The Official Guidebook to Science Fiction and Heartbreak

I thought about how to actually start this novel for several days. There were so many ways to do it. I could just start at the point where lips collided and go from there. I could start from that moment I watched fireworks erupt in the confines of my head and I felt my heart leaping from my prison of a body. Yet, those would be both too easy and too difficult to explain. So, maybe I should take you back a few weeks. Probably that early Autumn day when the chain of events began with a simple invitation.

It was Saturday, like 1 PM or some shit, I don't really remember. It's not important. I stood at the bus stop for approximately five minutes, tapping my foot along to whatever hipster-indie song that was leaking from my earbuds and into my eardrums, and leaning against the concrete wall behind me that separated the side of a hill and a sidewalk.

"Dude, you look like a hipster fag," came a voice as one earbud was snatched from my cranium. I turned to find Felix Fletcher, smirking like the idiot he really was.

"Yeah, yeah," I played along. I always played along. "I'm a hipster fag, I know."

"Nah," Felix stepped back and pretended to studiously check out my outfit, then held up his hands, forming a rectangle with the L's of them. I remember I was wearing some skinny jeans or something and colorful button up. Oh, and a scarf. He always teased me about the scarfs I wore. "You actually look good. Your hair all done up and shit. The ladies love that shit these days, y'know?"

"Oh, really?" I laughed. "Explain to me why I don't have any ladies loving my shit. Explain that."

"Well, first of, you said 'loving my shit.' That just sounds disgusting. That's probably reason numero uno right there," he smirked, looked me up and down once more and added, "The other prime suspect is that fucking scarf. Lose the fucking scarf dude."

I shook my head with a grin. "Nah."

"Whatever," he shrugged. "When's the bus supposed to-"

His words were cut off by the screeching of the city bus flying down the hill and obnoxiously coming to a stop. Good old Russel the Bus Driver at his finest. The man was like 60 or some shit and had zero perception of time. I'm legitimately certain he was probably legally blind and shouldn't be allowed to drive but what the hell do I know about optometry? Anyway, we boarded and took our seats.

"So, what the hell are we even going to do today?"

I didn't know. We never knew. We just hated being at home, so we just went out and did shit. He knew this very well, but I don't know, something about vocalizing your boredom comforts people. Typically, we'd go downtown and he'd suffer in silence while I hit the record store and raided the shelves for new bands he'd never heard of or old bands he'd never cared about. Then we'd go to the skate park (though neither of us can really skate worth a shit anyway) until we get bored of falling on our asses and leaving to get ice cream or frozen yogurt. I like that routine.

"Hell if I know. We could-"

"Hang on," he interrupted, looking down at his phone. He was swiping his thumb around, muttering to himself. "Well, if we don't got plans or anything, Im wanted to know if she could hang with us."

Im. Full name: Imogen Nicolette Hopps. She was at the center of Felix's world, whether he knew it or wanted to admit it to himself or not. Like if you imagined within a solar system, Imogen was a planet that the moon Felix orbited. Well, you couldn't really blame him. She was the kind of girl you only see in movies and read about in books. She was different. She dyed her hair soft, pastel colors and she smoked and wore fishnets nearly consecutively. And she was beautiful. Gorgeous straight hair (which happened to be a soft pink at the time) and porcelain skin and features. She had the most brilliant green eyes you'd ever seen.

"You mean hang out with you."

"No, she said 'Can I hang out with you and Noah? If you're not busy?'" Felix said matter-of-factly, as if he'd triumphed in a great war.

"Okay but that's just because you and I are like a set. And you guys have the biggest boners for each other and you know it."

Felix just sort of chuckled and his cheeks flushed red. But almost as soon as you'd see the color appear it was gone. He typed in something on his phone and then shoved it back in his pocket. "I told her we'd meet her in the park, okay?"

"You didn't even wait for my answer," I teased.

"Yeah, well, she's pretty and I'm not going to pass up a chance to see here."

Let me just stop for a second and just say that I liked this quality about Felix a lot. He wasn't a douche. Sure, he said offense things every now and again. But he was a teenager, who doesn't say offensive shit? But he was considerate of others and he didn't objectify others. Like earlier when he called me a fag, it wasn't to put me down. Had I actually been gay, he would have never said. Or, even if I was still straight and just simply didn't like being called that, he wouldn't do it. He only used it because he knew that I didn't think it was all that offensive. Gay guys are great! Where else am I going to get the clothes I love so much?

And he was like that with other people, too, in different ways. Like with girls. He never sat there and said, "Damn that bitch is hot." He'd never call a girl a bitch, at least not in that context, and he'd only ever call a girl beautiful or adorable or some shit like that. He was a bit of a gentleman.

We arrived at the bus stop nearest the park a short time later, and then followed by a short walk, we were in the park. It wasn't anything fancy. A bit of equipment with ladders and slides and monkey bars in the woodchips. There were swing-sets and teeter-totters as well. Sitting in the castle-tower equipment sat Imogen Hopps looking like a punk princess or something. Her pink hair was pulled back in a bun, but a thick strand hung down one side of her face. She wore an over sized gray sweater that simply stated ugh and some black skinny jeans and combat boots. She looked beautiful, and I could easily see that Felix saw that too.

"What's up, sluts?" She grinned.

"Oh, y'know, sucking dicks in the park for cash," I countered. She smiled bigger, her canine teeth touching her bottom lip. It was weirdly beautiful. She had such a great smile.

"You too, huh?" Her eyes fell on Felix. He could only smile the way he does when something is amusing but he has nothing to contribute. He smiles, teeth apart with his tongue pressing on the back of his top teeth.

"You caught me," he answered, throwing his hands up in mock surrender.

Im jumped from the tower platform and down into the woodchips. She stood from her crouched position and crossed her arms as she walked towards us. "What do you guys normally do for fun?"

"We normally go to the record store, and then skate, and then get Fro-Yo," Felix explained. The anime-haired beauty nodded and bit her lip.

"I could be down for that."

And down for it she was. We went on about our daily routine without skipping a beat. In fact, it was if she'd always been there. It wasn't as if she were the missing piece or something stupid like that. We were just fine without her, and her being there did not make it better. But it didn't change anything now that she was, in fact, there. She was witty, like me, and enjoyed records. But she was funny like Felix and they had a similar attitude about everything: fuck it, have fun.

I guess this was a good place to start this novel after all. Imogen becoming a bigger part of our lives was one of the important events that would eventually lead to our current situation. However, it is what she says next that opens all the doors in this story. Without it, I'm not sure things would have happened the way they did.

It was after we'd gotten our frozen yogurt and had headed back to the park to eat it. We all sat within the tiny tower, in a circle. Felix and Im were sitting piratically shoulder to shoulder and he kept whispering jokes in her ear. It was audible enough for me to hear and sometimes I'd join in on the laugh. Then suddenly she sat up, green eyes wide in remembrance.

"Oh yeah," she started, swallowing her frozen yogurt before continuing, "I totally got invited to this party on Friday night. It was from the Senior class, but I don't know. I didn't feel like going, but they said I could bring anyone I wanted. Wanna go?"

Felix and I looked at each other and shrugged. "Yeah."

"Sure."

Just a moment, author interrupting yet again. Okay, so you know those scenes in movies where somebody says something and you, the very, are like 'oh wow, I bet this happens' and it things sort of click? Well for those of you that don't know what that is, it's called foreshadowing. And looking back on this now and being the literary buff that I am now, I should have fucking seen all the foreshadowing. Unfortunately, life isn't a movie. I can't pick out the foreshadowing, and I can't rewind just to make sure that I do.

I just want you all to know that high school parties, as a rule, generally suck for kids like me. But trust me when I tell you that this party kicked ass and became one of the most important things in my life. I owe that party a lot, but then again, it owes me an unbroken heart.