II. Lonely Heart

I stayed up half the night trying to figure out what I would say. Melissa was the outgoing one. She would simply walk up to him and just “take him”—envision that how you will. I couldn’t do that. I hadn’t tried since fifth grade and ended up stuttering my way through it all, but recovered as he had gone into a sneezing fit, nearly blacked out and went to the school nurse.

Needless to say, nothing became of that and he moved away at the end of the year so we could never “try again” as others had over the years of liking, hating, infatuating, loathing and then on to speaking terms in high school.

Next to Melissa, I was a wall-flower, a lamppost on the side of the road watching everyone speed past. That was okay, I mean, love is over-rated in books and movies but the feeling of being left at home on a Saturday night reading chemistry book for an assignment that’s not due until Wednesday can gnaw on your heart.

I admit, I had that feeling in the past and, most likely, I’d have it again, but maybe for a few days I could feel the euphoria of someone likening me. Yes, that sounds one-sided, and so much like the girl in a bad vampire romance novel but I wanted it. I didn’t fully know love but I knew what I liked on the outside.

“Maybe he’s not a nice guy on the inside,” I whispered to myself. I could meet him, say a few things and see that he wasn’t worth the hours I spent over nothing.

I shot up from my bed and paced back and forth a few times before looking at the clock. I had seven hours before I had to go to school. That wouldn’t be enough time to think about everything.

I slept the entire ride to school, even with Melissa gunning the engine. The fog in my brain was so thick I wasn’t sure I could even walk. Melissa said nothing, at least I wasn’t sure if she said anything because she was gone when I woke up, still in the car with my neck in painful position.
I got out of the car, grabbed my backpack, and then stretched out before closing the door. Fortunately, no one had walked by at that point. In fact, it was very quiet. The buses were not our in front of the school and there was no one across the street at the smoke hole.

My watch read eight-thirty. First period had started thirty minutes prior.

“Crap.”