Dear Jane Doe

I hid nervously behind my façade of confidence when we all exited Jo’s van to unload our equipment. The high school was much like the college, small and traditional which suited us all fine. The whole point of today was to open our fan base to more people who lived locally… we weren’t aiming to be huge rock stars just yet.

I fiddled with the cables and my guitar just as the other guys were heading to the building itself. “I’ll catch you up in a minute” I yelled to their backs. The grounds were already teeming with teenage high school goers talking to each other excitedly about our gig. I smiled to myself. We were pretty good.

“I hear the lead guitarist is really hot” a girl behind me was chattering away to her friends “and he’s only in the first year of college which means he’s hot and older.” The fact that I was their elder by a couple of years seemed to enthuse these girls even more but I was more interested at how they knew I was so dashing. Then again… who didn’t know that?

I smiled even wider at my cockiness.

Their bell rang shrilly just as my equipment was sorted. I turned to survey them all milling into the school like ants into a teeming hill. Maybe I’d wait a few minutes so that there would be enough room to actually get in.

The noise was dying down while my guitar and cables left the back of the van to enter my strong arms.

“Well if it isn’t the freaky foreign girl… late for school again?” the menacing voice of a boy made me whirl around, the wires flying everywhere. There I saw three guys, cigarettes poised in their hands, and grinning smiles plastered on their faces. Instantly, I felt my hands ball into fists… but then I caught sight of who they were addressing.

My Jane Doe stared up at her insulters who blocked the small steps that lead up to the entrance, without so much of a hint of resentment on her face. My fingernails dug sharply into my hands as the fists became excruciatingly tight. How could this pathetic scum address her like that? How had he even the nerve to talk to an angel such as herself when he was a mere foul smoking douche?

Boldly, she began her ascent of the steps and tried to shuffle past them. No bitter retort escaped her perfect lips.

“Oh come on baby we were just messing about” one of the boys slid an arm around her waist and pulled her to him. This was too much for me. I dropped the box to shout angrily something incoherent that sounded like various swear words. I was shaking so violently in fury that it even made no sense to me.

The boys reeled around in shock as I stalked over to them with murder in my eyes. They sized me up: strong build, tall, older, extremely good looking. Then they were scarpering inside like the cowardly bastards they were.

I was up the steps now, my chest heaving in anger which was diminishing slowly. Distantly, I was aware of my stranded guitar behind the van but I really didn’t care. My instinct implored me to follow those fuckers and torture them slowly until their tiny brains could withhold the information that my girl was out of their leagues. My girl…

I turned around; she was still hugging her books close to her chest in the epitome of high school coy shyness. Jesus was I attracted to her, my manhood rising even when we were metres apart. Then those books she clutched so tightly slipped and were on the ground in a ruffle of paper.

As if in reflex, I bent down to gather them up just as she did the same. I remember vaguely thinking how cliché this moment was yet her closeness made me temporarily empty.

It was too much.

She was too close.

My heart beat too fast.

Her eyes caught mine and held them for a breathless moment. “I have to go.” I stood up with her to watch her leave before I really had a chance to control myself and retrieve my distant mind. Was that an English accent I heard? I hadn’t even gathered it through her singing but when she spoke it stilled my heart with lust.

Holy crap.

She was almost as tall as my 6, 1 ft and more beautiful up close, if that were even possible. In a crushing blow I realised I hadn’t gotten her name… she would have to remain my Jane Doe even longer.

Still slightly fuming, I retrieved my guitar to enter the placid high-school where I followed the sound of excited screams to my fellow band members. The same line repeating itself again and again around my head: “and she’s nothing more than a lost star floating past my lonely world.”