Missing the Big Picture by Donovan, Luke (great book club books txt) 📕

The following Saturday, May 12, I had a night off from Friendly’s and my mother was out with Anthony. This meant that I could spend all night masturbating alone, which I was looking forward to. Just as I had planted the pornographic magazines on my bed, I suddenly noticed three people jumping and bouncing around my yard. To my surprise, it was Taylor, Melanie, and Taylor’s pal, Dennis. They had stopped by unexpectedly and were planning to go to a party at a boy named Mike’s, who lived next door to Melanie and was a good friend of Eric’s. Taylor and Melanie thought it would be hilarious for me to show up, except they didn’t want the social repercussions of bringing me to such an elite high school party. The plan was for me to go through the front door and try to sneak in without anybody noticing. If there was a problem, the three friends would be in the car a few doors down.

It seemed that one of my biggest high school wishes might come true that night. Colonie Central was a large high school with nineteen hundred students, but the social networks within the school overlapped such that certain parties could claim attendants from the majority of one class. Often on Monday mornings, rumors abounded that somebody puked all over the bathroom mirror, or somebody had sex with somebody else and another person walked in on it, or somebody left her underwear at the party. The most exciting thing that happened to me on a weekend was finding a freshly clean sock to masturbate in. Now I was only seconds away from walking in and claiming that I was at a party where the most popular and influential figures of Colonie Central were socializing.

As soon as I got to the door, I heard some of the kids inside talking. “Yo, dude—the cops are coming.” But another kid asked, “Yo, who is that?” Then somebody screamed, “I think it’s Luke!” I was just on the porch, and I didn’t even make it inside before the plan failed.

I saw two boys walking toward me, and I heard one of them saying, “It is.” Before I knew it, at least five people were chasing me. Taylor, Dennis, and Melanie were parked behind a bush, and I was relieved to see their car. Taylor and Melanie didn’t share my relief, though, and kept the door locked so I couldn’t get in. I was pounding on the door, saying, “Yo! Let me in!” Finally, as the kids running after me approached the car, Taylor and Melanie let me in and we drove away. My dream to go to a party where all the high school seniors were never came true.

The next Monday at school I heard one of the seniors say, “It’s a pretty boring party when the only thing that happens is Luke Donovan crashing it.”

On that Monday, things would turn around for me. That Wednesday, May 16, was the AP Chemistry exam. After the test, the class was over, so I knew that I would never hear Tyler’s voice again. One by one, by the end of that Friday, all of my voices were over except three: Carmine, Sam, and Eric.

I used to describe the voices as actual conversations in which I would think something and the voices would respond. I was with most of the voices that I heard for at least six weeks. Some would talk a lot to me; others would say hardly anything, but I could still feel their presence. It was also weird when I would see these kids in the halls because in my mind I’d just been talking to them. In math class, Gabe told me that he was in AP English, that he’d been over to my cousin Alex’s house, that Alex’s friend Dale would steal from Alex, that the two of them would get in physical altercations but still remain friends, that he had sex with one of the girls I had known from church, that how everybody was talking about it, and so on. It was the same with Tyler. I listened to his voice describe his girlfriend, another girl from church. One time I actually told Tyler to raise his hand and ask our chemistry teacher a question about weighted averages. I turned my seat forward and heard him do just that. I did tell Dr. Roberts this, but his explanation was that I was making that up as well. I would still hear Carmine’s voice when I was in the halls and at my house—sometimes by itself or sometimes with Eric’s voice. In government and physical education class, I would still hear Eric’s voice.

I still continued to have weekly psychiatric appointments. All of these appointments followed the same pattern. I acknowledged that I wanted the voices to end, but I would never believe that it wasn’t real. Then Dr. Roberts would reassure me that people talking in my mind wasn’t scientifically possible. During one session, Dr. Roberts asked, “Are you ever going to accept the scientific explanation that this is not happening?” I just shook my head. “No.”

I didn’t just talk about the voices during my time with Dr. Roberts. I talked about how much of an outsider I was at school. I said I knew my mother thought my loneliness in conjunction with my challenging course work caused my mental breakdown. I told Dr. Roberts that if I talked to anybody when I had class with Eric, Eric would then try to befriend that person and discourage him or her from talking to me. Eric and his friends did spread lots of rumors about me—that I was this creepy, quiet kid who had to be gay because I hadn’t had sex by the time I left high school. Unfortunately, a double standard between boys and girls exists in that category. Girls who remain virgins are often see as angelic and pure, while boys who remain virgins