Chapter 2

CHAPTER 2

Mood for the day: Longing, regrets, fear of what’s to come, fear of those lost moments that have forever passed; moments where I was too scared to take a chance and just try. Living day to day. Living? Is that what I’m doing? Not caring what others think of me because my biggest critic will always be me. Walking around everyday hardly able to catch my breath, sad with no idea why, angry, angry all of the time. No reason for it because people genuinely care for me, but I don’t care for me. I want to go away, untraceable, never to be heard from again. I’m tired of being a scattered hot mess.

I closed my laptop and headed for school. I used to write in a journal but not anymore. I don’t want to leave behind ‘The last words of Bella Rose Wyatt’ in some notebook that my mom can discover and then anguish over. As a matter of fact, I intend to crush my laptop so that I can fade happily into oblivion. No one on my blog knows who I am or even what city I live in. They don’t know that in less than a year I will commit suicide. They don’t know that this last year of my life is my ‘magnum opus’. I have 312 followers, give or take some that un-follow me because ‘I need therapy’.

What they don’t seem to understand is that I don’t blog to impress them. I learned something last year when my journalism teacher forced us to write in a journal nonstop. I need to write. Sometimes writing is the only thing that stops my head from spinning and my heart from pounding. I write short stories, poems, my thoughts and feelings and sometimes I post interesting things that I find on the internet—but the last thing that I do it for is to talk to people. I’m sometimes surprised when some adult responds to my post that she is praying for me. It makes me feel violated and angry before I remember that I just wrote my deepest thoughts and potentially 312 people have read them.

Rochelle nudged me in study hall and I looked at her. She gestured with her head and I glanced in that direction. Jay Pembroke.

“He’s looking over here again,” She whispered.

He does stare a lot. When I met his eyes he didn’t even flinch. Of course I was the one to look away first.

“I’m going to go over and say something to him after class because all he ever does is stare. That boy is too shy to come over and actually say something to me.”

I shook my head, eyes still on the pages of my book; The Life of Pi. “Jason’s not shy, he is quiet but that doesn’t make him shy.”

“What’s the difference?”

I was thinking about the way girls tug on his arms and the way he shakes them off. “If Jason doesn’t like you he won’t pretend that he does. If he doesn’t want to be around you he’ll walk away, even if somebody is talking to him.” Rochelle giggled. We’d seen him do it, even rolling his eyes when the girls get out of control. “It’s like he doesn’t waste energy on unimportant things or things that don’t interest him; like…being a star is the bullshit that goes along with doing something he loves; running.”

“You know a lot about J.P.” She grinned, always wanting to discover if I had a crush on somebody. I am the most asexual person in the world in her opinion. She doesn’t understand that I can’t sit with her and gush over this cute boy or that cute boy. No boy wants me gushing over them.

I finally looked at her. Thankfully we sit near the back of the room where our mumbling goes mostly unnoticed. Coach Shannon is too busy pretending to read his class work to pay too much attention, but he will crack skulls if the mumblings turn into full out talking.

“I just watch everybody. Not just the jocks, I watch that kid who wears only black and that nobody ever talks to.”

“Because he smells like a musty basement.” Rochelle giggled a bit too loudly because Coach Shannon lifted his eyes in our direction. We both ducked our heads.

After a moment I continued. “He can draw really good. He’s an artist. I saw the doodles on his notebook. It’s like Keith Haring’s work. I was going to ask him…”

Rochelle watched me intently. “You were going to ask him what?”

She wouldn’t get it. I’d never thought to tell her this because she would never get it. “I was going to ask him to draw me a picture.”

She made a face. “He is a weirdo and will just attach himself to you.” Her eyes brightened. “You’re just hoping that when he pulls out that rifle he won’t shoot you too.” When I didn’t respond she continued. “You’re going to ask him to draw you a picture? Have you ever even talked to him?”

I shook my head and looked down at my book. It would totally ruin my day if he walked past me because he didn’t want to be seen with me. He could turn out to be as much of an ass as everyone else.  

She spent a few minutes talking about Jay this and Jay that and then other cute white boys in our school. She was being enthusiastic about this. I felt kind of bad about the way she was dismissing Andre even though he used to call me mutant and I never told her because I knew she liked him and didn’t need me casting a shadow on it. Ok truthfully, I didn’t tell her that he was one of the bullies that picked on me because it would ruin everything if she still dated him.

These are the people that devastate your life but they are still a part of your ‘universe’, circling you on a regular basis as if you are the sun and they are the planets and the stars. Except that I don’t feel like the star in my own story. I am a supporting character, a prop for everyone else.

II

At lunch Rochelle and Andre went off to grab a burger. I declined the invitation to go along with them—as I always do. I can tell Andre doesn’t want anything to do with me but he really likes Rochelle and so he just goes through the motions to appease her.

Last year some kid kept yelling out mutant every time I walked by. I am good at ignoring it but Rochelle was with me once and she told Andre. The kid was an underclassman and Andre is pretty big. I don’t know what went down but the boy doesn’t even look in my direction anymore.

So, in some respects it is cool to have a bully along the outer most rings of your ‘universe’.

“Bella Rose.”

I was deep in thought, thinking about how quickly I could grab something from the cafeteria and hit the library. I have a NOOK e-reader but I still like books.

“Bella Rose!”

I turned around in surprise that someone would be calling me. No, that a MALE voice would be calling out to me. Then I saw Jason Pembroke jogging towards me and my brow furrowed. He is truly a good-looking guy but there is a distance in his expression that subtracts from it. He had to be 6’3”and it would be easy to think that he wasn’t much more than skin and bones. But it’s not true, his body is just sleek muscles and not an ounce of fat. His light brown hair is long and reaches his shoulders but he never lets it grow out longer than that. I do like when he pulls it back because then little blond curls sprouts along the back of his neck and sideburns and looks messy and neat at the same time. I’ve always had at least one class with him every year since we were kids. We’ve never been friends but I know him.

I frowned as he came to a stop in front of me and then my expression cleared when I remembered about Rochelle. He wanted to talk to me about Rochelle. My posture instantly relaxed because this is a role that I knew well.  ‘Yes I will pass your messages to this girl or that one, and I will tell you if I think she likes you or if she has been talking to some other guy. Sure I’ll be your go-between.’

He reached into his back pocket. “You left your NOOK back in class.”

I gasped and looked at the faux leather bound e-reader in his hand and then patted my purse feeling the obvious lack of bulk. I usually shoved it in a small slot in the back of my bag and I’d never lost it before but since it’s hooked up to my Mom’s Amazon account it was a good thing that he’d found it.

“Oh thank you!” I reached for it but he suddenly pulled his hand back and opened the cover.

“Are these any good?” The screen was black and I pointed out where he could power it on.

“I like it a lot.”

“I can’t afford an IPad but I want something that I can use to access the internet, some apps and music.”

I shrugged. “This does all of that and is a lot cheaper.” I smirked.  “But most people buy it to read books…”

He grinned and I just kind of froze…well, except that my mouth almost fell open. I don’t remember ever seeing him grin. I barely ever see him speak. But his face transformed somehow and I saw something in it that I had never seen before. It was almost like the face that I had been seeing for all of these years was just a mask and he had let it slip and I was suddenly seeing the real Jason.

“I will use it for that too Bella Rose.”

Oh my God, my skin felt like a feather’s touch could have burned me. His use of my name was new and strange and beautiful. Bella Rose had never sounded so beautiful to me before. 

“What kind of books do you read?”

“Um…” I blinked and stopped staring, “a lot of free books. I usually download from the top 100 free reads list. I have The Walking Dead and some vampire series. And I have all three of The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo books.” 

“Oh? I do want to read The Walking Dead. So…If I buy a NOOK do you want to be NOOK friends and then we can share? I already read the Millennium trilogy so it looks like we have some common interests.”

“Uh…yeah. That would be great.” He handed me back the e-reader and this time allowed me to take it.

“Ok. I’ll let you get to lunch.” He turned around and waved at me from behind and I watched him head back down the hall.

I was nowhere near the cafeteria. How did he know I was on my way to lunch?