Your Nerd

Chapter 1

"I'm pansexual."

I stopped dead in my tracks causing the people behind me to topple over one another. Jenny skidded to a stop as well, looking completely annoyed. As I continued to stand frozen, I watched as the people moved past me forming a new line. Most shot me dirty looks and a few even gave me the finger. Normally that would have made me upset or even furious, but I couldn't move. I was frozen. What did pansexual even mean? 

"Why are we stopping, Mel?" My friend, Jenny, asked, tapping her foot impatiently. She never liked to be late to lunch because there was limited seating, and if you weren't the first in line, you would be eating on the floor. I just couldn't wrap my head around what she was telling me. Lunch didn't seem like a pressing matter anymore.

Jenny exhaled dramatically and pushed her long, dark hair away from her face. Thanks to her years in theater, she was very good at exaggerating her actions. She threw up her hands in frustration and punched my arm to get my attention. Breaking my trance, I moved us over to the wall so that we weren't in people's way. This made Jenny even more upset though, but I didn't want people to hear what I was about to say next. 

"What did you just say? What's...plantsexual?"

"No, Mel, pansexual," She corrected, "Do you think I'm attracted to plants? God, no."

She wouldn't stop tapping her foot and I could see how hangry she was becoming, so I began to walk again, for my own safety. Trailing next to me, the brown-eyed girl just kept sighing. 

"Okay, what is that?" I said as we made it to the long line into lunch. We would definitely be sitting on the floor today. 

"You live under a rock, don't you?"

"Jenny." I rolled my eyes. She always found a way to tell me how uncultured I was. I tried not to take it personally, but sometimes it was a little much. Jenny liked to act like she knew everything and I just had to follow along and let her feel like the superior one. 

"Pansexual," She spit out each syllable, "means that you love anyone, no matter their gender."

"Ah."

I glanced above the lockers to distract myself from Jenny's judgmental gaze and saw a new poster about the school's Snowball dance. I could feel Jenny's eyes burning into the side of my skull, but I didn't know how to respond to her statement, so I kept looking at the poster. It was very well done and had beautiful red rose petals glued onto it. Maybe Jenny would want to go to Snowball with me. Would Jenny want to go with me even though she was pansexual? Would she go with someone else? Would she go with a girl? I had no one; I wanted her to go with me.

"Hey Jenny, wanna go to Snowball together?"

"Idiot, you know how I feel about stupid school dances. They're forcing us to socialize. They're treating us like animals. It's completely ridiculous, and it's also the perfect ground for jocks to bully people. School dances were a terrible invention."

"Oh."

I hastily moved my attention to another poster and was blinded by the amount of color and glitter on it. It talked about how "everyone is welcome" at the school. Below those words in bold colorful font it read, "this is a safe place". I tried to figure out what that meant, but the lunch line began to move, and I couldn't avoid Jenny's eyes forever.

"Mel, are we still friends? Are you chill with what I just told you?" She was staring at me with a sprinkle of concern laced throughout her eyes.

"Jenny..." I stopped and made sure I had her complete attention. "You will be my best friend forever, no matter what."