All frozen behind glass, forever. All eternally posing for the camera; posing for the future. In a thousand years, the deeds and accomplishments of the class of 2000 may be long since forgotten, but the picture will last until the end of time. The first row will forever contain the short. The second row will forever contain the short but unwilling to admit it. The back will forever contain those just trying to stay out of the picture. Forever they will be trying not to be where they were.

He had always hated class pictures. The ritual grooming, the false faces full of teeth, the cameraman saying the same lame pun about Limburger cheese. Now his life at this instant was trapped behind glass and framed on a wall for posterity. Future generations could now come and see how once he had a picture taken. His hair was nicely combed and he had his tie on right, but his acne was still faintly visible even in the fingernail-sized portion of the photo. Future generations would be able to see that he got a pimple on his nose the very night before the picture. Every atom of his life would be fixed into place for the whole world to look at even as he himself was decomposing in a cemetery halfway across the country. The finality of it all made him sick. His head reeled as he stared straight up at the future. Afterwards, he nearly threw up.

The past, science tells us, is frozen. Everything about the past can be known, whereas the future is uncertain. All that is known about the future, say quantum mechanists, is what will probably happen. After that, it is all up to the cosmic dice.

He decided now was the end of the past for him. He would throw it away and start again. The first step to a new future, as he saw it, was to talk to the girl. He had been in love with her for a few months, but it seemed to him that he had been born in love with her. In reality, this was just the latest crush in a short life that had already known three or four other crushes. He wanted to talk to her, but the thought of it made him nauseated. His stomach tensed as he went through Rube Goldberg like plots in his mind.

All of the schemes assume that a lack of information is more likely to win her. Fear of being revealed weighs so heavy on his mind that his first rule is not to leak any clues to anyone. Were someone to ask if he 'liked' her, he would blush and deny it. He would protest against it outwardly, and inwardly be racked by fear of being caught. He fears nothing more than being seen looking lovingly into her eyes. Suddenly, his thoughts turned to the object and his soul cried out in anguish.

Her long raven black hair, like the night sky.

Her soft skin, white like milk.

Her laugh like a thousand gentle waterfalls.

Her chest like perfect pillows.

"No!" his heart cried back.

Pain is an experience overly intense. Looking at the bright light causes pain in the eyes. Touching something sharp causes pain in the fingers. Hearing a loud noise causes pain in the ears. Feeling too much causes pain in the heart. Masochists don't seek pleasure from pain, they are merely hedonists with a high tolerance for pleasure.

His soul was tossed between two equally horrifying prospects. The first prospect: being alone. The second prospect: being known. He feared being alone, old and dead with nothing left of him but photographs of the past. A past made immutable, impotent by the choices he made each second. At the same time, he feared being too close. Giving some one else too much power. Letting them come so close that the extended hand could slap as easily as caress. So he shoved people away in order to be unhurt. What he had not counted on was the hedgehog's dilemma. The hedgehog's real problem is the quills are sharp on both ends. To protect from pain, he hurt himself. While biting your tongue, maybe a punch doesn't feel so bad.

"No," he said again more softly. He was tired of running. Tired of hiding his thoughts where they couldn't be turned against him. He decided that it was time. It was time to jump off the cliff into the abyss. Time to cross the Rubicon and fight a civil war. Time to put the gun in his mouth and see what he really believed.

"Don't!" screamed a certain other part of him. The part that feared change, the part that feared the unknown, the part that saw daggers in men's smiles. Again, the reply came back, "No." He believed it was time. The time was not tomorrow or the next day or even yesterday. The time was now. He was spurred on by two forces. The fear of the great unknown, the future, and the lie of forever.

The lie of forever is a song all young lovers sing. It's chorus is very simple. "Forever, forever, I'll love you forever. I'll never change; tomorrow will be today. Forever, forever." The chorus is sung in order to fight off the forces of doubt, the gnawing realities. "You have little in common. All will be different in the future. Your love cannot last against the changing backdrop of your lives..."

He sang himself the song of forever. He tried to believe. He screwed up his courage. He really felt like vomiting. He forgot. He forgot that time would change them both in ways they could scarcely imagine. That he never had a full conversation with her. That they had little in common besides going to the same school. That he lived on a tiny planet in a universe so vast his brain could never fully understand even a small part of its vastness. He forgot as hard as he could.

He thought about the photograph and realized he was living life without a time machine. He was not allowed to go back and fix his mistakes. He would not be allowed to yell, "Do over!" if he missed his one shot. There were no "1Up" mushrooms and if he didn’t save the princess, she wouldn’t be saved.

Einstein realized people cannot feel themselves moving with a high velocity; they can only feel a change in acceleration or deceleration. This is why we do not feel the earth moving around the sun or a car moving at a constant speed. We move around the sun uniformly, so we cannot feel it. So too in life, no one notices the high school years speeding on by until graduation, when it all comes to a crashing halt. The photograph made him look at the landscape and realize that his life was rushing past outside the window. He wanted the car to pull over so he could live in today forever, like a comic strip character forever wearing the same clothes, but he couldn't find the brakes. With no way to stop he decided to at least take the wheel.

With the full weight of history behind him, all of civilization to this point, billions of people living and dying, entering and exiting until now, when he was on center stage, he approached her.

"Hey," he said with great trepidation and fading nerve. His heart beat so hard he could feel it and his stomach proceeded to tie a Gordian knot. A knot that if untied would prove him destined to conquer the whole world.

"Do you want something?" she said in a tone which trained psychologists could not have designed to be more disarming to him.

"Uh… No," he said beating a hasty retreat.

Undoing his tie with one hand, he locks himself into the bathroom stall. Kneeling before the toilet, tears in the corners of his eyes, with the full weight of history behind him, all of civilization to this point, billions of people living and dying, entering and exiting until now, when he is on center stage, he vomits.

Click. Flash. Fear of abandonment.