The Betty St. James Scholarship for Moderate to Severe Sleep Walkers and Talkers

Ever since we were kids, Imogen has kept a little notebook of Big Secrets. I don’t know how she does it, walking around with all that highly classified information in her backpack. Imagine if she left it on the bus, or dropped it in the hall, or got mugged by someone who decided to read its contents at an open mic. (Imogen says this last scenario is “unlikely.”) I don’t know. The anxiety alone would kill me.

The good thing is that the notebook is a little more subtle now than it was in second grade, the year Imogen and I met. Back then it was pink and fluffy with a bedazzled padlock and the word “SECRETS” stamped across the cover in huge gold cursive. And if you said something that rubbed Imogen the wrong way, like you didn’t think Hannah Montana was that great of a singer, she’d take the notebook right out in front of you and start furiously scribbling.

Now that we’re older—six months from our high school graduation—Imogen keeps her secrets in a small black Moleskine. Much more discrete. And she never opens it in public. Thank God.

On the first morning back from winter break, Imogen and I stand in front of the bulletin board, looking for our elective assignments. I get my third choice, a literature class called “Shakespeare on Film.” Imogen gets her first choice, which was also my first choice: “Glazy Days: Ceramics for Second-Semester Seniors.”

But despite all this, what Imogen says when she sees the lists is, “Why do you always get so lucky?”

She’s not saying that because Shakespeare on Film is such a great class. She’s saying that because right under my name is another name, a name Imogen’s been writing in her notebooks since we were both eight years old.

Enzo DeMars.

It may seem clichéd to have a long-lasting, hopelessly unrequited crush on the high school quarterback, but in Imogen’s defense, she liked him before he was cool. Before he was Endzone Enzo. Back when he was just another sweaty, buzz-cut kid scissoring up paper snowflakes in a blue plastic chair.

“Forget Enzo,” I say (for the six-millionth time in my life). “The far bigger issue is Mr. Dibbs being a tried-and-true hard-ass.”

Imogen makes a face. “Just don’t fail,” she says. “I can’t live with a rando.”

What she’s referencing is our grand plan for next year, the plan to share a room and join ultimate frisbee and major in art history and do everything together. Way back in November, we were both accepted to the Honors College at State, which is good because we get to room together, but bad because the HC requires us to maintain a B+ average throughout our last semester of high school. Something I thought was going to be easy, until I got assigned another class with Mr. Dibbs, who doesn’t let you start a sentence with “and.”

“I won’t fail,” I say, just as the bell blares out the start of first period.

Imogen turns to go. And that’s when I see it.

“Imogen!”

“What?”

I drop my voice to a whisper. “Your notebook is in your back pocket.”

She shrugs. “So?”

“What do you mean, ‘So?’ What if it falls out?”

Imogen pats her jeans. “It won’t,” she says. “You have nothing to worry about.”

*

But I do.

The secrets in Imogen’s notebook? They’re mostly her secrets. Love poems for Enzo. Unflattering sketches of her stepmom. Her hopes, her dreams, etc.

But some of them are my secrets.

I have this problem where I talk in my sleep. The scientific/medical term is somniloquy. Technically, it’s a genetic condition. Technically-technically, it’s matrilineal. My mom does it, too.

Back when we were in middle school, this older girl at State sleep-walked out of her second story window and shattered all the bones in both her legs. Every sleepover since then, Imogen’s been keeping a record of all the things I say when I somniloquize, just in case they can serve as an early warning sign for an unconscious disaster.

Here are the Most Embarrassing things I’ve said that are now written in Imogen’s notebook:

3. “I’m actually really smart, you just can’t tell because I’m also so pretty.”

2. “I need to pee! I need to pee! Oh, no.”

1. “Oh, Mr. Dibbs, you’re so handsome and your lips are so soft.”

Imagine there was information like that about you. You probably wouldn’t want someone to write it down. And even if you did let someone else write it down, because you knew they were doing it out of love, you definitely wouldn’t want it bobbing around in that person’s back pocket.

*

Maybe you can already guess what happens. I walk into Shakespeare on Film and fall crazy in love with Enzo DeMars.

Not right away, of course. And maybe not even “in love.” But it’s enough.

I’m a little late to fourth period, and by the time I actually get to Mr. Dibbs’ classroom, there’s only one seat left and it’s in the very first row. Right in front of Mr. Dibbs and right next to Endzone Enzo.

After an excruciatingly tedious lecture about how Shakespeare would feel if he could see the myriad ways his work has been adapted for the silver screen (which is silly and pointless because if Shakespeare came back from the dead and you asked him, “How do you feel about the myriad ways your work has been adapted for the silver screen?’” the only thing he would say would be, “The silver WHAT?”), Mr. Dibbs announces that the partners for Project #1 are going to be based on where we’re sitting. Which means that my partner for Project #1 (Watch and Analyze an Adaptation of Romeo and Juliet, Identifying Major Themes and Notable Artistic Choices) is Enzo DeMars.

“Sweet,” says Enzo, flipping over the handout for our assigned movie, Baz Luhrmann’s 1996 Romeo + Juliet. He turns to look at me. “I love Paul Rudd.”

And when he says that, his big brown eyes and his chipped front tooth and his dark curly hair and his single dimple, what I hear is, “I love you.”

“Me, too,” I say.

“You love Paul Rudd?”

“What? Uh-huh. Ant-Man.”

“Cool,” says Enzo.

I know I should say no when Enzo asks me if we should watch the movie together. Tonight. At his place. I know I should say, “Let’s watch it separately on our separate laptops in our separate homes and discuss over email.” I know that, if I do say yes (which I do), I should tell Imogen about it, just as a friendly heads-up, and that it shouldn’t be a big deal, because what’s wrong with going over to your project partner’s house and working on your project together? But when Imogen asks me after school what my plans are, I say, “I’m trying out for field hockey.”

Imogen blinks. “That’s weird.”

“It’s good to try new things as a senior.”

“You don’t like sports.”

“Or maybe,” I say, “I don’t know what I like yet.”

*

Here’s an introduction for an essay I never write:

Romeo + Juliet (Luhrmann, 1996) is a modern adaptation of Shakespeare’s most famous tragedy. A major theme of this movie is being extremely romantic and sad, and a notable artistic choice is how Leonardo DiCaprio makes his entire face crumple and his whole body fold up into a terrible origami portrait of grief, which in turn may cause the two members of the audience to look at each other at the end of the film and understand that they are either going to kiss or cry, and then make the choice that seems less embarrassing at the time. Paul Rudd is barely in this movie.

*

I see Enzo every day that week. And the following week. After football practice, at his house or mine, under the bleachers and behind the gym, in an empty art classroom, in my car, at the drive-in movie theater, at the regular movie theater. I tell Imogen I didn’t make the cut for field hockey, but now I have too much homework, now my mom needs help making casserole, now my cat is sick, now I’m sick, now I’m considering the dance team.

One time, Enzo asks me to tell him a secret, and one time, I say, “I talk in my sleep,” and one time, he says, “I’d like to see that,” and one time, I let him.

And it’s the next morning and I’m walking out of his front door wearing his shirt and holding my jacket bunched up in my arms and across the street I see the thing that all of me has been dreading and part of me has been expecting.

Imogen’s car.

Her face is already tear-stained, like she’s been crying for hours, like she’s already gone through all five stages of grieving for me.

“Field hockey is a fall sport,” she says.

*

I know what she’s going to do before she does it.

But that doesn’t make it any better.

*

Five days into the worst week of my life, the college counselor calls me into her office. Her name is Ms. Mabel, and because I got into State so early, I barely know her. She’s a short-ish, old-ish woman with gray-ish hair. She gestures for me to sit down across from her.

“So,” she says, “Anna.”

“Yes?”

“Obviously, I was very, ah, sorry to read about your sleep talking troubles.”

“Yes.”

“I must say, it was quite a shock to come into work on Monday and see those photocopied notebook pages all over the walls.”

“Yes.”

“You’ve said some alarming things in your sleep, but that was no reason for an anonymous bully to share them with the school. I hope you and Mr. Dibbs have spoken about appropriate boundaries in teacher-student relationships?”

“Yes. He let me transfer into a new elective.”

“Excellent. Well, I have some good news.”

“Ye—what?”

Ms. Mabel beams at me. “When I learned about your difficulties, I contacted the Honors College at State. I’m pleased to inform you that you have been awarded the Betty St. James Scholarship for Moderate to Severe Sleep Walkers and Talkers.”

I blink. “The what?”

“The Betty St. James Scholarship for Moderate to Severe Sleep Walkers and Talkers. It’s a monetary prize in honor of that poor girl who walked out of her second-story window and shattered all the bones in both her legs. A $20,000 fund, awarded to a student with a condition like yours, to be used to secure single accommodation on the ground floor of any on-campus residential building. Isn’t that wonderful?”

I feel like my feet are on the ceiling and my head is in the chair. “I—yes, it is. Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.” Ms. Mabel slides a folder across the table. “All the information you need is in there. See? Good things can come from difficult situations.”

As I walk out of Ms. Mabel’s office, clutching the folder to my chest, my brain is whirring. I’m not thinking, “$20,000!” I’m not thinking, “My very own room with no one else around!” I’m thinking about how, at this time last year, the only thing Imogen and I ever wanted was to do everything together.