MY GOOD FRIEND BARRY
A young adult novel
By
Jeff Provine
Episode Two: A Typically Atypical Day
With the formalities of applications over, life slipped back into its usual routine of school, goofing off, and school again. I did my best to press my good friend Barry into spending time with me, having him play video game after video game, even the dreaded Tetris, a game in which I had always been defeated by Barry’s awesome geometric might. The weekend slid away joyfully, and hope began to brighten within me that he would rediscover my importance in his life.
Barry approached me at lunch one school day, a wild look in his eye telling me that he had another of his “great ideas.” He was always like that when he was excited, scampering across the commons to find me at my usual table, eating a peanut-butter-and-raisin sandwich while reading something I picked up in the library. Today it was Ivanhoe. Yesterday it was Clifford at the Circus. Both are inspirational classics.
I had barely set down the book before he launched into his swift, eager speech. Barry was usually rather passive, adopting the form of a normal slacker with his flannel shirt over his old Nirvana t-shirt and seldom-combed black hair. But once excited, he was an entirely different person. He dashed across the school yard in his new shoes (which he had yet to trust fully), dodging skateboard-wielding, grungy punks who spent more time on their hair color than bodily cleanliness and packs of giggling, sadistic, preppy girls who each spent more time making certain their hair was immaculate than they collectively did doing homework.
“Dude!” Barry almost shouted as he tossed his backpack onto my table. “I just had the coolest idea!” I nodded during the brief pause before he began explaining. “Someone should rewrite Romeo and Juliet so that it has vampires! It’d be something like…” I leaned back a bit to capture the fullness of Barry’s most recent brainchild.
“But soft! What light through yonder window breaks?” Barry quoted Shakespeare flawlessly. He was a genius like that, capable of doing anything: integral calculus, in-depth psychological analysis, reciting historical references from all eras, anything. Even if he never bothered to use them, Barry had the most impeccable grammar skills of anyone I have ever known. Barry could do just about anything, but, instead, he spent most of his time dreaming up crazy, entertaining ideas, which, to him, were the most important things. I often wondered what he would be when he grew up, but then I doubted that Barry would ever really grow up. At least, I hoped.
“It is the east, and Juliet is the sun! Arise, fair sun, and kill the envious--” Barry’s eyes widened, and to add dramatic effect he tensed his hands and looked behind his shoulder. A wry smile twisted on his lips, and he broke character long enough to say, “This is the good part, where the vampires attack Romeo.”
“You cut out the balcony scene?” I gaped.
“Don’t interrupt,” Barry chided jokingly.
He leapt back into character, making a physical hop as he did. “Alack! What are these denizens of the night approaching? Forsooth, they are the walking dead, blood-eaters, bat-men, carriers of the vampiric plague. And now I am attacked, forever to join them as…”
And so Barry composed the plot of Romeo and Juliet the Vampire Slayer directly in front of me, quasi-impromptu, a task that swallowed up most of the lunch hour. It was a grand tale, fairly similar to the first and identical until Romeo fell victim to the pack of vampires in Act II.
Barry smiled so wide that his dimples almost met his teeth. “Okay, so after he found himself a vampire, he bawls over his fate in a very lengthy soliloquy. Oblivious and still in love with Romeo, even with his mysterious disappearance, Juliet soon learns the Capulet family secret: that they are, in fact, a clan of vampire hunters dating back to the days of the Roman Empire.”
“Thus getting the title, ‘Juliet the Vampire Slayer’.”
“Exactly!” Barry nodded excitedly. “She excels in her training under master-hunter and cousin Tybalt, Prince of Cats, which of course has to be shown in a Rocky-esque montage. At the end of the inspirational and sometimes humorous scene, the story returns to Romeo, who, blinded in his ravenous thirst for blood, attacks one of his friends, and thus Mercutio becomes a vampire himself. The two jokingly mourn each other’s fate by trading Shakespearean banter, and their vampiric activity sparks the keen vampire hunter senses of Tybalt. As with the original, Tybalt kills Mercutio, thus must Romeo kill Tybalt.”
“Old Bill Shakespeare missed a gold mine with this,” I said with a sarcastic smirk.
Barry ignored me. “Hands and fangs covered in red blood, Romeo flees his beloved Juliet in disgrace and horror, hiding in Mantua where he eventually procures a potion from Friar Lawrence to help him overcome his taste for the human lifeblood, much to the chagrin of his vampire brethren that watch from afar. Refilled with vigor in his undead life, he journeys back to find Juliet, blinded with rage and horror, already hunting him to avenge her cousin. After a brief duel, Juliet at last realizes Romeo has conquered his new evil nature and the two are reunited in a song that would dominate the Grammies and make the soundtrack a best seller.”
“You would have to pay off a lot of people to do so.”
“Anyway, the two become married, much to the chagrin of Juliet’s vampire-hunting family, who despise their undead in-law. I’ll just skim the rest of the story, you know, what with there being a lengthy and computer-generated fight scene as the Capulets and Romeo’s vampire clan have a massive final battle. So, in the end, the two star-crossed lovers are left to bid farewell to the Prince as they ride away on a quest to rid the world of supernatural evil. Oh, and that’ll lead into the sequel, Hamlet: Werewolves in Denmark.”
As Barry told his tale, I laughed aloud and applauded his performance. The idea was probably not his best (that title belonged to the Ninja Football League), but it was my attention that he wanted most. You see, Barry was a brilliant light in the realm of dark ignorance and shallow shadows, nearly drowned out by the superficiality of everyone around him. He truly was alone in his world, a beacon of incredible intelligence, creativity, and knowledge packaged with people who worried more about whether they felt cool than the philosophical implications of day-to-day living. His fellow students hated him as he always blew the grading curve, though he never studied more than out of his natural curiosity. Teachers were afraid of him because he was smarter than they were. The administration wanted to parade him for his great test scores, but they considered him too “unorthodox” for public show.
But I was there for him. I was his one-man applauder in an audience filled with people scoffing, asleep, or just plain brain-dead. Besides, I didn’t have anything better to do. I didn’t really exist. I myself was just a figment of Barry’s overactive imagination. No one ever listened to him. They just glanced nervously or contemptuously at Weird Kid, peeking over their eight hundred dollar sunglasses or out from under their cheesy, carefully cockeyed visors. Still, he was happy with my attention only, ignoring all the others while he acted out Romeo and Juliet the Vampire Slayer for his only friend, someone who wasn’t even there.
After his performance, Barry settled at my table and scooped his three-meat sandwich and bag of crushed Oreos from his backpack. He ate busily, stuffing his mouth and shaking his shaggy black hair as he fervently chewed. It was his daily custom to waste the vast majority of the lunch hour talking or reading comic books, then furiously devour his lunch in the few remaining moments before the bell rang and the students were herded back into the classrooms like cattle to high density feed lots in the stockyards.
Just as Barry finished the sandwich and turned ravenously toward his Oreos, I glanced up at a shadow crossing over my book. It was a strange event, since the table was generally ignored by everyone, leaving Barry to his own little world. As my eyes peeked up from the printed pages, however, that little rule of thumb was shattered. Mr. Johnson, Barry’s history teacher and notoriously known as the reason unlabeled sodas disappeared from the teacher’s lounge, appeared beside us, his bearded face forcing a smile.
“Hello, Barry,” he called in a sing-song voice, passing around me and looking at the perplexed teenager who stared up at him with black Oreo crumbs sticking to his lips.
While Barry slowly resumed chewing, Mr. Johnson tossed small talk aside and cut to the chase. “I just finished grading the American history exams, and I must say your essay was far above those of the others. You certainly know your factoids.”
“Thanks,” Barry mumbled.
“It brings me to wonder, though,” Mr. Johnson continued, barely listening, “why you’ve never been on the trivia bowl team. As coach, I’m always on the lookout for new additions, and we could certainly use a Jeopardy-brain like yours.”
“Really?” Barry asked, his eyes wide with a sudden recognition toward himself. “I mean, I tried out for the team when I was a freshman, but it never really worked out.”
“You did?” Mr. Johnson frowned, twisting his eyebrows in confusion. He then paused in mock-thought and lied, “Ah, yes, now I remember. Well, that was freshman year, and this is senior year. Things are different now, and I’m sure you’ll be great. If you just drop by Room 21 after school…”
“Hey!” I frowned, tossing my book. Barry blinked and raised his left eyebrow curiously. With a shake of my head, I explained, “This guy’s just trying to exploit you. He’s probably up for an evaluation and looking to get the team winning.”
“Well, if I could help, I should,” Barry told me. I shook my head at him and wondered where he got his idealistic ideas. He was such a pushover.
Mr. Johnson clapped him on the shoulder, mistaking Barry’s statement as being for him. “Of course you should. It’s a win-win situation.”
“You’ve got a lot to do,” I protested.
“I do have a lot to do,” Barry repeated, cocking his head to the side in thought.
“As does any senior,” Mr. Johnson said with a shrug. “But think of it! With you on the team, we might even make it to state finals! It’ll look great on evaluations… of your academic career, yes. Definitely something colleges will be looking at.”
“You’ve already sent off your applications,” I reminded him sharply.
“I’ve already sent off my applications,” Barry nodded, glancing at me and then back at Mr. Johnson.
“Oh?” the teacher said, his preplanned argument suddenly useless. His eyes spun, and he quickly rebounded with, “Ah, well, the application process is a very lengthy one. By the time you get around to interviews and so forth, the season will be over, and we’ll have our record to brag about. Just go in there and tell them all you’ve accomplished, and they won’t have any other choice than to give you a big old fat scholarship.”
I frowned and mad gagging sounds. Barry, however, seemed genuinely interested. It had been years since his last brush with the trivia bowl team, an episode that had been as disastrous as it had been amusing. As a green little freshman, he had wandered into the trivia bowl practice room, bright-eyed and certain that his encyclopedic knowledge of useless facts would ensure some much-needed attention. After introductions by a younger, less-bearded Mr. Johnson, they played a mock-game where the teacher read questions and the students sat at buzzers where could ring in and answer. Barry sat a little separated from the others, his thumbs trembling with excitement as he held them over the button for minimum reflex time.
It was going well, until Barry suddenly knew an answer (I believe it was to the question, “What was Rome’s opponent in the Punic Wars?”) and buzzed happily. He belched out the answer, causing the older, experienced students to frown at the newbie’s audacity to outplay them at their own game. Mr. Johnson replied that it was correct, and Barry quickly turned to me and mumbled that watching the history channel paid off.
“Excuse me,” Mr. Johnson had called out, “but games have to be played without talking. If you can’t keep quiet, you can’t be on the team.”
Barry turned back, red-faced and surrounded by slanderous whispers from the others that Mr. Johnson seemed to find inaudible. It seemed that his established, pet-players could do no wrong, but any slight mistake caused immediate chastisement upon Barry. The cycle continued, until at last the practice ended and Barry stamped out of the room, his eyes fiercely angry and his mumbles cursing the favoritism of experienced players. It was a waste of time then, and it would be a waste of time now.
“Don’t waste your time,” I said, rolling my eyes at the whole situation of a teacher nudging a student into activities. “Besides, we’ve got to get to work on the Ninja Football League.”
Barry nodded slightly and opened his mouth to speak, but he was interrupted by the shrill ring of the electronic bell over the public announcement system. The three of us looked up at the moans of students, and Mr. Johnson redoubled his efforts.
“So, see you after school?” he asked forcefully.
“No,” I told Barry.
Barry, however, paused. He glanced at me, slunk lower, and said, “Sure.”
“Great,” Mr. Johnson said with a nod. He turned, smiled to himself, and then marched off to fill the minds of tomorrow’s leaders with the dates of the Civil War.
Barry, meanwhile, began to throw the last bits of his cookies back into his backpack. Without a word, he scrambled up, pulled onto his shoulder, and climbed over the tabletop toward his homeroom.
“Wait, dude,” I called. “What’s up with that trivia bowl garbage?”
He did not hear me, or so it seemed as he continued onward. I was left alone as the courtyard emptied of students before the final bell rang to begin class. A small pack of smoking greasers that looked as if they had based their lifestyles on the music videos of the Eighties stayed behind, hiding and feeling rebellious in their refusal to return to class. I let out a sigh and looked at my book, finding escapism in the well-read pages. Whatever had gone through Barry’s mind, I would have no hope of catching him until after classes ended.
You see, I didn’t go to class. I didn’t need to. Aside from the simple fact that I was imaginary and thus did not have to go through the rigors of the American educational system, I was philosophically opposed to it. Ignorance is bliss (judging from most of the happy people around me), and forced education would ruin that bliss. I was hardly ignorant, which, for the right person, is a great weight that must be borne. Perhaps if there were some gage of intelligence and striving that would prescribe a better hierarchy of education, there would be less frustration at learning trigonometry for those who would never use it and much less busy work to slow those dashing to the head of the class. Then again, I doubt I even know what I’m talking about. Such a thing could lead to an intellectualistic tyranny, and there’s nothing worse than a snotty smart guy.
Perhaps my views of the education system were too harsh, but, as Barry constantly reminded me, I was the cynical one. As I watched the courtyard finally empty, leaving only an imaginary friend who was not there to begin with, I sighed deeply. Barry had listened to Mr. Johnson, and now he would be caught up in the tornado of after-school activities.
But, that was not the worst part. I had tried to warn him against it all, but Barry did not listen to me. I had always fostered him to be as independent as a normal human should, but the independence hurt when it focused on me.