There is a certain kind of hoarse shriek that I am convinced only the middle school male is capable of producing. Some of them with more regularity than others.
It is unique. Identifying. And, I can tell without looking which sound belongs to who.
Other people learn bird songs. Jessica learns the piercing sounds of middle school boys who shriek like they are trying to use echolocation to orient themselves in space.
Some weeks it is quick, announcing their presence as they come running in or jumping over or hurtling down. Other weeks, like this one, it continues until I am sure that their throats must be raw with it.
Over and over and over.
Not quite echolocation, but almost.
Shriek. Look up. Catch eyes. Play. Shriek. Look up. Catch eyes. Play.
Bump. Run. Catch. Torture. Release. Bump. Run. Catch. Torture. Release.
Shriek. Look up. Catch eyes. Play. Shriek. Look up. Catch eyes. Play.
He's in seventh grade, starting to get long and lanky, and the walk from one end of the church to the other was punctuated by greetings from the kids that he teaches, little boys who adore him.
And, maybe it is because it doesn't seem like so long ago that he was that size himself that I indulge the repetition and the patterns that we haven't used quite this way since elementary school.
Or, maybe it's something in the kids.
He brings up stories from our small group. *bby talks with me about when she was a baby. *nn* compares only knowing me since 4th grade. The girls huddle close but don't blink when I go to chase the shrieking one.
J*m** sits beside for the first time in forever, and J*m** rubs coins across the carpet until they are hot, pressing them against the tops of my bare feet, challenges me on our mini basketball hoops. There are no breakout groups. And, it's one of those weeks where growing up means going back, just for today, to being little.
So, when our pattern is interrupted by a game, he makes sure to tell me what side he is going to be on, makes sure that I see him during music (even when I break old patterns and don't come over), maneuvers his space during the lesson until we have a clear line of sight.
Because, these are steps to a fourth grade dance.
It's been three years, but we were once very good at this.
It gives us something to fall back on, something known. Something other than those messy questions that no thirteen year old wants to answer in a room filled with dozens of peers. "How are you doing?" "What's wrong?" "Are you okay?"
Not honestly, at least.
But, there is something raw and honest to the shrieks that never stop, to the running and the catching and the chasing. To the little boy who never gets up until I do, who asks that we not add other leaders into the game the way that most weeks allow. Who stops when I am talking to another boy and allows me to reach out and snag him.
Right to left. Back and forth. Rhythmic. Steady. I talk and swing him in a loose basket hold that he doesn't fight.
And, I am reminded of the fourth grader who used to run wild circles, watching me out of the corner or his eye. Until I caught him. Reached out and snagged him in the circle of an almost basket hold. Let him stay there until he finally melted.
These patterns. Seasons. Fourth grade steps in a seventh grade dance. Grown up and little all at the same time. These are the languages that we speak.
Languages where shrieks are sometimes just as good as words.
Because, well, that's just middle school.
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