Free Dr. Bird's Advice for Sad Poets by Evan Roskos Page A

be with those I like is enough,
    To stop in company with the rest at evening is enough,
    To be surrounded by beautiful curious breathing laughing flesh is enough,
    To pass among them . . . . to touch any one . . . . to rest my arm ever so lightly round his or her neck for a moment . . . . what is this then?
    I do not ask any more delight . . . . I swim in it as in a sea.
     
    While in my reverie, I pass Gina Best in the hallway. I’m probably too confident, but I think I should talk to her. I should find out why Jorie beat her up (though rephrasing the question will be necessary if Gina is to tell me anything).
    Gina Best doesn’t look like she has fought or will ever fight anyone. She looks like she will be a broadcast journalism major and then a talk show host and then end up involved in a murder-suicide after cheating on her husband. She’s tall and athletic—meaning her arms and legs are thick but not flabby. She’s got big brown eyes and perfectly straight teeth and no sign of ever having dealt with braces or acne. Most people probably didn’t even know that she and my sister were best friends way back in elementary school. Gina slept over at our house four weekends in a row once.
    Gina and Jorie stopped hanging out with each other in eighth grade when Jorie got mono and stayed home from school for half the year. When she came back from her quarantine, Gina was best friends with someone else and they just never got back in line with each other. Jorie ended up listening to lots of hip indie music; Gina went with a crowd that loved hip-hop. There could have been a ton of other reasons, but that’s what Jorie told me.
    I skip three classes tracking Gina and working up the nerve to talk to her. I’m not worried about school at this stage. I’m worried about me and Jorie. I need us to be under the same roof again because if we’re together we can help each other. All I confirm from following Gina around is that she smokes, has plenty of guy friends, and is what everyone would agree is gorgeous. Even though I spend the day staring at her back, I cannot deny that the way her body is crafted deserves an award. Whitman would say something about her hips and bosoms. Looking at Gina would make anyone think about the act of reproduction. And isn’t that the point of the Ginas of the world? To make sure we keep on making more Ginas so people stay interested in making more Ginas?
    Like Walt says:
     
    Urge and urge and urge,
    Always the procreant urge of the world.
     
    Gina eats during a different lunch period than I do, but the mass of people makes it easy to blend in and watch her with her friends. It’s all the kinds of people that reject Jorie. These girls are not poetry readers, not girls who cut themselves, not girls who would wear heavy metal band T-shirts or belch after chugging soda.
    Or maybe they are. Who am I to say they’re not?
    Toward the end of lunch, Gina heads for the doors that lead to the courtyard, leaving her friends behind, so I catch up with her. This is yet another moment when I have no idea what I’m doing.
    “Excuse me. Gina.”
    When Gina spins, her hair flips cinematically. She recognizes me and we both stand there quietly for a moment.
    “What do you want?” she asks.
    I come right out and ask her why Jorie beat her up.
    “Because she’s some kind of crazy person, clearly.” Gina walks, I follow. She offers me a cigarette; I decline with a wave of my hand.
    “I know that you guys haven’t been friends for a long time—”
    “That’s not true,” she says. “We’ve always been friends. I thought so, anyway. We just haven’t been
best
friends. We just haven’t hung out aside from in classes. I never hated your sister and she certainly had little reason to hate me.”
    “Oh.”
    Gina smokes without concerning herself with where the smoke ends up, which means I inhale far more than I’d like.
    “I talked to the vice principal about the day of your fight,” I say. “He