Chapter 3: All the Facts
I go up the stairs of the building in which my form class is located. Someone's behind me and I end up holding the door at the top for ages because I'm too worried that they'll be offended if I let it slam in their face, even though technically that face is very far from the door and they probably wouldn't even notice.
I go through my classroom door and avoid the eves of the one and only, Miss Garrison (yep, still 'Miss'). I feel like she wants me to say 'Hello' to her since she had a go at me once for not doing so, saying I would fail at life if I couldn't greet people properly.
That offended me.
However, I sucked up my pride and started saying it. Then she called me crazy and told me that I needed medicine to fix my brain so I stopped.
Since that ReAlLy offended me.
Phew. Made it. Haha. Phew. Yeah. I'm sitting down now. Putting bag under table. Just sitting.
"Hey Tweek."
"Hey Conifer."
"Conifer? Really?" Craig glares at me jokingly, used to me always replacing his name with random words that I pretend make sense.
"Yeah. Really it fits you perfectly." Oh no, I'm going to start babbling. "You're like, monotonous right. You seem to watch over everything in silence but you don't do it in a way that makes it seem like you hate what you're watching. Instead, it's like you're interested in what's going on. Therefore, you have like, the wise old nature of a tree. Hence, you're a conifer tree."
Did I really just call this guy a conifer tree? What in God's name is wrong with me?
I can't look at Craig's face. He sounds like he's smiling slightly as he says "Oh yeah?" though. That's good I guess.
I need to think of something to say or the silence is going to start again.
Miss Garrison starts calling out names so luckily I don't have to worry about this anymore. I observe the classroom while waiting for mine to be called.
Once more, this building is rather new to the school. Luckily it has managed to avoid the chipping away of said newness that can be seen in the tech department since it is only used for (in my opinion) pointless classes like…Sex Ed and Drug lectures and all that. And no, I'm not saying we don't need them, I just think they're only useful if taught well. I don't think I can listen to someone talking about caring for people with mental illness when they have personally called you crazy before (Miss Garrison is the teacher I'm talking about by the way).
Anyway, because of that, this place is pretty neat. It has the same boring blue carpet as the rest of the school, the same off-white walls and not-completely-open-able windows. Some of which are covered in newspaper for some inexplicable reason – lack of blinds I guess. This whole building has always felt rather cheap like that to me. It's clean but it feels paper thin, like one of those collapsible building things. From outside it looks like it could be bulldozed in one go. On the inside it seems sturdier but still has a strange paper-like quality about it. This place seems flimsy…unreal.
The room that I am currently in has tables arranged in a horseshoe shape, with very long sides. I sit facing the door and right next to the teacher's desk (definitely not something that pleases me). Nobody sits on the chair to my right, closest to Miss. Garrison's desk, partially because they don't want to be near Miss. Garrison and partially since they don't want to be near me since I'm apparently too 'sarcastic' for them or something. I don't really care that they don't like me but I don't like how they confronted my apparent sarcasm in the past so easily. When I first started speaking to everyone in our class, most of whom were new to me, I tried to be really friendly 'cause, y'know, I wanted friends.
Then one day, this kid comes up to me and says, "Hey, why are you so sarcastic?" and in seeing a look of surprise on my face continues, "It's just, you seem kind of rude sometimes and you offend people a bit. I don't have anything against you, I'm just asking for everyone else."
I told him that I wasn't even sure I ever had been sarcastic and, in a daze, said that I didn't want to offend anybody. The question left me kind of upset so I asked people from other classes about it, like Matthew, and found out that my whole form didn't like me for some reason that I couldn't comprehend. I didn't bother feeling upset about this anymore and instead decided that I would just not bother trying to make friends in the form anymore, leading to Craig being the only one who ever really talks to me, besides some random chats with people when we're in lessons and stuff.
This is why Craig is the one who sits on my right. He gets on with everyone just fine. Well, he gets on with people most of the time but he's that kid who kind of gets in trouble a lot and has a couple of fist fights here and there that lead to a few detentions but nothing too serious.
My relationship with him is kind of funny. When we were way younger, we had this sort of actual 'relationship' relationship. A fake romance created because some random people wanted it or something. We just both went along with it for a while because it didn't really cause any harm. After about a year, Craig told me that he was worried he'd not be able to date someone for real if they thought he was in a relationship with me though so we called it off. A couple of people were upset but the fuss had kind of died down by then so it was cool. I was fine with the situation too; I only went along with it 'cause he wanted me to.
So, five-ish years later, here I am, sitting next to him as the only person willing to talk to me.
I feel like a monster because a couple of weeks ago I started to realise that I might have a bit of a crush on him.
Don't get me wrong. I do like girls. I've had loads of crushes before. None of them pursued 'cause I'm scared as hell of that idea but nonetheless they have existed. At the beginning of this school year, I had a couple of random dreams about guys but nothing too intense and none of them about Craig.
Then, one day I'm in the same class as him and this girl asks me, "Are you straight?" right in front of him and, since I'm not completely sure, I say "Probably."
I swear that 'probably' has ruined my life. I guess it made me question what Craig would think about how I didn't say 'yes' and how he'd react to the notion of me not in fact being straight completely.
To be honest, he made it worse. I'm not sure if it was on purpose but, every now and then, in those lessons, he seemed to be remarking upon his straightness an awful lot. He never said it directly to me but he'd be talking with his friends and I'd overhear "I'm completely straight" or something like that and it made me think about it more since he was so on the defensive.
In following lessons, I'd hear him discussing 'celebrity crushes' with his mates and I felt like this added to my intrigue about what he was thinking.
One day, he's wandering around the classroom (this lesson is woodworking so it's kind of free since we have projects which we have to design and evaluate on computers in one classroom and make in another with one teacher supervising both rooms) and he starts talking about how he was doing loads of exercise for his legs yesterday and now they're super 'ripped' or whatever (Craig is very straightforward and sometimes egotistical about these things). There are only three people in the classroom: Craig, Clyde and me. So, after Craig has talked to Clyde about his legs, he comes up to me and places his leg on the chair next to me, bent like he's about to step up onto the chair.
He says, "See, feel it."
And I blush. At this point, I didn't even really think about Craig 'like that' yet, I'm just a very not physical interaction type person: I don't hug, I don't discuss sex and I don't touch people's legs. I told him that I didn't want to touch his leg but he kept insisting that I should and told me there wasn't anything weird about it.
In the end, he tried forcing me to, pulling on my arm (which I had locked behind my back) with a fair amount of force. I managed to avoid touching his leg but my face ended up beet-red, or at least felt so hot that it should have been and I felt like Craig thought I was for sure gay, even though I didn't really think I was at the time, ironically.
The fact that he was so desperate for me to touch his leg kind of made me wonder about him. I mean, who does that? But I think it was just because he was testing me out.
After this even I end up thinking about him more and more until one day I think, "I should try getting myself off while thinking of him."
This thought may seem quite strange but I feel like it was rather relevant. You see, I knew I liked Craig, as a friend, definitely. I thought it might be kind of nice to actually hang out with him (which I never do), hold hands with him and maybe kiss him. However, I wasn't sure I wanted to have sex with him. I wasn't sure a dick would turn me on.
I know I'm not asexual 'cause, I've thought about girls okay, at least a bit, so, I feel like if I were in a relationship I'd want sex and I'm a monogamist so I'd need that with Craig if I were in a relationship with him.
I managed to think about Craig while getting myself off but I wasn't sure if it was as effective as thinking about other things. After doing it, I also felt like I had kind of abused him, but that was pretty stupid because he doesn't seem like the kind of person to mind stuff like that.
Moving along, I now feel like I could happily be in a relationship with him. I have no idea what 'label' I'd assign to myself but I feel like I like Craig and have the ability to MaYbE like other guys too.
But I don't want to like Craig. Lately he's all I can think about and it's driving me mad.
Like I said, I've had crushes before. And to be honest, I get pretty deep into them. It was okay before though; the girls I had crushes on only spoke to me a couple of times and sure, those times were like heaven but, they meant that I didn't actually know much about them, or see them and be reminded that I like them too much.
I know that none of this really makes sense but my point is that I need to stop liking Craig since I'm becoming obsessed and he's self-proclaimed "completely straight".
Sitting next to him right now is kind of like torture. I always look forward to this part of the day so much but I dread it at the same time. It's over in twenty minutes and then I only really see the guy in passing here and there (with maybe a conversation in woodworking class).
I don't know what to do.
He's talking to someone else at the moment. After Miss Garrison called out the register he started a discussion with the person on his left in the horseshoe. People actually want to talk to him hence them being okay with sitting alongside him and I am now left to sit alone in silence, gazing about the room and praying that Miss Garrison won't speak to me.
I hate that I'm kind of jealous over Craig speaking to someone besides me. I feel pathetic.
Looking at the clock I can see that the next bell is about to ring. Miss Garrison seems to take a glance at the clock too and signals to the class that they should start preparing to leave. I get up and pick up my bag from under the desk, tucking in the dull blue, monotonous and eye-stabbing (apparently) chair that I was just sitting on and wait for the bell to ring.
After it does, Craig speaks. "Let's go" and we go.
On the way to our lesson, I ask what we have. He tells me "Maths" and then we head to maths. I'm about to head up the stairs to the lesson when he smirks at me and says something I can't make out in the loudness of the crowd.
He heads off in the opposite direction to maths, turning around when he realises I'm not following.
I realise that we don't have maths. I have French. A while ago now, I told him all our lessons for the day in the wrong order in order to confuse him, succeeding in doing so. Now, he has taken his revenge. My face drops in shock at the realisation of his attempt to deceive me and he laughs at my expression. I walk over to him and hit him lightly, with him continuously laughing as I smile with a fake scowl on my face as we head to our actual lessons.
I have to go up two flights of stairs; he has to go up one. After the first flight, he says "Bye" to me and I tell him to go to hell, still smiling.
I go to French and when break comes I tell Matthew about how Craig tricked me and I can't stop thinking about him and it's killing me.
I just want this stupid crush to be over with. I'm leaving this school at the end of the year so there's no point in even considering that he might like me; it would be pointless for me and Craig to start dating if we'd have to break it up in the end anyway.
I'm probably never going to see him again once I move. I'm not friends with him on Facebook. I don't have snapchat or twitter. I don't know his phone number. I don't even really know why I like him so much. I don't want to think about it.
