Sean Griswold's Head Read Online Free Page B

Of course I know Sean. I’ve known him for over seven years. He was the Tin Man and I was the Cowardly Lion in our fifth-grade production of The Wizard of Oz . When he threw up in seventh-grade math, it was on my favorite pair of sandals. The day after I lost the race for freshman class president, he turned around in biology and told me, “You’re the better man, well, girl, for the job. Sorry you lost.” I’ve lent the kid countless number two pencils and he’s passed back limitless papers.
    I can’t remember school without Sean Griswold in it; yet I can’t remember us ever having a real conversation.
    Sean gets to his locker about five minutes before the morning bell. He carries a bike helmet under one arm and shoves it into his locker along with some weird-looking shoes. Taped inside the locker is a collage of cyclists. No pictures of skanky girls like most gorillas at this school. No cutouts of sports heroes. Just bike riders in neon spandex. He slams the locker shut before I can see more. I wait until his big blond head bobs around the corner and slide out my Focus Journal.
    Payton’s Focus Exercise AKA Sean Notes
    January 18 7:58 AM
    Topic: Bicycle Boy
    I. Introduction
    A. Sean is either scared of aliens and wears a helmet to protect himself from getting his brains sucked out or, more likely, he rides a bike.
    B. Another clue to that fact would be the excessive array of cycling pictures plastered in his locker. Where do you even find pictures like that? Dork Riders Weekly ?
    II. Body
    A. Bike riding is SO not cool
    1. Having your parents drop you off is higher on the transportation totem pole than having to lock up your bike.
    2. Well, I guess it depends if you have embarrassing parents or a beater car.
    3. No, doesn’t matter. He carries around a HELMET. Can’t get lower than that.
    B. Why bike riding?
    1. Is it because he won the school Bike Rodeo in fourth grade and he’s still holding on to that moment of fame?
    2. Or is he nobly training to bike across the country in order to protest rising gas prices?
    3. Or does he simply hate walking?
    III. Conclusion (Bringing it back to the almighty head)
    A. So, something to know about Sean Griswold’s head: It is safe as he pedals to and from school.
    B. It’s a wonder his hair still manages to look decent in third period with that obnoxious helmet flattening it out.

    School is out and the masses have dwindled. This is the time I love, hearing the solitary click of the principal’s heels or the booming laughter drifting from Coach Berne’s office. The staccato quiet is comforting, like the smell of lead from a box of number two pencils.
    Except I’m not completely at peace. There’s a nagging feeling I’ve forgotten something. I would check my lovely leather planner, but I can’t remember where I put it, let alone the last time I wrote in it. Organization, coordination, concentration—basically all my former - ation skills—are all buried somewhere in my closet. Maybe it’s a good thing I have my Focus Journal after all.
    I thwonk my head against the cafeteria wall. Ouch. Why do people hit their head to get an idea? Zoning out is far more effective. I slide down to the ground and shift my attention to the JV swim guys hunched around a table in the back corner. Sean’s there, big head and all. Should I write something? I know I’m staring but I can’t stop. Is some blond hair and, if I’m being a little unscientific, a nice smile really going to help me remember all the things I’m forgetting? Even the things I want to forget?
    Jac’s play rehearsal should get out any minute. Maybe she’ll remember whatever it is I’ve forgotten. This is pretty tragic when you consider I’m counting on the biggest airhead ever as my memory jogger. It once took me forty minutes to explain that Australia is both a continent and a country. The conversation concluded