Nothing Can Compare in This World to You

It's been over a month. Over a month since I've had to have any kind of contact with Zacky. Mrs. Pagani decided to move her class around again and now, because of her, Zacky sat right behind me. For the first time in my life I couldn't concentrate in the least on what was going on in class. All through class all I could think about was him. I was nervous because I knew that all through class he could see anything I did and felt like he was staring at me. I didn't know if he was still mad from what happened back in February or if he was even mad in the first place.

When the bell rang to dismiss class it startled me out of my thoughts. The kid next to me gave me a weird look before standing up and leaving. Ignoring them, I pulled my backpack onto my desk, shoving my book and such in slowly and making sure that I left after Zacky had, figuring it'd be the best way to avoid him.

I was wrong.

"I want to talk to you," I heard as I felt a hand grasp around my elbow. I knew it was Zacky, just by the voice.

He started to pull me off to the side, out of the way of everyone rushing off to lunch. I didn't look up at him but instead stared down at my shoes, crossing my arms insecurely.

"Um..." Zacky mumbled, shoving his hands into his pocket. "Well this is really Goddamn awkward," he stated after a few more seconds and I felt a smile start to creep its way onto my face. I looked up to him from my shoes then and he smiled as well.

"Good. Now that we're on smiling terms I want to tell you that I am utterly failing our math class," He stated almost proudly.

A single laugh escaped my lips, sounding more like a sigh than anything else, and glanced back to my shoes.

"So... will you help me?" he asked after another few seconds.

"What's your grade?" I asked the ground.

"Uh," Zacky started and then laughed, "twenty three percent."

I looked back up to him, eyes wide. "Zacky, the quarter is over in a week! Even if I help you right now you're gonna have to get all A's next quarter just to pass!"

"That's exactly why I'm talking to you," Zacky told me, "You're the only person I know that can help me out so I can graduate. I mean, that is, if you want to..."

"You couldn’t have talked to me earlier?" I asked him, shifting all of my weight onto my right foot.

"Well... to be honest I was kinda afraid of talking to you..." Zacky said, scratching the back of his head.

"Did you forget that you’re the senior and I'm the freshman or...?" I asked him and he laughed.

"So can you help me?" Zacky asked after laughing at my question and changing the subject.

I can, I just don't want to, I thought. I had been doing so good at avoiding Zacky until today and if I did help him it would just be one more person to say goodbye too when I left. Not even Michael, Rebecca and Rachael knew I was moving yet.

"You know when to come over," I told him. I didn't want him to have to repeat his senior year because I didn't help him out with his math class. But I knew full well that Zacky wouldn't let me run again if something happened.

A few hours later when I was walking home a familiar car pulled up next to me and kept pace. I glanced over with an eyebrow raised.

"You don't have to climb in through the window this time," Zacky smiled at me and reached over into the passenger seat before the passenger door swung open, the seat belt tied to the door in an awkward manner. My other eyebrow was then raised as I glanced back from the door to Zacky.

He smiled again as I stepped into the road so I could sit in the car. He stopped suddenly for me, almost causing the four or five impatient cars behind him to rear end him.

"How does this work?" I asked, referring to the door and seat belt contraption.

"Um," he laughed, his left hand hanging out his window, casually flipping off the cars that were honking and swerving around us. He leaned towards me, taking my backpack and throwing it in the back seat with his, before reaching over and holding the door closed. "Wrap the seat belt around the handle a few more times and then use it like you normally would," he added and I did as told.

"What happened to your door?" I asked as Zacky returned to flipping off cars and started driving us to my house.

"It wouldn't open. I was supposed to drive Rev home after band practice one night and the two of us couldn't get it open so eventually we had all five of us trying to pry it open while Val and Michelle were pushing from the other side and it just... broke."

"Zacky?" I asked him.

"Yeah Tar?" he replied, glancing to me from the road for a second.

"You realize you're still flipping everyone off right?" I asked him as we pulled up to a red light and stopped next to a minivan full of kids a d a very angry looking soccer mom.

"Oh shit," he laughed and received a very evil glare from the mom as he withdrew his arm back into the van. He was still laughing as he turned back to me. "See what you've been missing this past month?"

"Seeing you randomly flip off people who live in Huntington and riding in a car that I'm most likely going to fall out of?" I asked sarcastically.

"Nah, that's actually more of a Rev thing. And as for the you falling out the guys ride with me all the time and they never do."

"I was being sarcastic Zacky," I said quietly and he made a turn onto another street. It was then I felt the seat belt tighten uncomfortably around my lower ribcage and abdomen as the passenger door swung open a bit. I reached over to try and hold it closed so that my pancreas and spleen wouldn't die.

"I know you were being sarcastic," Zacky said and smiled over at me bit it faded from his lips when I didn't return it. I barely even paid him attention.

In the thirty seconds it took for him to park in front of my house we were both silent. I got myself out of the seat belt/door contraption in Zacky's car as fast as I could, trying to get away from the heavy, uncomfortable silence.

"Taryn," Zacky called after me as I made my way up to the front door, remembering that my backpack with the key was still in Zacky's car.

"Yeah?" I asked, glancing back to him for a second and seeing that he had both of our backpacks. He didn't reply, mostly because I didn't give him enough time to because I tried opening the door and found it was unlocked, a sure sign that Trisha was home. Of course if that wasn't enough she was half naked on one of the couches in the living room with her boyfriend on top of her.

"Taryn, what the fuck?!" I heard her yell as she noticed me walking into the house.

I rolled my eyes and ignored the two half naked teenagers in the living room and quickly made my way towards the stairs. My sister gave a sudden shriek and I glanced behind me noticing Zacky had just walked in.

"Holy shit," he laughed at the two and turned to me, "I wasn't aware that we didn't have to wear clothes in your house Tar."

"Shut your fucking mouth, Baker!" My sister's boyfriend shouted at him, which didn't affect Zacky at all. All I wanted to do was get into my room, not deal with this. This was the last thing I needed to deal with right now.

"Zacky, come on," I beckoned.

"Coming Tar," he told me, walking forward towards me, but turning to my sister and her boyfriend as he did so, "See we're decent people and actually wait until were in a bedroom," he told them like they were first graders.

"Oh my God," I groaned into my hands and rushed up the stairs, Zacky following at a leisurely pace. Once I was in my room I turned around and watched him come in after me, dropping our stuff by the door and closing it behind him. When he looked over at me the smug look that was still on his face from telling off my sister and her boyfriend dropped off his face as he recoiled a bit.

"Uhm..." he mumbled at the look I was giving him, "You've never glared that evilly at me before."

I sighed, rolling my eyes angrily and sat cross legged on my bed, resting my chin in my hands that were propped on my legs. Down stairs the front door slammed shut, signaling that Zacky and I were now the only people in the house.

"I'm sorry Taryn," I heard him say and felt him sit on the bed next to me. "But," he started after a few seconds, "I don't think that's the only thing wrong." It took me a while but I did shake my head "no". I felt his arm wrap around my shoulders then as he moved a bit closer. "And I'm pretty sure that I'm not a bad kisser," he pushed; the egotistic tone in his voice that made him Zacky was ever present. I knew he was trying to make me feel better but he was bringing up the wrong subject for that.

I took a deep breath, trying to level my emotions before quietly asking, "Why are you like that?" hoping he'd understand what I meant.

"...Because it used to make you smile," he whispered into my hair after leaning forward and pressing his lips to the side of my head.

I couldn't help it then. I squoze my eyes shut as tightly as possible but tears still flooded out. Zacky's other arm made its way around me and he pulled me towards him in the two seconds it took me to start full on sobbing in front of him.

"Tell me what's wrong," Zacky asked my head as I clung to him.

"I-I'm-m-mo-oving-g," the two words, barely comprehensible, were cried into his neck.

"...Oh."