The first thing I noticed when I entered the cafeteria was the staggeringly small school population. The entire high school was maybe 100 people, tops. I feared that I would eventually know every single students' first name, last name, and home phone number. It was much too small-town-ey for me.

The second thing I noticed was an extremely attractive blonde boy sitting at a table by himself. I stared at him for a second, realizing that he wasn't 'attractive', so much as 'perfect'. He was tall-- I could tell, even when he was sitting down, that he was easily 6'2''. He had a nice body, strong but not bulky. I was drawn to him, possibly because he was the only person in this school besides me who was wearing converse and skinny jeans.

He had clear, smooth skin, and he was barely tanner than a corpse. The only color came from the dark, bruise-like marks under his eyes. He looked like he hadn't slept in a week, or maybe he had a stepfather like Doug. His eyes were dark-- I guessed they must be as pretty as the rest of him, but I was too far away to be able to tell for sure.

I was transfixed by his hair-- I have always been a sucker for good hair. He had pin-straight honey-blonde hair that sparkled with natural highlights, even out of the sun. It fell in front of his face, with his bangs covering one eye. It was classic 'emo', but it looked more… original on him. Like he was what everybody else was trying to achieve, but couldn't quite stack up to.

All-around, he was the most beautiful person I had ever seen in Cordova, Phoenix or anywhere else.

"Hey, new kid. Let's keep it moving. Some of us actually eat lunch," said a blonde girl who was at least six inches taller than me. I blushed, realizing that I had been hovering in the doorway gawking for at least a minute. Thankfully, the subject of my attention hadn't caught me… mid-gawk.

The blonde girl-- her name was… Ericka. I recognized her from my chemistry class. She was a year or two older than me-- stalked into the cafeteria, followed by her sniggering posse. I assumed they weren't going to invite me to eat with them.

I scanned the room, looking for an empty table to sit at. Just as I spotted one, a quiet boy from my health class spotted me, waving me over to his table, where he sat with two friendly-looking girls. I tensed for a second, but they seemed… genuine. I grabbed a chair next to a pretty brunette, who introduced herself as Jenna. The other girl, a redhead names Gretchen, was louder than the other two, but otherwise seemed nice enough.

The boy, Marshall, started a conversation about our new classes. Gretchen jumped right in, chattering away happily. I didn't say anything, just kept sneaking glances over toward the boy I saw earlier. Jenna noticed my stare and raise an eyebrow jokingly at me.

"Enjoying the view?" She whispered so the other two wouldn't notice.

"You know, I really am. The ocean and the mountains, they have nothing on him," I smirked.

"His name's Jasper Whitlock."

"He's… quite attractive," I said lamely. Jenna giggled at my atrocious understatement.

"Yes, he is," she agreed, "but nobody's had much luck with him. And believe me, people have tried. That girl Ericka, did you meet her? She's asked him out at least seven times. He's always said no, but I heard he was very polite about it…" She seemed to enjoy the conversation, losing a bit of her shyness. It was probably nice to have a new kid-- everybody else would already know all the good gossip.

"Anyway," she continued, "He's a bit of a mystery. He lives out of town, back near the woods, apparently, with his adoptive father. He just moved up here when he was a freshman. He's a junior now, but he should be a senior. He had to miss a year of school when he helped his dad with fishing."

"Oh," I said dumbly. I didn't know what to say after hearing this boy's story, and I was a little flustered when I saw Jasper look amusedly at our table a few times during Jenna's speech, as if he knew what we were saying. I quickly grabbed my backpack, rifling through it, pretending to be doing something important.

Gretchen giggled, "why is Jasper Whitlock staring at you?" I blushed four shades of scarlet, and shrugged, pulling out my iPod.

"He's not," I replied. It was true-- Jasper had pulled out a sketchbook and started drawing something. He didn't look at me again for the rest of lunch. I turned my music up full-blast and blared the song "Tear You Apart" so loud that I was cringing on the way to English.

I knew I was going to like Mrs. Renske-- she sent me to my table, in the back corner of the room, without making me introduce myself or speak at all. She sat me next to an empty seat. The two of us- me and Mrs. Renske- were going to get on very well.

My calm was shattered when Jasper Whitlock strode gracefully into the room, and was told to sit next to me. He half-smiled, but halfway to the desk, he tensed a bit, and dropped into his seat, tilting it as far from me as possible. I wished the floor would swallow me whole-- I finally see somebody really interesting in this town, and he acts like I'm a pariah. I blushed-- again-- and turned my iPod back on. Blue October can get me through this.

Class ended eventually, of course, and Jasper bolted. I groaned, packing my bag up slowly, and left class in a daze. The rest of the day passed quickly but dully, without even the excitement of humiliating myself In gym. I ran home, since it was still pouring rain, but it didn't get me there any faster. I just tripped more.

***