Friday, December 19

(After school, before winter carnival)

When I woke up this morning, I was convinced that my conversation with Lilly the night before was a dream. A fluke. Wishful thinking.

But then she barged into my room, pulled up the blinds, and demanded to know why I wasn't getting ready, and, I quote, "Mia may think that you're some sort of Star Wars god, but that doesn't mean you shouldn't at least put some effort into your physical appearance."

To which I replied, "There aren't any gods in Star Wars."

Which is an incredibly geeky thing to say, but it was a reflex. Besides, Star Wars is not only highly creative and insightful beyond its time, but pretty freaking awesome.

… That was pretty geeky too, huh?

But I digress.

I decided not to take the limo to school. I needed to clear my head and prepare myself mentally for the events that were about to unfold this afternoon.

Of course, when I got to school, I promptly berated myself for passing up an opportunity to see Mia. Not just because I'm madly in love with her, but so I could watch for signs if she's interested in me as well.

So that was why I decided to go corner her after homeroom and nonchalantly ask how she did on her algebra final.

I was still curious as to how she did, all feelings aside. I wanted to see how I did as a tutor and whether or not she was actually paying attention half the time.

Unfortunately, she wasn't at her locker. I can see why: it was surrounded by morons such as Baxendale, Richter, and Weinberger. Bleh. I don't envy her on that.

At her locker, however, was a yellow rose.

What the…?

Why yellow?

It couldn't have been from Kenny; he would only be giving her red roses, I'm sure. He's not that creative.

I doubted it was from Baxendale or Richter; I doubt they know how to spell yellow, much less know the significance of a yellow rose.

But wait… there's a note.

I figured it wouldn't hurt for me to look at it. I mean… it could be from a stalker. Or that guy who picks the corn out of his chili at lunch. And as her best friend's older brother/ the guy who's in love with her, I have the right to protect her from such weird people…

Right?

Nevertheless, I crossed over and plucked it out of her locker. I read the note and practically exhaled my lungs from relief:

Good luck on your trip to Genovia! See you when you get back!

Your Secret Snowflake,

Boris Pelkowski

Thank God. However, I wasn't quite out of the water yet.

Mia was coming right towards me.

Scrambling my brain for an excuse that wasn't half-baked, I merely waited to her to come to me.

Her expression was priceless: shocked. I suppose that's reasonable enough; I'm standing by her locker, holding a rose. What else would a girl think?

Disappointingly, I could only hand it to her and say, "Here. This just fell out of your locker."

Puzzled, she took the rose and read the note. At first she was a bit surprised and then strangely… let down? I pushed the feeling down, calling it wishful thinking and said, "Well? What's the verdict?" I was referring to the math final by now; not the rose.

Raising her head, Mia looked blankly at me. I think she was still in shock over the rose.

I tried again, slowly, "What did you get in algebra?"

I guess she didn't actually know herself, because she had to take out her computer print-out and look at it.

Her eyebrows went up, as if in total shock, and then the biggest, brightest grin graced her face.

And I fell in love. Again.

Then the world threw another whammy at me.

Falling out of her daze, Mia promptly launched herself on me, throwing her arms around my neck and squealing really loud.

My ear drums and my entire body will never be the same again. They're both still tingling.

After a little happy dance in my arms, she pulled away and was still in an euphoric state of mind. "I did it!" She grinned. "A B minus! Oh my gosh!" She thrust the paper into my hands and I stared at it, still a bit surprised from her hug.

"That's awesome," I told her, a smile creeping onto my face. "You did great. Congratulations."

"I never could have done it without your help," she said modestly. "I can't thank you enough, really."

I opened my mouth to reply, but then the bell rang and we went our separate ways.

I'm feeling pretty good about later on.

But now I have to go and set it up; Lilly has just said she's on her way.

May The Force be with me.

(Later)

The Force was nowhere to be found.

I don't understand what went wrong, though. I had concrete evidence; Lilly. I had supporting facts; Mia's hug. I had Judith on my side, dammit, and that girl can clone fruit flies, she can't be wrong!

I feel like shit.

I bet Mia feels like shit.

I feel like shit.

… I don't normally resort to swearing, as swearing, I think, shows society's incapability to express their feelings more articulately. Besides, Josh Richter swears more times than I can count, and if Josh Richter does it, it's not good.

But I suppose I should explain why I'm feeling so shitty. Yes… that's a good idea. Start in chronological order.

(Ahem)

It started out pretty well.

Out of all the booths, the Computer Club's was by far the most popular, which was surprising. However, we were working scrupulously for days on end. It's only logical that it paid off in the end.

Not only was the booth popular, but it was doing far better than Lilly's Amnesty booth (she wanted to have one for her moronic club but she didn't get her application form in in time for the deadline.

So you can see why I was in a great mood. I was nervous as anything and wanted to throw up everything I'd eaten for lunch, but otherwise I was fine.

However, I kept my cool when I spotted Mia and Tina Hakim Baba. I said, "Come on up!" And even though the line was really long, I didn't care that they were cutting in front of everyone else. And not a lot of people cared either. Especially after Mia's press conference.

I led Mia over to the chair that held my program and said, "Here, Mia, sit at this one." I put in the necessary programs and waited. I wondered what she was thinking she'd see. All around our classmates were laughing hysterically and I hoped that she wouldn't either once she saw my program.

I feel a tap on my shoulder. It's Judith. "Wait, what are you doing?" She wanted to know.

I gave her a look that said, "What do you think I'm doing?" She knew about the plan to begin with—hell, she helped me. But I answered, "No, that's okay. I have a special one for her."

Suddenly, I pulled her away and demanded, "You know what I'm doing!"

Judith gaped. "You're not showing her that, are you?"

See, Judith and I had a little disagreement on if I should declare my love on a computer program, or give her little hints on the program, and then she'd turn around and I'd be standing with roses and then I'd declare my love.

Could you see me doing the second option?

No, neither could I.

Besides, I'm a coward, I have to say. I hide behind technology and computers and blah blah blah.

But if Mia really loves me like Lilly says she does, then she shouldn't care one bit. That's what I kept telling myself anyway.

Besides, I don't understand why Judith didn't like the program. It's not as if I had any degrading or offensive images/messages on it.

Here was the program:

There's this castle. I tried to make it similar to the one that's in Beauty and the Beast, which is only Mia's favorite play ever. So imagine that castle. Imagine zooming in slowly to the castle and before long, you're in a courtyard. This courtyard is full of red roses. Gorgeous, blooming roses. Some are in bloom, some are not, and some have lost their petals, which are on the courtyard floor. Soon a banner comes waving across the screen, in front of the roses, as if the wind had brought it there. There are words written on the banner on a gold leaf. You can only read the words when the banner is still.

The words are:

Roses are red

Violets are blue

You may not know it

But I love you, too

Pretty straightforward, right?

Pretty brilliant, right?

Pretty darn mushy and romantic, right?

Right.

If we are all in agreement here, than maybe you can tell me why Mia hated it.

She jumped up out of her chair as if a piece of meat was on it and screamed. Not good scream. Bad scream.

What the…?

She didn't yell at me, she didn't scream at me, she didn't even look at me.

She ran.

She hauled Tina off the stage, and ran.

And I ran after her.

I kept calling her name but the entire school was at the Winter Carnival and I lost her in the crowd.

I gave up then and looked dejectedly into the ground.

So I have to ask, where did I go wrong?

So I'm sitting here, back at the booth, ignoring Judith's "I told you so's" and trying not to think about Mia.

I bet she's crying right now, dammit. Do I repulse her that much?

Oh god.

What if Judith and Lilly were wrong? What if she never loved me and now is freaked out because her best friend's older brother is in love with her and it's nearly pedophilic because soon I'll be eighteen and then she'll be a minor and I'm too old for her and….

Oh shit.

0 0 0

Notes: If you've been to my homepage, you'll see that I actually wasn't planning on writing because of unforeseen circumstances. However, I haven't been writing in quite a while (like two, three weeks!) and today I just go the urge and… well. Here we go.

Thank you so much to everyone who reviewed the last chapter. You guys are so awesome; your reviews always make me smile.

WARNING: one chapter left.