True Confessions of a Buddhist Jock
by Kate
Kyle got hooked.
He didn't mean to -- it was just so easy. "Buddhism for Beginners," that was the light stuff. Pretty soon he was into tales of the life of Siddhartha; a golden prince who left his city to see the world and discovered true suffering. Some of it reminded him of Evans. He read about bodhisattvas and nonbeing and it kept getting simpler, clearer... more reassuring.
Then he found out about eastern Buddhism, which was some interesting shit. The Japanese stuff, in particular -- some of the koan seemed pretty damn pointless, like "What is the sound of one hand clapping?" Maybe the lesson would've seemed more valuable if he hadn't had a friend on the team who had weird joints and could make one hand clap. But he still found himself reading the books more and more frequently, until he'd have an urge to read when his father was in the house and would have to go outside or drive down to the Crashdown to sit in the breakroom with Maria, who didn't give two shits what he was reading, or at least pretended not to.
Eventually he scrounged some Taoism from the local library. Going there was bad enough. He wore sunglasses and attached himself to this old couple and walked in slowly, looking down. The place was deserted inside, and it didn't take him long to find what he wanted, though he did it in a rush, feeling blood rise in his face every time somebody walked by his computer terminal.
Then he was alone with the books in the basement level, sitting cross-legged between the stacks. Free-flow. Flux. Elements blending in harmony with an omnipresent force. Not-knowing as the highest form of knowledge. "Did you realize that just now I had lost the me?" asked one philosopher, and his insides clenched in recognition.
He even learned how to pronounce the funky Chinese transliterations correctly.
It was all downhill from there. Liz asked him to drive her to a Students for a Free Tibet meeting at the high school and gave him a strange sidelong look when he mumbled something about waiting rather than coming back to get her. She let him stay, but the next time he went to the Crashdown, Maria asked what the hell he was always reading.
She snatched the book out of his hands before he could duck out of the room and stared at it, frozen between laughter and horror.
"Muladyamakarika?"
"I can explain."
She skewered him with whittled green eyes. "Kyle, this is serious. My mom reads that stuff. You do realize that it's deep philosophy, right? I mean, that's one hardcore Buddhist text you've got there."
"I--"
She stared him down. "The first step is admitting that you have a problem."
"I do not!"
"Look, if something's changed your entire lifestyle, then you've got a big problem. Remember when Liz first decided that she wanted to be a scientist, and then she started talking about us like we were an experiment and tried to make us go out on a date so she could study our behavior?"
Kyle glared back and grabbed the book, holding it to his side. "That was eighth grade, De Luca."
"Yeah, well, this is a lot worse! I mean, that's just a career. This is Buddhism. And you're a jock."
It went on like that for a while -- Maria usually did -- and he finally had to pay her to make her shut up. It cut into his fund for late fines and photocopying, but it was worth it. If anybody else found out... Liz Parker and her crew weren't the best secret-keepers even with a lot more incentive, but he had to try.
Hell, he figured, everybody in Roswell had something shameful to hide.
And since he knew most of their secrets, that suited his inner balance just fine.
End
disclaimer: none of them are mine, especially the buddha. i'm not buddhist or taoist, i've just spent too much time with my chinese poetry textbook lately -- so don't flame me if i've misrepresented something, okay? thanks!
author's website: http://www.geocities.com/moonwhip
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