We're Never Lovers

Chapter 1

"Will you shut the fuck up? You are giving me a migraine." That was the first thing Julia Skies said to me as she stood glaring at me from the door of Steven's garage. Hands on her hips, hair so blonde it was almost white swinging about in the wind and those startling, electric blue eyes piercing me.

I had never seen her before, never in my life and yet she was looking at me as if she despised me, that I had wronged her.

"Excuse me?" I say, she comes over to me and picks up my journal of songs I had wrote. Laughing, she looks at me and says, "Your songs are shit, stop writing about your girlfriend and write about something people want to hear about." Screwing her nose up, she wrinkled her faded freckles and dumped the notebook back on the table.
"What do you know?" I snap, getting really annoyed at her and she laughs, rolls her eyes and smirks. "No come on, Miss Music Genius. Show me what you know about music, sing the song your way." Looking at me, she sighs and picks the notebook up once more. Quickly reading through it, she says moments later, "Play the fucking song then." So I do and that's when I learnt Julia Skies can fucking sing.

And I learnt I cannot take other people's advice. I wrote more songs about my girlfriend, I even wrote a song about feeling on top of the school but I did not listen to Julia. I was stubborn, I resented her and avoided her whenever I saw her around town, around school. I did find out she had just moved here with her brother and father. I shared no classes with her except music, which she hardly attended and when she did, never spoke.

The next time I spoke to her was 2 weeks later, I was at Mikey's Diner on a date with my girlfriend, Lucie. We had just sat down at a booth near the kitchen when I heard yelling and there she was, Julia yelling at Mikey.
"You promised if I worked every night for 2 weeks, you would give me Saturday night. You promised." She shouted, he seemed calm and shrugged. Stopping to talk, he held his cigarette and smiled at Julia, "It's business honey, you can have next week." Before turning around, she went into his face and said something I couldn't hear, then she walked out like nothing had happened.
Not looking at me, she walked over to the table I sat at, took out a notepad, pen and blew her bubblegum.
"What can I get you?"
"I'll take the chicken salad please, what about you baby?" Lucie said to me but I was too busy staring at Julia, seeing if she would remember me. Looking up, she nodded at Lucie, then she caught my glaze and crinkled her eyes with her small smirk, "So it's you and the girlfriend you are so obsessed with writing with." Avoiding Lucie's confused looks, I replied to Julia, "So it's the girl who knows everything about music but works in low grade diner." I knew I had annoyed her because she broke eye contact, "Yet you seem to be here?" This annoyed me, I hid how poor my family was back then and I felt frustrated Julia being able to see through this act I was tricking everyone else with.
"Actually I'm here for the pizza it's the best, so we will be having a large, pepperoni pizza and a bowl of fries. Is that okay?" Lucie interrupts, "But baby, I am on a-"
"No my treat, for my girl and muse." Rolling her eyes again, Julia writes it down and says, "Anything else?"
"No thank you." Lucie smiles, Julia goes off and I turn to see Lucie glaring at me.
"Who is she?" She crosses her arms, I shrug, "I don't know." Raising an eyebrow at me, she looks at Julia, back at me and sighs.
Julia didn't come near us for the rest of the evening.

We didn't see each other until the 15th May, I arranged to meet my sister, Keira and Steven at the music room. Usually we go around 12:40 but today, we went at 12:00 when everyone was rushing to dinner. We wanted it to ourselves so we could run through a song I had wrote the previous night.

I got there first, I was walking down the hallway when I heard music coming from the room, a familiar, angelic voice. Looking through the window, I see her and she's grinning away. Heart of Glass by Blondie, that's the song she was singing. Watching her, she sang it with her way as she changed it around to make it more powerful.
"You didn't have to-"
"Shut up and listen." I hush Steven, he looks at me and then his face is full of awe. Finishing the song, we open the door and clap her, her turning around glaring at us.
"You're phenomenal." Steven beams, walking over to her and she glances at him before turning back to the scribbles beside her.
"Can I help you?" She snaps, making her annoyance crystal clear.
"Yeah, we were hoping to use the music room. If that's alright with you." Steven says, throwing her a grin. Turning around, she gets up and walks straight into me, her books dropping on my feet.
"Writing more shitty songs for your girlfriend?"
"Let me get those for you."
We say at the same time, her sarcastic and mine helpful. I look at her confused, she tilts her head at me awaiting an answer and I grab her books.
"How would you know if they're shitty when you never turn up in music?"
"Fuck you." She replies, snatching her books back and I roll my eyes at her starling stare.
"But I suppose that's your girlfriend's job?" She adds, a smirk playing on her lips and I feel myself go red. Clearly bored, she leaves the room and slams the door behind her, I watch her storm down the corridor and her ghostly blonde hair bounce behind her. Opening the door, Keira looks at me confused,
"What's up with you?"

Music was every Friday afternoon, and that very week's music lesson had a special guest. Walking down the corridor, I got there early and I figured I would be the first person there. No, I wasn't because there she was messing around with the piano and when I walked through the door, she raged over a wrong note.
Throwing some strong language into the room, she leans her head on the piano and I walk over to her.
"You can't throw a paddy every time you play a wrong note."
"You're not the boss of me." She moans back, looking up at me and screwing her nose up.
"Play it again." I tell her, she looks at me as if I'm crazy.
"You're not the boss of me."
"I don't even know your name, so yeah I know I'm not the boss of you." Staring at me, she sighs and begins playing again, her hands bouncing across the keys. Jailhouse Rock, that's what she was playing and I loved it, the way it echoed on the piano. It was beautiful, until her right hand slipped and she cursed.
"Hey, that was-"
"Shit I know." She stands up, grabbing her bag from the floor and collecting her papers.
"It wasn't shit, it was awesome."
"You're only saying that to be nice."
"You think I would lie to you to make you feel better?" I cross my arms, smirking and she rolls her eyes.
"The name is Marcus by the way." I hold out my hand, she looks at it in disgust and tilts her head at me.
"Everyone knows your name."
"Yet no one knows yours." I reply swiftly, she stares at me as if she was figuring me out. Finally, as the door opens and everyone floods in, she speaks.
"I'm Jul-" That's all I hear, before the classroom erupts in talking and I can't hear the rest. Then before I can ask her, she walks off and sits at the back of the room.

All that goddamn lesson, I spend thinking about all the possible names it could be. Juliana, Julie, Julian... I decide on one, the only one that I think it could be. Juliet, it suits her and I decide it's that. It has to be, it would then make sense why she never tells anyone. In fear of being mocked with having such a name. At the end of the lesson, I rush over to her as Steven turns to speak with me. Tapping her on her shoulder, she turns around and I grin at her.
"Juliet." She looks at me confused, her freckles wrinkling as she screws up her nose.
"Huh?"
"Juliet, that's your name isn't it?" She looks at me confused until her face changes and she's wheezing with laughter. Her laugh, god it was so high pitched like a squeak. It made me want to laugh with her, it was contagious.
"You think my name is Juliet?"
"Well I only heard you say Jul so yeah, I figured it would be Juliet." She laughs harder as I say this, grabbing her stomach and barely being able to breathe.
"What is your name then?" I ask and she stops, a small smile still on her face.
"Julia, Julia Renfield." I match her smile with a cocky grin, "I prefer Juliet."
"Well my name is Julia."
"Not to me it isn't, I'm calling you Juliet." I say, she raises an eyebrow at me and rolls her eyes.
"Why?"
"Cause it will annoy you and I know you hate it." I laugh, she rolls her eyes and I see a sparkle in them.
"Whatever, Brightwell." Heading out the classroom, I follow her out and before she goes, I shout to her.
"Fair well Juliet, safe travels!" Turning around as she walks backwards, she throws me a rude gesture and I laugh loudly at it, grinning at her hatred.

I couldn't stop thinking about those few moments all weekend, the way she was so cocky towards me and so sure that she despised me. You could see it, the way she glared at me and for some reason, I loved it. I loved hating her.

The following weeks, I went out of my way to find her though I could never find her in school. It was like tracking a ghost, I could not find her anywhere. Until one evening I was walking to Steven's, Keira by my side chatting about a new song we could try covering. I was half-listening, spending time looking at all the houses on this street. I had always found this street so unusual as Steven's house lived on the corner and started the line of rich houses. However across from him, there was rows of your average British council-provided houses. Passing the final council house, a voice catches my attention as I hear someone yelling. As they finish, someone storms out of the pealing, black door and they storm past me.
Blonde hair blowing everywhere, I catch a glance of the corner of her face, it's bruised. Shocked, I'm unsure what to do and I freeze.
"You seen that too?" Keira whispered to me, I nod and watch as she crosses the road.
The same time Steven walks out of his house...