Birthday girl

 Not me, but one of the girls of the class. She turned 19 today. I go absolutely blank on how to name her, just like I go blank on how to name most people in this class. 

It's weird because I had no trouble naming the Argo girls (who I haven't seen btw, maybe they have switched to intermediate classes after all?), nor Hikianalia, but my mind entirely goes blank as to how to name the other girls from my class.

For the sake of this article, I think I will name her Despina, after one of the moons of Neptune (and also a daughter of goddess Demeter). She's tall, her hair is lanky and straight, and she always appears a bit off in her own world. She wears a blue pareu to dance and wears headphones outside of the class. Neptunian. 

She's a Virgo sun, Gemini rising, Virgo moon. How do I know? She revealed it. I revealed my big three, too: Sagittarius sun, Libra rising, Cancer moon. 

***

We practiced the same steps as the other time mostly, but the lesson, for some weird reason, passed much faster. Perhaps because I wasn't stupidly worried about throwing up the whole time because today, I had a lighter dinner lol. But we were also less people. Usually we're a dozen, but here we were something like ten? Either way, it made it way easier. I do prefer when there is less people. 

At first, Hikianalia had us do the same game as the other day, but I felt kind of annoyed with it. I'm impatient. I wanted to get to it. She wants us to have fun, to get to know each other, but in the moment I was just... I kind of hated it. But at the same time, I know why.

I don't know how to have fun. I'm joyless as shit as a person. Or rather, "having fun" is something that I cannot just... do like the others, I feel. There's always a sort of restriction about it inside of me and I'm not sure if it's nature or nurture. I'm so serious about this, and you want me to have fun?

But I did laugh, and I did let myself loose a little. And I'm not mad at Hikianalia, anyway. But I see how I react inside. I'm both scared of myself and I only half understand what's going on.

My mind gets it, you know. My heart, it's gone. My body, it doesn't know what to do.

But then we got to practicing, and I noticed that those movements I had trouble making are starting to integrate. (Except the tā'iri. Fuck the tā'iri. I'll have to practice it anyway but the fucker is giving me a hard time if I'm not doing it sideways lol.) I didn't even need to think much about it. 

Like, I remembered my first workshop, the one that was in the association of Hopoe's friend even before I knew the one running it was even Hopoe's friend, and how I had an idea on how to do it, but I couldn't make the moves. How my legs just wouldn't follow. How I would try to follow despite the workshop being for all levels and I would just lag behind lol. 

And Hikianalia... she's so kind. She doesn't push us, and to me it's such an alien thing. I'm always bracing for being pushed, for being insulted somehow, for being implied I'm too stupid to learn. She always says that we should take our time, that she takes her time, go slow, don't force it, but she also reminds us to watch our feet, that it's about disciplining our bodies and such. It's a contrast that I could only dream of. In fact, I've always wanted this kind of "measured" approach. 

But the minute it actually showed up in my reality, it just threw my whole ass world upside down, and I have no fucking idea what to do with it. 

At times I'm rattled by her voice, how nice she is, how... just how. Don't you have some fucking grit? Don't you have guts? Dammit, show some aggression, fight us. 

But no. Hikianalia's not like that. And I'm bracing for an aggression that doesn't come. I'm dead sure that those moments where I just feel this anger inside is because she's not acting in the way I expect. The script is just off. I'm expecting frantic energy, I'm expecting backhanded compliments or remarks that just fly and hit you in the head.

But no. 

She won't do this. 

And this throws me off-kilter. 

***

Like I remember my driving instructors. How they kept saying I should switch to automatic because "I had trouble with gear-shifting". How I always refused that. How I was always bracing for their criticism, their remarks, for them making a weird fun-sounding comment but which tone was absolutely rattling me.

"Are you a gambler, Hi'iaka?" when I would try to exit a parking spot without looking... GOOD GOD. JUST TELL ME I FORGOT LOOKING HOLY SHIT. No need for a fake fun tone holy crap just... either STFU or just tell me I forgot stuff. 

Jokes on them, I got my license on the first try. 

I remember the riding instructors I had when I was younger. How they'd dismiss my remarks about using your voice and talking to the horse.

"You're too much of a chatterbox, use your legs instead."

How sarcastic I became, at the end. How at fourteen or fifteen, I was snapping back at the instructor because I couldn't figure out why we needed to do this or that exercise. How it even benefitted the horse (spoiler: probably walking sideways did NOT benefit the goddamn horse in any way, it's all for human show). Casimir, my horse at the time, because yes I had a horse in the past, was not the dressage horse kind. He was a Gypsy Cob type horse, chill as can be except if there was a tarp or a hose lying around (not that he would jump, but he was uneasy around them), absolutely not one to try and impress, or enjoy a rider bossing him around.

In all, while I didn't choose him, we were a very good fit. Two beings who didn't really exist for any other reason than existing, and who had no care to show off. 

I remember this gym instructor when I was seven, saying that if this kept up, aka me being stiff as a board and being in pain and thus unable to do what my fellow group members (who disliked me) did, she'd have to downgrade me into a group with younger (and less advanced) girls. 

It's disjointed because I'm tired, but you get the gist.

It's the same as when Hera would be nice to me. Or when I found out I was well-liked at the base. Like... how?

Because when I look in the mirror, it's not a good person that stares back at me. 

Rather, I don't hate my reflection, but the person inside of me does not feel like such a good and likeable person. 

In fact, she feels so intense and unlivable to be around that I'm always waiting for the moment the person in front of me just snaps out of the illusion and realizes that oh. I'm not that good. Maybe we should reconsider being around this person, at all. Yeah, let's leave, she's so heavy. We don't need heavy. We need light, joyful, and fun. Hi'iaka? She's just a stone you put around your neck and then you go into the river and you drown because she's just. So. Heavy.

***

I don't know what the fa'arapu did to me at the end, if it's low blood sugar (it's 10pm as I type this and I ate dinner at 6:30pm), or tiredness, or but as I got into the car, I started feeling like I needed to cry, and now that I'm home I'm kinda borderline nauseous and feel all dissociated. I'm pretty sure it brought up some... stuff. Some repressed stuff.

A spoonful of honey helped. I no longer feel nauseous, so probably low blood sugar, but probs I also need to rest. My body's been through the grinder, and the best thing is, I still feel... "hungry for more". 

***

But yeah. I'm thinking of telling Hikianalia about all of this. She actually touched my hips to correct my posture at some point and I did not flinch. 

Yeah. You heard that right. I did not flinch. I did not even feel strange. I felt safe.

And since I'm starting to feel safe to say, it... I think I should reveal myself a little more to her.

I mean, the other day's conversation did a lot. We do seem to get along well as people. Not just as teacher and student.

So, yeah... probably I will confide in her about this weird thing. How I just have zero idea how to deal with kindness.

How I am both so appreciative of her and yet it feels like I'm in the fucking Twilight Zone. 

Would've I felt this way with Hokulea? 

I think I would've possibly been on my guard around her, to be fair. 

***

Also. 

I got my license a year ago.

And... Hopoe's number.

I just realized it, and I... again, it feels like time just slips through my fingers, and I had no idea, a year ago, that I would be here a year later... and that all that went down, would go down, at all.

The day her eyes looked at me, all black and starry, and her cheeks blushed, and she let out that "aha" kind of sigh upon us parting.

I leaned in and did her a bise. I would've kissed her, had we not been in the hallway between the mess hall and the snack bar. 

It was clear as day that she liked me back. It's when I relaxed.

The same day, I showed her a lot of my drawings and she reacted with the heart eyes emoji.

That was the most positive conversation we ever had on text.

***

I was picturing us advancing. Going slow. Eventually dating for real. Then spending time at each other's places. Perhaps her coming over and my father finding us in bed. "Oh hello, my colonel", she would've said in an embarrassed tone while on top of me.

But that didn't happen.

Instead, I got Hopoe closing off within a few days and turning to stone, and never telling me why.

Where are you, my Hopoe? 

Where are you to watch me dance?

Where have you gone? 

Because I feel like something else has taken your place, and I just want it to release you.