Part 1: Talking To Strangers is my previous post. Thanks!
Sally, lost in her thoughts, walked down the hall toward her class.
“Hey Sally, nice dress. Was the Goodwill having a sale?” A few snickers accompanied the usual lame joke that, because it was mean seemed to be clever. Sally ignored them and walked a little faster. She tried to angle her head forward and will herself to be in her classroom. Her legs felt like they would stumble any moment. Unfortunately, a few lockers away from room 102, her backpack was shoved off her shoulder, and Candace blocked her path. Candace was as big and strong as any boy in school and her breath smelled like pickles.
“Hi Candace!” Sally said as brightly as she could. Candace squinted her eyes at such obvious fakery. Sally imagined Alec crashing through a window, doing a shoulder role, and coming up with a kick to Candace’s belly that would send her straight through the wall.
“Hi Smelly!” Candace’s pickled words swept over Sally’s face. She tired not to roll her eyes.
“I need to get to class.”
“You need to get out of my face.”
“Well, actually…”
“I know what you’re gonna say, but I don’t care.” She then gave Sally her mean face, which was pretty scary. Finally, Sally backed up and walked around her to get to her class, her backpack hanging from her elbow. She took her seat near the row of windows where she could spend the class gazing at the silver dollar eucalyptus trees and doodling. She found that she could get by in school if she either did the assigned reading or paid attention in class. When her name was called, as it sometimes was, she did her best to piece together what was being asked of her.
For long stretches she found herself watching the wind shiver the leaves. When she looked down at her notebook, she found a series of concentric circles filling the page.
“Anyone else have any thoughts on this? Sally?”
Sally looked up quickly from her desk as all eyes turned to her. She quickly turned her eyes toward the board as her inner focused illuminated last night’s reading. Science. Physics. Atoms. She sees a drawing on the board of two arrows pointing towards each other’s points.
“I think it’s weird that nothing really touches,” She said after a moment.
Ms. Gleico nodded. “It doesn’t feel like that does it? Everyone, pay attention to things you are touching right now. The clothes on your body, the desk and floor under you, your arms on the desk. Or head touching desk. Billy! Sit up! It’s hard to believe but what you are feeling is electromagnetic force. Your hand atoms and the table atoms never touch. They are repelled by each other. They get close, but, like two magnets don’t actually touch.”
“So,” Candace began, if I throw a pencil, at, say Sally, it won’t really bounce off of her head?” Snickers scattered around the room.
“That correct Candace, but you really will have detention.” Ooooo’s and laughs filled the room. Sally raised her hand.
“Sally, I don’t want this to continue.”
“No, Ms. Gleico, I was thinking about what you said about atoms.
“Oh, okay, go ahead.”
“If my hand atoms aren’t really touching the table atoms, does that also mean one hand atoms isn’t touching another one.”
“No one atom can touch another. Well, that’s not exactly true, but basically yes.”
“So what makes me, me? If the parts of my body aren’t rally touching?
“That’s a great question, Sally, and I think we would need to look at what you mean when you say ‘me’ or ‘touch.’
“Well, Ms. Gleico, this should make Candace feel really good. It’s not just her brain that’s not really there, but everyone’s.”
“Oh my god!” Candace squealed. “Did you hear that Ms. Gleico?”
“I did Candace, since she was talking to me. All right ladies, let’s call it a draw and get back to talking about schoolwork if you don’t mind.”
Just after Ms. Gleico turned to write on the board, Sally felt a small wooden object bounce off the back of her head. She smiled and whispered, “that didn’t really happen.”
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