Were You Paying Attention?

I picked at my black fingernail polish, only kind of half-paying attention.

Then the teacher said: “William? Do you have the answer?”

“Tracy,” I said absently.

“Excuse me?”

“My name is Tracy. William is my dad.”

The teacher furrowed his brow and reviewed the lightscreen near where his hand used to be, that arm now ending in a hook. “Oh, yes. Quite right. Tracy. Do you have the answer?”

“No.”

The routine went back to normal, then, the whole name thing having been sorted and my having confessed to not knowing the answer.

So Master Hook asked: “Were you paying attention?”

“No.”

I reflected on what a stupid question it is to ask someone if they’re paying attention. Like, if you have to ask, they weren’t paying attention. And this reminded me of Henna. I wondered how she was doing with me locked away in here and her out there. I wondered who she was with. Was she laughing with them? Maybe she’s kissing them …

“Tracy?”

“Yeah?” I said.

“Are you paying attention now?”

“No, not really.”

Master Hook took a deep breath, his little ginger moustache twitching a bit as he did. “Do you need some time in the tank to sort this out?”

“Really, dude?” I said.

I thought about what a pompous ass Hook was. And this reminded me of the time Henna and I were speeding through the jungle byways, listening to that song that she loved and singing along badly too it.

“I’m waiting.” Master Hook said, his arms folded, hook resting in the crook of the opposing arm.

“Waiting for what?” I asked.

“For you to clarify your comment.”

“Huh?” I said cos I really didn’t know.

Again, Hook sighed, this time much louder. “I asked if you needed time in the tank. To which you replied so eloquently: ‘Really, dude?’ And I asked what you meant by that.”

“Oh. Yeah. Right.”

“So?”

“So what?”

“What,” and he really emphasized the what, “do you mean by that?”

“I mean, like, jezzuz, man. We’re all here because we’re super fucked up …”

“Language.”

“... and because I can’t pay attention to shit …”

“Twice warned: language, Mr. Anderson.”

“... you threaten me with the tank.”

Hook smiled at that, a cunning grin, I thought.

“You perceive the tank as a threat, then?” Hook said.

My stomach went cold, and I lowered my eyes, scratched at a doodle of a sword I’d drawn on my notebook with a printed pencilette. “No.”

“Oh, really?” Hook almost sounded delighted. “Then how am I threatening you?”

“Whatever, man.”

“So you would like some tank time, then?”

Then that iron soul bulked up in me, and I said, “Just do what you’re going to do, man, and get off my dick.”

Hook did not like that.

After a few hours in the tank, I got out, dripping wet and covered in the effluvium of all the tiny jellyfish that were now dead for the alleged benefit of my mental health.

The denmaster pointed toward the shower. “Go wash off. I’ll get you a gown.”

I nodded, then shuffled in slime to the shower, washed off.

As I did, I looked over my shoulder, saw I was alone for the moment. So I used that time to think of Henna—how pretty her face was, how lovely her legs and feet looked in my mind’s eye. At times, it was like I part of her, like a twinstar, a binary union of two souls, like we’re opposites but the same, split down the middle.

And, then it dawned on me like a crack in the head that we’re not together—not in any sense. So I started crying. Like a lot.

The shower hid the tears but not the sobs.

So when the denmaster returned with the printed gown, he exhaled in sympathy, and seemed to want to pat me on the shoulder or something, but didn’t. He just said, “It’s gonna be okay, man. I promise. Whatever it is, it won’t last forever.”

“I know,” I said. But I didn’t take it the way the denmaster had meant it. I took it as further evidence of how hopelessly fucked I was, that I would never get Henna back, and even if I did, it would only end again.

Once I was dried off and back in my room, in bed, I tried to take my mind off Henna by reading. But it didn’t work. I could only see the two of us in the main characters. I could only hear the echoes of the song in my mind, hearing her singing along.

So I cried again. Cried myself to sleep.