Average Life ch.1 Nobody's perfect.
"Hey, do you know what grade that kid in?" I asked my best friend Anna as we walked by ourselves in the worn track during gym.
"You mean Josh?" she asked.
"Yeah." I had known what his name was, but I just didn't want it to seem like I was super interested. I also knew Josh wasn't in the eight grade, which meant he had to be younger than us. Be interested in a lower-grade kid? Ewww.
But he was really hot.
"I dunno, probably seventh or something." Anna replied, breaking my train of thought. I nodded absent-mindedly, anxious to get off the subject.
"so are you going to Lanie's Christmas party next weekend?" I asked her. Lanie was one of my best friends, and was also one of Anna's friends, although Anna claimed she didn't like her.
Anna was weird like that.
"Yeah, I'm going. I wonder who will be there."
"Probably just a bunch of girls." Me and Anna's group of friends were the athletic, sporty bunch at our school.
And completely anti-boy.
Me and Anna weren't though. At least I wasn't, and I'm pretty sure Anna wasn't either.
"Yeah, probably. But if it was your party, would you invite any guys?" Anna shot back at me.
"Probably not." I admitted, "But that's just because this is my first year at this school." It was a pretty lame excuse, but it was true. At least, that's what I told myself, but let's face it- I was maybe just a little bit possibly kind of boy shy.
Maybe.
"Yeah, me neither." Anna laughed. Even though it was only my first year at this school, we had become best-friends right away. It was weird how we had almost the same opinion on everything, and also got the same grades, missed the same numbers on test…
Weird.
We continued to awkwardly walk, and I desperately wracked my brain for another subject to talk about.
"Did you see Samantha's shorts last night at church?" I asked. When in doubt, gossip.
"Ugh, those things were up her butt. They wouldn't be appropriate at the beach, let alone God's house." Anna snorted in disgust, and I couldn't help but laugh. Samantha was one of our favorite people to hate on.
"I know right? It's ridiculous how she can think she looks good in them. No offense to her, but… she's not exactly the smallest person." We both giggled, and I felt a little guilty. I know that throwing in the occasional "no offense" doesn't make what your saying any less hurtful, but it was so hard not say something mean every now and then, with all the hatefulness that goes around a middle school. It was like a constant battle in my mind- What God would want me to say, or what the devil thinks would be a juicy piece of gossip. Sometimes, I feared the devil was winning.
I was a Christian, and so was Anna, although I didn't think she was as faithful as I was. There you go again, judging other people. I mentally slapped myself. We both went to the same church, though I hardly ever saw her there. When I tried to convince her to come with me one Wednesday night, she had relented, saying she was busy. I didn't push her on it.
The substitute coach blew the whistle, and we left to go dress back in.
"so Anna, are you coming to my birthday party this weekend?" I asked Anna as we sat on the gym bleachers. I tried to ask casually as I tyed my, shoe, not wanting to make her feel like she had to go.
"Yeah, I told you yesterday I was."
"Oh." That caught me off guard- had I really been sleeping that much this week? Well, I was on my period…
My thoughts were momentarily distracted by Taylor Colley walking into the gym. Taylor was my friend, I would like to think, but she was more of one of those "Really sweet outside of school but at school she acts like she has something to prove." She was popular. More so then I was, but hey, I haven't even been at this school for half a year! But, inside of me, I truly knew I would never be anywhere close to as popular as Taylor. She was pretty, had a ninth grade boyfriend, and plenty of other friends- girls and boys- flocking around all the time. What else could you want? In some ways, I thought that my friends were holding me back. I would love to have a boyfriend, but I though that maybe a guy would see me with all of these other girls who didn't seem to want a boyfriend, and think that I didn't want one either.
Nah, that's a lame excuse. Guys just didn't like me.
I wasn't exactly pretty, and although I dint have bad acne, I would get random break outs that were annoying bright red, and very raised of my skin. I was also tall, which I hated, and so that limited me to two options- 1. Date someone who was shorter than me (awkward) or 2. Find somebody that was taller than me.
I'm pretty sure that those were my two most unattractive flaws though I'm sure I could be a bit funnier, or wittier, and maybe my hips were a little plump and made me look box from the back.
But hey, nobody's perfect.
