Broken Love [COMPLETED BUT EDITING]

Chapter 1

When I started at Mervone High School, I was beyond excited. I'd come from a small middle school where everyone knew everyone. I was tired of the same faces every day. I was tired of everyone knowing what I'd done wrong, what trouble I had caused. I hadn't been the nicest person, but I'd never gotten that reality check until I started high school. And even then, I didn't realize until much much later. 

I was the type of girl to obsess over boys. I don't know why. I would like one guy and then another. I was boy crazy. It was very taboo for me to like guys in my family simply because it was inappropriate and I was too young. But that only pushed me to go further. 

I, of course, first fell for the sophomores. First it was Evan Cadel. Then it was his friend, Charlie Grey. Yes it was stupid, but I tried to befriend them. It was horrible. I'd thought they were being nice to me when I talked to them but no, they were being fake. 

I decided to stay away from upperclassmen and stick to my grade. And I fell for the most popular kid in my grade: Edward Clemson. Boy did I fall! And thing is, we became "friends" or so I thought. He hurt me, and took advantage of the fact that I would do anything for him. We argued with each other. 

It was...toxic.

I forced myself to move on. It took some time but by second semester I really thought I'd reshaped myself. 

Somehow I ended up liking a guy from my Spanish class. It was the only class we had together. He was a sophomore. His name was Shane Mallik. But I didn't fall for his facial features. 

I fell for his personality, for him, for Shane. 

I didn't immediately like him. 

We slowly became friends. He liked talking to me, and I him. We laughed and worked together. And somehow I ended up liking him. I loved to mess with him. He loved to never do classwork. Shane and I got along. He didn't make fun of me the way Evan and Charlie did. And they were all friends. To him, it didn't matter.

I thought that things wouldn't get complicated. I'd like him and that would be that. I could hide my crush on him until he liked me. He was pretty much oblivious at the moment. 

I noticed how Charlie, Evan, And a few of their other friends, Eli Maen, Richard Hodon, and Eugene Moon had begun to notice me and my friends, Sarah Haman, Vanessa Chan, Lara Kela, and Mina Doran. They had seen me getting close to Shane and they wanted to know why. Mina talked to Eli a lot, and slowly I did too. 

So the girls and I decided we would try and figure out what they were up to. Vanessa was friends with Charlie. And her boyfriend was a sophomore, Marcos Velas. 

We gave them codenames, and we tried to learn everything we could about them. It was typical high school drama. And I was a typical idiot. 

But then ...geometry class happened. And I added more drama to the equation. 

Ms. Ardon, my geometry teacher, decided it was time to move seats. I ended up at a table with three guys: Sam Dorin, Mark Beerin, and James Marquez.

At first, I didn't care. These were boys from my grade. Aside from Edward every other guy was friend-zoned. William was the only other boy I considered cute in my grade, but he seemed far too immature for me. So I decided I'd prefer to befriend him. I'd always been chill with the guys. Once I didn't crush on them, it was so easy to talk to them. I was just one of them.

Unfortunately, I came up with a plan to get to Will through James, his best friend. Will never spoke to me, and I wanted to be his friend. Don't ask me why. it was a bad plan from the start.

James and I started to talk. And I liked talking to him. I liked being his friend. We laughed, argued, teased each other. I'm not exactly sure when it happened, but we began to flirt.

To me, James was definitely not the sort of guy I'd ever like. He was around my age, quiet in crowds, and kind of unnoticeable. I preferred older, bad boy types. I'd never seen James as the type of guy to work out, but he did. Once he took off his ever-present sweatshirt, you could see the muscles. I'd never sat close enough to notice until now.

He wasn't extremely muscular. He was lean, with underlying strength that rippled through his skin when he stretched. He was the sort of guy many girls would fall for if he were more popular. But he never put himself out there.

He preferred the sidelines, or so I judged him.

He stayed away from fights, from crowds...or so I judged.

He seemed kind, willing to help out anyone if he could.

He seemed kind of like a nerd.

But I was wrong. So wrong.

One of my friends, Lara was close to William and James. especially James. When I found out she was close to them, I was curious. She began boasting about how she knew them better than anyone. I was so jealous. And I couldn't figure out why. So I made it my mission to get closer to them.