Long-Distance Calls

14

That day at school, I spent every hour staring into space. I didn't blink, I didn't move one finger. I was dead still, whether I was staring at a speck of dust on Killian Maddox's sweater, or dried out chewing gums sticked under a desk.

I didn't even bother to ask myself whether Erasmus had noticed or not, it honestly didn't even cross my mind.

My mind did not drift in weird places as it usually would. I did not think about aliens. I did not think about the one. I didn't think of anything. I just felt emptiness. And a constant feeling of anxiety eating me alive, tearing me apart from the inside.

I didn't eat at lunch. I sat at the table with the others but I didn't even bother to take a plate. I kept staring into nothingness. Amber tried to approach me, she asked me why I wasn't eating, but I didn't answer.

I couldn't talk to her. I couldn't even look at her. I felt Andrew's eyes constantly staring at me, looking at everything I did. At every move I made.

When someone grabbed the bottle of water I was staring at on the table, I needed to focus on something else. This happened to be Josh. I stared at him kissing Amber. I didn't even realize that I was looking at him. He probably did. And I think he waved, at one point. But there was no reaction from my part.

The whole day was like that. I shut down all my senses, closing myself into a cocoon, letting everyone live while I slowly died inside.

At one point, though, Amber became insistent, she asked me why I wasn't talking to her, and I had to talk.

"I'm..." my voice barely came out, I hadn't spoken a word for too long, so I cleared my throat, "uh... I'm feeling kind of bad today..."

"Why so? Are you ill?" She actually sounded concerned.

"I don't know..." I had to make conversation. She would have asked me what was wrong. If I was mad with her. And what would I have said? I sighed. "So... Josh."

"Yeah. We went out yesterday. Me, him and Andrew," They didn't invite me. Andrew didn't even bother to tell me they went out. "And it all happened really fast. We were talking and then, all of the sudden, we were kissing."

"Wow..." I muttered, still staring into space, talking in an emotionless way, "I don't even know him. I never talked to him."

"Well, you should!" She was all excited, "He seems like a nice guy."

He seems. How do you kiss someone that seems nice. Someone that you don't even know.

I looked at Josh as he talked to Andrew while eating in a kind of rough way. He didn't seem really nice. He didn't look very friendly. He looked hot, that's for sure. With his biceps and his jawline. He was really handsome, but he had that bad boy look.

"So... are you two, like... in love with each other?"

"Woah!" I saw her smile out of the corner of my eye, "In love! Wow! See... I don't really believe in love. I don't even think I can love. This is just for fun."

I didn't look away from my staring spot, I just raised my eyebrows, though my eyes remained as lifeless as they were.

"I know what you're thinking," she kept talking, "You think I'm an unpleasant bitch. I think so too. I don't know how to be nice. And I don't know how to love. And I'm a troublemaker too. I always ruin my relationships and other's. People should stay away from me."