➕ Beauty ➕

Understanding

As time went on, I felt an unease of fatigue. My eyes began to swell and a gravitational pull sank into my fingertips.

I hear Gemma's voice "John. Need help?"

"No, um. I'm okay." I try to say. A face of worry clouds her face. I look at her. "No really, I'm fine."

She says, "Okay, but just ask if you need any help."

I look back on the screen. "So have you finished the graphs yet?" I ask.

"Yep. Have you finished our evaluation?" Gemma says.

"Almost. Yeah."

"I still can't believe she only gave us a week to finish this project. Mrs. Summerville sucks balls, I'd love to slap that 'know it all' face she always has."

"I agree."

She continues "If she were more like Mrs. Botherway maybe she would gain some respect. And maybe we'll learn, instead of hearing her bitch around with her shit stories."

"She also has to chill, or another wrinkle will make her face even more unbearable to look at." Looking at what I've got so far I end up the essay. "C... H... A... N... G... and E. Done"

She leans in smiling "Okay, let me see it."

I back up and wrap myself around the laptop "I can't! I have to send it to Jake... for him to re-write it."

She dashes in front of me. "When I say 'let me see it' I'm going to see it." she says as she swiped the computer off my lap.

"Was That an innuendo?" I ask without her answering.

Her eyes scrolled through the page like it was a speed reading competition. Her concentration zoomed out of the screen onto me, an unimpressed look gloom's around her face. "Your right. we gotta send it to Jake."

________

"So what did Jake say?" Gemma asked me.

I read the message. "He said it was... 'eh. I could do better.' Not much hel-."

"HA, I TOLD YOU HE'D BE JEALOUS."

"Ha." I say.

She spoke a bit softer, "Do you still have other writing? Like, poetry or a story... or anything really?"

I felt my face scrunch up a little, I try my hardest to hide this expression from Gemma. But still. she caught a glimpse of my mouth cringing. Suddenly I can see her pupils daialate back, there was regret in her eyes. I break out from a lump in my throat, "Yes. Um, would you like to see more."

She says, "I'm really sorry I asked." She avoided eye contact and tried to stare towards the ground.

I reassure her. "No, no, it's okay. I'm okay now." I smile, and suddenly, I could see her eyes brighten like they always do.

I read her a story I've been working for the past two days. The class was to construct a short story in first-person with a poem at the end. I took a long time just brainstorming the ideas, and I knew Mrs. Botherway (our English teacher) adored creativity, so unlike the rest of the class I wanted to be risky. Mrs. Botherway never cared about the length of a story, the whole piece of writing only needed to be more than three-hundred words. The story was called 'A Smoker's Dream'. I explain this all to Gemma.

________

I finish reading the piece of writing I made. Her mind trailed off to where (I presume) she imagined from my story.

I expect no reply from what I already got from her face. But still, she can't help but comment. "Wow... like, WOW..."

"Yeah, I tried really hard on it-." I say quickly,

"... Like, oh my gosh!..."

"It wasn't really that good." I try to tell her.

"... Like, woah."

This goes on like this for ten minutes.

_________

After she finally finishes (having a biblical feeling from my writing [she couldn't stop moaning after the twelfth time. {And she moaned very loudly} And had to use the bathroom afterwards]), we continue to talk about random things.

"You know, since were done, let's improve our knowledge in..." She whispers in my ear. "Anatomy."

"EW, YOURE GROSS." I exclaim.

Gemma speaks in a deeply sultry voice. "Come on, you can take your- (moan)- giant flashlight, and- (moan)- explore my territory."

"Hey! That's not even anatomy!" I say as her giggles fill the room.