By Mitch Cassidy

High School Janitor

Do you believe in soul mates? I had a feeling you would. I’ve noticed that you read the horoscopes every morning in the cafeteria before you go to your English class. You always leave the paper on the table after you finish reading it. It’s okay though, I don’t mind cleaning up after you. After all, it is my job to pick up after you students.

There's one in every school.

I pick the papers up for you; and I do it with a smile on my face. I then take the newspapers home and I shred them up into little pieces. I use the scraps of paper and some of my “special sauce” to construct little papier-mâché figurines of you in different poses. I put my little statuettes on my bedside table and I sleep better at night while you watch over me.

I know what your thinking, but you’re wrong. I’m not a weirdo stalker or anything. It’s not like that at all.

I’m your soul mate.

We’re allowed to love each other that way.

You may be asking yourself how I’m so certain I’m your soul mate. To me, it’s as clear as the day. But if you want proof, look at the little things. Like the way you smiled at me last month when I gave you that paper towel after you had spilled milk on your shirt. You looked like you were about to cry and I gave you that towel and I could instantly see a big smile creep upon your face. I still have that paper towel. It’s framed on my wall, right next to your used Kleenex and the midterm report card that you crumpled up so your parents wouldn’t see the F you got in Math.

Don’t worry though, I won’t tell Mom and Dad about your deception. That’ll be our little secret. That’s what we soul mates do; we look out for each other. Like when that senior creep Billy Myers said “Howdy” to you last semester. You smiled back at him, but my soul mate sixth sense told me you felt he crossed the line.

The police still haven’t found Billy’s body and they won’t either; the students ate it. I guess you could say that we served Sloppy Billys that day.

But seriously, our lives just have this weird way of intersecting.

Remember that car accident that your mother was in last year? My sister’s son’s babysitter’s boyfriend was right down the street pumping his gas when it happened. Isn’t that so weird?

Stuff like that happens all the time. Two months ago, I was taking a break from mopping the floors and I was eating a Popsicle when I saw you gliding down the hall like an angel. You were talking to your best friend, Kristy McMullen and you wouldn’t believe it, but you’re shirt was the same color as my Popsicle: green! How bizarre is that?

I took that Popsicle home right then and there and put it in my freezer. I still have it in there, right next to the “present” you forgot to flush down the toilet last November.

With those kinds of uncanny happenings, how can anybody help but realize our astronomical compatibility? I’ve known about our soul mate status for a while now and soon you’ll realize it too.

I remember staying late last year, giving the school bathroom a final clean, just so I could catch a glimpse you as your mom picked you up from theatre practice.

I used to say to myself, “Mitch Cassidy, how weird is it that your soul mate’s mom drives the same exact car that your mother’s neighbor drives?”

Then I realized it wasn’t that weird. It’s just something that happens to us soul mates. It’s just God’s way of pointing out our shared destiny.

I do believe that we’re meant to be together. Why else would you have the same name as my pet turtle? Sure, I may have named my turtle after you, but I don’t think I would have been “inspired” to do that if it wasn’t for fate’s hand in the matter.

Sometimes, I lay in my bed at night, nestled underneath the quilt that I sewed from your used homework assignments that I rescued from the trashcans around school. I stare at the photo collage on my wall and stroke my lucky lock of your hair and dream about our future together.

Then, while I gingerly touch my bathing suit area, I dream about the day I propose to you and I cry uncontrollable tears of happiness as I hear you say “I Do” at our wedding. I name our kid (Mitch Jr.) and picture our family vacations (Sea World). I look forward to even the smallest things, like when I’ll cover you with honey and lick every inch of your body while our only son flogs us with grapes.

Oh yeah, I definitely look forward to the sex.

I wish I was an emoticon.

As a teenager, I was even scored lower in a summer job review because of the fact that I wore a frown more often then a grin.

My aversion towards saying “cheese” is not intentional, though. I do not choose to go through life with a furrowed brow and a grimace. That’s just the way my face naturally rests. Unless I am actively commanding myself to smile or grin, my mouth instinctively turns downward and my expression hardens. It’s an autonomic behavior that more often then not leaves me looking like a man with the weight of the world on his shoulders.

Atlas, though, I am not.

While I struggled with my fair share of depression in my youth — and what teenager doesn’t? — I currently consider myself a pretty happy guy. When I’m not getting into car accidents, living in rat hole apartments or having hallucinatory headaches, that is.

My job is good. I have some solid friendships. My relationship with my family is top-notch. Throw in some good tunes and I’m practically beaming with contentment — on the inside. On the outside, I look like I’m about to mug somebody.

I really do try to throw on a smile every now and then. As I go through the day, I’ll periodically remind myself to grin at the world —creeping out, perhaps, the people around me with an out-of-nowhere smirk.

They say it takes more muscles to frown then it does to smile but, for me, it takes less work. If my mind is racing and I have enough items on my plate, I’ll forget to remind myself that it’s smile time and soon enough I’ll go back to my natural worried expression.

I think my reflex-induced frowning can be traced back to high school.

As part of an effort to impress my classmates, I sought to create and nurture a persona for myself. Since I was not the athletic one or the smart one, I thought I would try my hand at being the deep one.

I bought some black t-shirts (not enough to look like one of those lame goth kids, though — even I had my standards) and I spent my days in the classroom looking pensive and remorseful – as if I were covering up some dark and secret past.

Instead of becoming my school’s version of a “Twilight” vampire, though, I found myself adopting my own made-up persona a bit too well.

Soon, my attempts to affect a depressed, sullen persona actually led to me becoming a depressed, sullen teenager. The bright and chipper Robert that had scampered through the halls of junior high was replaced by the mope who hung his head while shuffling through the halls of high school. I was such a dork.

Unfortunately, I didn’t put any stock into the old wives’ tale about making faces. Unfortunate because now, even as a reasonably well-adjusted adult, I find myself still slipping into the facial patterns of a teenage goth-lite douche bag.

If it takes work to smile, though, I’m willing to put in the effort just so I don’t catch myself in the mirror and become reminded of what a pitty-party I used to be in high school.

I’ll plaster on a Chesire Cat grin, throw some sparkles in my eyes and walk around looking like I escaped a television Christmas special if it means separating who I’ve become from who I used to be.

Queue Mr. Big’s “To Be With You.”

I am walking alongside the creek.

It’s not as much a creek as it is a depression in the dirt used to protect an irrigation pipe. Even still, it’s my creek.

As I walk, I fiddle with my CD player — thumping my fingers against the underside of the machine. The player has been on the verge of dying for almost an hour. Even though I have grown tired of the CD that I brought with me on my walk, I believe that the heavy silence that comes without music would be much worse.

The sun beats down and I wipe the sweat off my skin. I can feel a zit forming on my forehead and I continue to walk down the non-creek that is nevertheless a creek.

I listen to the CD for a few more minutes before my player finally, irrevocably dies. It had died five times before. I resurrected it each time by taking out the batteries and switching them around; flipping poles and playing god. Bringing my CD player back to life did not make the music any better.

This time, though, the batteries are completely depleted. I take the headphones off my head and hang them around my neck.

I walk with my eyes pointed at the ground, staring at my dust-covered boots, trying to remember when I first learned to tie my shoes. The memory is lost, though, buried underneath the memories of her.

Her: the unrequited love.

What a cliché.

I look down at my shoes and try to remember my childhood but all I can think about is her laughter. All I can picture is her face, smiling at me, teasing me with knowledge that I will never know. I remember all of these things yet I cannot remember the name of my kindergarten teacher. In the back and forefront of my brain, she lurks. She is everywhere. Her hair shimmers with the florescent lights of the grade school classroom.

“What are you thinking about,” she asks.

“I’m thinking about you,” I tell her.

“Oh” is her only reply.

With that she disappears.

I look over my shoulder and spot a jackrabbit that has emerged from the non-creek. A dog that had been sniffing at a nearby dumpster also spots the rabbit and begins the Chase.

Will the dog eat the rabbit when the Chase is over? Will the dog end the Chase just like that or will he let the rabbit escape so that he may dream about future Chases. What can there possibly be left after the Chase is over? Does the dog desire the rabbit or does he just want the Chase?

Am I in love with the Chase or am I in love with her?

What would happen if she says yes? Will I take her in my arms and look into her eyes and will the music swell and the credits roll. No. What will follow will be much more uncertain, much more frightening.

I will probably call her every night, sharing more and more of myself until she truly knows me. But then, once she knows me, how could she ever want me. Or worse; what if I get to know her and no longer want her? When it is just the two of us, no longer strangers to one another and no longer in love with each other, what then? Will the Chase have justified the end?

The dog looked as if it was smiling as it chased the rabbit. It was probably out of breath. I don’t smile much anymore. I claim I am deep in thought and merely forget to smile. The truth is, I don’t believe in smiling anymore. After the Chase I will smile. Right now I am out of breath and I can’t smile.

“What are you thinking about,” she asks.

“I’m thinking about the Chase,” I tell her.

“Oh” is her only reply.

With that she disappears.

I am alone and I am walking alongside the creek that is and isn’t a creek, desperately trying to revive my CD player and hoping to get to those last remnants of energy that I know must still live in the batteries. I was right — the silence is much, much worse.

As I fumble with the batteries, I feel a pang in my chest, a spasm of desire. In this Chase, I realize, I am not the dog. I am the rabbit and I am being pursued by the ghost of what could be.

I am tired of running and I will tell her how I feel.

I am walking alongside the creek that is not a creek and she asks me what I am thinking.

I tell her I love her.

“Oh” is her only reply.

She does not disappear.

I don’t know what happens now.

Read more stuff I wrote during high school