My One True Love (Unfinished)

Chapter 1

“Can anyone tell me what the answer to this equation is?” Mr. Collins said, pointing to an almost impossible maths question.

“Come on, this is easy. We did this at least five times last week! Matthew, you can figure this out, right?”

Matthew, a rather tall teenager, who was sitting right at the front of the class, shook his head.

“Melody, how about you?”

I looked up from my book which I was drawing on.

“No. Sir, can’t you just tell us the answer? It’ll be easier for you and us.”

“Well, if none of you can figure it out, I guess I’ll have to tell you. Firstly-”

The loud racket of the lunch bell cut Mr. Collins off completely. As soon as the class heard the bell, they shoved all their books into their bags and raced off towards the door. I slowly stood up, placed my books inside my bag and walked towards the door. My name’s Melody and I’m 15 years old. I don’t play many sports, although I do like swimming and soccer. I’m around average height, and I have blonde, shoulder-length hair. Just as I was heading off towards the library, I noticed someone was calling me.

“Melody, wait up!”

I turned around and saw my best friend, Becky, running towards me.

Becky is also 15 years old, although she’s a little shorter than I am. She has short, brown hair, which is tied up at the back, and she loves to play sport, especially netball. We both have known each other since grade one at St. Joseph’s.

“Hey Becky. What did you just have?” I asked.

“Oh, I just had P.E. Do you want to wait for Chris? He said he’d be here soon, but he probably got kept in or something.”

Chris also went to St. Joseph’s, except he was in a different class to ours. It was not until grade five when I met him. He’s really friendly, although he does like to play pranks from time to time. He’s really popular, although he always manages to spend some time with Becky and myself. But that’s only a quarter of his niceness. Two years ago, in grade eight, he gave some of his spare change to his friends and they didn’t even have to pay him back. Plus, he usually ‘helps’ people with their assignments or homework by giving them his completed work! I don’t know how he can just give away his work like that. If that were me, I’d be more aggressive. But I guess that’s just Chris.

“What? Chris actually wants to see us?”

Ever since Chris became popular, he was always spending more time with his new friends instead of us.

“I know this is mean, but I think he’s been a bit…selfish,” said, trying not to use the words that were going through my mind now.

“C’mon, can’t you just give him a chance?” Becky pleaded.

“A chance? He’s had two months to redeem himself and yet he can’t even make an effort to see his old friends,”

“Melody, good friends give each other second chances. What would happen if he did that to you?”

“I don’t care what he would do, just as long as he didn’t talk to me,” I said, a little bit too harshly.

Becky looked taken aback. I hardly lost my temper to people, especially towards Becky.

"Please Melody,” Becky pleaded once again, now using her pleading face as well. “Just five more minutes and if he doesn’t show up- Look! There he is!”

I turned and saw Chris walking towards us.

Chris was also 15 years old and had wavy blonde hair. He was really tall, muscular and rather handsome. His eyes were dark blue and his voice sounded rather mature. Chris played a number of sports, although his favourite sport was basketball.

“Great,” I said using my sarcastic tone, “Look, Becky, I’m going up to library. You do whatever you were supposed to do with Chris,”

“Oh no, I can’t do that! Stay with me. Please!”

“You still obsessed with him?” I said, smirking.

“No, just because I had a little crush on him, doesn’t mean that I was obsessed with him,”

“Oh yeah, the frequent walking past him during lunch, the constant touching whenever you were talking to him and the everyday phone call you made to him doesn’t mean that you had a crush on him,”

“So I might have had a small soft spot for Chris, but I don’t anymore,”

“Yeah right,” I said under my breath.

“What did you say?” Becky queried suspiciously.

“Nothing. Just talking nonsense,”

When Chris walked up to us, there was an uncomfortable silence.

“Hey Becky,” Chris said, breaking the silence, “How you going?”

“F-Fine thanks,” Becky stammered. I gave her a withering a look and she blushed.

“Hey Melody. What’s up?”

I merely stared at him, trying to make him uncomfortable.

“Yeah, well,” he turned away from me and started talking to Chrissie.

“Hey Becky, I need you to do me a favour,”

Becky looked apprehensive.

“What sort of favour?”

He looked at me and started talking out of the corner of his mouth.

“You know that thing I wanted to talk to you about,”

“Oh, THAT thing,”

“Well, this conversation obviously doesn’t involve me, so when you’re done here, Becky, you know where to find me,”

I turned and started walking towards the library.

“See ya later, Melody,” Chris said.

I continued walking as if I didn’t hear him.

The school library was usually quiet, although there were some, ‘disturbances’. Today a small group of guys, who were in the same year as me, were sitting along the ‘comfy chairs’ and making a huge racket. One of them was talking animatedly to his friend which was about a woman who had a sex operation in the Guinness World Book of Records. The rest of them were laughing at the conversation, while one fat guy got kicked repeatedly by one of his friends.

I looked around at the tables and saw my fellow classmates, Michelle and Matthew, from my maths class, working at a table near the bookshelves. I walked over and sat down, while both of them said,

“Hi,”

‘Hey,” I replied, “how’s it going?”

“Not bad” Matthew said, “I’m just helping Michelle with her English assignment,”

“Really,” I said as I took out my science book, “What assignment are you doing?”

“Oh, it’s the movie one, where you… uh…”

“It’s the one where you have to make a comparison with these two movies, and then write a comparative essay about it,” Matthew said, finishing Michelle’s sentence.

“Yeah. That one,”

Both of them bent back down over Michelle’s paper and started working. I turned around to see whether Chrissie was in the library yet.

That’s when I saw Chris.

Chris was walking rather fast, and looking in every direction. Judging from his behavior, I could tell he was looking for me.

“Shit,” I said.

Michelle and Matthew looked up to see what was wrong.

“What?” Matthew asked.

“Don’t worry, it’s nothing,” I replied, hitching up a fake smile, and then quickly turning back to my work.

“Oh my god,” Michelle said, “he is SO hot!”

“Is it Chris?” I asked.

“Yeah, I think so. Look at his hair! He is so fine!”

I turned around to see Chris a couple of metres away from us. I quickly turned away from him and said to Michelle,

“Michelle, shut up! Whatever you do, don’t tell him I’m here,”

“Why?” Asked Matthew.

“Just do it! And don’t look at him, otherwise it’ll be suspicious,”

Matthew shrugged and returned to Michelle’s work. Michelle on the other hand, found it very hard to look away from him.

“Michelle,” I said, through gritted teeth, “look AWAY from him. Not towards him! Are you deaf, or do you need your hearing checked?”

Matthew laughed, and it was his laugh that gave me away.

“Shit he’s coming towards us! Do I look good?” Michelle asked, flattening down her hair.

“Hey,”

I turned around to see Chris beaming down at me.

“Hi,” said Michelle, breathlessly, “I’m Michelle. It’s really nice to meet you. You’ve got a cute nose! Oh, look at his nose, Matthew come here and look at this it’s so cute, and OH MY GOD he has the most breathtaking eyes I’ve ever seen in my whole lifetime! Other than Robbie Williams, of course. Do you like Robbie Williams?” Michelle asked innocently.

Everyone stood silent for a moment, while Matthew gave Michelle one of those ‘I-can’t-believe-you-just-did-that’ looks.

“Oh, this is Matthew,” I said, finally breaking the silence.

Chris looked at Matthew and he nodded.

“Hey, Melody, I need to ask you something,” Chris asked, while looking embarrassed at the same time.

I looked at Matthew and Michelle for some sort of encouragement of whether I should go. Matthew was nodding his head vigorously, but Michelle on the other hand, was having this dreamy look on her face while she was looking at Chris, plainly not paying me any sort of attention.

“Fine,” I said, still looking at Michelle and Matthew.

I got up and Chris led to me to one of the bookshelves. He turned around and I saw he was nervous. There were beads of sweat breaking out on his face and he kept on biting his lip. The way he was acting, it was like he was going to ask me out.

“Do you want to go out with me?”

“Out? With you?”

I couldn’t believe it. Chris, one of my best friends for over five years was asking me out. I didn’t even know that Chris had that little something for me. I was even that good looking. Well, all my friends considered me good looking, and maybe Chris did too, from his point of view. And to make matters worse, I didn’t have any feelings for him. None whatsoever. Well, I wasn’t surprised, considering that Chris was hardly around us, so how could I like someone who doesn’t even spend time with me?

There was this uncomfortable silence where Chris kept on shooting me these hopeful looks, while I was still deep in thought of whether I should go out with him.

“Well?” Chris asked after about a minutes’ silence.

“Chris, you’re a really good friend, except that, well, I really don’t have any feelings for you,”

Chris looked at me in disbelief.

“You don’t have any feelings for me? Why? Is it because that I’m ugly? Or are you already seeing someone else?”

“Chris, it’s really hard for me to like someone whom I’ve hardly spent time with,”

“Hardly spent time with?” Chris repeated.

“Yeah. But it’s all right. You don’t have to give up all your friends just to spend time with me. In fact I’m really happy for you that you have lots of friends!”

Chris looked at me incredulity. I looked at him pityingly and gave him a swift hug which caught Chris unawares. I let him go and said,

“I’m really sorry Chris,”

I let him go and left Chris standing there. I walked back to the table where Matthew and Michelle were working. I sat down and silently started working. Matthew looked up and asked,

“Is everything all right?”

I once again hitched up a fake smile, looked at him and replied,

“Yeah, everything’s great,”

I bent down and started working again. When the bell rang indicating the end of morning tea, I went to my next class, geography.

As I sat down outside my geography class, Becky walked over and sat down next to me. Becky looked at me and asked,

“Is everything all right?”

I looked at her and said,

“Becky, did you know that Chris liked me?”

Becky quickly looked away from me and started talking to her shoes.

“What? Really? I-I didn’t know that! What happened? Did he ask you out?” She said in a falsely innocent voice.

“Becky, you’re a terrible- wait. How did you know that Chris asked me out?”

Becky looked uncomfortable.

“Well, you see, Chris wanted to know how to ask, well, YOU out,”

I looked at her in disbelief.

“He’s had a big crush on you for ages,” Becky continued, “but he didn’t have the nerve to ask you out,”

At that moment our geography teacher, Mr. Daniels, ushered us into our class.

At the end of the day, I headed for the buses outside my school. As I waited to get on the bus, I saw Chris walking over to me. I quickly looked away and saw one of my friends, Lorelai, from my geography class. She saw me and said,

“Hey Melody! Are you okay? You weren’t talking much as usual today,”

“Oh, I was just thinking about something important that happened to me,” I replied.

“Does it have anything to do with Chris?” She asked.

I froze. How did Lorelai know what happened between me and Chris? I stole a glance at Chris and saw that he wasn’t really trying to talk to me, but one of his friends he saw near the bus.

“How do you know about that?” I asked innocently.

“Well Chris hardly talked to you during class, and he kept on shooting you these really weird looks during geography,”

“Well, if you really must know, he asked me out during lunch,”

“Really?” Lorelai exclaimed, “What did you say?”

“I said, ‘no’,”

“‘No?’ Why? I reckon he’s pretty cute!”

“Yes, but I haven’t talk to him for ages. I’ve never even seen him since grade eight. We’ve only seen each other a few times, but that’s all. I can’t like someone who doesn’t even talk to me,” Lorelai nodded and while we waited to get on the bus, she had a glazed look on her face like she always did whenever she was thinking hard about something. When the person in front of me moved onto the bus, I stepped on, and I showed the driver my bus pass.

He nodded and gestured for me to sit. I sat at an empty seat, waiting for Lorelai to come on, as she caught the same bus as me. As I looked outside the window, I saw Chris lining up for the bus. I then remembered that he caught the same bus as me and I silently cursed to myself. When Lorelai got on, I gesture for her to sit next to me. As she walked over to me, I wondered if I should tell Chris about why I didn’t want to go out with him. If he understood, I everything would be okay between us, instead of this uncomfortable silence we were having. When Lorelai sat down, she asked me,

“Are you going talk to Chris at all?”

I pondered the question for a moment then replied,

“I think I should, otherwise he might think I’m ignoring him on purpose,”

Lorelai nodded, and started talking to some of her friends that were already on the bus. When Chris came on, I decided to talk to him now. I stood up and called out,

“Hey Chris! Come over here for a second!”

He looked at me and sat down near his friends. I felt rejected. It seemed he didn’t want to talk to me either. I slumped back into my seat and remained silent for the whole journey.

When the bus reached my neighborhood, it slowed down outside the school bus stop, which was next to a river. I stood up, along with a few of the other kids, and made my way towards the exit. As I was walking down the aisle, I looked at Chris and I saw that he was watching me, but when he noticed I was looking, he turned away. When I passed his seat he took another quick glance at me, and then continued to talk to his friend. I ignored him and got off the bus. Lorelai leaned out of the window and called out,

“See ya later, Melody! I’ll probably call you later tonight,”

I waved back and walked down the street.

Most of the kids lived near the bus stop, but there were a few that lived further down the street. I also live around there as well. I’ve been there for as long as I can remember which is actually not very long. I have a terrible memory, but all the pictures mum took helped me remember all the times where I had embarrassed myself. It seemed that mum had gotten every single photo when I had gotten dirty, when I was crying when my brother took my ice cream away from me and when I had stood naked in the kiddie pool with a bucket over my head.

As I was walking, I realised that there was only me and this other guy left. I’ve had a crush on him for ages, but I’ve never actually had the nerve to talk to him. All I know is that he’s at least a year older than I am, and he goes to the same school as me. I’ve seen him around the place, but I don’t think he knows who I was. He has brown, messy hair, and he’s rather muscular. He has the most attractive smile and every time I see it, I literally melt at the sight of it. Today he was alone, which was strange because he was always surrounded with at least three of the girls from my bus. He didn’t seem attracted to them, although he might’ve been already going out with someone. But I did have a rather romantic encounter with him the other day.

When I was walking to the bus stop, I saw him and the other girls talking. I started to walk behind him and the girls, mainly because I wanted to hear what they were saying, but generally I walked behind them because of what the girls always said to me whenever I walked in front of them. As I was walking, one of the girls had seen her friends near the bus stop. She called out,

“Hey, Jess! Wait up!”

Her friend turned around and waved to her. She turned back and said,

“I’m sorry, but I have to see one of my friends. I’ll see you later, okay?” She then blew him a kiss and ran off.

“My god,” I said to myself. I must have said it pretty loud because when I looked back at him, he was smiling at me. I looked at him shocked, and he continued to smile, shaking his head. I tried to smile back, but it was more of a grimace. I immediately turned around and started to look at the ground. I was still in shock, mainly because he smiled at me. I knew it was just a smile, but I couldn’t help myself, he was so hot. The last time I saw him that day was at school, but he didn’t notice me. So much for that smile. Well, okay, I guess it might not have been a romantic encounter but for some reason I felt as if he actually DID mean it. Maybe he did.

I decided that today would be the day to go talk to him. I walked closer towards him and when I was close enough, I called out,

“Hey!”

He turned around and gave me a questionable look. I walked up towards him and said,

“Hi, I’m Melody,”

He continued to look at me strangely, but then he held out his hand which I gladly shook.

“Hey, I’m Dario,”

“‘Dario’. That’s a unique name,” I said.

He smiled and said, “So’s Melody,”

I smiled at him and he asked, “So you go to my school don’t you? I’ve seen you around,”

My heart started beating rapidly. “So he did notice me!” I thought to myself.

I nodded and said, “Yeah, same here. What grade are you in?”

“11. What about you?”

“10,”

He nodded and we continued walking together, side by side. It was getting really awkward, with both of us not saying anything, so I decided to make some conversation.

“So who are those three girls you hang out with at the bus stop?” I asked.

He smiled at me once again and said, “jealous, are we?”

My face started to heat up and I knew I was blushing really badly. I felt better when he said, “Relax, I’m joking. Nah, they’re just some girls I know. They’re only talking to me ‘cause my father’s a producer, and they’re trying to get him to cast them into a movie,”

I nodded and kept walking. So there wasn’t anything going on between them. I decided to ask another personal question, when he said,

“Hey, can I have a look at that bracelet?”

I looked down at my hand and realised that he was talking about the bracelet my father had got me when he was in Japan.

“Yeah, sure, go ahead,” and with that, he took my hand in his and started to run his fingers over the bracelet.

“I’ve seen a bracelet like this before. It was somewhere in Asia…”

My body tingled with excitement as his masculine fingers held my hand. He even rubbed every now and then, but I knew he wasn’t doing it on purpose. Just then his fingers ran over mine and when I looked down, I realised he was looking at my ring. “Wow, this is a sweet ring. It looks pretty ancient though…. Is this an heirloom of some sort?” I nodded and replied,

“Yeah, it was my great-great grandmother’s. All the women in the family have worn it,”

“Sweet,” he said once again, and with that, he let go of my hand. I felt disappointed that I wasn’t holding his hand again, but it wasn’t as if I was going to ask him to hold my hand again just for the sake of it.

“Where do you live?” he asked.

“Actually just down this street,” I said and pointed towards the street sign, Clayton Street, which we were walking towards to.

“What a coincidence,” he said, “me too,” I nodded and we walked into the same street together.

I kept on shooting him side looks at him and watched how his brown hair moved whenever he took a step, and how his face seemed so smooth. He sometimes caught me looking at him, which resulted in giving me the most attractive smile he’s ever given me. I blushed and quickly turned away. As we continued walking, we started having a fairly interesting conversation. He asked me some personal questions, such as, if I was single, or if I liked anyone. I asked them as well, but he said no to all of the questions. When I heard him say ‘yes’ when I asked if he was single, my heart leapt at the answer. “So I might have a chance after all!” I thought. I then asked him,

“Where’s your house?”

He pointed to the huge mansion we were walking towards to. I stared in amazement at the mansion. I knew someone lived there, but I never knew he lived there.

“You’re rich!”

He laughed and said, “Yeah, I guess,”

As we walked up towards his house, I saw that they had a large, Victorian-like fence all around the house. Their lawn was perfectly manicured, and they had flowerbeds at intervals all around the lawn. I couldn’t see the back of the house, but I knew that there would be a pool there. He walked up to the gate, opened it and turned back to me and said,

“Well, this is my stop. Before I forget, where’s your house?”

I pointed down to the house on the far left of the street. He nodded and said,

“Cool. I guess I’ll see you later then,”

I nodded and replied, “Yeah, bye,”

He smiled and walked off. I started walking down the street, but before Dario’s house disappeared from my view, I stood there waiting until Dario went inside his house. Just before Dario went inside, he turned around and when he saw me, he laughed, and waved at me. I waved back, embarrassed. He shook his head and he disappeared inside. I continued walking to my house. My mind kept on going through the conversation me and Dario had. I knew that tonight, I was going to have a dream that I would never want to end.

When I got to my house, I went inside and saw my brother, Jai, leaning on the countertop, talking to someone on the phone. When he saw me, he nodded, and headed off towards his bedroom. I lived with my brother, my mum and my dad, although my dad went on frequent business trips around the world. This time he wasn’t going to be back until sometime next year. My mother worked pretty late, so I never got to see a lot of her. But on the weekends, she never works, and she always comes home during the evenings, so everything balanced out. Jai worked in the department store as a salesperson. He loves it there and nothing gets between him and his work. I went to my bedroom, placed my bag on the floor, and lay on my bed. I started to think about Dario, and later when I went to bed, I started having exotic dreams about him.

The next morning I woke up and went to have breakfast. Mum and Jai had already left for work, so I had the house to myself for a while. I looked at the clock, and it read 8:00. I had another thirty-five minutes before my bus came, so I started getting ready. When I was ready to leave, I locked up the house, and headed down the street. Hopefully I was going to run into Dario at some point, before his ‘fan club’ showed up.

When I went past his house, I stood there, right in the middle of the street, waiting for him. After a few minutes, I realised that he must’ve already left for the bus stop. I waited another minute, just in case, but then decided that it wasn’t worth it. As I started walking, I heard someone calling,

“Hey Melody, wait up!”

I turned around and saw that Dario was walking towards me.

“Hey Melody. I thought that was you waiting for me,” he said, catching up.

“What? I was not waiting for you,” I exclaimed.

“Oh yeah, the way you stood outside my house, in the middle of the street, doesn’t really count as waiting,”

“I was- I was just looking at your house,” I said evasively.

“Uh-huh,” he said, looking at me suspiciously. He then smiled and said, “It doesn’t matter if you waiting for me, you know,”

“I was not waiting for you!” I exclaimed, laughing, “Listen, can we just drop the subject?”

He nodded, but he kept on smiling at me in a mischievous way.

When we were near the bus stop, I realised that his ‘fan club’ would be here any moment. When I saw them, I started edging away from Dario, hoping he wouldn’t notice. He did, and he asked me, “What are you doing?”

I stopped, blushed, and said, “Nothing. It’s just…”

“It’s about Jess, Bianca and Kiki, isn’t it?”

“Who?”

“The girls that don’t like you?”

“Oh, I wouldn’t say that they didn’t like me, but they’re just, well…”

“Listen, don’t worry about them. They just get jealous whenever they see me with another girl. They think they might have a chance to get the part in the movie. As if they would get it,” he snorted, shaking his head.

“Thanks,” I said, and he winked at me.

So I stood beside him, but as the girls walked up to us, I started to feel uncomfortable. The girls looked at me with a look of disgust on their face, and said to Dario, “Hey Dario. Come over here, I need to show you something,” said one of the girls, and she pulled on his arm, but he just stood there and said, “You can just bring it over here, can’t you Jess?”

She just looked at him, and said nothing more about it. They started talking about homework their English teacher set them, and I decided that this conversation wasn’t really interesting. I walked behind the bus stop and looked at the river. It looked so peaceful, and I found myself staring at it for sometime until Dario appeared beside me and asked, “What’s wrong?”

I shook my head and replied, “No, nothing’s wrong,”

He nodded and said, “Well, the bus is here. We better get going,”

I nodded and walked towards the bus. When I got on, I looked around to see where Lorelai was. She was in our usual spot, except that she had the window seat. As I walked down the aisle, a pair of hands went on my shoulders and Dario, who was behind me, said, “Come on Melody. Other people have to get to their seats as well,”

“Shut up Dario,” I replied laughing, and sat down in my seat. Dario sat at the back with his friends, which happened to be a few seats away from ours. Lorelai leaned over and said, “Who’s that guy?”

“You know that guy I told you about?”

“Yeah,”

“That’s him,”

Lorelai looked at me in surprise and said,

“Ohhh…So you finally talked to him?”

I nodded in reply.

Just then Dario yelled to me,

“Hey Melody! You were great last night! We should do more of that often!”

“What?!” I exclaimed turning around in my seat. There sat Dario, smiling, and his friends all laughing.

“Yeah it was awesome! I wish I could’ve done it again but, you know, we both had school the next day, so I had to leave it for tonight. Hope you forgive me, ‘cause I know that you loved it!”

“What are you talking about?” I asked, shocked at was he was saying. He then winked at me and smiled. I don’t know if that meant he was just joking, but he didn’t want to admit it in front of his friends, or if he was putting it in for show. I turned back around and saw Lorelai looking at me, completely dumbfounded.

“Melody is this true?!” Lorelai asked in astonishment.

I shook my head in disbelief and said, “No, it’s not. I can’t believe you’d believe something like that,”

“But- but he seemed so serious…” she said, confused.

“Don’t worry I think he’s just joking,” I replied.

She nodded and started talking about Dario, and asking questions about him. When she got to the point of him being single, she stopped halfway through her sentence and said, “When Chris hears about this, he’s going to be furious,”

“Why? He’s not on the bus,” I replied.

Chris never caught the bus to school. His parents always dropped him off, although during the day, his parents were always working, so he had to catch the bus home.

“Besides, it’s not as if someone’s going to tell him, and I can trust you to keep a secret, can’t I?”

“Yes, but I’m not worried about that, I’m worried about what everyone else heard on the bus when Dario shouted out those things,”

My blood turned to ice. Lorelai was right. Everyone was going to spread this all around the school! And Chris’s friends were also on the bus, so they were also likely to tell him. What was I supposed to do? Even though Chris never spent any time with Becky, and me he was still my friend, and I didn’t want anything bad to happen with our friendship.

“You’re right, but what am I supposed to do?” I asked.

Lorelai looked thoughtful for a moment, and replied, “Well, the only thing you can do is to tell him face to face that it was all just a joke what they said on the bus,”

“But what about his friends?”

“What about them?” Lorelai asked.

“Well, they’re likely to reassure him that it really did happen,”

“Relax Melody. Who do you think he’s going to believe: his new friends he met during high school, or you, who have been his best friend for almost 5 years?”

“True… I just hope he doesn’t really believe them no matter what,”

Lorelai nodded and started talking to some girls in the seat in front of us. I turned around once again to check if Dario was still mocking me, but thankfully he was talking to his friends and the rest of his group seemed too interested in the topic they were discussing to notice I was watching. Dario did notice me, however, and he gave me the smallest smile he could manage without being notice by his friends. Although it was something relatively small, his smile gave me reassurance that Dario was only joking when he said those things, but the consequences I may have to suffer were high. When we reached school, I got out of my seat and headed for the door, with Lorelai behind me. As I got off the bus, I turned around to wait for Lorelai, but she had stopped on the way to the door to talk to one of her friends who was travelling to a different school.

Dario, instead walked off, and when he saw me he walked over and whispered in my ear,

“Hope you didn’t find what I said insulting. I’ll talk to you later,” and with that, he winked at me and left with his friends. I breathed a sigh of relief when he said that, although I was still waiting for the impact of the gossipers to tell their tale around the school. When Lorelai got off she asked what Dario had said to me. I said that he apologised for what he said to me and she replied, “Wow, he’s so polite. But I wonder why he did that to you?”

I nodded in reply and replied, “Yeah, me too,”

Lorelai then headed off towards her group of friends near the school, and I headed towards the side gate of the school. Near the gate I saw Becky talking to Chris. He was laughing, while Becky was smiling. I walked up to Becky and asked,

“What’s so funny?”

Becky turned around immediately and the smile vanished on her face when she saw me. Chris stopped laughing and turned to look at me.

“Melody! What- what are you doing here?” Becky asked, shocked.

“Coming to talk to you. Hey Chris,”

Chris nodded and said, “Hey,”

I looked at him and said, “Okay…listen, Becky I’ve got some news for you. It just happened yesterday-”

“I’ll talk to you later okay, Becky?”

Becky turned, smiled at Chris and said, “Sure. Bye,”

Chris smiled at her, waved and went the school grounds. When Becky turned back, I asked her,

“So, why were you and Chris talking?”

“I’m allowed to talk to him aren’t I?”

“Yeah, but why did you all suddenly stop when I was around?”

Becky looked uncomfortable before answering, but she replied, “It’s nothing, really, we were just having a conversation,”

“Yeah, a conversation which I wasn’t allowed to hear,” I retorted.

“Melody, don’t get worked up about it. It’s just that since you said ‘no’ to him, he’s been feeling a bit awkward around you,”

“Awkward? But does that give him a right to act all anti-social around me?”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, I was trying to talk to him yesterday on the bus, but when I called over to him, he just ignored me and sat near his friends,”

“He always sits near his friends, you know that,”

“Maybe, but when I went past him on the way off the bus, he just looked at me with no expression at all,” I replied.

“Well, maybe if you don’t talk to him for some time, then try again later on, he’ll probably have forgotten about the incident and start talking to you again,”

I nodded and replied, “Yeah, I hope you’re right,”

“I’m always right. So what was that big announcement you had?”

“Oh, that. You know that guy that I had a crush on?”

“Which one?”

“Huh? No, that guy that caught the same bus as me. Remember when you caught me staring at him one day when I was lining up for the bus?”

“Oh, yeah him. He’s pretty good looking,”

“‘Pretty good looking’? He’s amazing! The way his hair moves when he walks, the smooth edges on his face, his lean, masculine fingers…”

“Uh, can we please get back to the subject?” Becky asked, snapping her fingers.

“Anyway,” I said distracted, “I just talked to him yesterday!”

Becky squealed with delight and cried out, “What?! You did? What happened? You have to tell me everything you did, okay?”

I nodded and started telling her about my romantic encounter with Dario.

I walked out of my English classroom with Lorelai by my side, talking about our English assignment our teacher had just set us.

“It seems pretty easy,” Lorelai said as she flicked through the criteria sheets. “Hmmmm…it says that we have to choose a book and write an essay about it,”

I groaned and asked; “Does it say what sort of book?”

“No, so I guess that means you can choose any sort of book you want,”

“Okay then, but how many words do we have to do?”

“Around 600,”

I groaned again and Lorelai laughed. “It’s not that hard, Melody. 600 is pretty easy,”

“Yeah for you maybe. I’m not the smart one in our class,”

“Well I could help you if you like. Do you want to get started now?”

“What? Are you crazy? Start my assignment on the first day we got it? No thanks,”

“Oh well then, I guess you could fail yet another assignment…. It doesn’t bother me,”

I rolled my eyes and replied, “If you want to help me so badly, help me with my problem of Chris,”

“Still not talking?”

“No, more like avoiding. He’s been moving away from me every time I go near him, and he acts all stony face around me. I think I’ve lost him as a friend,”

“Don’t say that! Just give him some time and everything will work out, I’m sure,”

“I hope your right,” I replied.

As we walked towards the library, I saw Michelle, Chris, Matthew and some of his friends talking in the courtyard. Michelle was looking at Chris, but this time she didn’t have a dreamy look on her face. This time she was constantly stare at Chris which he noticed, although he didn’t say anything about it. One of Matthew’s friends brought it up, which made Michelle go crazy at him. Matthew laughed and whispered something quietly to Chris. He smiled and nodded. Michelle also noticed this and kept on bugging Matthew about what he said. He didn’t say anything, but Michelle kept on looking at him suspiciously, while Chris was laughing. I felt jealous, seeing Chris with all of them and not me. It pained me to see him laughing and talking to them, but whenever I was around him, he never payed any attention to me. I somehow felt rejected because of that.

When we got to the library, I saw Dario sitting at a table with some of his senior friends. Lorelai smiled when she saw him, and made me walk past his table with her. As we got closer, Lorelai staged this loud conversation with me, trying to use as much of my name as possible.

“So Melody, I think we should get started on this assignment, don’t you think Melody? I think so Melody,”

“What are you doing? Shut up!” I whispered, jabbing my elbow into her ribs.

Lorelai just smiled and nodded towards the table. I looked and saw Dario was looking at me with a grin on his face. The rest of his friends were at the computers, so I knew he wasn’t going to do anything…. foolish.

“Hi,” I called out to him and he nodded in reply. I grabbed Lorelai’s arm and pulled her away from the desk.

“Why did you just do that?”

“What? I just wanted to see if he remembers you and, lucky for you, he does!”

“Whatever. Listen we came here to do some work, not to stare at Dario,”

“You guys were going to stare at me?”

My whole body froze. I slowly turned around and saw Dario was right behind me, with a mischievous grin on his face.

“What? I never said that!” I replied evasively. “You-you must be hearing things Dario,”

He smiled and asked Lorelai, “What’s that you got there?”

“Oh, that’s our assignment we came up here to do,” she replied.

He nodded and asked, “I could help you guys if you want,”

Lorelai was just about to say ‘yes’ when I stepped in and said, “No thanks, Dario. We’ve got it covered. Besides, we don’t want to take you away from your friends,”

He shook his head and replied, “No, it’s all good. My friends are just researching some things for class, and I don’t really have anything better to do,”

“Well, if we’re not taking you away from your friends, then sure!” Lorelai replied.

He smiled and Lorelai led me and him to a spare table. I glared at Lorelai and she gestured for me to follow. As I walked towards them, Lorelai shoved me between herself and Dario. I was stuck in the middle, and when I tried to move to the outside, Lorelai nudged me back into the middle. My arm brushed against his, and I could feel his smooth, soft skin for a few minutes, before his arm went away again. We got to a table that wasn’t inhabited with screaming year 8’s and gossiping girls, which was near the bookshelves. I sat down near the edge of the table, still a bit angry at what would happen between me and Chris because of Dario’s outburst. Confused at what happened on the bus between me and him, yet I was also hoping that Dario would sit near me so that I could talk to him. He sat on the opposite side of me, and as he sat, gave me his famous smile. I smiled weakly back, and when I looked at Lorelai, she was grinning in a satisfied way. She put the assignment sheets down and walked off towards the bookshelves looking for a book to do her essay on. No doubt she would be spying on us, so I tried to not make any contact with Dario and started to do my work. As I was writing, I noticed that Dario was smiling at me. I looked up and asked, “What?”

His smile reduced a little, but replied, “Oh, nothing.” He then turned away and started looking (or perving in my opinion, although I knew he wouldn’t do anything like that) at the senior girls who just walked in. They walked past, and gave Dario a friendly smile and one of them said, “Hey Dario.” He smiled his famous smile that I knew so well at the girls, but for some reason, I thought that he was only smiling at the girl who said ‘hello’. As the girls walked on, I realised that Dario was still watching them. I asked him,

“What are you doing?”

He looked away from the girls and replied,

“Oh, it’s nothing,”

I looked at him suspiciously and he blushed and quickly looked down. I stared at him in shock. That was the first time I saw Dario blush, and that made his face become tinged with pink. He looked a like a young boy when he did that. I then realised that he liked that girl that talked to him.

“You like her, don’t you?” I asked quietly.

He looked up at me and grimaced. “That obvious?” he asked.

I nodded curtly and began immediately writing some notes on the book I was going to do, without looking at him once. Inside of me, I felt like my heart had turned to ice. I knew I should have been happy or even curious about his love interest, but I was too focused on my relationship (that was going to happen) between me and Dario too be even remotely happy for him. I wanted him for myself, even though I knew it was selfish, but I would’ve thought that I might be able to get him to like me. I should’ve been happy with Dario as my friend, but I wanted to be more than just friends are. I wanted to tell him that I had a crush on him, but I didn’t have the nerve to tell him. Maybe I should’ve, but what would he do if I did tell him? We’d only known each other for two days, and I didn’t want to destroy the friendship I had with him. I didn’t know what to do or say, so I kept quiet and continued to write. Lorelai had come back from the bookshelves with a book she was going to do her essay on. I looked at her, but she was too focused on the book she was reading. Dario asked, “What book are you going to do your report on, Melody?”

I looked at him with no expression on my face and replied, “Don’t know yet,” and with that I left the table. I walked off towards the computers, thinking that I should pretend to be doing something instead of sulking that I wasn’t going to get Dario after all.

After school finished, I walked towards the buses lined up outside the school. Lorelai was going to be a bit late, so I promised her that I would save a seat for her. As I waited to get on the bus, I saw Dario walking over, so I quickly turned around so I wouldn’t have to talk to him. When I looked up, Dario was already at the end of the line, talking animatedly with his friends. I turned back towards the front and waited to get on the bus. After I had shown the bus driver my pass, I headed towards my usual seat next to the window. I looked out of it, and saw Dario staring right at me. I jumped back onto my schoolbag and he laughed and waved at me. I gave him a small smile and turned my back on him. I stared at the floor for some time until I realised that Dario was already on the bus and heading straight for me. I quickly looked away from him, so he wouldn’t notice that I knew he was coming. He moved my bag onto the floor, sat next to me, put his arm on my shoulder and asked, “What’s wrong, Melody?”

I looked at him over my shoulder and said, “Lorelai’s sitting there, you know,”

He looked at me in surprise and replied, “Oh, sorry. Did you want me to move?”

I shook my head and said, “Don’t need to. Lorelai’s not going to be here yet. You might as well use it. Why don’t you sit near your friends?”

“I am,”

My heart sank, if possible, even lower. So he considered me a friend. I knew I should’ve been happy that I had this hot, friendly guy for a friend, but my feelings weren’t with him at this particular moment. They were with me, and I wasn’t about to share them with Dario. He squeezed my shoulder and said,

“Melody, this isn’t you. Tell me what’s wrong,”

“You don’t know me that well. This might be how I act all the time,”

“Maybe, but I do know that this Melody is the complete opposite of the old one. Spill it you impostor, what did you do with the old Melody?”

I chuckled at his joke, and he smiled. “There we go. That’s better, isn’t it Melody?”

I shrugged and he put his arm around me. My body tingled at his touch, but I resisted the urge to be tempted by him and his masculine body. Just then his friends came on the bus, headed towards their usual spot. As soon as I saw this, I pushed Dario off me, and quickly looked out of the window as if nothing had happened. As they walked past, one of them asked Dario, “What are you doing?”

Dario took a sideway glance at me and replied, “It’s nothing,”

I braced myself for more taunting from his friends, but they walked on. Dario got up and turned around to look at me. I continued to stare out the window, and after he gave up waiting, Dario headed towards the back. When he left, I withdrew my gaze from the window and looked at the floor. I didn’t know what to do. He obviously knew that something was up with me, but he couldn’t figure out what it was. Throughout the day, I battled with the thoughts of what would happen if I told Dario that I liked him. If I did, he would either start avoiding me, just like Chris did or ignore the fact that I did like him, but act differently around me. If I didn’t tell him, he would likely be going out with that girl he liked. I had decided that I should talk to him soon, but I wouldn’t reveal anything about my love life. Lorelai had just came onto the bus, and headed towards my seat. She sat down and I asked, “What did you have to do?”

“Oh, I just had to get my marks from my art teacher,”

“For your assignment?”

“Yeah,”

“What did you get?”

She smiled smugly and replied, “An A”

I smiled at her and exclaimed, “Congratulations!”

“Thanks. So what did Dario want to talk to you about?”

I looked at her suspiciously and asked, “What do you mean?”

“Melody stop being so stupid. I saw you on the bus, with Dario next to you talking to you. What happened?”

“Nothing happened. He just sat down and asked if I was alright. How do you know this anyway?”

Lorelai grimaced and replied, “I came to the bus a bit earlier then expected and as I was talking to some friends, I saw you and Dario talking to each other,”

“Oh,”

“So nothing happened?”

“No, nothing,”

“Well then, why did he put his arm around you?”

My whole body froze and I asked her, “How did you know that?”

“So something DID happen. What was it?”

“Nothing! He just put his arm around me, and when his friends approached, I pushed him off and acted as if nothing happened!”

Lorelai nodded suspiciously and searched through her bag for the book she was reading in the library. I looked over the seats to see where Chris was. He was sitting near his friends, talking animatedly. I wondered to myself if Chris already knew about what Dario had said to me. Hopefully he didn’t hear it, but if he did, I hoped he would know that it was probably some sort of misunderstanding. I hope he would.

When the bus arrived at the bus stop, I said goodbye to Lorelai and headed off. As I walked down the street, I heard Dario calling out to me. I continued walking, but he didn’t stop calling out. All of the other kids had noticed and was starting to turn around and watch who was calling. I gave up and turned around to see that he had his hand cupped around his mouth, thinking that I couldn’t hear him. He dropped his hands and shouted out, “Finally!” I grimaced and he laughed. He started to walk towards me, when the three girls Jess, Bianca and Kiki showed up. They moved in front of him so that he couldn’t see me, and started talking loudly. I wondered if they were doing this on purpose, but then I realised that they would be if they heard Dario calling out some other girl’s name instead of theirs. I couldn’t see what was happening, but I decided to continue on walking. As I walked into our street, I wondered what happened to Dario. I silently laughed to myself at the thought of Dario getting trapped with the group of girls who thought they could become something more than what they were now.

“What’s so funny?”

I jumped and quickly turned around. There stood Dario, smiling with all of his perfectly aligned, white teeth shining in the sun (Not really, but they were pretty white).

“How did you get here?” I asked in disbelief.

He chuckled and replied, “It was easy. I just told the girls that they were holding me up and I had to go to this ‘important meeting’ straight away where my father finally chose the girl for the big movie production,”

“They believed you?”

“Of course they did. Anything that involved me and my father was on top of their priority list. They immediately let me through, but not before they started to suck up to me once again,”

“Bet you loved that,” I said under my breath.

“What was that?”

I looked at him in surprise, put on an innocent face and said, “What was what?”

He looked at me suspiciously then laughed. “Yeah I did love it actually,”

I looked at him in surprise then he laughed, and said, “I was just joking. Don’t take it so seriously,”

“Oh,” I nodded and with that I walked off. Dario came to my side once again and asked,

“Are you sure you’re okay?”

“Yeah,”

“Well, you don’t seem it,”

I shrugged and continued on walking. Dario shook his head and said, “Well, I guess there’s no point in figuring out this riddle. Also, when we were talking on the bus today, why did you push me off?”

“You mean when you had your arm around me?”

“Yeah,”

“Well, your friends were coming, so I decided that you shouldn’t be seen like that, especially if Bianca, Jess and Kiki saw it,”

“Stuff them. It doesn’t matter if they saw me doing that,”

“Your friends would have remarked on the situation,”

“Oh,” he looked down at his feet and fell silent.

“What’s up?” I asked. He looked up and replied,

“Sorry about what had happened this morning. I didn’t mean to do it. I was sort of telling them how this chick came and talked to me, and I sort of got the urge to show off in front of them,”

“And to humiliate me, I’m sure,”

He stared at me in disbelief and replied, “What?! I would never do anything like that do you. Or to anyone else for that matter,”

“Bianca, Jess and Kiki would have deserved it,”

He laughed and said, “Yeah, I think they would have deserved it better than you, but you have to believe me that I wouldn’t do anything like that to humiliate you,”

I smiled and said, “I do. Thanks,”

“No problem,”

He walked beside me and said nothing more. I liked the silence that we had between us and I now felt that I had something heavy was lifted off my chest. He would still be wondering what I wasn’t telling him, but I thought that would come at another time.

After a couple of days, I realised that I shouldn’t have left Dario in the dark. I wasn’t going to tell him that I liked him, but I was going to start talking to him once again. Chris on the other hand was still avoiding me, but I was starting to get used to it. He didn’t hear anything about the incident with me and Dario, but started to completely ignore me. I usually saw Chris in the grounds with Michelle, and rumour had it that they were going out. But that information was incorrect (which was normal for the gossiping students, as they usually left something out or the information was all made up. But they usually got the main topic right). They did go out, however they broke up which was oblivious to all of the gossiping students. They were still good friends, and they did everything together, just like when they were dating. It was also rumoured that Chris was dating someone else now, but no one knew who it was. Not even Michelle or the other gossiping students knew.

Later that day, I told Lorelai that I was going to start talking to Dario again. I had told her the other day my reasons so she knew what was going on. Dario, however, didn’t know and I kept it that way. She seemed relieved that I was going to start talking to him, because she knew that I had really strong feelings for him. I told her that I was only going to talk to him; I wasn’t about to go tell him how I felt about him. When we got on the bus, we went to our usual seats, except that Lorelai had got the window seat first (I knew that she did it on purpose so I could talk to Dario). I sat down grudgingly and Lorelai asked,

“What? You wanted to talk to him right? This is your chance!”

“Yeah, but after I got off the bus, not now!”

“Too late,” Lorelai smiled and she nodded towards the door. Dario came walking towards me, famous smile and all. Lorelai busied herself with her book just as he walked past. “Hey,” I said.

He looked at me in surprise and said, “Hey Melody,” and with that he sat down in the seat behind us. I turned around and asked, “What did you do today?”

“Oh not much. I proved my maths teacher wrong by telling him that he could this maths equation another way,”

I laughed and said, “Really. What happened?”

“It turned out that I was right in the first place, and the homework I got wrong was actually right, so luckily I didn’t get detention. What about yours?”

I shrugged and replied, “Oh, not much happened. Just the same old, boring school day,”

He laughed and said, “True. Listen I’ll talk to you later when we get off the bus okay?”

“Yeah, sure,” he smiled and with that he left and went to his seat at the back. I turned back to the front and Lorelai asked,

“How was it talking to Dario for the first time in four days?”

“Normal. It wasn’t as if I’ve never seen him before,”

“No, it was more like you weren’t talking to him because you like him,”

“Shut up,”

Lorelai smiled and continued to read her book.

When the bus reached our neighbourhood I got off and Lorelai called out, “Good luck!”

“Why’s she wishing you good luck?” Dario asked.

“Don’t know. She’s crazy,”

Dario laughed and I smiled. In truth, it was good to be talking to Dario again. He made me laugh so easily and he was a really great friend. Just then I saw Bianca, Jess and Kiki catching up so I said to Dario, “Watch out, your fan club’s approaching.”

He looked up and when he realised it was those girls, he shook his head and continued walking. “Don’t worry about them. They found out they didn’t get the part in the movie production, so now they’re all sulking and being very mean to me,”

I laughed once again and asked, “Who got it?”

“Oh, some girl who goes to a completely different school. It’s a miracle how they found out about it though. No one knew except my father, me and the winning girl,”

“Probably stalking all the contestants,”

“Yeah, they probably were,” he laughed.

As we walked into Clayton Street, Dario asked me, “So, why are you finally talking to me? A couple of days ago, you were all quiet around me. In fact, if I’m not mistaken, you were avoiding me. But now you’re talking to me. What’s up with that?”

I hesitated before I answered and said, “Well, it’s nothing really,”

“Melody that answer doesn’t work with me anymore. You have to tell me why,”

“I don’t have to,”

Dario grabbed my hand and spun me around to face him. He held my hands tightly and said, “You have to tell me,”

I looked at his hands, and then at his face. His smooth face was watching me very closely, but even when he was serious, Dario still had that charm about him. I leaned forward, unable to resist this temptation any further. My lips touched his, and I felt the warmth of his mouth. Dario was still holding my hands, but his hands moved up towards my head, and he started making my head lean in closer towards his face. I could feel his warm breath around my face, while my lips closed tightly over his. My hands went around his back and I started to rub my hands over his back. My lips continued to close on his so tightly, it was as if I was trying to bite it. In the midst of this passion, I realised that this wasn’t supposed to be happening. He wasn’t supposed to be finding out my feelings like this. I was supposed to be telling him, not expressing it. I withdrew quickly and stared at him in shock, as if he was the one who kissed me. He looked at me curiously, and asked, “What’s wrong?”

I continued to stare at him and ran off. I couldn’t face him now. It wasn’t as if I didn’t want to kiss him, I did, it was just that he wasn’t supposed to find out my feelings for him now. I was supposed to tell him in my own time. Dario called my name out a few times as I was running, but I ignored him and ran straight into my house. Jai was sitting at the table, eating a snack, when I came bursting through the door, which made him jump so violently, he dropped the packet of chips he was eating.

“Melody what-?” he asked but I ignored him and went straight to my room. I closed the door and slid onto the floor, my face in my hands.

‘He wasn’t supposed to find out like this,’ I kept on repeating to myself. I didn’t want to make it seem that I was desperate for him. I liked him and my feelings just took control of me. All I knew was that I wouldn’t be able to face him at school next week.

The next morning, I got up and walked to the kitchen. Yesterday’s incident kept on repeating itself in my mind, over and over again. I had a dream about Dario which was really interesting, but it kept on ending with me running away from him. It was the weekend, which I was thankful for, because that meant that I wouldn’t have to see Dario. I walked into the kitchen and saw mum and Jai at the table.

“Good morning, sweetie,” mum said, “How are you?”

“Fine, thanks mum,” I replied as I sat down at the table. She smiled at me and passed me a plate of toast, with some margarine and jam. My mother looked exactly like me, except that her hair was a tad darker than mine, and a bit longer. But the facial features were almost exactly like mine. Jai was the complete opposite. Even though he did have the traditional colour of blonde (which ran through the family), Jai resembled more of my father. He had a normal length nose, and he was quite tall for an 18 year old. He had stubble growing which he said attracted girls. I laughed when he said that, because most of the girls I knew hated facial hair. He was built like my father as well; he had a broad chest and muscular arms and legs. When he went to school, he usually won the sprints and shot put. He’s got thousands of trophies from the sports carnivals and the peninsula tryouts from school.

I put some margarine and raspberry jam on my toast and thought about the romance me and Dario had yesterday. Jai and mum were talking about his work, when there came a knock on the door. I froze with my toast halfway into my mouth. Mum looked confused and got up to answer the door.

“No mum, don’t go!” I said, muffled by the toast in my mouth. She ignored me and opened the door. There stood Dario looking at my mother. I hid behind Jai, who was looking at me, confused. Dario couldn’t see me, because of my mum, who was in the way.

“Hello. Is Melody here?” I head Dario asking. Mum looked around at the table and I mouthed the word ‘no’ to her while shaking my head at the same time. She looked back at Dario and said, “No, I’m sorry, she’s in the shower at the moment,”

Dario nodded and asked, “Well then, could you please give this to her?” and he took out a piece of paper from his jeans.

“Sure,” mum replied, taking the paper.

“Thanks,” he replied and he left. Mum shut the door, and I came out from behind Jai.

“What was all that about?” Jai asked.

“Nothing,” I said and I went over to mum and snatched the paper out of her hands.

“Who was that Melody?” mum asked.

“No one mum. It was just this guy I met a couple of days ago,”

“A guy, eh? You’re in Melody. And about time too,” Jai said.

“Shut up Jai!” I cried out and I chucked the last bit of toast I had in my mouth at Jai.

“Oh that’s disgusting Melody. That was in your mouth you know,”

I walked to my room, staring at the letter. What could Dario have possibly written to me? I closed the door and sat on my bed. I unfolded the letter and read:

Melody

I hope you’re alright after what happened yesterday. To tell you the truth, that’s the first time a girl has kissed me and not the other way around! But I did enjoy it nonetheless. I don’t know why you took off just after that little incident, but hopefully it didn’t scare you or anything. I really wanted to talk to you after what had happened, but I’m starting to think that that may be impossible. I’m going to be delivering this on Saturday, and with a bit of luck you’ll be there to receive it. If not, I understand why. If you could, it’d be really great to see you reply to this letter. I’ve also decided to give you my mobile number if you want to talk later on.

04 25 31 16 89

Dario

I read and re-read it to make sure I understood what I was reading. He didn’t think badly of me after all, which I was thankful for. He also wanted to talk, which made it seem he wanted to discuss something important. I decided to write back and mail it in his mailbox.

The weekend had ended with no more encounters from Dario. I delivered the letter to his house, late on Saturday night so he wouldn’t see me, but I didn’t receive anything from Dario yet. The letter explained most of why I wasn’t talking to him, but I thought that I could explain the rest of it later in better detail when I next saw him. On Monday morning, I realised that today was the day when I was going to be seeing Dario for the first time since the kiss which happened on Friday. Mum and Jai had already left for work, so as usual I had the house to myself until the bus came at the bus stop. I decided to leave a bit later than usual so I wouldn’t have to run into Dario. I left with around fifteen minutes left to spare. As soon as I started walking down the street, I saw Dario just disappearing from sight. I breathed a sigh of relief and continued walking. I managed to get to the bus stop just as the bus came. I deliberately waited until I was the last one, however Dario noticed I was lagging behind, so he did too until he was the second last person the bus. I cursed to myself and walked onto the bus with him. Dario didn’t turn around and greet me; in fact he didn’t do anything. He just walked on without turning around once. As he passed my seat, he dropped a piece of paper next to Lorelai. She looked at Dario, but he continued to walk towards the back. I got Lorelai’s attention, and gestured to her that it was for me. She nodded and took hold of the paper and waited until I sat down. She gave me the piece of paper, but didn’t say anything. I thanked her and unfolded it. It only contained one sentence from Dario and it read:

Meet me near the trees at the oval during second lunch

I folded it back up and started wondering why he wanted to see me. I was expecting Lorelai to ask some questions on why Dario gave a letter, but she didn’t say anything. When we got to school, Lorelai and I walked off and headed towards our form classes. I looked back and saw Dario getting off the bus. He saw me and nodded. I waved back and headed off to class.

I was very anxious about the meeting with Dario. It was a bit weird as well, because I never knew any guy who would want to meet me for a private conversation after they had kissed me. As I walked towards the oval, I realised how many kids were there. Finding Dario was going to be like finding a needle in a haystack. I walked around the perimeter of the oval, hoping that I would see someone that would look like Dario. As I headed towards the trees, I could pinpoint where he was. He was standing near a tree which had fallen down from a recent storm. I walked over to him, and realised that he had his back to me. I cleared my throat and he turned around. When he saw me, he gave me that famous smile of his. I couldn’t help but smile back. He sat down on the tree and patted the seat next to him. I hesitated at first, but gladly took the seat in the end. An awkward silence ensued, with the both of us looking in different directions. In the end, Dario asked me, “So… how’re you holding up?”

I looked at him and replied, “Pretty good,”

“Cool,”

I continued to look at him and expected more, but Dario looked away once again. I sighed and said, “Well, you wanted to meet me. What now?”

He continued to stare off in the distance and realise that I wasn’t going to get anything out of him. I got up and was about leave when he said, “Wait Melody,”

I turned around and saw that Dario was smiling at me mischievously.

“How did it feel?” he asked.

“What are you talking about?”

“How did it feel to be left out? That’s how I felt when you wouldn’t tell me what was wrong with you,”

“So this meeting was all about that then?” I asked, angry at what he was doing.

“No, but I wanted to prove to you that you shouldn’t do this to anyone even if you like them,”

“You knew that I liked you?”

“Of course. You were giving it away too easily. Especially the kiss,” he said mischievously. I smiled and walked back over to him and sat down.

“I guess I should’ve kept it low-key then,” I said.

“No, you didn’t need too. I mean, I did like you too,”

I looked at him in surprise and I saw that he was smiling and blushing at the same time.

“You liked me?” I asked, shocked.

“Yeah. But you’d notice that I wasn’t doing anything… obvious to show my feelings for you,”

“Wait. If you liked me, why did you say that you liked that senior girl?”

He blushed once again and replied, “I didn’t really. I only did that just to see what you would do. You did react, but not in the way I expected,”

I looked at him and asked, “How did you think I would react?”

“I thought you would’ve worked harder to get me to notice you more,”

I started to get angry at him. He did all of that stuff to see if I would react? I started hitting him with my fists, not hard, but hard enough to show him that I was angry with him.

“H-hey, what are you doing?” he asked, laughing.

“You bastard! I can’t believe you did something like that to see if I would like you!” I exclaimed, still hitting him.

He shook his head, laughing, while blocking my hits at the same time. He then grabbed my hands, unclenched them, and started caressing them.

“You have really soft hands, Melody,” he said quietly.

I blushed as he said that, and took my hands out of his. I looked away from him at started to stare off in the distance. He laughed quietly and moved closer towards me. I looked back at him, and saw that he was watching me closely. I reached out and caressed the side of his face. He moved into my hand and started to move his face up and down.

“You’re the one with soft skin Dario,” I said as I took my hand away from his face.

“Well, I do try to moisturise my skin often,” he said. I laughed and got up from the tree.

“What’s wrong Melody?” he asked. I didn’t reply, but walked over behind the tree. I stared at the trees, thinking about Dario. He walked over and asked,

“What are you staring at?”

I shook my head, but continued to stare. Dario also started to stare at the place I was looking at, but soon found it uninteresting.

“Melody?” he asked, waving his hand in front of my face. I immediately snapped out of my concentration phase and stared at Dario.

“What?” I asked.

“You done being creepy?” he asked. I laughed and replied,

“I’m just thinking,”

“About what?”

I didn’t reply, but decided to ask him a question that I was dying to ask for ages, right from the point where I first saw him.

“Dario, do you want to go out with me?” I asked, while bracing myself for the answer. He looked at me in shock and replied,

“I can’t believe you would ask me something like that when you already know the answer,” he said. I looked at him, sceptical at the answer he would give me. He laughed and said, “Yes, of course I will,”

I laughed as well and kissed him on the lips. I could sense he was shocked at this sudden kiss, but he let go of all emotion, and kissed me back, harder than what he did back at home.

A week had passed since I asked Dario out. He was certainly glad that I had finally asked him out, or it might have been he was glad to be going out with me. Either way, it was still great to be going out with someone like him. Even though we were dating, we hadn’t actually gone anywhere. In fact, Saturday was going to be the day when we were going to have our first date. Fortunately for us, there was going to be a movie marathon and we decided to go and see it. When I told mum that I was going out with the boy she had received the note from, she squealed with delight (which was very weird for me to hear. Normally, she’s usually so formal and polite, but tonight she seemed to be acting like a teenager again) and started allowing me to go on these wild shopping sprees so that I could pick out my dress.

“Mum,” I said to her one day as she was browsing some outfits for me, “why are you doing this?”

“What hun? Oh this one looks nice!” she said and she held up this spotty yellow and red dress.

“Mum, that dress is a crime against nature!” I said, disgusted at the thought of me wearing something like that.

“But it brings out your inner-you,”

“My inner-you would rather kill itself before wearing that,” I said with disgust.

“Oh well, okay then,” she said as she put the dress back onto the rack. “Anyway hun, what were you saying before?”

“Why are you doing this? You never allowed me to do something as outrageous like this!”

“Honey, I’m just really happy for you. You’re finally growing up!” She said, as she pinched my cheek.

“Mum, not in public remember?!” I said, through gritted teeth.

“Oh right, sorry. Anyway, I’m just happy for you that you’ve finally found someone that you’re truly in love with. And he’s a good looker too,”

“Mum, that’s disgusting!” I exclaimed. I couldn’t bear mum saying anything like this. In fact, I’d be a lot happier when this date would finally finish. Mum was starting to really annoy me.

Dario was going to wait for me there, so in the end, Jai had to drop me off. He’s got this red Mustang, which he managed to afford after dad gave him enough money. Dad’s rich, but for some reason, is so tight with it that he’ll hardly buy anything expensive, even though he earns quite a lot. I got into the passenger seat and Jai hopped in beside me. He started the engine and revved it up. Mum came out of the house in her dressing gown.

“Have fun, hun! Jai, please be careful when you’re driving,”

“Don’t worry mum, Mel won’t be seeing any accidents today,”

“Thank god. See you later when you get back in the morning!”

“Bye mum!” and as I waved to her, Jai reversed out of the driveway and drove off. I sat quietly in the seat, looking out of the window and thinking of how much fun I was going to have with Dario.

“So you’re finally going on a date, huh?”

I looked over at him and nodded.

“Huh. Well, if you happen to have any trouble with this Dario bloke, just remember that your brother is here to help you out,”

I smiled at him and said, “Thanks Jai,”

He nodded and fell silent for the rest of the journey. When we got to the cinemas, he said, “Okay Mel, this is your stop. I’ll come pick you up around 5:30 am, okay?”

I nodded and got out of the car. He was just about to drive off when he stopped, leaned his head out of the car and said, “Remember Melody, if you’re in any trouble, just call me on my mobile, and I’ll be there as soon as I can, okay?”

“Yes Jai, I understand. I don’t need this from you as well,”

“Well, mum made me promise. Besides, I do have your best interests at heart,”

“Thanks,”

He nodded and he accelerated off. I walked through the cinema doors and stood dumbfounded at the mass gatherings of teenagers I saw there. I saw some teenagers from my school, while there were completely different kids I’ve never seen before. I also saw some teenagers from my primary school that I haven’t seen since we left in grade 7. I looked around the waiting area for Dario, but I didn’t see him. I walked around, searching for Dario. I soon found him near the ticket line. I walked over to him and said, “Hey Dario,”

He looked up and when he saw me, gave me that famous smile I knew so well. He looked up at down at me and said, “Hey Melody. You look fantastic,”

“Thanks. Do you know what movie you want to see?”

“This is OUR date. Not mine. I waited for you here so that we could both choose,”

“That’s really sweet of you Dario, but I don’t mind what we watch,”

As he turned back to look at the choices, I saw Becky standing by herself. I walked over to her and said, “Hey Becky! How are you?”

She jumped and quickly turned around. “Melody! Wh-what are you doing here?”

“Seeing the movie marathon. What else? Oh, by the way, you’ll never guess who I came here with its-“

“Come on, Becky. Let’s go,”

I stared at the guy who said that. I then realised that it was none other than Chris.

“Chris?!” I exclaimed. He quickly turned around and when he saw me, he jumped just like Becky did.

“Melody?”

I looked at Becky, and I could tell that she was embarrassed about this whole ordeal.

“Did you happen to forget to TELL me, something Becky?” I asked her, angrily. She continued to stare at the ground, while Chris was still staring at me, which was making me uncomfortable. Thankfully, Dario came over and said,

“Okay Melody, I’ve got the tickets and-” he stopped at the sight of Becky and Chris. “Who are they?” Dario asked. I looked at them and replied,

“No one, Dario,” and with that, I led Dario away from Chris and Becky.

“So,” I said, trying to make myself forget what I just saw, “what marathon are we seeing?”

“The horror marathon,” Dario replied.

“Horror, eh? Just don’t let me see any of the scary parts, okay?”

“Don’t worry,” he said mischievously, “my lips will be on yours so much, you won’t be able to see a thing,”

I laughed, and put my arm around his waist. He put his arm around my shoulder, and we walked towards the ticket taker. I reached around Dario’s jeans and found the tickets lodged in his back pocket. As I put my hand into it, Dario turned towards me and asked, “What are you doing?”

“Feeling your ass. What else?” I replied. He smiled, and his arm went down near mine. I looked at him and pulled the tickets out of the pocket.

“I was just joking. I was looking for the tickets,”

He leant down and whispered in my ear, “I’m not,” and with that he squeezed my ass. I jumped and he laughed.

As I gave the person our tickets, he said, “Cinema number 3,” I thanked him and we walked off. We walked into the cinema and I let go of Dario and asked him, “Well, where do you want to sit?”

He looked around for a few seconds, and then decided to sit at the back. I followed him and sat down next to him. He asked me, “Hey, did you want something from the snack bar?”

“Just a medium coke, thanks,” I told him. He nodded and walked off. I sat down, with my jumper wrapped around me. As I waited for Dario to come back, I watched as the cinema steadily become full with teenagers and their dates. I then saw Becky and Chris, arm in arm, but thankfully they didn’t see me. They sat near the front, next to some of their friends. Dario then came back with two drinks, and a large bucket of popcorn. He made his way up to the back and gave me my drink.

“Thanks,” I said as I took my drink from him, “You didn’t have to buy the popcorn you know,”

“Why not? Besides, it’s for me anyway,”

I looked at him and hit him on the shoulder. “Thanks!” I said.

“Just joking, it’s for both of us. What, you’d think I’d leave you in the dark?”

I smiled and took a handful of popcorn from the bucket. We waited silently for the movie to start. There were still a lot of couples arriving, but luckily for them, the movie hadn’t started yet. Some of Dario’s friends had turned up and started to talk to him. I felt a bit awkward and embarrassed at the same time, being around people I didn’t know. Thankfully, Dario didn’t introduce me to them, but they did notice that I was there. One of them whispered something to Dario and laughed, but Dario replied, “Stop being such a dickhead, Jake.”

They continued talking, but once the cinema started getting darker, they left. Dario leaned over to me and asked, “Are you okay?”

I looked at him in the dark and replied, “Yeah. Why?”

“I just thought that you might’ve felt left out,”

“Don’t worry about it. I wasn’t feeling too comfortable around them anyway,”

“Okay then. Also, you don’t need to worry about what Jake said,”

“What did he say?”

“Just brought up that same topic I called out on the bus,”

“Oh,” I said and fell silent. The movie marathon started and the opening sequence showed us what was happening. A lady had just gone into this house, which was supposedly where the psychotic murderer lived. The psycho usually stalks his victims and pretends to be someone trustworthy. When he’s gained their trust, he lures them in his house, where he keeps them as his prized possessions. No one knows what happens when the victims go into the house, but supposedly he tortures them before he does anything else. As I watched, the lady opened the door which, funnily enough, made that annoying squeaking noise. She crept into the foyer and looked around. On the walls, there were a lot of pictures of women and men. They were wearing normal clothes, except the weird thing was that they had this dead expression on their face. This made it seem like that the pictures were actually staring at the person in the hall. As the lady looked even closer at the picture with the man in it, she realises that he has no pupils whatsoever. Just then, the eyes turn onto her, blinks and vanished. I jumped a mile when I saw that. Dario laughed silently and put is hand on my knee.

“Don’t worry Melody. It’s fake,”

“I know it’s fake,” I hissed at him.

He laughed again and lifted up the arm rest between us. He put his arm around me and said, “Don’t worry Mel. I’m here for you,”

“Thanks,” I replied, and with that I put my head on his shoulders and continued to watch the movie.

It was around 5 when the movie marathon finished. I was really sleepy, but Dario kept me awake, by scaring me every time a spooky part came on. We didn’t do anything romantic, but me just being there with Dario was romance enough. As we walked out of the cinema hand in hand, I realised that everyone else had left and we were the last group. I saw Jai near the entrance to the movies and I turned around and said to Dario, “Jai’s here. Thanks for taking me Dario. I had a great time,”

He smiled and replied, “Same here. Oh, Melody, before I forget, in two weeks, it’s my birthday and I was just wondering if you would want to come to this party I was going to have at my house,”

“Sure! I’d love to go to your party!”

“Sweet. I’ll give you the details later on, okay?”

I nodded and kissed him on the cheek. “Thanks again, Dario,”

“My pleasure,” and with that he gave me a swift hug and walked off. I walked over to Jai and he asked, “Have a good time?”

“Yeah, it was great. Ready to go?”

“Anytime you’re ready,” and we walked off towards his car. We both got in, and Jai asked, “No trouble?”

“No, everything was fine,”

He nodded and started the engine. As we drove off, I asked Jai, “How come you were so early? You said you were going to pick me up at 5:30,”

“No reason,”

“No, there’s a reason behind everything. Hmm…… wait. I know why you were so early. You were concerned for my safety, weren’t you?”

He didn’t reply, but merely shrugged.

“You were, weren’t you? You came early because you though I might have gotten into trouble!” I said, punching him on the shoulder.

“So what? I came because I cared for your well-being Melody. I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if I realised that something terrible happened to you and I wasn’t there to help,”

I stared at him. This was a side of Jai I never saw before. He usually kept to himself and never showed any interest in me, whatsoever.

“Thanks Jai. I really appreciate it,”

He looked at me and said, “Yeah, well you should. I’m spending my valuable resting time playing chauffeur for you,”

I quietly laughed to myself and realised that what he had said to me, and how he was being so protective, had actually increased my respect levels for him. I didn’t see him now as the annoying person who ignored me and made fun of me, but rather as the father figure of the house. In fact, he was more than a father figure: he was my brother.

A week later, Dario and I were still going strong, while we had also gone a on a few more dates. Dario had also told me the date and the whereabouts of his party. It was going to be at his house and it was going to be on the 20th. For the rest of the week I was thinking of what present I could give Dario.

“You don’t need to give me a present,” he said one day, “as long as you come then that’s good enough for me.”

I said I wouldn’t get him anything, but I decided to in the end because I knew that he would still get me something even though I would have said ‘no’. On the eve of Dario’s party, I decided to go shopping at the mall with Lorelai. Dario found out that I was going shopping, but neither Lorelai nor I told him what we were doing. I just replied,

“It’s nothing Dario. We’re just spending some leisurely time with each other.”

He looked at me suspiciously for a few minutes, than gave up and kissed me on the cheek and walked off. When we got to the shopping centre, we decided to just walk around and look in the shops, until we found something that Dario might like. In the end, I decided to get him a necklace with a shark tooth on it, and an expensive pair of skate shoes. When I told mum that I was going to Dario’s party and I wanted to get him something, she immediately gave me two hundred dollars to spend.

“Mum! This is a lot, don’t you think?”

“Is it?”

“Yes! You gave me TWO hundred dollars, I don’t need that much!”

“Oh well, spend it anyway. Your father keeps sending it in and I don’t know what to do with it.”

“What if you put it in the bank?” I asked, sarcastically.

“My account is full enough as it is, and so are yours and Jai’s. Besides, you shouldn’t be worried about what you give him, or how much it costs, it’s the thought that counts remember?”

After wrapping Dario’s presents up, and signing a birthday card for him, I was off. Considering that I lived close to him, it would be pointless to take the car, so I walked. When I got to his house loud music was pumping out of the house, while millions of teenagers were piling into his house. I walked up to the door, which was open and walked inside. I’ve never been to a party before and when I saw how many people there were, I was shocked that Dario knew this many people. I didn’t know where Dario was, so I just stood there with the presents under my arm, looking like an idiot. Just then, Dario came through this group of people and headed towards me.

“Hey Mel. Glad you could make it,”

He kissed me on the cheek and I said, “Here Dario, I’ve got something for you.”

He looked at me suspiciously and when I gave him the presents, he unwrapped it and exclaimed, “Melody! This is… fantastic Mel. Thanks.”

And he gave me another kiss, but on the lips this time. When we drew apart, Dario said, “Hey your friend, Lorelai, is here if you want to see her,”

“Cool, thanks.” I replied and he smiled and headed upstairs. I walked around aimlessly, trying to find Lorelai, but I knew that I would never find her amidst everyone here. Just then, a familiar voice called out to me. I turned around and there I saw Lorelai smiling at me.

“Hey Melody, how’s everything going?”

“Yeah, great. I gave Dario the presents,”

“Really? Did he like them?”

“I think so. He seemed really excited, or maybe he was just putting it on for show just so that I wouldn’t be embarrassed,”

“Don’t say that, I’m sure he loved it.”

I nodded and started to walk around with Lorelai. It turned out that Dario DID have a pool, an extremely large one, but he also had a spa and a bar outside as well. I didn’t drink alcohol, and planned not to at the party, so I just kept to my diet coke and watched everyone else as they made fools of themselves while they were drunk. About two hours into the party, I realised that Lorelai had disappeared. She told me that she was going to the toilet about fifteen minutes ago, but she never returned. I went upstairs in search for her, when all of a sudden, I heard her voice. It came from the bedroom on the right, so I snuck over quietly, but as I did, I realised that the door was slightly open. I stood just outside the door and listened intently. I couldn’t hear properly, because of the music and the teenagers both of which were loud enough to raise the dead. I strained my ears and I could tell Lorelai was in there, but the strangest thing was, was that she was laughing. I leaned closer and realised that someone else was there, a male. Lorelai was talking to the guy, but what she was saying, I couldn’t make out. All of a sudden, the mystery guy’s voice reached my ears. At first, I didn’t believe it. But as I listened, I realised that deep, mature voice. Dario was in there with Lorelai.

I almost collapsed on the floor. I was that shocked. Dario, of all people had an affair? With me, no less. I was dumbfounded. The only thing I had to do was to go in and check to see if I was right. If I was, and Dario WAS cheating on me with Lorelai… I didn’t want to think about it. All I could think about was opening the door and praying to god that I was wrong. I opened the door and I heard Lorelai gasp and she pulled the bed sheets up over herself. I looked at the guy and realised that it indeed, was Dario. I stood there, watching Lorelai trying to get her clothes one-handed, while still holding her other hand onto the bed sheet. Dario was sitting upright, half-naked, looking at me in shock. I stood there for another second, blinking back tears, but when Dario made to get up and walk over to me, I ran. I ran through the house, back out onto the street. Tears were now pouring down my face, making my face feel cold and wet. I didn’t bother to wipe my face, but I kept on running until I reached home. The door was unlocked, thankfully, and when I burst in, I saw that mum and Jai were watching TV. They started when they heard the door slam and when they turned around, they saw me with tears literally pouring down my face. My face was shining with tears, and when mum got up and started to walk over to me, I ran to my room and slammed the door, hard. I jumped onto my bed, and started crying my eyes out so much, that I was in danger of running out of tears. As I cried, flashes of the incident went through my mind, how Lorelai was naked, how Dario was enjoying himself more with Lorelai than with me, and how Dario looked when he saw me, shocked that I had finally found out their secret. A soft knock came on the door, and I screamed out with all my might, “Go away!”

I might’ve been acting like a three year old child throwing a tantrum just because he didn’t get what he wanted, but I couldn’t help it. Dario and I were getting along so well, and then Lorelai comes along and messes it up for both of us. That gave me enough reason to cry and scream at my mum and brother. They came in anyhow, and mum sat at the edge of my bed, while Jai stood there, looking at me with this confused and sad look on his face. Mum gently placed her hand on my leg and asked,

“What’s wrong, baby?”

“Go away!” I said again, moving my leg so that she was no longer touching it. I knew that my mother and brother did nothing to deserve this, that they were only trying to help, but I didn’t feel like talking to anyone at the moment, including my family. They remained in my room until I had stopped crying. I knew they were waiting until I was finally calm enough to answer them. When I finally shed the last tear, mum asked again, “What’s wrong?”

I looked at them for a second and replied croakily, “Dario,”

Jai immediately screamed out,

“That bastard! I’m gonna give that cunt a thrashing!”

Mum looked at Jai sternly and said calmly,

“That’s enough Jai. Don’t swear,”

Mum turned back to me and asked,

“What happened between you and Dario, Mel?”

I turned away from them, because I could not bear to say it in front of them. Saying it would mean that it had happened and I didn’t want that. I wanted it to be a dream, a horrible, nightmarishly real dream that would finally end. But I looked mum straight in the eye and when I finally said what Dario had done, I knew that it had actually happened. Tears were now coming back and I buried my face back into the pillow again. I could hear Jai and mum talking quietly about what happened, and when mum asked, “Are you alright?” did I finally stop crying again.

“Sort of,” I replied croakily, wiping my face on my pillow. Jai was once again watching me but then all of a sudden, he cried out, “I’m gonna kill that mother fucker,” and he ran out of the room.

“Jai,” mum said warningly, but he had already left the room. I didn’t want anything bad to happen so I called out to Jai, but unfortunately my voice was so hoarse that I could barely even shout. Mum had saw me however, and she called out, “Jai, wait! Mel wants to talk to you.” Jai came back into the room and went over to me.

“Yeah, what is it?” he asked in a brotherly sort of way, something that I had never heard before.

“Don’t do anything Jai. It’s not worth it,”

“Why not?” he asked, his voice becoming harsh once again, “That arsehole deserved it.”

“But Jai” I said with a pleading tone in my voice, “Please don’t. How is that going to help? You may have vented out your feelings on Dario, but I’ll still feel miserable about everything.”

Jai looked at me, but I knew that he knew that I was right.

“Okay, I won’t,” and with that he kissed me on the forehead. Mum was obviously very happy, because she was now wiping tears from her face, with this big smile on her face.

“Mum?” I asked shocked, “What’s wrong?”

“I haven’t seen you two this close since… well, since ever!”

Jai and I both laughed, and he went over to give mum a hug.

“No really, I’m alright. How about some ice cream Melody? I’ll get you some chocolate topping on it as well, okay?” she sniffed and with that she walked out of the room. Jai smiled at me again and he too left the room. I just lay there, hugging my pillow tightly. I knew that this would be a night that I would never, ever forget.

The weekend passed without incident. I heard from neither Dario nor Lorelai, but I was happy about that. As long as I didn’t see or talk to either of them, I was happy. Both Jai and mum were acting strangely during Sunday. Jai was a lot nicer to me than usual, and mum let me do a lot of stuff she wouldn’t have let me done, such as watching Home and Away when Neighbours was on. But I knew that they were doing it to keep me happy, but with both of them being there, I would be still happy. It was Monday, and that meant school. I dreaded this day, because it would finally be the day that I both saw Dario and Lorelai since Saturday. It was quarter-past eight when I decided to leave. I walked down the street past Dario’s house, but I didn’t look at it or even walk near it. I just kept my head down and continued to walk. I heard a door slam, and when I looked up, I saw Dario coming out of his house. I quickly looked back down and walked even faster to get out of Dario’s sight. When I reached the bus stop, I saw that some students were already there. I was thankful for this, because that meant I wouldn’t have to see Dario at all. It was twenty-five past eight, so I decided to sit behind the bus stop until it came. I saw Dario reach the stop as well, but he went over to talk to some of his friends. When the bus came, we all go on with Dario at the start of the line. I brought up the rear. When I got on, I realised that I couldn’t sit next to Lorelai, but that seat was already taken by… Dario.

Big surprise there I said to myself, as I watched them talking. I decided to sit near the front, where no one usually sat, and once I was seated, the bus left the stop. I looked out the window and sighed to myself.

So much has happened I thought to myself. Everything was going good, but now…

When the bus reached the school, I was the first one off. I quickly walked to my form class, but when I looked back I saw Lorelai and Dario with their heads down talking to each other. I stopped and stared at them. Lorelai was laughing too herself, while Dario was smiling that smile he always gave me. Tears sprang into my eyes, and I tried to blink them back. It was so hard to accept Dario was no longer in love with me. As if Dario had heard this thought, he looked up and saw me standing there. I quickly looked down at the ground and headed off to form.

Chapter 2

During morning tea, I headed up to the library to start work on my geography assignment. The library was unusually full today, and in the end I had to sit at the table that mainly had seniors working. I sat at the very end of the table and pulled out my geography book. I was looking through my notes, when I heard someone talking to me. I looked up and saw this guy looking at me. He had dark brown hair and dark eyes. He also had an athletic build which was easily visible through his shirt.

“Hey, you’re Dario’s girl, right?”

I shrugged. “Not really,”

“Oh, what happened?”

“Nothing that concerns you!” I snapped at him.

The guy looked at me, shocked, and replied, “Geez, sorry. I didn’t mean anything,”

I looked at him and apologised.