These Words Are Choking Me Slowly

Once the 24 minutes of homeroom was up, and the bell rang, I sprung out of my seat and out of the door. And, of course, Liam followed me.

Falling in step with me, he began, "Raynie, look, I'm sorry about what I said back there. I mean, if I had known that you'd start to cry, I wouldn’t−"

"Whoa," I said stopping, "let's get one thing straight, I did not cry. Okay?"

"Alright? I mean...it kind of looked like you were crying..."

""Yeah, well I wasn't!" I yelled, irritated.

He's crazy. I so wasn't crying.

I started to walk again. And he, of course, followed.

"Okay, okay! ...Well...will you at least talk to me abou−"

"No. I will not talk to you; because we are not friends. We haven't been for two damn years."

"At least let me walk with you to our next class. You have Ms. Davids science for first period, right? I do too. Let me just walk with you."

Maybe, if I just let him walk with me, he'll realize that I don't want to talk to him and he'll leave me the hell alone. Yeah...I'll just let him− wait a minute. How does he know my first period?! I never told him that...

"How the hell do you know that I have Ms. Davids for first? I never told you that." I questioned him suspiciously. Just by glancing at him I could tell that he didn't know how to answer me.

Gawd! He's so creepy... I don't remember him being a total stalker when we were friends. Shaking my head a little bit to clear my thoughts I turned to him, expectedly, awaiting his answer.

"Umm...you told me?"He said...more like asked.

"Umm, no I didn't?"I said, mocking his previous tone.

"Hey, honey!" Erin shouted as she ran up from behind me, and threw her arm over my shoulders in a lazy manner. "What do you have first period?"

Before I could answer, Liam spoke. "We both have Ms. Davids, what about you?"

"Well, Raynie," Erin said ignoring Liam, "I have Ms. Davids too! Yaaaaay!"

Laughing, I said, "Oh, yay! To Ms. Davids' science lab!"

With another laugh, we started to skip towards our first period while Liam traveled behind us chuckling.

--10 MINUTES INTO FIRST PERIOD SCIENCE--

"Wait, what?!" I screamed, appalled.

"I said, you and Liam Lewis will be year-long lab partners." Ms. Davids repeated, sounding confused with my sudden outburst.

"I'm sorry, Ms. Davids, I don't think you understand me; me and him can't be lab partners! Especially not for the entire school year!"

Chuckling, Ms. Davids replied, "Sure you can sweetie! You've just got to get to know him. The worksheet I have planned for today should help you with that." And with that, she walked back to her desk, smiling.

Mentally face-palming myself on the forehead, I thought: This is so unfair. How am I supposed to ignore this big idiot if I have to be his lab partner?! Grrrr... Stupid Erin got partnered up with Liam's friend from earlier, 'Derik'. Lucky, Erin...

I snapped out of my train-of-thought when I heard chuckling besides me. Looking to my left, I saw Liam laughing and shaking his big head.

"Alrighty, weirdo-Rainbow," he said smiling, "While you were incoherently mumbling to yourself, Ms. Davids passed out these worksheets to each pair of partners."

...Did I say that out loud?!

Snatching the worksheet from him, and sticking my tongue out at him when he looked at me surprised, I read the title of the paper.

" 'Getting to Know Your Partner for the Year.' " I said quietly reading it out loud. "Oh, great," I said sarcastically, "Bonding time."

Laughing, he snatched the paper back from me.

"Alrighty, we have to ask each other questions and record the answers..." His voice sort of trailed off as he bent over the paper and started to write frantically.

What is he doing? Don't we have to ask each other questions? ...Why is he filling stuff out?

After about a minute of his frantic writing, he sat up. "Okay," he said, passing the paper to me, "I got most of the questions I had to ask you done. I think I need about one or two more though."

Looking down at the paper I saw that Liam had already answered 28 of the 30 questions he had to ask me. What shocked me is that he got all of the questions correct...

I quietly read over some of the questions from the worksheet to myself.

What is your favorite color? black and turquoise.
What is your favorite food? veggie lasagna .
What is you favorite sport? volleyball− to play; football− to watch .
What is your favorite song of all time? 'I Must be Dreaming' by The Maine .
Etc, etc.

I glanced up at Liam with a confused look on my face. "How did you...I...what?" I stuttered as he stupidly grinned.

Stupid smile...

"Come on, Braynie-Raynie. We were best friends since we were in kindergarten," he said like it was the most obvious thing in the world. "I would never forget ten years of friendship," he said sighing, "I just wish...I just wish you wouldn't forget either..."

"Gawd, Liam! Look," I said the last part a little softer, "we were best friends for ten years, yeah, I know. But...we both know that...things happened. Things changed... But if it helps, I do remember our friendship; all of it." I said the last part purposely quieter than everything else; hoping he wouldn't hear it.

Sadly, he did hear it. He looked up at me with pained eyes that quickly turned semi-normal. "You do? Raynie...you have no idea how much I've missed your and Erin's friendship. I...you'll never know just how much I regret what happened to our friendship. I beat myself up over it for months."

"Liam, please...just, stop. I can't handle this crap. Not again." I said angrily.

I mean, I'd been through hell and back after what happened. Sure...I'll admit it, I missed him like crazy for the first year and the second year too; but that doesn't change anything.

"I....I just can't," I stuttered, trying desperately to explain to him why we couldn't be friends again. "I mean, yeah," I began, sighing, "I miss you too. And I know Erin does too, even if she doesn't want to admit it. But−"

"Wait...you miss me? As in...present tense? As in, you still miss me to this day?" Liam asked, with that stupid grin plastered on his face again.

Gawd, I don't remember resenting his smile this much when we were friends. I can't believe that I never noticed just how obnoxious his grin is. It's just so...cheeky and out there. It's really starting to piss me the hell off...

"Hello?" He said, waving his hand in front of my face. "You've spaced out a lot today." He pointed out, laughing. "So...about you missing me..."

I just had to open my stupid, big mouth and say that; didn't I?