Chi

So, every time I look in the mirror and I see me, I think : ‘What could I wear to impress ‘him’’. But when I go to school and see that ‘him’ isn’t there I take off that new chick shirt and start dancing and laughing my normal, cackling laugh. I act like a freak around my friends and the other boys that I’m not in love with. And then when I get home I get into my penguin pajama pants and slip on a sports bra and relax in my bed and go on facebook, do homework or something like that. But when I go on facebook and start chatting with ‘him’ my butterflies start all over again. I work out every day and watch R rated movies and eat sweet and sour chicken and play chess because of ‘him’. So when I see ‘him’ on Facebook and he posts some comment addressed to me I just HAVE to post some hot ‘pic’ as they call it just to have him talk to me about it the next day at school when I don’t slip off the new chick shirt because he’s there. You get what I’m saying?
It didn’t used to be like that. The daily routine of 8th grade. The daily routine of seventh grade was much different. Just take out all the parts about ‘him’ and you’ll see. I didn’t used to stare and get shy when he was around. I used to debate with him about politics and have the teacher praise him and I for good debating skills. I had another ‘him’ back then and I hardly ever saw that one. But maybe it was seeing my 8th grade ‘him’ every day that made me fall and love, and get depressed during that switching summer when he had pictures of himself with ‘her’. No, I am not his ‘her’ this year, he doesn’t have one thankfully. But, in case you were wondering, I hope that his ‘her’ in High School will be a girl with brown hair that she straightens every day, who secretly wheres penguin pajamas after school every day, who’s real laugh is like a witch on her broomstick lighting up the castle, who gets straight A’s like him, and who’s real name is Christina Shane Brookes but everyone calls her a short and lovely nickname which just happens to be: Chi.

Brooke

It’s kind of hard for me to know that ‘he’ likes one of my best friends Brooke. The comforting thing about it though is that I’m pretty sure that she hates ‘him’. She has told me that she is not in love with anyone, but she jokes with him and I’ve seen him pining for her throughout the grade of 13 year olds. One time in science he came up to Brooke and started guiding her hand in the electric planes with instructions of how to fly it. But I guess I need to give Brooke more credit. She shakes ‘him’ off like a pesky fly but with a laugh. Obviously, he doesn’t understand that she wants nothing with him. Still, I’m not so sure about the truth to Brooke’s lamentations about ‘him’ annoying her and how much she despises him. I just agree with myself that Brooke is too jovial to ever actually be cold to him.
I admire my friend for being such a natural and attractive girl. She laughs like me and sometimes dresses like a five year old, she has never hid her feelings about and issue even if another popular or huge boy or girl opposes her. She laughs off there accusations and never lets anyone hurt her. Of course sometimes she scoots over little things that may be important to me or Cassie but I can forget and still love her.
I have known Brooke forever so other people do not know her faults as well as I, but everyone loves her and that is probably what is most loving about her.


Cassie

Things are not as difficult with Cassie and I because she doesn’t have a relationship with ‘him’. She is supportive about it with me all the way because she doesn’t know him as well. She still doesn’t like him because he can be mean on accident at sometimes, but she is supportive and never gives the illusion of a though that ‘he’ might like Brooke. But I have had the most fights with Cassie. I am glad to say though that that ongoing cycle has come to an end. I stopped it one night on spring break at 2 am with an email that I was sorry about the mean things I had said to her because I was upset with her and that we should be friends again. She sent another email back to me that she agreed. We had both crossed the line on that fight and it was time to forgive and forget. But I never forgot those fights. I have them kept in a folder in my email.
Cassie and I used to love the same guy. But once she started getting pushy about him, and I started to see the real side of him I did not like, I decided to pull up my real feelings and I realized that my long time friendly enemy was the one. In my dark and deep feelings I realized that all along I had been in love with ‘him’ and that I couldn’t stop it.

Desperate

But still it was around this time that he started to drift away from me. I didn’t know wether this was him realizing he was in love with me or if it was him realizing he was in love with someone else. I thought about him every night though and I was getting desperate. I didn’t like that feeling. I hated it in face. I hated not being able to fall asleep at night and being incredibly tired in the morning and telling my mom it was because I couldn’t fall asleep and she would blame it on the coffee I had at 5 pm. And I hate this 8th grade routine. Sometimes I would get depressed and a little bit mad at Brooke for being so naturally attractive while I had to work at it and it still wasn’t working. I want to be a trial lawyer when I grow up and my teacher can see that. In 7th grade it was different because he liked me and my sharp wit. But I didn’t jump at the chance when I was totally being myself with him and now ‘he’ doesn’t like me for myself. And once you get in that bad habit of desperation it’s kind of hard to stop. It’s like that boy is the cool one and the desperation is meth. He’s tempting you to try it and now you can’t stop. I don’t want to go so far as the commercials that tell you to stop using meth show : the older brother screaming at his sibling to give him all his money, the girl over the sink with blood just pouring out, and the woman with the ash teeth. But I felt like I was on the brink, edge of falling.


‘Him’

I guess now you wonder who ‘him’ is. We can all call him not cool, or a geek, nerd, psycho, unpopular, wizard, whatever but he is in fact the most liked, and, in moderation, nice boy. He is very much considered mean in the 8th grade girl world, where everyone secretly likes him. But he is also very much nice but can’t control his opinion and that turns into oblivion which turns into a word called mean. I, I feel, am the only one who understands this even though 4 other 8th grade girls like him. I don’t feel like I have any competition with these girls, even though he gives them at times his all. I think that they are extremely annoying and I hate it when he laughs at them or they try to catch his eye. They ignore me and suck up to him. I’m sorry to say that the only ‘competition‘ I have is Brooke. She is just so attractive in a 3rd grade way and I’m exhausted with the way he looks at her. He is smart beyond belief, and as much as any other girl denies it, he has way more knowledge than me. He came to our school last year and we got to know each other in History and News class. We argued subjects and in art we argued in a playful way. I was kind of fluttery around him all the time but never unleashed these feelings to swarm around my heart like invading troops. I buried them deep down in the ocean of my gut and just argued my way to first in line in his heart.
‘He‘ was always an extremely intellectual person who could be considered very attractive by some and very mean and unattractive by others. He also isn’t exactly the cutest guy either. He actually could be called very ugly by some. I have no problem making fun of his round face and hair streaked with cream. Brooke and I have had many a laugh over the way his face scrunches up when he’s concentrating. But I love it and still know that I might never get over it. I made a vow back at the beginning of this year that I would never say yes to anyone but ‘him’. ‘Him‘ being Connor Forbes who my friends and I prefer to call Crazy Connor.


People

So many people contribute to my story good and bad. But some of them are right in the middle as well. But I feel it right to start and go on in chronological order, so that would mean the other ‘him’ in my life. ‘He’ plays an important role for setting me up for the 8th grade routine. He showed me what it was like to think you’re in love. Because I thought I was in love, I acted like that to him which now gives the jerk the wrong message that I love him. Because I am tossing the term ‘love’ around, I need to tell you what it is to me. To me love is loving the person for who they really are. For example, I never really loved Sam for who he really is. I guess I was just caught up in 7th grade drama. I get the backtoss of my fake affections with everyone thinking that I love him now. I have to deal with the smirks of others when we pass each other in the hall and I never feel safe talking to him ever again. Sam is a guy who is rather annoying with his repeated mentions of soccer and I get tired of it. I don’t have much to say other than I wish I had never convinced myself to love him, it only caused me trouble in the future.
Kale’s name is actually pronounced Call Ey (as in Hey), Kale’s crucial role came into my story when I started falling in love with Connor. After all, she had been his first drug taker. But, unlike me who tends to argue to catch the guys attention, she smiles and pushes against girls and never defends them and always in my eye was seen as a girl who never knew the right thing to say. Oh, she would say what she meant alright, but it would hurt someone in a flash. Kale was mean to me when she found out that I had fallen in love with someone who was ‘rightfully hers’. I have a constant battle with her and a constant struggle not to interrupt her and tell her to shut up when she says exactly what she means. She is obviously a drug taker like me though, but in a different way.
Joey and I were best friends for the first portion of 6th grade, and when she started to ignore me, I saw her for the jerk that she was. She is incredibly annoying and incredibly bad at doing her schoolwork and I do not think that anyone likes her. At times I felt that Connor liked her the slightest bit, but after a few incidents of showing no interest I stopped believing that.
But Jolie is different, and interesting in that way. She comes to light that is a subtle and cunning way. Of course, everyone suspects that she LIKES Connor, but she does not seem the one to fall in love easily. She is cunning in drawing a person towards her and I suspect that it has worked on others, but not on ‘him’. ‘He’ does not appreciate her silent coldness towards Brooke and Cassie and I. She is so slight and avoiding of us (Cassie, Brooke, and I) that it makes me think of her as a one to feel that she is better than everyone. I used to try to befriend her, but I thought better of it.
But Leena and Lila are not a supposed ‘threat’ to me. No, they are twins and their only fault is sucking up to Joey, Jolie, and Kale. They treat us like dirt anyways so I have nothing more to say.


Why?

I don’t know why I keep holding on, maybe it’s just the thought of holding ‘his’ hand and him looking me in the eye and saying I love you. But when I really pull out my feelings I ponder, ‘do I really want that?’. I’ve never studied his face before. I’ve looked him in the eye, but I’ve never looked at him. Do I want to touch him or be close to him. Do I want to love him. Do I want to be his one and only. I can’t answer these questions because the answer would be painful. But, to be perfectly clear, I need to ask myself why - why do I keep holding on to the sugar on the crust?