Another Lunch
Another day, another lunch. I walk through those all-too-familiar steel double doors and take my place in the lunch line. The usual smells of bleach and stale food my nostrils. The large white lunch lady hands me my tray without a saying a word. I take my generic black plastic tray and head toward the back of the cafeteria. As I walk past the rows of laughing and happy children my eyes search for the one person I long to see each day. I spot him out at one of the tables of junior-class boys. I walk up, not quite knowing what to expect. I know we have to keep it quiet, I know we won’t hug or even waive, but perhaps a word, just one word can get through this divide. I walk up to him, smile, and open my mouth to speak. Before a single sound can emerge from the depths of my soul I met with a barrage of comments
“You’re master ain’t here girl.”
“You lost? The fields out back.”
“Hey bitch, go fetch me another tray, I’m awfully hungry.”
Each successive comment is met with audible laughter. Those were only the ones I heard, although I’m sure that there were more. I stood frozen, eyes level with Michaels, not knowing what to do. Should I say something? Go? Cry? Run? How could Michael allow this? why didn’t he stop it? i stood and watched until Michael himself, trying to fit in cracked a smile. It’s at that point that the cold began to envelope me and I became alone. Sure he’d apologize and I would take him back, but things were altered forever. I had strayed from the rules, from the confines of color and tried to find my world of Grey. Now I am left, even with Michael, together, alone.
