Decided to Break It

Ever since the hospital, I’ve been hanging with Echo a lot. We’d really gotten to know each other over the past month and even spent time together at the studio with our dads. She was weird towards hers and I asked her what the story was, but she never explained. She just said he wasn’t that loving- whatever that means. We sat at the lunch table, waiting for the others to get there and just talked about random nonsense. Amanda and Matt sat at the table first while the others were in the lunch line. They’d gone off school property, which you weren’t supposed to do, and bought a pizza for them to split. God, it smelled good when they opened the box. “Hey guys.” Matt said, taking a huge bite out of a piece.

I watched Echo dig her nails into her arm as she smiled at both of them. “Echo.” Amanda said in a mocking tone. She didn’t respond. Kevvy sat down next to Echo with his tray of food and smiled at the gorgeous girl. “Hello, my dear.” He said to her. She smiled back and quit digging her nails into her skin. “Hey Kevvy. What was the homework for Jefferson’s class?” Matt asked. They started talking and I nudged Echo and made a face at her. She gave a weak smile and glanced back at Matt’s pizza. “Want some?” I mouthed to her. Her eyes got really wide and she stood up quickly. “I’ll be back.” She rushed out of the café and I turned my attention back to my “friends”. Mike and Ian sat down which made me more comfortable since Amanda and Matt were making googley eyes at each other. Sickening. No tact.

“Hey, Josh.” Kevvy said, keeping his head down. “What’s up, man?” I patted his back and waited for his response. “Um… I was sort of wondering… I mean… I don’t know if…” “Oh my God, spit it out!” Amanda said, frustrated while biting a piece of food. Ian’s mouth gapped. “He has a crush!” Mike “oooo-ed” and Kevvy smirked. Oh God… “Are you and Echo a thing?” He finally asked. His face twisted up a bit, like he was afraid to ask and afraid of the response. “Oh… Um…Well, no… b--” Matt cut me off. “Don’t date her, she’s fat.” I cut my eyes at him. I noticed she’d lost a lot of weight recently. It was scary but I didn’t know how to say anything to her. “Fuck you.” I said back to Matt. Ever since he started dating Amanda, he became an asshole- just like her. “He’s right.” Amanda turned to Mike.

“Would you date her?” “I don’t know her that well. But she’s cool!” He replied honestly. I love Mike. He was true to himself always. Kevvy was quiet the whole time. I didn’t know what was going through his head until Echo sat back down. Everyone was immersed in their own conversations except me, I made sure to listen.

“Hey, Echo… Um… I was wondering if you’d like to do something tonight?” I held my breath and everything around me went into slow motion. You know, like in those movies? I never thought that was possible until now. She turned to me but I couldn’t look at her face. “Um… I think Josh and I are hangin’ tonight.” I heard her say. That would’ve been awesome really… until Ian spoke up. “We’ve got band practice tonight. It’s kinda private.” He said. I was paralyzed. I really liked Echo… I don’t know why I hadn’t said anything to her. “Oh…” She looked at me and I just blankly stared. She smiled weakly again and turned to Kevvy. “I’d love to!” He smiled big and Amanda made gagging sounds. “Disgusting.” She whispered.

I reached across the table and took two pieces of pizza from Matt and started eating them at once. “Damn, Josh! Coulda asked!” He said. I flicked him off and went to the lunch line. I grabbed a bottle of chocolate milk, two brownies, an ice cream bar, a burger, fries and a coke. I slammed the tray on the table around my “friends” and began to dig into my food hard. I didn’t even realize how fast I was eating until Kevvy spoke up. “Dude, you’re gonna choke.” He said, chuckling innocently. It’s like I snapped out of binge mode and just looked at my tray. How dare he talk to me? I hate them all! I took the rest of my food, trashed it, and calmly walked to the bathroom where I repented for eating so much. Why do I always end up right back here?