Friend of a Friend
I walked into my chemistry class and a friend of a friend waved me over “ come sit with me today” she said. I usually just sat near the front of the class, no one in that class intrigued me so I didn’t bother to make friends or conversation with anyone. So I sat down next to this friend of a friend because why not? She complimented my makeup,I had black eye shadow around my eyes and a deep red lip. Her complimenting was nice but I now felt the need to compliment her, I noticed she was playing with the rings on her fingers. They were colorful plastic and chunky, they were statement pieces and I thought they were awesome, so I said “cool rings”. Other people at the table made conversation and I jumped in when they talked about something that interested me. One girl asked me how I walk with such confidence and I said “what do you mean?” she replied “when you walk down the hall you just just keep walking and you look straight ahead…and people move out of your way.” I remember her saying that so vividly because I had never thought or seen myself this way. So I told her the truth and said, “I just pretend that nobody is in that hall with me, I put my headphones in and play a crazy song so that when I’m walking down the hallways it feels like I’m in a different world.” She looked at me with confusion written all over her face. Then I heard a deep laugh and the whole table looked over and I saw a boy with dark hair that sat over his eyes sitting across from me and I hadn’t even noticed him sitting there, and apparently I wasn’t the only one who didn’t notice him. Another boy at my table exclaimed “What the hell! How long have you been sitting there?” He said “I got to class late but I’ve been here for about thirty minutes.” That’s how the story starts, a friend of a friend and a deep laugh.
Thirty minutes? How had I not seen him? I thought back to the last thirty minutes and realized I had in fact seen him, but it was as if my brain didn’t process him being there. He was just listening and observing or what I like to call people watching. I didn’t like that he could sit back and have no one notice him, I have a problem with things getting past me. Usually I am the one to watch and get information, but he did it to me! I had a sudden feeling of what does he know?! I am a very private person so I immediately decided that I didn’t like him, and I’m sure you could see it written all over my face. Now all of these thoughts had happened within a matter of seconds, and remembering why the whole table had suddenly noticed him I asked in a rude tone “why did you laugh?” He looked at me with a blank expression, or maybe it wasn’t a blank expression and I just couldn’t tell because his hair fell over his eyes blocking emotion cues. Anyway he said “I just think it’s funny how the people who don’t want the attention get the most attention.” He was right. I didn’t want any attention this year because it always created problems for me, but I needed to throw him off my tracks so I said “How do you know I don’t want the attention?” At this point I was staring him down trying to convey that he needed to back down from this conversation. But he looked back at me staring just as intensely, it was killing me. He finally said something “I guess I don’t know.” I had won, he let it go but it didn’t feel like it was over.
The next class I had was weight training. I had just changed into my workout clothes ready to hit some weights when the coach said “Kings you need a workout partner.” I had friends in this class but I didn’t like the idea of having a partner, I liked to workout by myself. So I told my coach, “ I work better by myself, I think.” He then replied with “ just try it I think it could benefit you, have someone push you to do more.” When my coach said this at first I was offended. Did he not think I pushed myself? Then I thought that maybe I do need to be pushed to do more so I told the coach with a grin on my face “fine” His face got brighter and he said “great! You can pick the music today if you want.” This made me happy because he always put on 80s music and it was getting a little old. So Mr.coach called someone over, a name I didn’t recognize. Of course the boy from earlier came and walked over with a smirk on his face, words can not explain how much i wanted to wipe that arrogant smirk off his face. When he walked up I said “No!” Coach was trying his hardest not to laugh and he said “Why? He would be a great workout partener.” I sighed, not really having a reason to hate him. I said “Fineeeee” I then asked if coach would put it on parkway drive he said yes. I walked away and started working out. The boy from my chemistry class walked up and said “You can’t just start without me.” I responded with “I just did” and continued to lift the weight. After lifting that type of weight I put it down ready to move on. “Pick it back up.” My now weight lifting partner says. I look at him like he’s crazy. He then smirks and repeats himself, I pick the weight up knowing that this is why I got partnered. I look over at him like “what now?” He says “ keep lifting until I say stop.” he said so calmly so I just kept lifting.I felt like I had to for some reason. I then said “you know your name means gift from God?” He then moved so he stood in front of me and simply said “yes.” He didn’t say anything after that. I think I annoyed him,I felt awkward so I just kept lifting. Eventually my arms and legs started shaking and I looked back at him silently pleading. He just stared at me. At this point I had started tearing up, he finally said “you can stop.” I dropped the weight down so fast and sat down on the ground wanting to cry for some reason. He kneels down next to me, puts his hand under my chin lifting my head up so we see eye to eye and says to me “you did good.” I look up at him and just feel myself break, I run out of the weight room and into the locker room and wait till the class is over. This moment should have been the sign for me to stay away from him, but of course I didn’t.
For the next few days I tried my best to ignore him, mostly out of embarrassment. I didn’t talk to him in chemistry, in weight training we lifted next to each other without speaking, he didn’t try to tell me to lift more weight and in English we didn’t sit next to each other. But I sadly couldn’t avoid him forever. In English I sat next to the outlet so anyone that needed to charge their computer would come and sit next to me. When I walked into class there he was sitting in the seat next to mine. You’re probably thinking well just move seats, I couldn’t they where assigned. So I put my headphones back in pretending he didn’t exist and started working on my paper about Macbeth. I only get away with pretending he doesn’t exist for a couple minutes, because he passes me a note. I know I shouldn’t read it but I’m a naturally curious person, so what do I do? I read it. It says “what are you listening to?” I feel myself smile because I love music and love talking and giving suggestions about music. I write back “something you wouldn’t like.” I wasn’t even listening to a particular music artist. I just know I have a weird taste in music. But he writes back saying he wants to listen and see for himself so i give him one of my earbuds and he starts moving his head from side to side vibing with the music. Looking back on that moment I’m sure he was faking and didn’t even like my music because his music taste was very basic and the opposite of mine, but I didn’t care at the time I was just happy he liked my music. He then passed me another note and it read “It’s cute that you have such different taste in music…I guess not just music lol” I read this and felt the opposite of cute. Did he think by letting him listen to my music that I liked him? I wasn’t trying to come onto him or anything. I wrote back this, “I have a boyfriend who thinks it’s cute too.” He read that, looked at me and smirked. He wrote back,and what he wrote back I’ll never forget. “I don’t care” Is what the note said, and he really didn’t care
It started with a friend of a friend and ended with me getting sexually assaulted. That boy thought he was a gift from god.
