Shield Me From the Storms

After we went bowling, I lay in bed wide awake even though my eyes were starting to sting with desperation for sleep. But no way could I shut my brain off. I had too much to think about. Josh kept worming his way into my thoughts and while that put a smile on my face, it also stressed me out. Thinking about Josh was enough to set me on edge and stressed. I didn’t want that. I wanted to be able to think about Josh and feel nothing but a rush of excitement and happiness. I so badly wanted to be able to associate Josh with positive emotions, but it wasn’t only positive. Due to those positive feelings being present, I was also swamped with anxiety and stress and fear. I didn’t want to like Josh; I didn’t want to like anyone. I’d trained myself over the years to not feel things for people and so far I had been relatively successful. Sure, I’d had the occasional crush every now and then, but it had never been anything close to what I felt for Josh.

--

True to what he’d said while bowling, Josh talked me into going to one of his football matches. I’d sat with Sophia quietly, while she had jumped up and down cheering for Josh. I couldn’t help but laugh softly at her enthusiasm. She practically screamed whenever Josh scored a goal and even I couldn’t help myself from swelling with pride every time he did so, even though I didn’t really have any right to be proud of him. It’s not like he was mine or anything. But I did anyway – he was so talented and he really deserved to be man of the match. It didn’t really seem like a big deal to him, but I was amazed by him.

After the game, we went to get ice cream which Sophia paid for despite my attempts to pay for myself. We all sat in a booth and ate as Josh and Sophia talked about the game and a guy Sophia had met. I wasn’t sure when she’d met him, considering I’d been with her most of the time, but I guessed it was when I went to the bathroom. As she gushed on about this new guy, I kept glancing over at Josh only to lower my eyes when my gaze met his. He must have sensed me looking at him, because whenever I looked up, he was already looking at me. I couldn’t help but blush whenever our gaze met. After a while of the tension only growing between us as we exchanged glances, I could feel myself starting to get a little bit stressed, but then Josh’s phone rang.

I don’t know what he was told, his face grew suddenly distressed and he leapt up from the table with a quick, “I’m sorry”, before running out of the café. I frowned after him, concerned with his sudden disappearance, before turning to Sophia for some explanation. She looked at me sadly and shook her head.
“He’s got a lot to deal with at home,” she said and I knew that was all she was going to say on the matter. I looked back through the windows of the café but any sign of Josh had vanished. I bit my lip and lowered my gaze to my melted ice cream in front of me. “I guess we should get going,” she said and I guessed she was just trying to distract me, but nothing could.
“Is he okay?” I asked. “Shouldn’t we go after him?”
“He doesn’t really like people getting involved with his stuff at home,” she said and I just nodded as I slid out of the booth. It was silent on the drive back to my house, I was lost in my thoughts and I guessed that Sophia just didn’t know what to say.
“Thanks for the lift,” I smiled and she nodded.
“No problem,” she said and I got out of the car and waved as she drove off. I glanced across the road toward Josh’s house but from the outside it was silent. I bit my lip once again before turning and going inside.

--

The next morning, there was a knock on the front door just a few minutes before I was about to leave. As I was just coming down the stairs, I called out that I’d get it and opened the door. Josh was standing there with a small smile on his lips. “Oh, hi,” I smiled, pleasantly surprised. “Is everything okay?”
“I wanted to see if you wanted a lift to school?” he asked and I blinked again in surprise.
“Oh, yeah, thanks,” I smiled. “Let me just grab my bag, I’ll be ready in a sec.”
“I’ll wait out here,” he said, heading back to his car. I could tell that something was off with him, his eyes didn’t seem to have their usual sparkle. I frowned with worry and quickly found my bag. I went into the kitchen to find my parents.
“Who was at the door?” dad asked.
“My friend Josh,” I said and while mum didn’t bat an eye lid, my dad looked over at me with a grin. I blushed but otherwise didn’t react. “He’s giving me a lift to school.” I went into the cupboard and found a cereal bar and headed back to the front door.
“Dani, that is not a proper breakfast,” mum called. “You’re meant to have food with your medication.”
“This is fine, mum,” I said, suddenly thrilled that Josh had decided to wait outside. “I’ll see you later.”

I quickly went and got in Josh’s car and sent him a smile. He smiled back, though it didn’t quite reach his eyes. “We’re picking up Sophia too, if that’s okay?” he asked and I just nodded.
“Of course,” I smiled. I settled back in the seat and looked out the windows as we drove. I took a deep breath and could smell Josh’s body spray. It smelt pretty damn good. It was silent until we reached Sophia’s and I could feel myself starting to get kind of stressed with the tense atmosphere. I realised then that this was the first time Josh and I had been alone together and my heart started to race. I took several deep breaths, desperately trying to calm down and I could feel it working.

Once Sophia got in the car, she started chattering away about the guy she met yesterday, Will, and the tension started to disappear. She didn’t comment on Josh’s mood, so either I was imagining it or it wasn’t all that bad. I could tell something wasn’t quite right, though. But I didn’t feel confident enough to ask him about it.

For the rest of the day, Josh seemed to be lost in his own world and no matter what I tried, he didn’t seem that interested in talking. At lunch, he sat silently poking at his food, hardly eating a bite. After school, me, Josh and Sophia went to the drama club. Instead of splitting into groups, this week we were doing a whole club exercise, working on character development and improvisation. We had to sit in a circle, with a maximum of 3 people in the centre, who had to create their own characters and have a discussion and their characters. It was quite fun and I was getting into it until I saw that Josh was just sitting cross legged in the corner and I was pretty sure he didn’t hear a word that was said for the entire hour.

When Sophia dismissed everyone, I went over and sat by Josh while she talked to the other club members. “Hey, Josh,” I said softly. He looked up and smiled at me. I bit my lip before reaching over and taking his hand. I was kind of expecting him to not really register it, but instead, he held on tightly and shuffled closer to me. I smiled softly, glad that I was helping him, even though I didn’t really know what was going on. I just wanted to make him happy, to see him smile. As I held his hand tightly, I knew that I couldn’t deny it and I couldn’t escape it. I liked Josh. I’d been denying it for the last month or so, and while that thought freaked me out like crazy, I felt relatively calm as well. Calm enough to turn to Josh and whisper, “will you go out with me?”