Ursa Minor (On hiatus)

The trespasser

I made it to send the apology. And with a little urging from Trish I made it to meet Lisa the next day by her locker. And I was forgiven. Lisa wasn't immune to my smile either. The days that had followed I'd been like the best boyfriend ever. I'd accompanied Lisa to her favorite store and watched her try out at least ten outfits, and told her that she looked pretty in each and every one of them. Which she of course did. And then we went and had cupcakes at the new place by the library in Glenville where she'd hinted she wanted to go for at least a month. Ok, so maybe she drove me home, but I had paid for the whole thing. And called her afterwards. Not to mention still meeting her every morning and waiting outside choir practice as usual. And that wasn't enough, to top it all I had agreed to come with her to the prayer group this afternoon.

Yeah, best boyfriend ever. It was fucking exhausting though. If I planned it carefully, hopefully I could do like one week of perfect boyfriendness and then coast along for the next two or three weeks just making an average boyfriend effort. Because otherwise I would be dead before Christmas break. My mind was all a jumble already, being so attentive to Lisa took away from my much needed time alone. But maybe I would have to sacrifice that, have to learn. If I didn't want to be alone forever.

Though there were two people not very happy with me working on improving my boyfriend skills. The first was Trish, who was pissed I hadn't tried as hard with her, apparently. 'You never watched me try on dresses', she had complained. 'Well, I watched you take them off', I not very gentlemanly had replied, and she'd rightfully kicked my shin and called me an asshole. The other one was Adam, who by now seemed convinced that I was one bowling night away from becoming a full-fledged Bradford and forever lost.

"You're coming, and that's final," he stated, as we were walking to first period together, not intending to take no for an answer. He was skipping last period, and had decided that I would come with him. But I felt less and less the need for escaping. Because even though being a perfect well-behaved boyfriend, even saying hi to Claire in the hallway, was tiresome, in a way it just got easier. It was like the nicer I acted, the nicer I became. The better of a boyfriend I was, the better I wanted to be. I still had no intention of becoming like Will Bradford, or any of them, but I couldn't deny that it was nice having Lisa beam proudly at me during lunch, or getting a B instead of a C- at a math test because I'd actually gone to study hall and actually studied. It wasn't me becoming someone else, it was just me making things easier. Making things nicer. When had my life become so nice? Even more mind-boggling, when had I started wanting it to be so nice?

"Mom'll ground me if I get more detention, seriously," I tried to weasel my way out of it, and Adam glared at me darly and shot me down, but I only heard it distorted and fading in the background. All my attention drawn to where Allen were standing close to his locker talking to some of those Bradford's that I still hadn't bothered attaching names to. Both his regular bag and the old camera bag hanging of his shoulder, a bluish-green sweater with the sleeves slightly pushed up, his hand on his neck. I remembered for a second the faint freckles on his hands.

Like he could feel me looking Allen turned as we passed them, and his eyes found mine. I squited and looked away for a second, because it was still so intense somehow. I looked back to see Allen smiling quickly, excusing himself from the nameless dullards. I slowed down, waiting in on him. Adam punched my arm, confused. "Why are you stopping?" 

"Hi there," Allen said in his usual bright way as he caught up with us. I smiled a 'hi' and Adam punched my arm again. Harder this time. 

"Hi there," he mimicked spitefully, and yeah, I didn't really see the point of introducing them after that.

Allen started talking about the presentation for the project, ignoring the comment and Ade altogether, and since we were both many many inches taller than him, Ade should have been easily ignorable also for me. I almost wanted him to just fall off the face of the earth at least for a couple of seconds. Almost wanted the sea of people in the hallway to drain away so I could be alone with Allen. Maybe then it would be less awkward feeling the smile unfolding on my face as I searched for something to say. What I really wanted was to tell him something about how I really liked the cd he'd borrowed me, but with Adam positively fuming beside me, it wasn't the time.