0758
Sooner or later
I was going to have to admit to myself that he just wasn’t going to show.
0800
Maybe I wouldn’t
be feeling so sick and light headed if I’d had some toast this morning, I had
tried to eat, but the one bite that I’d taken had got stuck in my throat.
0801
He wasn’t going
to come was he?
0802
I’d have to
leave soon or I’d miss the bus, and that wouldn’t be a good idea when I had a
science mock exam first period.
0803
He wasn’t here.
0804
I left the house
and trudged up the road, completely aware of the empty space all around me.
Simon and I had
walked to school together every single morning for the past 6 years, he would
always come and pick me up, even though it was a one minute walk, we’d always
do it together, it was our little ritual, and in a way it helped us to get
through the day. It felt so wrong
without him being there, I was now convinced that today wasn’t going to be a
good one.
As soon as I got
to the bus stop I quickly looked round for him, he was nowhere to be seen. Neither was Ben. I was completely alone – I’d been greedy and now I had no one.
I sat down on
the bench outside the pub until the bus came, and then spent the whole journey
lost in my own thoughts. It was a
relief when we finally pulled up to the school drive as I knew I’d have to
think of something else for the next few hours.
“Where’s Simon?”
a voice greeted me the moment I stepped onto the school tarmac. It was Jemma, standing right in front of me
with a concerned look on her face.
“He didn’t get
the bus,” I grunted in response.
“You OK?” she
asked, “you look awful”
Why is it that
people always say that, is it meant to make you feel better or something? I
glanced at my reflection in a passing puddle.
I did look pretty bad, it seemed that I had completely forgotten to do
anything with my hair this morning, it was laying around my face in greasy
clumps.
“I’m fine,” I
replied hastily, quickly fixing my hair into something that represented a
ponytail.
“Did something
happen last night?”
“No,” I said a
little too quickly, “everything was fine.”
“You got the
after birthday blues or something?”
She was
beginning to get annoying now, every time she spoke her voice was ringing round
my head in a high pitched squeak.
“Yeah, something
like that.”
“Or was it Ben?”
I snapped to
attention and glared at her, “what?”
“Was it Ben?”
“What about Ben?”
“Did he wind you
up or something?”
I took a deep
breath, trying hard to control the anger that was welling up inside me. I had no reason to be angry with her, she
was only trying to look out for me, but she was just pushing and pushing and I
knew that pretty soon I was going to snap.
“Can you just
leave it?” I asked.
“Its Simon isn’t
it?” Jemma continued, refusing to drop the topic, “you’ve had some kind of bust
up haven’t you?”
“Yes, OK!” I
said, exasperated, “we’ve had a bit of a disagreement.”
“Awwww hunny,”
she soothed, and quickly bundled me up in her arms.
I stood there
awkwardly, my arms laying limp at my side, I couldn’t accept the hug, I didn’t
deserve any sympathy.
“We’d better
hurry, we are going to be late,” I said flatly, pulling out of her grasp and
rushing to get away from her.
By the time it
got to lunch I wasn’t feeling much better.
I hadn’t seen Simon at all, and now I was wandering aimlessly around the
corridors looking for Ben. I knew he
could make me feel better. He had been
amazing last night, he only had to touch me and it all felt right again, I
could forget everything, and that was something I really needed at that moment.
I wasn’t having
much luck though, I had seen him in the distance a few times during the day, but
every time I’d gone to speak to him he had mysteriously vanished. I knew that he was due out of English at any
moment. Maybe hanging around outside
his classroom door was a little desperate, but I couldn’t think of anything
else to do – I had to see him. I wasn’t
even entirely sure how I knew he had English, somehow I seemed to have most of
his timetable memorised in my head.
I heard movement inside the room and held my
breath as one by one the class tipped out into the corridor.
Finally there he
was, last out, talking to a few of his friends, a couple more good looking
Populars, they were all laughing and joking without a care in the world. He looked up for a split second and I smiled
at him, he quickly looked back down at the floor.
He was ignoring
me again.
This was
obviously the way it was going to be, he said he wanted to be with me but when
he was with the Populars it was a different matter.
“Ben?” I said
quietly as he moved towards me.
He looked up and
his face changed. I wasn’t sure exactly
what it was, as a second later he showed me a very slight smile.
“OK?” he whispered
to me, so quietly that no one else could hear him.
“Yeah,” I said
smiling back, feeling loads better already.
“I’ll catch up
with you later OK?” he mouthed back.
My insides felt
warm, that two second contact had been enough to make me feel better, I now
felt like I could battle my way through the rest of the day.
I bound into the
lunchroom and found Rena and Jemma immediately, sitting in our usual spot, just
unwrapping their sandwiches.
“Blimey!” Jemma
commented as I went up behind her and gave her a little hug.
“I’m sorry,” I
said, “didn’t mean to be off with you earlier.”
“Can we take it
you made up with Simon then?” Rena asked, “judging by the grin on your face
something good has happened.”
“No, I haven’t
seen him,” I replied, taking a seat and taking the lid of my pack lunch box.
“What happened
with you guys?” Rena asked.
“I’d rather not
say,” I said, I’d never be able to confess to my friends what I had done, I
felt too ashamed, plus it all seemed so surreal I wasn’t sure they’d actually
believe me.
“OK, subject
change then,” Jemma said, realising how awkward I felt, “How did you find the
science mock?”
I breathed a huge
sigh of relief. Finally they understood
that I just wanted to be left alone, my love life was a huge no go area and I
wasn’t ready to discuss it with anyone.
The chatter
about science continued around me as I got lost in my own thoughts. Despite my brief encounter with Ben I was
still worried, I hadn’t seem Simon all day and wasn’t convinced that he was
even at school. It made me feel sick
every time I thought about the look on his face last night, I may have broken
his heart, maybe he’d never be able to show his face again, and we could
certainly never be friends again. I had
ruined everything. I had Ben, and he
made me happy, but should I be willing to give up everything for him?
A sudden
explosion of giggles boomed out around me and jolted me back to the here and
now.
“What we
laughing at?” I asked
“You wouldn’t
understand,” Rena said, nearly choking on one of her cheddar biscuits.
“Try me.”
“We were just
talking about how Jemma was perving at Ben during PE this morning, her tongue
was practically dragging along the floor.”
My stomach
lurched, they were talking about Ben! Normally I would have rolled my eyes or
retorted some awful thing about him, but now I couldn’t. He was my Ben, and hearing other girls talk
about him in this way just felt wrong.
He was my Ben and only I should be allowed to look at him in his
football kit.
“You OK?” Jemma
asked, placing a hand on my arm, “you’ve gone really pale.”
I nodded my
head, and quickly stood up, not trusting myself not to say anything, I had to
get myself out of that room as quickly as possible.
Muttering
something about catching up with some revision in the library I almost ran out
of the hall, not stopping until I had reached the safety of the corridor.
I leant against
the wall and took a deep breath, shutting my eyes until I had calmed down.
“There you are!”
My eyes shot
open at the sound of Ben’s voice, he had appeared next to me, and just hearing
his voice sent shivers all over my body.
“You been
looking for me?”
“Sure have,” he
replied.
“Haven’t seen
you much today,” I said, trying to keep my voice casually.
“Been a bit
busy, that’s all,” he smiled at me, and I felt relieved, of course he was busy,
how could I have believed it would be anything else? He had obviously just not seen me in the corridor, it had been wrong
of me to jump to conclusions.
“That’s OK.”
“Am going to
make it up to you tonight though,” he said, winking at me.
“You are?”
“Yep, we are
going to try what we discussed last night.”
I wrinkled up my
nose in confusion, “what was that?”
“You’ll see,” he
grinned at me and my stomach turned over.
He was so gorgeous, I couldn’t believe he had picked me.
“Oi Adams!” a
voice boomed out from behind us.
Ben leant in
closer to me and whispered in my ear, “I’ll see you later gorgeous,” he pressed
a tiny bit of paper in my hand and walked towards his friend.
I waited until
they had walked down the corridor and then opened up the screwed up bit of
paper.
It was simple
and to the point.
7.30 pm – mine