Disclaimer: Mine, they aren't.

Telling Him

By: Skitso

His mom and my mom are friends. When we started school together, living on the same street, but never really friends, our moms decided we should car pool. Every day for three and a half years I have ridden to school with him right beside me, first in the back seat of my mom's tiny colt, or his mother's more spacious station wagon, and now, separated by the consol between us, he's driving, and I am sitting quietly in the passenger's seat of his precious Mustang.

And his hand is just laying there, and its hard to resist the urge to lace my fingers through his, trace lines up and down his arms, anything really. But I do resist. I always have. I always will.

"Well, ready for another day in paradise?" he asks, flashing me a lopsided smile, one of his many features that drive me crazy. In a good way, I mean.

I sigh and grab my backpack and together we trudge through the parking lot, through the crowded halls, only stopping when we have finally reached the senior locker bay. He turns the combo on our locker and then yells when it doesn't open. He punches it hard, twice, and then the door falls open, and some of our books fall to the floor.

I lean down to pick them up at the same time he does, and as we reach for my history book, our hands brush lightly. He doesn't notice, but I do, and even though it was fleeting, my hand tingles where the tips of his fingers grazed it.

…

We're in gym now, and Coach Z is making us play basketball. "Come on," he says, throwing the ball hard at my chest. "Play."

"No thanks," I say, throwing it back. Unlike his throw, mine is weak and the ball bounces before it reaches him. "Suit yourself," he says, his voice sounding a little bit annoyed.

I watch him for a while, playing the game with random members of our gym class, Jack, Dutchy, Amy. The bell rings after a while and I hardly notice it, so entranced I am by the way he moves. It's graceful, like a cat. One final jump shot, which Jack tries to block, but falls over instead, and then laughing, he's ready to leave.

So he drapes his arm over my shoulders, and pulls me along, not thinking twice about the effects his actions are having on me.

Back in the hall, he's getting ready to go to algebra, and I'm fishing for my copy of A Separate Peace, and with my head in our locker, I can hear Melissa Parks.

"Hi Adam," she says, and I hear him return the greeting casually. "Walk me to class?" she asks. I pull my head out of my locker and turn to stare at him, and I think he senses it because he snaps his head around. It's on the tip of my tongue to tell him what I've been wanting to for so long now. He smiles at me, and then nods to Melissa and I watch them disappear down the hall, chatting amiably as they do.

I slam our locker shut and lean my back against it.

I'll never say it, no matter how much I want to.

…

"How'd your math test go?" he asks when we're back in his car later, pulling our seatbelts over our shoulders, because he's so concerned about safety. Only the question wasn't posed at me.

Melissa shrugs from the passenger seat. "I think I did okay. I might have pulled off an A-. That last question was so hard."

They talk all the way to her house and I'm starting to wonder if they even remember they have back seat company. He pulls up to her driveway and then leaves the car running while he walks her to the door.

I stay where I am and pout. I liked this neighborhood a lot better before Melissa lived in it. She moved here the summer after we started high school and she has a thing for Skittery. She has good taste.

When Skittery and I were in Kindergarten, he pushed me down the slide and when I hit the bottom, I cut my lip.

After that we were inseparable. As he comes back down the driveway, rubbing his hands together in the cold air, a wide grin on his face, I wonder if he remembers that.

So I ask him.

He laughs. "All these years…I totally forgot."

His smile fades and he looks at me again. "Is something wrong?"

"Nope."

"You can move up, you know. I feel like a chauffer with you back there."

I stay where I am and turn to stare out of my window. I can feel his eyes on me for a few more seconds, and then he puts the car in reverse and pulls away. "Suit yourself," he says. He sounds mad, but I don't care.

I shouldn't feel angry. Melissa told him how she feels. I didn't. But I had hoped maybe he would figure it out on his own, that I wouldn't have to throw myself at him.

But maybe that's what he likes.

"If you need to talk…" he says, stopping in front of my house, not bothering to walk me to my door.

I don't say anything, just slam my door and stomp up my walkway and through the front door, which I also slam.

…

When I turned seventeen, Skittery and I rented a whole bunch of movies and sat on the old couch in my basement watching them, eating pizza, and drinking his favorite, root beer. "If you can't have the real thing, you might as well pretend," he always said.

He was angry that night because I insisted on watching Lord of the Rings, but he hates those movies. He watched them anyway because it was my birthday, at least that was what he said.

And so we sat on the couch, and we were sort of leaning close to each other. I wanted to tell him then. To take him in my arms and just hold him. But I didn't.

I fell asleep on him and he left before I woke up the next morning for work.

Then once, I got really sick with the flu and he brought me a can of chicken soup. Then he cooked it for me and we sat there in my bedroom eating soup and just talking, and I felt something, and I was sure he felt it too by the way he let his eyes linger on mine for long periods of time. Or how he kept touching my leg whenever he laughed at his own jokes. Or the way he kept asking if I needed anything or if I was warm enough, or was I sure I didn't need any more medicine.

Then I was back at school, and the lingering glances stopped and he hardly looked at me, and I felt heart broken. Especially when he started spending more time with Melissa, and canceling our plans all of the time.

Once, he called me on the phone and it wasn't like all of the other times. Our conversation was brief and awkward and I couldn't help but wonder…

"uh…sorry to bother you….I was thinking…"

"Congratulations!"

"No…uh…" Insert long, long awkward pause.

"Skittery?"

"…do you…have the history notes from yesterday?"

And my heart broke again.

"Yeah. I'll give them to you tomorrow."

And that was it. And he kept avoiding me.

…

"You've been really quiet," he says later. We're sitting on my front porch on opposite sides of the swing. He tells me he had started to drive home but my face popped up in his mind and he had to come and check on me. I looked so sad.

"I'm always quiet." I reply, quietly to stress my point.

"Not around me."

He scoots closer and puts a hand on my leg and the contact sends shivers up my spine. I want to look at him so bad but I control myself. "How's Melissa?" I ask, and I think that catches him off guard because he pulls away suddenly.

"Fine, I guess. Why?" And then I take a chance and look over at him. And then I can't look away because of the look he's giving me.

He has the most beautiful eyes I have ever seen.

"I dunno." I shrug, and I can't take my eyes away no matter how hard I try.

"Tell me what's wrong."

"I already told you. Nothing is wrong."

And this time I do pull my eyes away and I stand up and he does too. "Just go home," I mutter. "Call Melissa or something."

"This is about Melissa?" he asks.

"It's about a lot of things."

"You just said nothing was wrong."

"I lied."

And then I slam my door in his face.

I'm sitting in my bedroom at my desk with a blank sheet of paper in front of me, a pen in my hand.

There's so much I want to say, but how do I say it?

And so I close my eyes and I think. About him. About us. And his face fills my mind, and his laugh, and the way he smells, walks, talks, breathes, lives.

I love him because he quit smoking just for me, because I told him that my grandpa died from cancer. Cold turkey.

And I love him because he knows, he knows, when I've had a rotten day and he always comes to check on me.

And I love those awkward pauses in our conversations because he could be thinking the same thing I think, and that gives me hope.

And he hates math, and I love that too.

He can play the piano and once he wrote me a song. It was silly and whimsical, but I have a recording of it and I listen to it all the time. Because I love him and I can't help but think deep down that he feels the same.

I need to tell him.

I open my eyes again and then my pen starts moving, almost on its own.

In its completed form, the letter is short, simple, but to the point. It says what it needs to.

…

The next day is Saturday, and I miss seeing his tired face at my doorstep, yelling at me to hurry because he can't be late for biology again even though he's getting an A.

I tie my shoelaces, pull my hoodie on over my jeans, and with the letter in my pocket, I pull open the door.

The sun is bright but deceiving. The air is frigid. My car is in the shop so I have to settle on walking to his house, which I am okay with because it gives me time to calm my nerves.

Only I think I'm more nervous when I'm finally standing on his doorstep, staring at the doorbell and willing myself to ring it.

But I don't.

I can't.

I don't know why, because the letter says everything I feel and just having him know would be a huge weight off my chest.

Even if he doesn't feel the same way back.

So I turn to leave and I'm halfway down the sidewalk when I hear the front door open. I spin around and there he is, looking surprised to see me.

"Did you knock?" he asks, stopping where he is.

"Uh…no…"

"Oh…"

And there's an awkward pause and a million things are running through my head, him being the main one, and we're just looking at each other, his deep brown eyes locked on mine.

"I was thinking about you last night…" he says it quickly, and then breaks eye contact to look at the ground. I take a step forward.

"Why?" I ask.

"I was worried…You seemed so mad at me and I couldn't figure out why."

"I was a jerk yesterday."

"Yeah you were." He cracks a grin and looks up at me again. This time he steps forward, and my breath catches in my chest. "I was on my way to your house," he says. Then he gulps.

"I was on my way to yours," I reply stupidly.

"You're here…what did you want?"

I take a deep breath and then reach into my pocket. My hand closes around the letter, and I pull it out slowly telling myself I can still forget the whole thing and just tell him I'm here to borrow a CD. But my hand is already out and stretched toward him.

I've been staring down at the grass and when I look up, I realize his hand is stretched out toward mine. He's holding a folded piece of paper, just like the one I'm holding.

"W-what's that?" I ask, not bothering to lower my hand.

He doesn't lower his either.

"I told you I was thinking last night," he says. And I'm surprised he's still looking at me. "I-I needed to tell you…" he trails off. "Just take it."

"Only if you take this one."

"Deal."

The switch is awkward and quick, and we avoid any contact but now we're holding our notes to each other, and my hands are shaking. I'm afraid to say the least. I suddenly want nothing more than to grab my letter back and tear off down the street. I'll move to Alaska. He'll never find me.

Not that he'll want to once he reads that letter.

"Don't open it here," he says, putting a hand over mine. I shiver at the touch and he pulls his hand away. "Sorry," he mutters. I want to tell him not to be. My hand is his for the taking, but my mouth is sealed shut. "I just don't want to see your reaction…"

"What are you?"

"Just read it when you get home." He glances down at the letter in his own hands and then smiles at me, and I'm not sure if it's a sympathetic smile or not.

He turns away and goes back into his house. He stares out at me from his window until I turn away and start back toward home.

I wonder if he's read it yet.

At home, I take my time. I hang up my hoodie, light a fire, fix myself a mug of hot chocolate.

Now, sitting in front of the fireplace, I stare at the paper in my hands and I am terrified of what I might find inside. But there's a small glimmer of hope.

That's what drives me to unfold it.

My name is written across the top, almost carefully as though he worked on it forever.

Then below that,

Please don't hate me. Right, like that's even possible. I've just…there have been things on my mind lately, and I've wanted to tell you.

I just didn't know how.

Until yesterday when I saw you looking so sad, and for the first time, you wouldn't tell me what was wrong. And then you looked so mad at me. You've never been mad at me.

I guess I haven't been very nice to you lately. I haven't exactly been mean to you but…whenever I see you in the hallways, there's nothing more I want to do than slam you into a locker and kiss you senseless.

Wait. What? I reread the last part again. It does in fact say "kiss" and not "beat."

My heart starts beating faster as I continue.

So I tried to avoid you, because I was so sure you would be scared off. I couldn't stand being so close to you, and not being able to hold you like I wanted to.

Please don't let this affect our friendship. Because I couldn't stand it if you hated me. I just needed to tell you. I love you.

My hands are shaking by the time I get to the last line beneath which he has written in his girlie scrawl love, Skittery.

And I can't help but smile.

Suddenly my phone rings and when I pick up it's him. He sounds breathless and excited and I wonder for a second if maybe he's calling to tell me he gave me the wrong note.

"I just read your letter," he says.

Here it comes. This could go either way.

"I read yours, too."

There's silence.

Then,

"There's a great Italian restaurant down town. You wanna go get some lunch? Maybe a movie after?"

"Like a date, maybe?"

"Uh…well, that's what I was hoping for but if you'd rather—"

"I'd love to."

I can almost hear him smiling.

He talks fast when he's excited. "So, I'll just get my shoes and stuff and we can go, right?"

"If you can pick me up…"

"Of course! You're my date!"

"So you're paying?"

"Yup. And I'll even hold doors open for you."

"Such a gentleman. You may just get a kiss tonight."

"I think I'd like that very much."

He tells me he's coming to get me and so I run upstairs to change into something nice. Nice jeans and a button up shirt, red, Skittery's favorite color.

And then I go downstairs and wait.

And I can't help but smile.

A/N: I have no idea... it just hit me, listening to "I love you" by Celine Dion…I needed to write some fluff. And now that I have, I feel so much more relaxed…BTW…the narrator is whoever you want it to be…I know who it is in my mind…but…dream away people, dream away…