Smile On His Lips and Cuts On His Hips (Jalex)

Twenty Five - Follow Your Bliss

I’d concluded that I simply needed to enjoy existing above all else, and the best way to do this, it seemed, was to, as Joseph Campbell once said and my English teacher scrawled on one of my assignments, “Follow your bliss.”

This quote had been scribbled over the bottom of a vignette I wrote detailing a fight my parents had about the value of school (for different reasons, my dad adamantly opposed college while my mom supported it) and my subsequent realization that it was only important to do what made me happy after a she gave it a quick praise. Annoyingly, Campbell summed it up much better than I did.

So that was my disappointing plan: adhere to the monotonous path of normal people, go somewhere I somewhat liked, and not let myself get pushed into a bright white cubicle job that made my eyes bleed at computer screens.

And, at that moment, I was perfectly applying to this tactic, running idly in triangles on a dying field for no apparent reason. Boring.

Almost immediately after we got over the repeated, laughable mispronunciation of my name, we rounded another corner, passing by the chain link of a baseball backstop and continuing across an additional quarter of the field. I was, deplorably, already starting to feel the strain in my legs, nonexistent muscles not benefited by their restraints. I’d forgotten my gym clothes and was jogging in my old favorite pair of skinny jeans, flatteringly tight and ripped right through the knee.

Groaning as we lapsed into shouting silence, I glanced out over the expanse of mixed green and white, wondering if Kellin was skipping with those sketchy Mexican friends of his or actually missing class because of some legitimate excuse. He hadn’t appeared for roll call.

The members of our PE class had hardly changed, even with the abundant schedule changes and reorganizations that were required by the start of a new semester. A couple new kids switched in, the most noticeable being blue haired, friendless, squeaky Josh Ramsay. His reused gym clothes displayed the name of his brother and he seemed completely clueless, apparently unaware of the fact that the people he borderline stalked and blabbered at blatantly rolled their eyes at his existence when his jittery look was averted.

It's quite sad, when someone carelessly laughs right along because they don't realize that they are the joke. 

Apparently, my mind got too consumed by the whereabouts of the last member of our P.E. group and strangeness of the period's latest addition, as I failed to realize that we were passing yet another backstop until I had to quickly correct my steps to turn the corner, distracted eyes not seeing the bar extending behind the metal barrier until I tripped over it.

I swore, spitting out a ‘Fuck!’ as I tumbled onto the gravely dirt, brown smearing the black denim of my legs and hands automatically jumping out to protect myself, tingling with the sting of slamming into pebbles. Josh turned around, jogging backwards slowly as I muttered grumpily on the ground. I guessed that Alex waved him away, since the boy traveled on with a slightly concerned frown, looking over his shoulder as he went.

Sitting up, I leaned over, assessing the damage to my pale skin and glaring at the only other bare spot of flesh that had hit the ground: my knee. If those fucking pants hadn't ripped, the skin stretched taught over that joint would have been perfectly unharmed, but, nope, the unprotected flesh was scraped and marred, blemished dirty red-brown.

Maybe it was my fault, as I had tugged the denim of my jeans too tight across my bones. No, whatever; they should be able to withstand the stress of fitting tightly.

“Shit, are you ok?” Alex asked, quickly kneeling next to me, honey irises flecked through with worried gold.

I nodded, holding out a still staticy hand as he straightened up again, pulling me to my feet. Rubbing my smudged hands on my thighs, wiping off the dirt, I looked down, deciding that I should probably clean the scratch to make sure it didn’t get infected and miraculously kill me or something improbable like that. On second thought, that may not be too horrible – there were surely many more pleasant ways to cease living than a painful death by slowly spreading skinned knee infection, though.

“Yeah, it’s fine. I’ve had worse,” I replied, giving him a sick smile, knowing that only Alex would understand the disturbed subtext behind that statement. Sure, I’d also been yanked over in a dog park in elementary school and cut up my knee so terribly that it still hadn’t quite returned to normal, but that wasn’t to what I was referring. And if Alex’s skeptical gaze flickering down to my hip was any indication, he knew exactly what my statement really revealed.

The boy gave me a strange look for a moment before shrugging minutely, continuing to attempt to loop around the field, this time in an unashamed walk since my legs were a shaky from the annoying fall. A couple steps in crackling quiet passed before fingers were brushing against my abused ones; spindly bones tangling together as I flicked my hair out of my eyes to give Alex a genuine grin. He smiled back, and I wondered if unintentionally hurting myself also had more positive consequences than foul repercussions.

I didn’t get it. I didn’t understand why Alex liked me and my profoundly unnerving sense of humor and laughed of the sarcastic remarks that I frequently spit out and weren’t even intended to be funny.

I failed to accurately comprehend why he explained what had happened to our teacher with pleading wide eyes, getting us a pass to the bathroom where he wet down soapy paper towels for me and held my patterned hand as I winced at the sting of the chemicals on my torn flesh.

I couldn’t figure out why the brunette bothered trying to help me and protect me from my pathetic self.

I didn’t realize what drove Alex to press me gently against the cool tile of the wall and sweep a kiss against my lips, tugging me back out the door a second later with a bright grin and goofy gate that balanced out my lagging one.

Contemplating whether Alex had the same thoughts with our names reversed, I decided that there were some things that I would never manage to understand, and, maybe, that was ok. After all, what’s the point of magic if you know the technicalities behind the tricks?              

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"Follow your bliss" I'm some advice that I'm trying really hard to take. I'm not really sure what happened with this chapter, though, it's not what I meant it to be about. Admittedly, I don't know what I originally intended to happen in it, but it definitely wasn't this. Could be worse, I suppose. Please comment and vote!

xoxo

Rose