How To Get a Boyfriend 101

10 : Tuesday

Step Ten: Update your wardrobe! You need to be chic, stylish, and elegant 25/8. Take a trip to the mall with your besties! Spoil yourself! He'll see that you have great taste in clothing, and maybe he'll realize you have great taste in men, too!

I'm not really sure what to make of this step. Shouldn't this have gone before the photoshoot one? This book is messed up. Blake says he's looked ahead to step 101, and apparently, it's a repeat of another step. Whoever wrote that book must have been pretty uncreative (cough, cough).

Either way, it's not important. I'm just going to keep following the steps until I run out of them, or until Jason is my boyfriend. I doubt that the latter will ever happen, though it breaks my heart to think that way.

School is pretty uneventful, for some reason. Usually a lot of stuff happens for no reason, but today there wasn't really anything. Jason was in a pretty rotten mood for some reason, so I mostly stayed with Russell. Blake wasn't at school for some reason.

I need to stay up-to-date with my friends. I'm tossing out a lot of "for some reason"s, for some reason, and that needs to stop.

I—wait. Say it with me, fellas...

I sigh.

Yes, there it is. That satisfying exhale that can mean so many different things. Lately, my sighs have been either "I'm done with life" or "I'm confused." Right now, I'm done with life.

The sigh tickles my throat as it goes up, and I can feel my diaphragm expand. The warm air tingles my front teeth in comforting way; the inhale after my sigh is, as always, like a glass of lemonade on a hot day. It's a cool, refreshing feeling, to have air sucked into my lungs. People don't breathe through their mouths often enough. Like, seriously. Maybe the whole world should sigh more. Maybe we should have an International Sighing Day, or at least an International Sighing Convention, where all the sighers go to sigh together.

I would pay actual money to go to a sighing party.

After school ends, we walk back to our dorm building, Jason walking quickly. Russell walks at a normal pace with me, and we stare after him.

"What's up with him?" I ask, concern laced in my voice.

Russell shakes his head and turns up his empty palms. I haven't really spoken with him since that disaster in the cafeteria yesterday. "I have absolutely no idea."

Through an unspoken agreement, we turn in a random direction and start wandering around Misty Bay. Russell and I fire questions at one another, random things that kindergarteners would find amusing.

"What's your favorite animal?"

"What?" Russell's question startles me. I pause for a moment to think. "Oh, uh... I don't know."

He smiles. "I like cats."

"Cats are nice."

"Yeah, they are. Sometimes I wish I could be a cat."

I raise an eyebrow at Russell. "Because..." I prompt him.

"Because all they do is eat, sleep, get petted, and receive love. Who doesn't want that? I want love and snuggles and to be patted on the head and..... yeah."

Oh, dang.

Oh... dang.

Russell is a softie? This is highly unexpected. I'm starting to doubt Jason's tough exterior now. I already know a bit of his goofy side, since I glanced over at his FROG worksheet from the past, and Jason 💪💃also 💅 wants 🌒 rainbow🥇 cheese 🪐.

"I, uh, also want love. Uh-huh," I mumble.

Yeah, so now there's a tense silence. We continue walking in no particular direction. After about, oh, I don't know, maybe five minutes of getting lost, I have an idea.

"Wanna go shopping?"

Russell stops walking for a second and I turn around in time to see a grin spread across his face. "Hell yeah. I wanna get lost in a mall!"

"Russell, do I need to remind you? There aren't any big malls in Misty Bay... we only have, like, fancy cheese shops and expensive art galleries."

"We'll go to the department store to hang out, then," he says. I shrug. It's only two blocks away. I sigh, and Russell marches purposefully beside me as we make our way into the store. When we arrive, I take out my wallet and sigh again. Empty, just like I knew it would be.

It's not that I don't have sufficient money. My parents are sending me a decent allowance plus extra whenever I ask. I am just forgetful sometimes. I'll have to remember to call my mom, although I have no idea when I'd do that. They're in Australia, which is about 16 hours ahead, so it's sometimes hard to coordinate a phone call. I guess I can text them, but it feels strange to ask for extra money in a message.

When I left for school this morning, I only expected to need a small amount of money for lunch. I didn't bring my credit card, although I probably should have. I should probably start bringing it around with me instead of being lazy and leaving it at home. It only weighs, like, 6 grams (5.7 to be exact, according to Google)... so it shouldn't take that much effort.

Unfortunately, I don't have any effort. But that's beside the point.

Russell and I arrive at a department store, and he turns into a five-year-old. "Lix! Look at all the cool stuff!" Needless to say, Russell walks out of there with a whole new wardrobe. He wears lots of neutral tones, which looks really cool with his olive-toned skin.

Unlike him, I walk out of there with new jeans, a new turtleneck, and some not-so-considerable debt to Russell. Shout-out to him for paying for my clothes; I'll have to remember to pay him back. I wonder if he takes cash or credit. Probably just cash. The turtleneck I got is pale green. Ever since I got three compliments about the pink one, I've wanted to make turtlenecks my thing.

"Selfie time!"

Did I ever mention that Russell is a thirteen-year-old middle school girl? Because he isn't, but he sure acts like one. We change into our outfits—Russell changes three times before deciding on one he likes—and go into a coffee shop, where we order their most photogenic drinks.

That translates to... water. I don't want more debt.

Russell, on the other hand, gets this giant iced venti cloud caramel chocolate mocha cream pie bologna marathon runner sweat ham and cheese sandwich macchiato thing.

It's a really unsettling shade of orange.

We pose in front of a half-dead tree and take selfies of my freckled face. Then, Russell gets into the picture frame, and it's like the phone falls in love. Have I ever mentioned that Russell is hot? I think it needs to be restated:

Russell is hot and photogenic. Since when has life been so unfair?

Oh, right. Life has always been unfair.

I groan, in my head, and out loud, I sigh. When Russell's done being a model, we head back to the dorms. "I'm going to go talk to Blake," he says. "Do you want me to tell him something?"

"Eh. Just tell him to answer his texts."

Russell nods and shuts the door behind him, and I'm quite surprised to acknowledge that I had a fun time with him. Russell isn't all that bad. And if I can get along well with him, then I can definitely get along well with Jason, too.