bell rang and he jumped off the desk and hurried off to do something, leaving Mona to sit, thinking. Maureen arrived a second later and greeted her, but didn’t say anything else.
Most of the hour was about that year’s Seminary theme and about how awesome the teachers were sure that the year was going to be. Mona liked Seminary teachers, for the most part, in general. They had the same sort of companionship and childishness with each other that Mona saw in the Orchestra. They seemed so unconcerned with what people thought of them, which was how Mona felt around her orchestra. They sang really loudly (which would be awkward for anyone else but them) they were confident, and when they messed up, they didn’t care and they laughed at themselves.
They also knew how to be serious and get things done, which was important to Mona. She had learned a lot from her previous Seminary teachers.
When school finally ended, Mona was a little tired of reading, which was saying a lot coming from her. She had finished the book that she was reading, which meant that she had gone through almost two thirds of the books that she had brought with her. She was pretty much ready for someone to give he something else to do besides read.
She went into David’s classroom to wait for him, and pulled out the spare book that she always kept in her backpack for situations like this one. After a while, she put her book down and wandered around the room, looking at the paintings that hung on the wall. She didn’t know much about art, but they seemed fairly good to her. David walked in and was working on his laptop, which was plugged into the wall at the front of the classroom. She glanced over at him.
“Did you paint all of these?” She asked, moving onto the next one and squinting at it.
“Yeah.” He said, distractedly. There was an awkward silence, once again (In her mind, Mona thought that her life in this place was turning out to be one, huge awkward silence) She finished her uneducated inspection of the artwork and then returned to her seat. She reluctantly picked up her book and started to read again, until David was ready to go home.
They were sitting in the car, driving, and Mona almost asked David if he had any good books, but she stopped herself. It was a weird feeling, but she felt hesitant about being friendly with David. She felt like if she extended her friendship to him, she would run the risk of him crushing it. She didn’t like to be hurt. She sighed.
* * *
David hated to admit it, even to himself, but after Mona left to go to class, he immediately felt better. He felt more relaxed, because he wasn’t tensed waiting for an argument every second. He figured that his expecting arguments to happen, was probably causing them, but he felt like he was a warrior surrounded by enemies that weren’t hostile at the moment, but might turn so at any second; or a pirate, because pirates were fine with each other until someone said something wrong and then they were killing each other.
His analogies weren’t perfect but he sort of liked thinking of himself as a pirate. He set his laptop up in the front of the room, even though he wasn’t going to be using it there today, because the first day of the trimester, everyone met in the biggest room.
He could hear the other Seminary teachers arriving, because they were all singing one song or another. This was infectious, for soon he was humming (very loudly) a song that Mona and Annalise had been playing the day previous on the piano.
Richard White poked his head into the classroom, which he did often, and asked,
“What song is that?” David looked up from his laptop, and grinned, happy that the year had begun and that he could see people that he liked again.
“I have absolutely no idea.” He said shaking his head. “Mona and Annalise were playing it yesterday on the piano.”
“Who’s Mona?” Richard asked, abandoning the doorway and coming to sit on a desk at the front of the classroom.
“Oh, yeah, you haven’t been in town for the last two weeks, I forgot that I hadn’t told you yet. We were assigned a foster child two weeks ago.” David explained, pressing some buttons on a remote, which turned on a projector above him. He was making sure that it all worked.
“Oh, really! Good for you guys, I bet Annalise was pleased.” Richard said excitedly.
“Nah, she was scared to death. Although, she’s been a lot better at adapting than I have.” He said.
“What’s the kid’s name? Mona?”
“Yeah. Mona Carter. She’s fifteen, a sophomore.”
“Mona… like the painting?” Richard asked and David laughed.
“I don’t know. She’s more into music than art, though.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah. She has all these songs committed to memory for piano and she plays all string instruments, including the guitar.” The projector was on and working, so David shut it off.
“Impressive.” Richard said, nodding. The bell rang and David unplugged his laptop and followed Richard with it into Brother Bird’s room. His room was connected to another room by dividers, so they opened them up and herded all the little kiddies in there for the first day of the trimester.
All of the Seminary teachers were in charge of an aspect of today’s proceedings. There was someone in charge of overseeing devotional, there was someone in charge of obtaining and distributing the disclosure, someone was in charge of the Seminary theme video, and someone was in charge of the game that they were going to play at the end. David was in charge of showing the slideshow introducing all of the Seminary teachers.
The class went just about as well as cramming fifty people into one room could possibly go. In between the first class and the next, Richard came over to where David was sitting, with his laptop on his lap.
“So, this girl, Mona… What’s she like? I mean besides being a music genius.” Richard asked conversationally.
“Well, she’s probably, the weirdest teenager that I’ve ever encountered before.” David answered truthfully.
“Ha, I don’t know, I know some pretty unusual individuals. She’s Mormon, right? What else?”
“Yeah, she’s Mormon.” He paused, thinking. “Well, she’s pretty sarcastic and a little pessimistic, but she insists that she’s not a pessimist, she says that she’s a realist, though I’m not really sure of what the difference is.”
“Oh, no. There’s a big difference. Pessimists are negative, glass half empty, types; but realists just see an irrelevant glass filled with a substance. They are more perceptive of what is truly important in life.”
“Yeah, I guess. Anyway, she brought more books with her when she came than she did clothing and in the two weeks she’s been here, I haven’t seen her reading the same book twice. In fact, she’s got to be running out sometime soon. Do you think she’ll start over when she’s done? Anyway, that’s about it with her. She likes to disagree a lot. Her opinions are always contradictory.”
“Ha ha! Come on, don’t you just love it when teenagers are into reading?” Richard said, grinning.”
“She’s not just into it, she’s obsessed. She’s also not afraid to vocally argue her point.” David said. Richard found this pretty amusing. “Anything that se can get away with arguing about, she does.” Richard raised an eyebrow.
“So you two don’t get along very well? What about Annalise?”
“Oh, no. She and Annalise get along just fine. They talk about music and stuff, and they read together, but she seems to always be ready to lash out at me when I try to engage in conversation. She has all these strange interests that if I even think their a little bit strange, she gets all defensive, and feels like she has to convince me otherwise. Annalise usually has to break up the arguments”
“Does she have compelling arguments, or is she just disagreeing?”
“Her arguments are very compelling! Which is even more frustrating. She uses logic for just about everything. I’m sure she’s a very intelligent individual, but you’d think she’d be above all those rebellious feelings and teenager angst or whatever you want to call it. She doesn’t have a very open mind, which is weird for someone who knows that much stuff, so I’m thinking that it’s just me. She’s somehow inclined to not listen to anything I have to say.”
“Hm…” Richard tapped his finger on his chin. “I don’t know. My seven-year-old sometimes gets defensive when he thinks that his little sister is being critical when, in fact, she’s just making a comment; because she’s been critical to him in the past, so he is immediately suspicious of everything she says. He’s not close-minded.”
“I’m not a critical person, though.” David said, he had been fiddling with a marker, but he now set it back down on the metal strip below the white boards.
“Didn’t you just say that you though that some of her interests were strange?” He asked. “Maybe, because she has been criticized for these interests in the past, she’s a little sensitive about them and was suspicious when you expressed your negative opinion on them?”
“I don’t know. That’s not the only thing we argue about. It just always seems really tense between us.” The bell had rang and they were ready to start class, so David had to wait until the hour was over to get Richard’s reply. When they did get a minute, Richard sat for a second trying to think of something to say.
“Ha ha.” He chuckled a little. “This is one of those moments where I am supposed to say something incredibly profound.”
“Profound would be helpful, yes.” They both laughed a little, but for David it was a little bit of a nervous laugh. He was really hoping for some powerful insight, but what he got was,
“Unfortunately for you, this is one of those times where I tell you that there isn’t a specific, profound thing that I can tell you. Try to understand where she’s coming from.” David stared at him for a while. “That’s it.” Richard smiled.
“Didn’t you just hate it when you were a kid and the adults had all the answers to your problems, but they let you run around being miserable until you figure it out all by yourself, because they think you need the learning experience?” He glared at Richard teasingly.
“Yeah.” Richard laughed, patting David on the shoulder. “Sorry, man.”
It was time for class again. David found that, for once, he’d gotten tired of doing to same thing over and over. As a teacher, listening to other teachers complain about being tired of their lessons by the end of the day, but he didn’t find it tiresome at all. His lessons were never identical and different things were said in each class, so, really, he felt like each lesson was about something entirely different, and the same all at once.
Today, though, he was tired of watching the same video over and over and reading through the same disclosure. When it was lunchtime, he sat tiredly at his desk in his office and started remaking a Power Point that he didn’t particularly like. He’d totally forgotten that Mona was going to come eat with him until she was standing in his office doorway.
“Oh, yeah… food…” He said, twisting around in his chair and grabbing the container that held their food. He handed her two peanut butter and jam sandwiches and a water bottle filled with orange juice. He waited for her to start talking excitedly about how her first day was going, because that’s usually what kids did, but of course she remained silent. He didn’t like silences, so he broke it
“So,” He said, not taking his eyes off the screen. “How’s it going so far?” He saw her shrug out of the corner of his eye and he didn’t think she was going to answer, but she proved him wrong yet again.
“It has potential to be a good trimester.” She said. She didn’t make any eye contact; she just sat studying her sandwich. He didn’t really want another silence, so hi thought for a moment, and then said,
“Really?” He nodded politely. “ You have Seminary… sixth hour, right?” She had just taken a bite, so her mouth was too full for her answer, so she just nodded.
“So, what’s next?” He asked. He watched her swallow hugely and then answer.
“Orchestra.” There was another silence. David typed a paragraph into the Power Point and then centered it on the slide before breaking the silence again.
“I don’t know much about the music program here.” He started typing again and then heard Mona say,
“Neither do I.” David stared at her for a long time, trying to decide whether she was being sarcastic again or not. He felt guilty as he saw a flash of hurt in her eyes. He turned quickly back to the computer screen.
“It was a joke.” she said quietly. David kept his cringe from showing outwardly. He finished his Power Point, but he didn’t want to quite working and try to converse any more, so he opened a blank Word document and started typing nonsense. He watched Mona eating out of the corner of his eye. When she was finished with her food, she dug a book out of her backpack (which David noticed was looking considerably heavier).
She held the book close to her eyes and tilted it so that the light would catch on the pages. David wandered if she ever got tired of reading the same books again and again. He felt like he should offer to find her some more books to read, but he kept silent. He didn’t want to trigger another awkward moment.
When the bell rang, she stood up and picked her stuff up off the floor by her chair where she had set it. He waved at her and she held a hand up back and then exited the office.
The next hour was the same for David as it had been the four previous times. He couldn’t wait until they could get into their classes and start actual lessons, studying doctrine, which never got old to him.
For sixth hour, David noticed that Richard had engaged in conversation with Mona, who was sitting on the back row of chairs and desks, a book in her hand. She seemed to like him. She smiled when he joked and talked quite a bit to him. This blew David’s mind, He didn’t understand why she immediately opened up and liked everyone she met, except for him. A few seconds before the bell rang a girl, whom David knew was In their ward, sat down next to Mona. She greeted her, but was otherwise silent.
They went on with the day’s monotonous activities, though he was a bit glad to see that Mona looked every bit as bored as he felt. She had her book out and was reading about twenty minutes into the period and finished it with five minutes left of class to spare. She pulled out another book, but, surprisingly, she didn’t open it. She sat watching the people around her, who were all talking, waiting for the bell to ring.
There were a few girls flirting with a guy in front of her and to the left. She watched them, and then turned to some loud girls comparing phones. David found it strange that this adolescent could be so observant. When the bell finally rang, signaling the end of school, David was so relieved that he shared a high five with Brother Stevenson. They stood making light conversation about the first week being a bit of a drag. Out of the corner of his eye, he watched Mona slip silently out of the room.
He figured that she knew that teachers stayed after for a while in case someone needed to talk to them. Plus, he needed to complete a few more preparations for his lesson the next day.
He finished his conversation with Brother Stevenson and then returned to his classroom. Mona was in there but she wasn’t reading like he’d expected her to be. Instead she was inspecting some of his paintings, which were hanging on the walls around the classroom. He went to the front of the room and plugged his laptop into the wall. He opened the Power point and started going through his first lesson in his head.
“Did you paint all of these?” Mona asked suddenly from the other end of the room where she was staring at a painting. The question seemed genuine, and not skeptical.
“Yeah.” he said. He expected her at make further comment, but she did not. He was beginning to wonder if she met anyone’s expectations.
She returned to the desk next to which she had stored her stuff and picked up the book that was sitting there. David thought that she had to be getting tired of reading.
When he was ready to go home, Mona followed him silently out to his car and then stare out the window as they drove.
Annalise was sitting on the couch flipping through the Ensign, which she had just received. She looked bored. David went over to her to give her a kiss on the forehead, but all she said was,
“It was quiet here, without all your bickering…” David smiled and climbed the stairs to his room. It felt good to take off his suit. It seemed that they (whomever “they” were) had purposefully made those suits stiff and hard to move in. All looks, very little convenience.
Once he had on a nice, stretchy t-shirt and some normal jeans, he took his bag downstairs to his office and took the laptop and other papers he’d shoved in there, out, putting them on his desk. He was just sitting down and was about to open his scriptures to find a reference he’d thought of, but couldn’t seem to remember where it was, when he looked up and saw that Mona was standing in the doorway, watching him unblinkingly. He nearly fell over in surprise, and glared at her, as she was barely able to suppress the smile that was turning the corners of her mouth upward.