Goodbye

Jesse came by the next day to pick me up. My mom answered the door and saw him. She told him I was still sleeping and asked him to wake me up. Jesse smiled and nodded as he walked up the stairs to my bedroom.

Jesse saw me in my bed, asleep. He walked over to me and shook my shoulder.

“Five more minutes, Mom.”

“Kayla? Get up, please! Or I’m gonna tickle you!” Jesse screamed as he started tickling me. I screamed and giggled. He found out I was faking soon after. He sat on my bed and watched as I grabbed my pre-chosen clothes. I told Jesse to close his eyes while I changed.

“Why? Can’t you change in your bathroom?”

“No! Emily always hogs the bathroom in the morning! By the time she’s done, it’ll be nine.”

“Fine,” Jesse whines as his eyes close. I wave my hand in front of his face to make sure he can’t see. I change, knowing he’s peeking, and tell him we can go. We are wearing different clothes but the difference makes us look like a couple.

I’m wearing a white aero fleece, pale blue tank, light wash Bermudas, and neon green converse with forest green shoelaces. Jesse’s wearing a white hoodie vest, dark green fedora, ripped, dark wash jeans, and blue tennies with sky blue shoelaces.

“Wow. Could we look anymore less of a couple?” I say, sustaining my laugh.

“What? You don’t like what I helped you pick out? I think we look fine.”

“It’s not that. It’s just I’m worried that people will think we’re a couple and all.”

“Well, then we can tell the people who ask if we are, that we’re just very, very close friends.”

“Well, what about your fans? What will happen if they think I’m dating you?”

“Well, I don’t know. I’ll just tell them to go away.”

“Okay. But if someone tries to kill me, I’m blaming you.”

With that, we ran out of the house and onto the streets. He runs ahead of me towards an
old fashioned stage. We get in through the back door. There was a CD player on the stage, sitting on a stool. We walked over to center stage. I marveled at the vast space were people would sit to watch performers. Jesse walked up to me and stood looking at the empty seats.

“Jesse, this is… this is… this is amazing!!!”

“I thought we could hang out where no one could bother us. A place only you and I can go to so we can be alone.”

Jesse was watching me then I looked at him. What he said had puzzled me. Jesse walked over to the stool with the CD player on it. He turned it on and began singing. It was his song Because You Live. He sang and begged me to do the same. I giggled and walked over to his open hand with mine stretched out to his. He grabbed my hand and we began singing, dancing, smiling, and laughing together. Random songs he had sung play in no particular order but we have fun as the music echoed around the stage as we dance by ourselves and together. Body Language comes on and we begin a duo-dance off between the two of us.

“Parlez vous francais? Konnichiwa, come and move in right my way,” Jesse sung and I do so. I danced in front of him, blocking his way. He smiled and grabbed me in a hug and spun. I looked at him confused as he stopped but still held me. The song is still playing but it didn’t matter. Jesse turned on the next song and it was Beautiful Soul. He smiles at me and I smile back. His arms wrapped around my waist as my fingers ran through his hair. His friends walked in on us and yelled, “Jesse!!! You started the party without us!?!”

I laughed as his friends including some girls ran over to us, whooping and hollering. Jesse laughed but is still looking at me. He seemed tired because he leaned his head down so our foreheads touched. I smiled at him and he smiled back. I didn’t understand what he tried to do but I found out later on. We started dancing again as soon as all of Jesse’s friends came onto the stage. It was fun but most of the time while his friends were there, we snuck off and hid backstage and listened to his IPod.

When we did come back to our buds, they were listening to the song My Boyfriend’s Back and having a dance-off. We joined in.