In The Eye of the Beholder | Jonathan Crane

February 1991

Did you ever love her?

Do you know?

Or did you never want to be alone?

-Jet Pack Blues (Fall Out Boy)

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I quietly sat alone in the school's library. Jonathan wasn't with me today. He was probably watching Sherry Squires from a distance, wishing she could be his. He recently started doing that often. Which meant I spent most of my time by myself.

It wasn't that I was angry that Jonathan had a crush on someone. In fact, if it was someone else, I would have been extremely happy for him. But his crush was Sherry Squires. Not only did she never even look Jonathan's way, other than to sneer at him, but she was dating Bo Griggs. Bo Griggs was a frequent torturer of Jonathan's. Why Jonathan would willfully endanger himself by trying to engage Sherry was beyond me.

Jonathan was usually smarter than that.

I gripped the pencil in my hand tighter. He wasn't stupid, so why was he acting that way? It wasn't jealousy making me so angry; I wasn't in love with Jonathan. He was my best friend. He wasn't anything more than that and I didn't want anything more than friendship.

The bell rang.

It was time for chemistry.

How wonderful.

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The school day ended and I was walking out of the school alone for the first time in a long while. But I didn't want to go home. Not today. Dad had been angry about something that morning. Chances were he was still upset. And today I wasn't in the mood to piss him off even more.

"I suppose I should go to the library and start getting research for that English paper," I muttered to myself.

The library was close to the school, but it seemed like hours before I got there. My feet moved slowly against the gravel road. And when I got there, my day got so much worse.

Bo Griggs and his group of friends were standing in front of the doors. I tried moving out of their line of sight before they could see me.

I was too slow.

"Hey, it's Scarecrow's witch friend!" one of his friends called. I froze, like an idiot.

"Connery! I got words for you!" Bo called to me.

"My name is Amber. What do you want?" I bravely said, turning to face him.

"Keep your creepy ass friend away from Sherry! Tell him he'd better stop staring at her or I'll kill him, understand?"

"Yeah, yeah. Sure," I said. "I'll tell him."

I wouldn't tell him what Bo said. Even if I did, it didn't mean Jonathan would listen. He was as stubborn as he was intelligent.

Bo gave me on more hard glance before turning back to his friends. I turned away from the library. Research could wait.

Guess I had to see if dear old Dad was still upset.

It wouldn't surprise me if I had a new bruise on my arm later. But that would be alright.

It'd been almost a week since the last one.

I could live with a new bruise once in a while.

After all, it wasn't all the time.

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A/N: So, I missed posting a chapter last week. I swear I worked myself half to death doing schoolwork last week. I really did try to write, but I couldn't find the time. Sorry about that. Anyway, I'm not feeling super confident about this, but it could be worse.

Like always, let me know if I messed something up!