I have to admit that Chasen has more game than most grown men I have encountered. The first time he proposed to me in class, I was was writing something on the board. I turned around to see him bent on one knee, hands extended in my direction.
"Miss Bass," he said dramatically, "Your smile is like the kiss of Heaven rained down on Earth. You need a man who will treat you right. Will you marry me?"
The class began to giggle. Some kids just rolled their eyes.
I bit my lip. "No Chasen," I said. "But thank you for asking."
"Is there somebody else?" he asked, puzzled.
"No. I'm too old for you."
"Age ain't nothin' but a number, Miss Bass," he replied.
"Sit down, Chasen."
Chasen winked at me then walked back to his seat. A few minutes later he was blowing kisses to the girls on the other side of the classroom.
A few days later, I pulled Chasen aside after class and asked him what the matter was. His grades from sixth to seventh grade had gradually declined, his focus becoming weaker and weaker. He was not doing anything in my class but socializing and falling asleep, and his homework record was abysmal.
Chasen shrugged. "I can't focus, Miss Bass," he said. "I got too much on my mind."
"Like what?" I asked.
"Girls," he said, grinning. "I can't get them out of my head."
"But you are going to have to. The little girls at this age are fickle anyway," I replied. "You need to wait for a young lady who is smart and has a head on her shoulders instead of going after these fast, crazy ones."
Chasen scrunched his nose up. "But the smart girls ain't pretty," he said. "They busted."
"Oh, Chasen," I said with a sigh. "There is more to being pretty, you know. And the girls you easily overlook now won't always be like that. Besides, any girl that you want won't be putting herself out there the way most of them do these days. She will be brave enough to be her own person, and her focus will be on doing well in school."
Chasen eyed me skeptically. "I don't knoooooow, Miss Bass," he answered. "I love girls now though."
"Have you ever heard of Samson in the Bible?" I asked him.
Chasen shook his head.
"Classic example," I replied. "He was the strongest and handsomest man of his time. No other man could compete with him. All they could do was hate. God gave Samson a particular kind of strength that wasn't common among human beings, and a sign of his strength was his long hair. With this strength, he could kill small armies by himself, tear apart wild animals with his bare hands, knock over walls and buildings, and so on. He was a good man, until he fell for a woman named Delilah. And I'm not gonna lie - Delilah was one bad woman. She was gorgeous, which is why Samson lost his mind and fell googly eyed all over her."
"What happened?" Chasen asked.
"Oh, well," I said solemnly. "It's actually quite tragic. Samson starting acting stupid when it came to Delilah because all he saw was pretty. He ignored the fact that she was from the enemy tribe of his people, not to mention one trifling chick. She wanted to know what the secret to his strength was, and because he had to keep it a secret, she would throw a fit and become emotional and tell him that he didn't love her. She would cry and yell and pout and ask him over and over again, until..."
I paused.
"What?!" Chasen exclaimed.
"Samson, because of his crazy love for her, ignored the signs and gave in to Delilah's request, telling her that his strength stayed with him as long as his hair remained uncut. And you know what she did?" I asked.
Chasen closed his eyes and shook his head. "Don't tell me he got played, Miss Bass. Don't tell me he got played."
"Oh he so got played," I said. "The next day Delilah shaved Samson's head while he was sleeping and then sold him to his enemies for a bag of cash."
Chasen's jaw dropped. "Awwwwww, that's cold," he said.
"Yep," I answered. "And do you know what his enemies did to him?"
"What?"
"They poked out his eyes."
"Oh my god!" Chasen exclaimed. "She dirty, man! Dirty!"
"Yes she was," I said. "And, you know, Samson ended up getting revenge because when his hair grew back, he had just enough strength to knock down the building where a lot of the enemy leaders were, but he died with them when the building collapsed. And all of that could have been avoided if he had just listened to what people were telling him.
"But," I continued. "All he saw was pretty."
"Ohhhhhh," he said nodding. "I see what you sayin'."
"Exactly," I said. "So wait for a good woman who is smart first and then possibly pretty too."
Chasen stared at me quietly. Then he dropped to one knee.
"Marry me, Miss Bass!" he exclaimed.
"Chasen, get out," I said.
"Aww, but you sai-"
"Out!"
"Aww, man," he mumbled. "A brotha' cain't do anything right these days..."
* * *
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