True Believer

“Whirlwind romance” perfectly described our relationship. It had taken Jared two weeks to call me, claiming the eyeliner had smudged into an incomprehensible blur. Eventually he had broke down and asked Roxie for my number. Personally, I think he had gotten my number from her sometime during that first week and used the rest of the time to work up the nerve to call. He was unbelievably cute that way. But that’s not the point of this.

The point is I warned him I didn’t believe. I warned him that I was a lost cause, and there was no changing that. Instead of heeding my warnings, he weaseled his way into my love life and I couldn’t help liking his sweet and unusually shy demeanor. He called me “his little skeptic.” And skeptical I was. Not of him, of course. If I believed in love, which I didn’t, he would be what I believed in.

7 Months Ago

I had officially decided. Jared Monaco, with his silly smile and awkward shyness, was the world’s worst dancer. And I found that inexplicably cute. I hated that I sounded like a grade schooler with her first crush, but I felt close to the same way I felt when I was nine and Jimmy Preston held my hand throughout the entire course of recess. Everything Jared did was new to me, different, and, in my opinion, better.

Jared had finally worked up the nerve to call me two weeks after I had scribbled my number on his arm with my asphalt-black eyeliner, offering an excuse that any non-ignorant person could see through a mile away. I almost turned him down, remembering how every day he didn’t call was a hit to my self-esteem. Then I also remembered the party, and how Jared managed to use perfect give-and-take in the conversation, how he didn’t just listen to me but also contributed and evoked the words out of me. So I told him that I wouldn’t mind seeing him around. I was so strongly hoping that he wouldn’t realize the nonchalance of my words was merely a mixture of playing it cool and tending to my bruised ego.

Hearing him ask if I wanted to catch a movie had sent my mind reeling and heart beating heavy, even if the gesture was slightly cheesy and juvenile.

So there I was, sitting in the ugly red upholstered chairs of Hollywood Theater. Jared was next to me, along with Garrett who was on my right and Kennedy who was on the other side of Jared. I hardly knew either of them then and the awkwardness hung in the air. We were watching some comedy. It was one of those movies that was so stupid you had to laugh in order to keep from screaming.

Jared and I were touching the entire time. All of it was innocent, of course. We didn’t hold hands, he didn’t pull that fake yawn thing, and I did not foreign sleepiness as an excuse to lay my head on his shoulder, though thinking back I wish I would have. We shared an armrest. That’s all, besides the occasional knee brush, though that was always unintentional.

It was sweet and reassuring and I had a difficult time believing he was for real. Most things that seemed too good to be true really were. So why would my skeptical mind change itself for Jared? In all honesty, it didn’t. I didn’t. Not for a while anyway.

That night, after we left the theater, he took me home and walked me to the door. Garrett and Kennedy stayed inside the car and proceeded to make kissing noises when Jared pressed his lips softly to my cheek.

“Shut up, guys!” He shouted while his face lit up bright red. He squeezed my hand gingerly and whispered goodnight to me before walking back up the path and disappearing into the truck and then down the street.

When I walked in, I was ambushed by my mother and sister. Words like “boyfriend,” “kisses,” and “second-date” were thrown at me. I rolled my eyes, summarized the night enough to appease the both of them, and bolted to my room where I collapsed onto my bed.

Later that night, while I was lost in a world Sarah Dessen had created, my dad knocked and let himself in. I got the sex talk that night for the first time in eighteen years. It was awkward and unnecessary. By then, I knew much more than just how babies were made. But I didn’t want to ruin the image my dad had of his innocent and completely clueless little girl.

Eventually my dad left and I dog-earred my tattered copy of This Summer. I switched off my lamp, laid back against the pillows, closed my eyes, and thought. I thought about tonight; I thought about Jared; I thought about kissing Jared. More than that though, I thought about hurting Jared. I really didn’t want to hurt him. But I knew I wasn’t the girlfriend type. I was far too level-headed, far too focused on getting into college and getting the life I had somewhat planned. But a thought did differentiate itself from all the others. What if, by some chance, we kept it fun and light? Dates, kisses, fun, maybe a few feelings, but no labels? I fell asleep hopeful that night.

I may have been hopeful, but I was naïve. So, so naïve.