A Pen Not a Plate

I should have seen this coming to be honest. The evidence was all in the countless times I profusely sweat and got panic attacks when I was a few feet away from him.

He wasn't the only one either. This is how I always handled situations when I was around people I really liked. It didn't matter whether the attractions were sexual or not. As long as I liked someone, I always found it really hard to be around them. By finding it really hard, it meant having speech impediments, becoming more reserved than usual, doing things with little to no thought, and the worst of them all, my profuse sweating.

But I was 15 then and he was 14. At this age, this is how I thought about approaching issues that concerned human connection and attractions. To speak to me let alone be my friend was an enormous task that many people did not want to be a part of and when it came to people I really liked or admired, it was almost miraculous that I ever got to speak to them at all.

Prince was such a person. One of the very rare people I really liked. I don't think I can call it a crush. I have come to think about crushes as sexual in nature. This wasn't like that. It was just an intense feeling that I needed to be friends with him. This feeling for me was more intense than crushes because it was selfless and agape in nature. Crushes tended to be fleeting but this was enduring.

Nevertheless, the intense feelings of friendship I had for him always caused me massive anxiety whenever he was close. Sometimes I had to hide or miss my meals so that I could avoid being near him. I couldn't resist but feel weird about this behavior. Another reason I avoided him was that I thought that by staying away from him, I would sort of remain neutral and unnoticed by him so that he could never find out my weaknesses and insecurities. The further I stayed away from him, the better things were and it made me feel good but since we were in school and practically on the same block, I knew that at one time, I had to confront my fear but I didn't care as long as I stayed away from him.

My plan would not hold out for long though. It started out when he asked a mutual friend of ours for help. Denis and I were not just close friends at school, we also happened to come from the same town several miles away from school. We did everything together. We were the 2 kids who were learning musical instruments, seeing who could learn Italian the fastest and who drove our parents' cars around our home town in a convoy-like manner at very high speed with the car hazards turned on. We were a little reckless but I think we were also very responsible.

But unlike me, Denis was sort of a school celebrity who got along with everyone which is probably how he met Prince. So when Prince decided that he needed help from a senior, Denis was by some fate the person he went to for help. Prince needed a pen and Denis didn't have one so they both came to my window catching me off guard. This was a disaster from the beginning.

They found me picking my nose because I have this annoying allergy that makes my nose itchy and sometimes between viciously rubbing it and picking it makes the allergy bearable. They found me picking my nose and this was not the worst of it. I was so embarrassed because the person I had spent years avoiding had finally found me in the most vulnerable position of my life. Or so I thought. I kept thinking to myself how much of a disaster this had been that I didn't hear the question Prince asked me.

At this time I had already started sweating and as for my voice, that was nonexistent so I didn't even try to ask for clarification. So I opened up my locked and got out my huge ceramic plate which by the way had no business being there since all plates were kept and always remained in the refectory but I had removed mine because I was avoiding the same guy who was now asking for my "plate" for God knows what.

The only problem was that he was not asking for a plate. He wasn't even asking for anything to do with meals. It wasn't even break or meal time. The last thing someone would have asked was anything to do with meals. But I didn't know this. How could I? I was busy focusing on how embarrassed I was with my nose-picking encounter and I was also busy sweating and hating myself for making such a terrible first impression.

So when Prince and Denis both looked at me like I was crazy for handing them a plate they'd asked for, I couldn't understand why. They both just stood there with their eyes fixed at me. Denis then broke out laughing hysterically while Prince and I remained eyes locked. His eyes were full of patience and empathy so much so that I could feel his non-judgment towards how I was handling the situation. Sensing the empathy in his eyes gave me a little bit of comfort and freed my speech up just enough to ask for clarity on what he wanted.

Since Denis was still laughing so loud, Prince waited a bit for him to calm down before he composed himself again and repeated the question. As he asked, I could feel that he too was scared of me or maybe he wasn't comfortable around me and this made me even more uneasy but the great thing is that this time, I managed to get the question right. He wanted a pen. But I couldn't shake off the feeling of dread that followed my realization that he wasn't comfortable around me. This made me panic even more. At this point, Denis was recovering from his laugh but now I was visibly shaking too and my hair was extremely itchy on top of my profuse sweating.

So I withdrew my ceramic plate to put it back and get the pen instead. But the combination of sweat and shaking requires a lot of attention to maintain a grip on what it is you are holding. I did not have enough attention and my plate fell out of my hands onto the ground and broke. Denis would have injured himself if he hadn't sat down while laughing because this time his laughter was so intense to bear and other people around found my anxiety funny so they joined in too.

The shuttering of my plate brought my senses back a bit. This gave me enough time to pick a pen and give it to Prince who looked like he was now taking pity on me. He thanked me and left as the laughter from everyone continued. It took me two months before I could show my face in public again.