When I was in middle school, I really wanted to wear baggy pants. I thought that was the key, the one thing that would change me from unwashed semi-mute same clothing every day for a year kid to Mr.cool, everyone wants to be my friend kid.
Well, one day I was rummaging through some storage boxes at home when I found a pair of my dad's old jeans. They were a 36 I believe, and I was size 28. I tried them on. I didn't have a belt, but just looking down and seeing myself in my very own baggy jeans, I felt so immensly cool. The feeling was so exhilirating...maybe...just maybe I too could be the kind of guy who wears baggy jeans to school.
I rode that feeling a little more, then put them back.
Lazy 1 hour bus rides homes, half-asleep. Dreaming. Dreaming of a different me. A brave me, who had already taken those jeans out, had already been wearing them, had already been at the forefront of the baggy jeans trends. Girls looking at me, guys wanting to be me. Nods in the hallway. "Cool jeans," they'd say. "Thanks."
Alarm, 6:30. Snooze. Wake up, have 5 minutes before bus. Shit.
Putting my one pair of dried out cords on. My heel pushes too hard against the pants when I put them on, rips all the way from the knee down. I can't go to school like that. It might be cool, but probably just weird. No one else is doing pants ripped up to the knee. I have no other pants though. Wait. My dad's jeans...should I? Warm feeling. Thrilling even.
I dig through the box, grab a belt, put them on. Run outside to the bus stop. The jeans almost fall off, I tighten the belt. Even though they didn't fall down the thought of tripping over my jeans in front of the entire bus makes my face burn. No time to think, bus door is already open, I go up the steps. Bus driver gives me a strange look...can't quite place it. I sit down. I still feel so nervous about my jeans.
I give them a good look. They are really baggy on me, the crotch is at my knees. I pull them up a bit, adjust my belt, fold the top sides in. My best friend isn't on the bus, no one to get any feedback.
I start feeling the thrill come back. The feeling of...risk? Reward. I might pull this off. I might start a trend. Ultra baggy.
I get off last, I'm still worried my pants might fall off, it feels like they are barely staying on and I need to adjust while I walk. As I walk through the little covered outside area with the soda machines I still to feel...cool. A rebel. Fuck the system. I'm wearing whatever the fuck I want. My family can afford more then one pair of pants for me, look! Not some falling apart tan cords that were cool 2 years ago, but some trendy baggy jeans just like Kurt.
I'm feeling pretty bold.
Then I see it. A girl looking right at me. Obviously looking at me. In slow motion, her hand goes to her mouth and I hear a little giggle. A group of girls hears her, and turn to see what she thinks is so funny. They see me, and they laugh. They know I notice them but they don't care. One of them does a little impression of a penguin walking.
Is that how I look like? I notice that I am sort of shuffling a bit, the bottom of my jeans keep covering my entire shoe and I have to keep pulling them back up because it makes me feel like my pants are falling off.
No one is high-fiving me, no one is asking me out. Why the hell isn't Brian at school today? He'd help me out.
I just want to sit down and figure out whats going on here, I get to homeroom and take a seat at the back. The teacher eyes me as I walk by but doesn't say anything. I no longer feel cool. I feel deeply embarressed, with no where to go. But...I keep telling myself maybe this isn't as bad as I think, that maybe I can still pull this off.
SSR. The teacher leaves the class for 10 minutes while we read. I hear some kids softly talking about something up front, and occasionally heads turns to look at me. I pretend not to notice.
Social studies. Bell. I stay seated. I notice a few people waiting to see me stand up. I won't let them.
After the last kid leaves, I stand up. The teacher looks up from something she was doing on the desk.
"Anon, I'd like you to come with me to go see Mrs. Carlson." "Ok." Mrs. Carlson is the school counselor. She has big flowers on the end of her pens.
The teacher walks with me through the halls. Later I realize it was to stop people from laughing at me, or at least try. To protect me.
We walk past glass double doors and I finally get to see what I look like.
I look like a 5 year old wearing his dad's giant jeans as a joke. The crotch is almost at the floor. My shoes are not even showing, they are just tubes of jean. I don't look cool. I'm not the daring fashionista I thought I was going to be. I'm the kid who was being escorted...not for being 'bad' in any sense of the word...but to be protected somehow.
I feel deeply humiliated. Deeply.
I sit in the counselors office, my homeroom teacher next to me. I'm staring at the floor. Mrs. Carlson has been talking, very gently, about dress codes. I feel my eyes start watering, my face starts burning, I know I'm about to cry. My teacher speaks. "Jen, I don't think anon was trying to break the dress code, I think maybe he just...well..." I feel her hand on my back. "Anon, do you have any other pants at home to wear to school?"
I feel my whole body burn, tears well up, I put my arms on the table and look down at the floor. I shake my head.
"Anon, it's nothing to be ashamed of ok? You didn't have any other pants so you wore your dad's pants to school, is that right?"
I nod.
I hear them talking softly. Mrs. Carlson goes to a room next door with my teacher and tell me they are going to be right back.
I cry into my sleeve.