IF YOU WANT TO TALK

Part One

It started with a sticky note.

Caleb blinked once. It was still there. Stuck to the front of his locker. Obnoxiously yellow.

Caleb blinked again. The writing was barely more than a scribble, but if he turned his head and squinted he could just about read the words 'If you ever want to talk'.

Caleb blinked once more. It was a mistake. Caleb was absolutely sure of that fact. He reached up to pluck the sticky note off his locker door, and flipped it over, hoping for a name or something. His mouth fell open slightly when he noticed that there was a phone number written in a lot more careful handwriting on the back.

Suddenly he felt like he was prying even though the note was left on his locker.

He instinctively went to stick it back, but was struck with the sudden fear that it would fall off and someone else would find it, and then they also would have this stranger's number.

Caleb shifted uncomfortably, arm suspended in mid-air, indecision making him immobile. After standing there doing nothing for a solid minute a huff of air left Caleb's lips. There was a metaphor for his life in there somewhere.

He didn't have long before class, and didn't really have time to stand there staring into space. Spinning in his combination he yanked out the books he needed for his first lessons, with only a slight hesitation he stuck the note into his maths book. He'd deal with it later.

*

Later came and went, finding Caleb alone in his room, staring blankly at his ceiling. He was obsessing. He knew he was obsessing – but he only had about three contacts in his phone that weren't family. His eyes flickered to his phone that lay on the pillow next to him the sticky note discarded beside it. Four now.

His finger tapped jerkily against his thigh.

Over thinking it.

Over thinking it.

Over thinking it.

He sighed picking up his phone. Only to let out a much louder frustrated groan and put it right back down again. He curled in on himself.

What if the person on the other end got mad at him for some reason?

What if this was just a really random and elaborate prank?

He discarded that idea fairly quickly. Caleb didn't have any friends, but it wasn't like he was ever bullied either. He was just... insignificant. If he disappeared no one would notice, accept for maybe his parents.

Which means that the note wasn't for him, and he should tell the person who left it that they got the wrong locker.

But what if the note was for him? What if there was a person close by that actually wanted to talk to him.

Caleb didn't linger on the thought – or more accurately Caleb tired not to linger on the thought. He really did, because it was a sad and lonely thought that just the idea that someone wanted to talk to him could make him this excited.

Maybe it was time he got a puppy or something.

Picking up his phone one last time he forced himself to press send on the message he'd written and re-written a million times.

[you got the wrong locker]

And there. It was done.

The reply didn't take long at all, which was good news for Caleb's nerves, which were telling him to crawl under his bed and never show his face in public ever again.