Step II: Frustration

When I was fourteen I had a crush on Jack. Not that that's anything special – at one point or another, every girl I know has had a crush on Jack, up to and including David's sister. He's just that kind of person – the nice, attractive boy who's great at getting attention focused on him. The fact that he was on the football team probably didn't hurt, either. But the point was I had a crush.

On a boy who sometimes spent days Blink's house. Jack seemed to be everywhere, and I mooned about, and panicked about what I'd say to him and how to act around him, never mind that I'd known him just about forever (though we weren't really close before high school – Jack always had tons of people surrounding him, and I kept mostly to Blink and Race). I thought I was in hell, seeing Jack all the time, but even then, if seeing Jack got too bad or if I didn't want to see him, I was able to go to my house and close the door.

If I close the door to avoid Blink, he'll just crawl in one of the windows. Well, okay, he'd knock on the door and my parents would let him in. My parents love Blink (hence, among other things, the huge lunches I bring to school), they'd let him in even if he knocked on the door in the middle of the night.

I wasn't going to be able to just step away from Blink. There was just no way.

Thankfully, the day of my big light bulb moment was Wednesday, and since baseball games are generally Thursday, there's extra practice. Extra practice generally means that the players are lucky to get home before ten. Blink loves those days, mostly because they give him a perfect excuse not to do his homework. I managed to get out of school without seeing him, get home without seeing him and have an incredibly pointless conversation with David, without seeing him. It wasn't exactly a relief, but it was nice to have a few moments of peace to collect my thoughts.

Of course, that peace only lasted until the next morning. Blink's my ride to school – it's not like it isn't a short enough distance to walk, but I always caught a ride with Blink and cancelling would set off alarm bells. And the last thing I needed was a concerned Blink pestering me all day. So I was faced with him first thing. Just what I needed.

For the first time in practically ever, I overslept. My mother came rushing in my room at 7.45 yelling at me to get up. Generally, I have some kind of natural clock which makes sure I wake up exactly five minutes before my alarm goes off at seven, but that day I managed to ignore both my inner clock and the insistent beeping of my Mickey alarm clock. I wish I knew how. Anyway, I raced out of bed, threw on a tee-shirt and a pair of jeans, ran downstairs, where Blink was sitting, talking to my mom.

It felt like being hit by something. I mean, not like having the breath knocked out of me, but still. Blink. In my kitchen. Which shouldn't really have been a surprise - most mornings I'm the one sitting in his kitchen, waiting for him to get a move on, it made sense that the one day I was running late he'd do the same. Still gave me a shock, though.

"Finally!" he said when I came in, fortunately oblivious to my inner flailing. "Let's get going."

I kissed my mother on the cheek, grabbed my backpack, an apple and followed Blink to the car. Blink's one of the few people I know who has a car. Granted, it's a small, red Ford which sometimes needs to be pushed to get it going, but it's still pretty nice not having to walk or, god forbid, take the bus every morning. Except that day, it looked even smaller than it usually did. I was going to be that close to Blink. Oh god.

I got in the car and fiddled with my seatbelt for a while, for lack of better things to do to control my nerves. After a couple of false starts, Blink got the car going, and we were off.

"So."

"Shut up, Blink." I stared at out the window with great concentration.

"You overslept," he said.

"No kidding." Apparently, being in love with Blink didn't make him any less annoying. That was some what comforting.

"Last time you did that, it was 'cause Jack had gotten a new girlfriend." At the time, telling Blink about my crush on Jack had seemed a good idea. At that moment it seemed like the stupidest thing I'd ever done.

Apart, of course, from falling in love with Blink.

"Mush? Mush?" Blink was looking at me with, oh joy, concern.

"Yeah?"

"You okay?" Yep, definitely concern.

"Yeah, yeah, just zoned. So, baseball after school?" Baseball is a lifesaver when it comes to changing the subject – these days, say the words 'Orioles', ' Jays', 'Red' or 'Sox' and Blink'll forget everything in favour of ranting about the Yankees. Sometimes when the speaker wasn't even talking about baseball.

"Uh-huh. You gonna be able to make seventh inning?" Thursday is also chorus practice, but I generally try and make it before they start singing – anything for Blink after all.

So, yeah, okay, David had a point. All right, all right.

"Of course."

Blink grinned and my stomach did a weird wobbly thing. That was going to take some getting used to.

I'd forgotten my lunch. I had forgotten my lunch.

David was grinning madly when I discovered it. Yeah, he was hiding behind his book, but I knew. I glared at him.

"Don't you owe me money, Dave?"

"Nope," he said, and I could hear him smirking. I had a vague passing thought that maybe David had stolen my lunch, before I managed to regain my sanity. Falling in love with Blink clearly had killed my logic and reason.

"I'll buy," Blink told me, "I woe you a couple of hundred lunches anyway."

I glared at David's book once again and followed Blink up.

"You okay?" Blink asked, passing me a tray. I ducked my head and pretended to agonize over what milk to buy.

"Yeah, sure. I guess it's just homework and stuff, getting me distracted."

When I looked up from the milk, Blink was watching me, looking very concerned. And cute. But he always looks cute.

I decided to stare at the salad bar for a few moments. Just to, you know, get a grip on reality again. That failed spectacularly.

"C'mon, Mush," Blink said, kicking me gently. I glared at his foot.

"I'm fine, Blink," I said and took one of the pizza slices. It was the most edible looking thing there.

Blink didn't look particularly convinced, but he let up and we started up on one of our ongoing arguments, about Loony Toons vs. the Animaniacs. And you don't really want to know how long we've been arguing about that - you'd think by now Blink would've given in to the greatness of Animaniacs.

It felt almost normal. If you ignore the fact that I had to work pretty hard not to just stare at him.

We sat down, pretty much ignoring the others as we kept arguing and I caught myself thinking that, okay, I could cope with this. I could ignore this whole falling-in-love-thing. After all, Blink was still Blink, just as always. Still the goofy, ridiculous, sports-obsessed, cute, sweet Blink I'd always known. Except now I kind of wanted to touch him, more than usual. Kind of wanted to kiss him. Just, I don't know, do the kind of things people in love do. With Blink.

Maybe the ignoring thing wasn't going to go so well. I could cope.

Right.