A look at a current calendar shows we do not have a Friday the 13th or a Halloween coming up in the near future (which is really when I wanted to tell this story) so I guess I'll have to tell it now. Let's hope you can follow along, because I'm totally terrible at this.

At a auction around the time I was in 5th grade, my dad purchased an oversized antique and quite exquisite wooden desk. It looked like the type you'd see in a governor's mansion or something. Very nice. I used it for a few years, and when my sister and I began to share a room, it went into storage. I forgot about it until just over a year ago when I moved it back into my room.

And the story of Polo?

On one of the rare in bed at 9:00 p.m. sleeping nights, a girl called me. Twice. My mom answered, told her I was asleep, and told me someone had called the next morning. I assumed it was Britt. I checked the caller ID, and saw a last name I had never heard of. I went straight to the student directory, matched the number with the name, followed by a trip to the yearbook where I matched the name with the photo. I had never seen her before, and now she had called me.

This was the weekend of Thanksgiving. I told G and B, and that night, we went about trying to find her. We called, drove past her house, and nothing seemed familiar to any of us.

So the next trimester started that Monday (four days later). During roll call on the second day of class I hear Polo's name. I looked around to see who this was. Just as I turned my head, I saw the girl next to me raise her hand. This mystery girl was sitting to my right.

After class, I asked if she had called me. She hesitated and said no. "Oh. Because your number was on my caller ID."

"Oh." That was all she could respond with.

So the semester goes on, I ask her out, we go to a dance and stuff and that is that. A year after that, I decide that I have enough room, and set about moving the desk into my bedroom. It was incredibly dusty, (I guess it always had been kind of dusty) so I set about cleaning it for the first time.

I realized that a lot of things were carved into it. Things that looked like plants or triangles and squares. Lots of stuff. But what was carved just above the left side shelves literally made me jump back. In letters approx. 1/2 inch tall, was her last name. And at the risk of giving up one of my favorite aliases, I offer a picture of the carving in question:

It's not the greatest picture, but until I get a better one, this will just have to do. It clearly spells out her last name and now you know why she has the alias she does of "Polo", first given by B or G.

I find it incredibly odd that she'd call me out of nowhere, she'd be assigned a seat next to me in a class a week later, and that I bought a desk and found her name carved into it seven years later.

It's creeping me out even thinking about it.

Jason

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