Forgotten Wind: Disclosed Memories

Chapter 6: Beating Courage

Art is one of my talents. That's what I've been convinced about by people all my life. I consider myself as an artist since I'm very progressed in drawing cartoons. When I was six years old, I always found a natural interest in this. Of course, my skills in the drawing have improved since I've gotten older.

For my 16th birthday last year, one of my aunts bought me a kit for artists. It consisted of an easel, a large sketchbook, charcoal, and coloring pencils. I was really happy to receive this, especially under the circumstances where I've been doubted by certain people. But they never understood my true potential.

When I took art classes back in middle school, I studied two types of art. Visual and traditional.

Visually, I took it as a challenge to draw and the concepts that came to mind were learning how to draw by looking at the objects in front of us. I wasn't very good at that.

Traditional art wasn't that much of a hassle for me. Body poses, architectural sketches are really what I've been practicing.

Anyway, the next day at school was pretty chill. The wind was cool but it was mostly cloudy. There was a predominant chance that it was gonna rain later. I wasn't surprised by the least about that.

It was close to lunchtime in the afternoon and the teacher sent me to the attendance office to turn in the attendance sheet. We didn't take specific turns taking the sheet down to the office. I never cared much about it.

As I was walking down the central hallway of the school, I see Carla and an old friend of mine from elementary school. I waved to her but she looked away and kept walking past me. I suppose that I and she never spoke much around times that we've seen each other. Maybe she didn't remember me.

When I finally reached the attendance office, I knocked on the door and no one answered. I slightly opened the door and saw only an empty chair behind a paper-strewn desk. The cabinet drawers were ajar with multiple folders and papers sticking out.

"Leave it on the wall." A voice said from behind me.

I quickly turned around as I didn't recognize the voice. Surprised, I see the boy from the cafeteria the other morning.

"I'm sorry?" I stuttered.

"You can just leave it in that folder, right there." He said, pointing to a bolted plastic folder that was on the wall next to the door.

"I-of course." I sheepishly said as I put the sheet into the folder. But when I turned back around, I was unexpectedly facing to face with him. I stood there frozen as his hazelnut eyes focused on mine as if they were looking into the depths of my soul. His full lips formed a wide smile that exposed his white pristine teeth. His skin was of a tan color from the sun.

Finally, my legs were no longer stiff during that moment. I slide past his shoulder and walked on down the hallway. My head was tilted down as to not meet his gaze.

As I was making my way back to my class, I could feel him following me from behind. Then from the corner of my eye, I saw him stroll beside me. Matching up to my speed that I was walking.

The sound of him clearing his throat startled me a bit inside as I was halfway from my classroom.

Before I could least expect it, my hand was grabbed and I stopped in the middle of the corridor. I turned my head to him as he looked at me with short thought, contemplating what he wanted to say. 

The words that finally came out of his mouth were a surprise to my thought.

"I'd like to hang out with you." He told me.

Before he walked away after that simple sentence, he left a piece of paper in the palm of my hand.

It was his number. His number. No one had ever given me their number before, besides Joe and Alicia.

I thought to myself while I sat back in my desk in the classroom. I continued to look at the piece of paper and think: Could this be it? Could I actually have someone who... likes me?