space dust || boyf riends

six

six - is it being greedy to need somebody to see me?

I'm slowly starting to regret my decision.

It isn't Rich's fault at all, no. I just hate social interaction. Really badly. I'm sitting at a table with him and his friends who I don't know; the kind of people who treated me like garbage on my first day, like the tall, athletic-looking black guy, and the half-blonde girl who's always attached to her phone (and also the tall guy?) and whose wardrobe appears to consist of just crop tops. I don't remember their names, even though Rich introduced them to me. I guess he did that when I spaced out or whatever it was to avoid having a panic attack.

But there's good things in this lunch, I guess-like Rich. He's been keeping me occupied, even though he's talking with his friends. I've just been looking at him. I like looking at him. He's pretty.

He grabs my hand like it's the most casual thing in the world; he doesn't even take his eyes off his friends. He doesn't seem to mind my trembling. Our hands are on the table, on display for the whole entire world to see.

"Aren't you gonna eat?" He asks me. I don't have a lunch today. Oops.

"Oh...I'm not hungry." I tell him, which isn't a lie. If I ate, I'd probably puke it all up because of how nervous I am.

"Awh, does little Richie finally have a boyfriend? He's growing up, Jake," the girl interrupts our conversation. She nudges the guy's shoulder. He smiles and laughs, and then she smiles and laughs. I feel my face go red.

"What?" Rich lets go of my hand. It hurts more than it should. "No. We're not-we aren't a thing."

Ouch.

"Sure, whatever you say, Richie," the girl teases.

"Stop calling me Richie! It's so annoying," he says, but he doesn't look annoyed. Hell, he's even smiling, which makes me feel the happiest I can feel in this situation.

"Wait," the other guy-Jake, I think his name is-looks right at me. He inspects me for a moment. Yes, inspects. It's making me feel uneasy. "Didn't you go to school across town?"

Something bad is about to happen! My brain says. I wish I had something to grab onto, like, oh, I don't know, Rich's hand? But that's not happening any time soon, so I grab onto the sides of the seat underneath me.

"Yeah," I reply, and I even nod to get my point across. "I, ah, I switched schools just a-just a few, uh, weeks ago."

"You were a part of that stoner crew," the unnamed girl says. Her tone is just as bitchy as I expected it to be, which annoys me. They weren't a stoner crew, they were my friends. They just happened to smoke weed. I just happened to smoke with them.

"Yeah. Yeah, I was definitely part of a stoner crew," It's supposed to be sarcasm, but I sound like I'm telling the truth. Fuck.

Rich cuts in, "A stoner crew? What?"

"Yeah, whatever. So you knew Brooke, right? Weren't you like, her boyfriend or something?"

And that's the question that completely breaks me.

I can't move. I thought I could escape this. I thought I could escape her, but I can't.

"Yeah, I, ah, I guess I knew her. But I-I wasn't her boyfriend," but everyone knew she felt something more for me. Hell, even I knew that she felt more for me, and I-

"You were there when it happened, right? That must've been so awful, it really must have been." There's no real sympathy in this chick's voice. That's because she's mocking me. She's fucking mocking me, and I know she's mocking me.