A story about two boys, love, loss, friendship and all the messy in-betweens.
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As peculiar as what he said might have seemed, it drove Golden Boy absolutely mad with want. Because it was him, it was Starry Eyes.
Starry Eyes, who's words we...
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the party ;
Dear no one,
We were at the first party of the year.
Starry Eyes and I were closer than ever, could you believe? This outgoing, funny, confident kid, wanted me, the absolute opposite, to be his friend - best friend. He didn't care that my dad was Chinese and my mom was black. He didn't care that I had no one - no one at all - to call friend.
He'd wanted that spot. And I was just about ready to give it to him.
With Starry Eyes' help, I'd made friends with some of the kids around the block of our neighbourhood instead of at school. He told off anyone who wasn't kind to me, like some knight-in-shining-armour saving the day. It took me a year in Starry Eyes' presence, but I finally had genuine friends. This small town was starting to feel like home.
We were in eighth grade at this point, our last year of middle school, but Starry Eyes had promised me it'd be the best - starting with this party.
And like always, I believed him.
"Hey, Golden Boy," he'd said and I knew by the glinting look in his eyes that he was about to tell me something I didn't need to know, but that he'd say anyways.
It was his thing.
"Did you know that the heart beats over 100,000 times a day?" And it was a strange fact. I'd wondered when he had time to learn all of these. Overtime, I'd learn of his insanely good memory and knack for memorising things in the general knowledge books his mom got him.
The music was blaring loudly through the house of a neighbourhood kid and everyone was dancing, running around and jumping into the pool like the whirls of the autumn night air wasn't wrap around our little, growing bones.
I'd watched him lick his dry lips and tap his fingers at his side furiously. Odd.
Is he nervous?
I'd wondered this as my eyes trailed along the neon flashing room before landing on him. It was then that I first realised how his facts usually pertained to his feelings.
"Do you want a drink? I think there's punch over there," I'd pointed to a corner, and he'd nodded vigorously before dragging me by my wrist towards the punch.
"I know I seem really laid-back and confident or whatever," he'd said softly - sadly even, "But honestly, I can't help but care about what others think of me," he pouted as he sipped on his punch. How very astute for a nearly-fourteen-year-old. It was one of the few times in our life where he'd opened up about how he felt without me having to pry it out of him.
His eyes slowly wondered to the group of girls standing in the yard. He'd nervously fidgeted with his hair.
"It's what I like most about you, doofus," I'd said, hoping it'd bring some sense of comfort. His eyes trailed back to me.
He smiled. Genuinely so.
I watched as his nerves calmed down slowly and grinned widely when he'd asked me to go dance with him. I'd laughed because he was actually good and I liked to watch him. We floated in the crowd, as everyone enclosed around us.
And as the night carried us, and nine o'clock neared, we danced our preteen hearts out, high on life - and probably sugar. By the time it was nine, I'd had enough and Starry Eyes'd had enough.
Or so I thought.
Before we could announce our departure, one of the girls from the yard pulled us into a different room. He'd followed her far too willingly for me to not realise why. And that room held a memory I'd want to burn out of my mind for the rest of my life.
As they passed around a cup of distasteful, burning liquid, they used the bottle who's contents we were apparently sipping on, to indirectly ruin any innocent feelings I felt up until then.
They'd spun the damn bottle and he'd kissed the damn girl and I'd felt the damn feelings.
