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For what felt like the millionth time, I sighed at the conversation between me and Sophie, one of my best friends. She was trying to persuade me to come out that night and actually have some fun for once, but with me being me, I was objecting to it at all costs.
“Come on Jodie,” her voice crackled down the phone, “it’ll be fun!”
“I’m sorry Soph, I’ve just got too many things to do. Maybe next time.”
“But it won’t be the same without you,” she pleaded with me. Thank God I couldn’t see her face, or else I would be having a hard time trying to resist her puppy eyes.
“There’s gonna be you and Emma and Alex and Jack and Zack and Rian... Trust me, you won’t even notice I’m not there.”
“Lies!” She screamed down the phone; I had to pull it away from my face until she’d done. “Well, lies in the sense that you forgot about Craig for Emma, but mainly lies because we’d all notice you not being there! Please come with us, pretty please.”
I had to compose myself before replying. “I can’t, okay? I would if I could, but I just can’t.”
On the other end was silence – I had beaten Soph. “Fine then,” she sighed, “but whatever you’re doing had better be mega important, okay? I’ll talk to you later.”
“Yeah, sure. Bye.” With that, I hung up on her, and looked at the mess around me; there was a half-eaten bag of prawn cracker sticks, opened can of Fanta, and FML site open on my computer with my music on shuffle. Yep, that’s what was so important that I couldn’t go out and have fun – I was too busy being a loner and feeling sorry for myself when I don’t have anything to feel sorry for. Okay, so that wasn’t the only reason that I didn’t want to go out. It was because Alex was going to be there, and last week he’s gotten a new girlfriend, Isabel, who was a total bitch to everyone (apart from Alex, of course). Everybody else was able to ignore it, but not me, I was too sensitive to anything, and the constant remarks she made about my hair or lack of makeup and style or my weight were beginning to get too much. Which probably wasn’t going to be helped by sitting around eating all night.
A couple of hours, and quite a few bags of food, later, and I was ready to start poking myself out of total boredom. Just in the nick of time, however, my phone started to ring.
“Hello?”
“Dude,” Emma loudly whispered, “listen to this.” I heard some form of movement, and then one of the most surprising sounds came through my phone.
“Oh my God,” Isabel’s whiny voice came through clear as day, “it was a joke! Get over it, won’t you?”
“No, I won’t, cus even though you say it’s a joke, I don’t see anybody here laughing at it, do you?” Alex sounded stressed and incredibly angry.
“I bet she’s bribed them all, probably with food. Can’t see how else the fat cow would have any friends!”
There was some form of scuffle, and I could just about make out Jack’s voice. “Dude, she’s not worth it, chill out.”
“How the hell am I meant to chill out when she’s talking about one of my best friends like that?” Silence passed for a couple of seconds, only the sound of my own breathing audible, then a crack came out of nowhere.
“What the hell did you do that for Sophie?” Jack yelled, though obviously he wasn’t all that angry about it.
“Just because Alex can’t hit her, doesn’t mean that I can’t.” Sophie sounded pleased with herself. “I hope that false nose of yours falls off you stupid tart! Yeah, that’s right, we all know! And if I ever hear you talking about Jodie like that again, then you’re gonna end up like Humpty Dumpty cus no-one will be able to put you back together when I’m done with you, you hear me?” Some inaudible response must have came from Isabel, causing Soph to try and swing for her again.
“Soph!” Emma yelled, which went directly into my ear. “Wait, Alex, where are you going?”
“I’m going to somewhere way more important than here. Oh, and if she doesn’t already get the message, we’re over.”
“Um,” Emma spoke to me again, “I’ll text you later and tell you what’s been going on.” After hanging up on me, I stared at my phone in disbelief – what the hell had actually just happened? Were they... were they fighting because of me? I prayed that they weren’t, because there’s no way I’m important enough for all of that to have happened just because of me.
Yet another hour passed, and by this time I was so bored I had actually fallen asleep, so I wasn’t too happy when I heard someone knocking on my door.
“If that’s Emma, I’m gonna murder her,” I muttered to myself as I walked down the stairs, still feeling half-asleep. Fortunately, it wasn’t her standing there. “Oh my God, you’re soaked right through!” I said to Alex. “Where the hell have you been?”
“About,” he replied, trying to keep the anger out of his voice. “I guess you already know what happened tonight then.” In disbelief, I nodded, not knowing what else to do.
“Do you... do you want to come inside?” Nodding in the same way that I had just, Alex stepped inside, and walked straight past me into my kitchen.
“You want a cookie?” He yelled to me; the way he acted at my place, you’d think he lived there.
“Sure,” I said, grabbing it out of his hands before he had a chance to react. We stood there for a few moments, chowing down on what is the sweet goodness of cookies, when my phone vibrated. Have you seen Alex? It read. We can’t find him anywhere DX
“Who’s that?” He spoke, mouth full of food. I stared at him; I don’t know how many times before I told him not to speak when eating.
“The search party looking for you.” Just as I was about to reply, Alex came and took the phone out of my hands.
“I don’t want them to know I’m here. I came to talk to you, not to have all of them fire questions at me for the rest of the night.”
I felt like I was speechless. “Um, well they’ll come here and look for you, so it’s probably not a good idea to stand here cus they can see through the window.”
Grabbing a drink, he walked out of the kitchen. “Okay then, we’ll hide in your room for a bit until they’ve given up.” I followed him up the stairs into my room, where he proceeded to pick up my barely-touched acoustic guitar and sit down on my bed, playing around with it. He did this for a few minutes, producing some good sounding music; this was like our ritual whenever he was round mine, where he would sit and mess about on the guitar, and I’d just sit on the floor and listen, letting my thoughts wash over me. In the middle of a daydream, I was brought back to reality by Alex waving a piece of paper in my face. “When I nod at you, sing this.” Confused, I took it anyway, and was surprised to see him break away from our ritual when he began to sing.
“He woke up from dreaming and put on his shoes,
Started making his way past two in the morning;
He hasn't been sober for days.
Leaning now into the breeze,
Remembering Sunday, he falls to his knees.
They had breakfast together,
But two eggs don't last
Like the feeling of what he needs.
Now this place seems familiar to him –
She pulled on his hand with a devilish grin.
She led him upstairs, she led him upstairs,
Left him dying to get in.
Forgive me, I'm trying to find
My calling, I'm calling at night;
I don't mean to be a bother,
But have you seen this girl?
She's been running through my dreams
And it's driving me crazy it seems,
I'm going to ask her to marry me.
Even though she doesn't believe in love,
He's determined to call her bluff;
Who could deny these butterflies?
They're filling his gut.
Waking the neighbours, unfamiliar faces –
He pleads, oh he tries,
But he's only denied,
Now he's dying to get inside.
Forgive me, I'm trying to find
My calling, I'm calling at night;
I don't mean to be a bother,
But have you seen this girl?
She's been running through my dreams
And it's driving me crazy it seems,
I'm going to ask her to marry me.
The neighbours said she moved away;
Funny how it rained all day.
I didn't think much of it then,
But it's starting to all make sense.
Oh, I can see now that all of these clouds
Are following me in my desperate endeavour
To find my whoever, wherever she may be.” He nodded at me, but I couldn’t seem to sing. “What’s the problem?” Alex asked me as he played the same chord again and again.
“I don’t know how it goes,” I admitted. “I’m scared I’ll mess it up.”
He considered a solution for this previously unthought-of problem. “Then I’ll sing it with you, okay?” I nodded, still scared that I would mess it up and ruin his hard work.
“I'm not coming back;
I've done something so terrible,
I'm terrified to speak
But you'd expect that from me.” Me and Alex sang it together, him going slower for me. But he needn’t have worried; I got into the zone, and didn’t even notice when he stopped singing along with me.
“I'm mixed up, I'll be blunt, now the rain is just
Washing you out of my hair and out of my mind
Keeping an eye on the world,
From so many thousands of feet off the ground, I'm over you now
I'm at home in the clouds, and towering over your head.” Alex smiled at me, and finished off the song with his last verse.
“Well I guess I'll go home now...
I guess I'll go home now...
I guess I'll go home now...
I guess I'll go home.” The final note faded away, leaving me utterly breath taken. “So,” he calmly asked me, “what did you think?”
My mouth couldn’t move; how was I expected to be able to describe it? “It was... it was... oh my God, I can’t explain it! It’s too good for words!” Alex’s face lit up when I said this.
“Really, you think so? I mean, I’ve been working on it for months now, and I wasn’t sure if you were gonna like it...”
“Hang on, are you telling me that song was for me?” Sheepishly, he started fiddling around with the guitar – I had my answer. “So you got me to sing my own serenade song?” I couldn’t help but smirk at that; it was such a typically Alex thing for him to do.
“It just didn’t feel enough to write a song for you,” he explained. “I knew you’d want to get involved with it somehow seeing as it annoys you when you just have to listen to a song.” He was right, down to every last detail.
“I loved it,” I said as I got up off the floor and sat by him on the bed, “thank you.” I wrapped my arms around him, forgetting that his clothes were still soaking, and that the guitar was in the way.
“Sorry, I guess I should move this,” Alex chuckled, setting it on the floor. But when he turned back to look at me, there was something different in his expression, like there was something more that he had to say, except I was wrong – before I had chance to react, I found his lips pressed against mine, the tension in them noticeable. However, when I started to kiss him back, all of that seemed to fade away, and I effortlessly moulded into his body, wishing that this moment would never end. A tap on the window did just that, though, and me and Alex turned our heads round to glare at the intruder.
“Oh my God, how did she...?”
“It’s Emma, of course she managed to get up here,” I answered him. “Go away now,” I shouted at the window, “or I will have to kill you.”
“Aww man!” Came her muffled response. “But it’s so cute! Just lemme stay, you won’t even know I’m here.”
“Who else knows you’re here though?” Alex shouted back at her.
“Umm...” Which in Emma-speak meant everybody. Lightly, Alex sighed, before getting up and closing the curtains in her face. “Hey, now that’s not fair!”
“Tough,” he yelled at her while giving her the finger; I couldn’t help but to giggle. “Now,” he said as he came and sat back down by me with the biggest grin on his face, “where were we?”