Bringing Smiles Back

Chapter Two: The Not So Sweet Home

   I wish I could say that the day flew by, but it didn't. The hours seemed to drone on with the teachers saying the same thing over and over again. By the time I get to lunch, I was pretty much ready to pass out. I walked through the lunch line, watching as the lunch ladies eye me cautiously as they slop what looks like dog food onto my tray. I thank them as if it actually looked edible, and pay for my so-called meal. At my old school, I was pretty much a social reject. Didn't really have any friends and was considered a nerd with my social anxiety and straight A's. So sitting at an empty table isn't really anything new to me. I sit down, push the disgusting substance they called lunch away from me, and pull out my one of my pride and joys. My notebook. I untie the dark blue ribbon that wraps around the soft-covered notebook and pull out my favorite pen. If you were to read this blue book you would probably know more about me than any other person. For this isn't just my songbook, but it's where my every problem, pain, and any other emotion I have is poured out. I write poems, I draw, I write songs, anything to release all that's inside of me. In fact, if you were to read my notebook, you would probably send me to a councilor or put me on suicide watch. Because I have been spilling out my terrible thoughts, guilt, and depression onto these pages since the day my parents started fighting. Which was a long time ago. But just as I'm about to put my pen to a page, I feel the table move and look up to see a very familiar face. "What you working on?" Garret asks me as if he was truly interested. You see, I came to the conclusion between this morning and now that whatever reason a boy like him has for talking to a girl like me, it can't be good. Maybe it was a dare from his friends. Go and spend a day with the weird new quiet girl and see if you can get any funny information about her. Well, I'm not taking the bait. Snapping my book shut I become occupied with my milk carton, hoping maybe he'll just leave if I pretend he's not there. No such luck. "How come you're sitting over here all by yourself?" he prods trying to keep the dying conversation alive. I finally look up at him with an accusing glaze. "Why are you sitting over here by me?" I ask, expecting him to admit to taking a dare and walk away. But instead he laughs and puts his hands on his chest as if I've just stabbed him. "Wooh! Somebody bring a fire extinguisher over here, this girl is spitting fire at me!" he exclaims loudly. I ignore his dramatized actions and continue. "I mean seriously, don't you have any other friends waiting for you?" I know I probably sound rude, but by the way he looks, he could definitely be considered one of them. "Well, who exactly would you assume to be my 'friends'?" he asks curiously. I say nothing but he follows my accidental glance towards what obviously looked to be the jock-prep table. They are all being obnoxiously loud and quite a few of them have girls hanging all over them with short cheerleading skirts on. Obnoxious. I look back to see him observing their testosterone-filled table, before he returns his gaze back to me. And despite my resolve to stay away from him earlier, his piercing green eyes provoke another steady flood of heat to run up to my cheekbones. "I'm different than them." he says seriously. His words take me by surprise and I question them curiously. "What do you mean different? Different how?" He stares at me some more for a moment before wordlessly lifting up a cross necklace that I had not seemed to noticed hanging around his neck before. "I believe in more than parties, drinking, and hooking up with cheerleaders." he says solemnly. I'm left once again speechless as his serious expression slowly fades back into the dazzling smile that has consumed face almost every other  time I've seen him today. "Don't judge a book by it's cover." he says grinning at me from across the table. That simple saying seemed to be one of the truest things I've heard in a while. "Sorry." I say honestly feeling quite a bit of guilt for immediately categorizing him with those self-centered know-it-alls just because of his handsome face. "It's all good." he says forgetting it just like that. "So, what were you working on there?" he asks gesturing to my notebook with a nod of his head. I instinctively pull the notebook close to my chest as the loud high-pitched bell echoes throughout the cafeteria. I quickly grab my untouched tray of "food" and nod a goodbye to him before running off to my next class. Saved by the bell.