It's your first week in junior high. You don't know why you were so excited about it throughout the summer holiday, nothing has changed since last year.
Your other classmates acknowledge your existence only when you are assigned a project.
You stopped thinking about it a while ago, and decided you take comfort in the fact that at least your teachers love you.
No, you rephrase.
Your teachers love your knowledge.
No one truly loves you. Well, maybe expect for your parents, but they are never home to let you know if it's still true or not.
Your mother is an artist and your father a teacher. They used to take you with them wherever they traveled, which meant changing schools at least once a year.
When you started high school you told them you'd like to settle in your residence in Boston, so you don't have to change schools anymore. You assured them you can take care of yourself, and that they have no reason to worry.
All they did was smile, kiss you on the cheek and wonder out loud when had you become so responsible and exclaim with surprise how fast time flew past them.
And they turned away, returning to their work.
Two years later, and you still hate yourself for expecting anything else from them.
You have everything anyone could possibly ask for. By the age of ten you have seen more of this world than other people see in their whole life.
Then why do you feel so empty?
A void in your chest that is too stubborn to disappear, no matter how much you read, or learn. Always pressing against the walls of your chest cavity, reminding you.
Reminding you the difference between being lonely and being alone.
Reminding you how you are both.
It's your first week in junior high. And nothing has changed.
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…
You are making your way towards the gym when you hear them. In front of you, you recognize some girls from your English group giggling and whispering and failing miserably at being discreet while pointing at a boy in the yard, sitting on a bench all by himself. Usually you turn your head to see who their victim is this time and then turn away, minding your business, not wasting your time with brainless school girls who believe they have just found their true love every time they spot a good-looking young man.
But something about the way he has his arms sprawled out on top of the bench, or the way he looks up at the sky make you stop and really look at him.
Taking in his posture you assume he is about 6 feet tall, and noticing the hint of facial hair, his broad shoulders and hard angular jaw, you guess he can't be more than one year younger than you.
He stretches and rises from the bench, throwing his leather jacket nonchalantly over one shoulder. You can clearly see the way his muscles clench and then relax underneath his tight white t-shirt.
You haven't seen him before, he is such a fine specimen of human anatomy you would have recognized him if you did.
The kind of boy you'd consider dating, if he turned out to be at least half as smart as he is good-looking.
You continue your way to Physical Education, not seeing the tall brunette standing next to a tree behind you who has been watching you intently for the past 5 minutes.
…
You are currently warming up outside on the football field with the rest of the girls from your class when you see him again. He is sitting on the bleachers, and waving.
Towards you.
You can literally hear the girls' hearts around you pound loudly in their chests.
Yours skips a little too.
You watch the trajectory of his eyes, and then you see it.
He is not waving at you, or anyone around you.
He is waving at a girl about 100 feet away on the field, who is slowly approaching you.
There's no need for all your 167 IQ points to realise she must be the boy's sister. Tall and lean, same angular jaw and raven dark hair with untamed curls framing her face. Even though she is wearing a Red Sox Jersey way too big for her size, when she clenches her fists you can see her muscles are just as well defined as her brother's. Maybe even more.
Next to her is your Physical Education teacher, talking fervently and gesturing excitedly in the air. Her eyes are pinned on her feet, and you can clearly see she is trying to hide her disinterest to what your teacher is saying. After a few moments you see her raise her head and her eyes darting up, probably searching for her brother.
But they don't go all the way up to the bleachers. They stop mid-way.
And land on you.
Her eyes remind you of when you went to Switzerland and tasted the finest chocolate you can remember ever eating in your whole life, or when you were little and you used to go into your mother's dressing room and steal her silk scarf and sleep with your face pressed against it, whenever you had a bad day.
And the way she looks at you makes your hands sweat and your knees weaken. And it's soft and warm and cozy and home.
You must have stared dumbly back at her, because she flashes you half a grin.
Oh.
God.
Dimples.
You saw the ghost of two beautiful miniature valleys grace her cheeks, before disappearing in an instant as she turned her head to look at your teacher and smile politely back at him.
You make a mental note to take a picture of this girl, send it to Mirriam-Webster Dictionary and kindly ask them to submit it as an example picture for the word exquisite.
Because if she is not the most beautiful human being you have ever laid your eyes upon, you clearly have been looking at the wrong people.
You shake yourself and hope your face is once again one of distant disinterest and cool professionalism.
You do want to get to know this new girl. You definitely don't want to do it with another 15 people around you. You tell yourself all you'll do is shake her hand and smile politely at her, but how can you possibly do just that when only the prospect of touching her makes you burst with happiness?
You don't find out, though. As soon as they close the distance, the teacher gestures she should head to the bleachers to where her brother is sitting.
No introduction.
No hand-shaking.
You have never been more relieved and heart-broken in the same time in your whole life.
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…
You spend the rest of your day thinking about that class. She has sat through the entire class watching you.
Intently.
You could feel your skin burning, but it wasn't like grabbing a hot kettle and dropping it because of the heat, no. It was like keeping your hand above a candle, high enough so it doesn't really hurt, but still low enough to feel the heat enter your skin constantly. Like the Chinese water drop, always in the same place, until it became unbearable.
By the end of the class, you talked yourself out of it and convinced yourself again to talk to her at least half a dozen times.
When the teacher finally dismisses the class, she is already gone.
That's the only time you see her or her brother until you go home. You look after her in the hallways, you turn your head during your lunch break twice as much as you did during the last two years of high school combined.
You don't see her, but you know she's there. You feel it in your bones.
And for the first time in your life, you have a feeling you can't explain through science.
It's unnerving.
You don't want it to stop.
…
You're walking towards the black limo waiting in front of the school to take you home, when you feel like a tug at the base of your skull. It's tickling, like an insect landed there. You raise your arm and massage the spot gently, before turning your head.
There she is.
Leaning against the school wall, headphones in, eyes closed.
As soon as your eyes land on her face, she opens her eyelids and looks at you lazily.
You see her lift her chin a little, as if in an act of defiance. Challenging.
You turn your body completely in her direction, and you see her square her shoulders before crossing her arms on her chest. Waiting.
You take a few steps but your stride falters as a dark skinned boy runs towards her and sticks out his hand, introducing himself. She looks at you for another half a second, before talking to the boy in front of her.
You don't wait for her to finish talking, turning back and getting into the car.
It's your junior year in high school. And nothing has changed.
