The girl nearly gave me a heart attack, right then. Just bursting out into the hall like that.
I reigned my anger in, and looked at her. She looked like I was going to fine her for being in the same room.
I told her we needed to talk. It was pretty direct but I didn't care. I needed to see this person for who she really was and show myself that there's nothing to be jealous of.
It was stronger than me; I immediately started the visual investigation. My eyes scanned her from bottom to top and back down again, trying to detect jealous-worthy elements. Except for boobs and general cheery-ness, nothing, as per usual. Fan-fucking-tastic. Even when she was scared she was happy! How was that even possible...?
I cut my own thoughts short by telling her that the next day, after her school day, we'd talk. It would probably be at the studio or who knows where, but we were both hard workers and were miles ahead of the others. I told her that, just to make sure she had no excuse.
She stammered for a while. Was she doing that on purpose, being all cheery and adorable all the time no matter what?
I told her that it wasn't a question. The following day we were going to talk it out.
Jealous, my ass. She should be jealous of MY ass! That sounds right, doesn't it? But even right then I could feel that weird feeling just a bit; it was harder to breathe, like my throat was being squeezed lightly, I felt a bit sick, and I couldn't keep my eyes off of her. It felt like driving by roadkill; it was disgusting but it had to be seen. It was jealousy, wasn't it. I was envious of SOMETHING there and I couldn't get my eyes away.
Screw that. My motivation to talk to her rose by 300%.
I was NOT jealous.