She gave herself away with her hand—
    the way it floated across the paper, so indiscreet.
  And she passed to me the note.
“One hundred and twenty.” I know what she means.
   Ten minutes crawl by, and I scribble my response:
1-1-0.    (It’s a game we like to play.)
I look up to her face from my paper. She’s smiling.
    Smiling at me, with her eyes.
Those eyes, only described as intense. They are so.  {Ninety.}
[Sometimes you meet people who change the way you think.
    Especially when the way you think is tainted.]                      {8-0.}
Her eyes searched through my past, filtering my defense.
   I was afraid because I had let her in so quickly.
     (Like the others, I thought. Worried.)                        {Sixty left.}
But she stopped. And she listened. Then, she related.
  It was strange, having someone who could repeat out loud the sentence playing
                             Over and over in my mind:
“That was the worst experience of my life.”
(And really understand what it meant.)                    {4-0 still to go.}
   It was relieving, not having to explain,
      because she already knew.
She knows who I am because oddly enough, she is really the same.             {Only twenty more.}
    Different decisions and different paths, yet
     Similar experiences to share with each other.
Someone, I feel, who won’t let me down this time.
  Maybe she won’t always understand,
but I know she will definitely try.                                                                           {Zero.}
   Class is finally done.
      The lesson is over.