Three Months Later
I TAP THE MICROPHONE THREE times and clear my throat.
The crowd in the gymnasium hushes except for my front-row cheering squad. Folding cha irs lined up in rows are beginning to fill with students as they flood through the doors and into the middle of the gym. Ham’s standing at his chair beneath the makeshift stage, waving at me like a parent at a child’s preschool graduation. He wears a T-shirt with script words: #HomelessIsWhen.
Ham started a nonprofit, said he was trying to “bring awareness” and “shed light on shit.” He demanded that I help, since, you know, I’m the spokesperson. I would have volunteered anyway without the arm twist or promise that it was his ticket to college with me.
Ham’s hashtag went viral. In our school, that is.
Bea and Beth colored posters spreading awareness and plastered them all over the gym, halls, and classrooms. The posters say things like #HomelessIsWhen We Don’t Look and #HomelessIsWhen We Don’t See. Bea’s a different person with Reed out of the picture. Well, with Reed being homeschooled, or attending school out of state, or being arrested for hitting another girl. I’m uncertain which rumor is truth.
I smile as Jarrell pretzels his arms around Ham’s back. Ham drops his head against Jarrell’s chest, which is wrapped in a black custom T-shirt with block letters that reads: I’m with Him, only the i in Him is slashed and a red a inserted in its place. Ham’s become a beautiful bubble I never want to pop.
Someone shouts, “You’ve got this!” And in that moment, I think, Shit, maybe I do. Beth motions for Bea to sit down, and Bea shoos her away like a bug. Bea nods in my direction and I nod back. She lifts her hands and claps the tips of her fingers together. Minuscule movements, baby steps forward. Small, but I’ll take it.
Bea and I aren’t best friends. But we’re not enemies, either. We’re just two girls finding our way in a world that often pushes back against us for reasons that are different, yet the same. We smile in the halls, always say hello. Our support for each other is understated. We don’t have to state it for it to exist.
Mr. George petitioned the city for a halfway house so women in abusive relationships can escape. He also asked me to help lead Hinderwood High’s donation team, but when Bea stepped up, I stepped aside. Bea leads with ease. It just took her some time to find her stride.
Kristen runs toward the front row waving a banner that reads:
Congrats, Linden!
She trips on a guy’s boot blocking the aisle and whips around with her finger aimed. She scolds him for laughing, and for manspreading. Then she squeezes next to Ham and flops the flag against the heads of three students. She hops up and down and cheers.
Toby pushes his way to the front row. His peach-fuzz eyebrows are growing in nicely. The bronzer finally wore off his face but left blotches of orange like a patchwork necklace along his neckline. He decided to leave his hair neon orange, thought it made his eyes pop beneath his football helmet when he defended the line. Fear factor, he said.
Toby inches beside Seung. He nods, giving Toby the go-ahead to grab him like a teddy bear and lift him above ground. Seung pats Toby’s back, a signal to put him safely on the floor where he belongs. Toby drops Seung and grins. He now hugs Seung any chance he gets. He tries to hug Ham, too, but Ham stiff-arms and shouts, “I’m already taken!” before Toby can wrap his arms around him. The hugs are Toby’s way of apologizing for all his racist bullshit. And it’s Seung’s way to always forgive. Seung and his amazing heart.
The gym is brimming with students and parents and people from town. Deputy Boggs and his tiny team sit toward the back. Mr. Ryckman, the janitor, stands by the door. Eva, my grandmother’s old nurse, scoots toward an empty chair into the middle of the crowd. She waves when she sees me and yells, “Go, girl!”
I fix my eyes on Seung in the front row. He takes a breath, which I know is for my own benefit, and before he exhales, I begin.
“Thank you all for being here today.”
The gym hushes.
“Thank you. To all the teachers. To Principal Falls. And the students and parents who took the time to come.”
Complete silence.
“Thank you for having me.”
You could hear a pin drop.
“Thank you for letting me share my story.”
When I finish, the crowd claps. Okay, erupts.
Seung is the first to leap to his feet and cheer, then the first to climb on his chair and shout. In my honor. Ham and Jarrell hop onto their folding chairs, too. Ham yells my name, and within seconds, everyone else in the room is chanting, too.
Lin-den.
Lin-den.
Lin-den.
Tears flood my face and I’m too busy smiling at the crowd, standing on their seats and chanting my name, to give a damn.
Toby jumps up, cheering. Mr. Dique holds his hand out and Principal Falls steps onto her seat. Her turbulent claps make Mr. Dique duck his head before scurrying over to a vacant chair and climbing up. Every teacher follows. I even see Coach Jenkins shake open a folding chair and stomp upon the seat while pumping his fist.
I stand at the podium and listen to the rhythm of my name bounce off the rafters and against the matted walls. Principal Falsetto’s sister, Helen, smiles in my direction and winks. She shoots me a thumbs-up, then turns to speak into the camera. I gave her permission to share my words after I shared them with my school and the people I love. She promised she’d only report facts. She even put our agreement in writing.
Mrs. Rhee stands on her seat and hops, while Mr. Rhee holds her elbow for balance. Mr. Rhee catches my eye and offers a friendly salute. I salute him back.
I scan the crowd for Mr. George, but he’s vanished. I don’t remember seeing him during my speech. Probably started wailing and had to run out of the room for tissue. He hasn’t stopped blubbering since I filled him in on my plans. After living at Hinderwood High, I figured it was the right thing to do. I needed to share my story here, first, with the people who became family in such a short time. What I didn’t figure was how everyone would accept me, with open arms and a standing-on-chairs ovation.
A guy in the back shouts, “Look out!” He points up and half the gym cranes their necks toward the ceiling. A drone dips and darts and dives above heads. It’s coming straight for me, now hovering near the podium, aimed at my face.
I duck as Mr. Dique leaps off his chair and lunges toward me like he might tackle or rescue or flatten me onstage. He yells, “No more interruptions!” and swats his hands at the machine. The drone’s engine revs. “I said now is not the time!” Mr. Dique shrieks.
The machine buzzes above me, gently lowering itself onto the podium. Mr. Dique steps back as a dozen yellow roses drop from the landing skids and plop into my arms. As I look out into the crowd, someone in the front row gasps. Then a student shouts, “I knew it wasn’t one of us! It was one of them all along!”
A grin slowly spreads across Mr. Dique’s face as he nods at Mr. George, pointing and shouting, “You got me! You got me good!”
Mr. George climbs the steps of the stage and pitches the remote control onto the podium. I grin, thinking, Mr. George really is the perfect helicopter, I mean drone, parent. He wraps his arms around me and doesn’t stop squeezing until Seung taps his shoulder and says, “Cutting in.”
“HOMELESS IS WHEN”
a speech and article by Linden Rose
winner of the National Scholarship for Journalism
Willamette University, Spring 2018
A complete version of this op-ed piece
was published on KOIN 6’s news blog and
in Hinderwood High School’s online newspaper.