Yet Another Story Of Love

The Piña Colada Song

Hi there. My name is Jenny Watts, and this is...uh, my story.
I'm 17 years old, from San Francisco, and until recently, I thought my life would be fine. Smooth-sailing. I'd get a diploma, a job, then a boyfriend, and maybe a family, and finally probably a nice wooden coffin. It was all planned out. Well, sort of.
Then something happened.
Something changed.
My family moved, and overnight, my whole life was turned upside down when I was transferred to Jaxon High. And then-
"Cough."
And then I met this-
"Cough."
I met this-
"COUGH."
I stopped speaking, and took a deep breath, staring hard at the kid at the back row.
"Is she narrating a story or something?" He snickered and fell into another completely legit coughing fit.
"Alex, how many times have I told you not to interrupt someone when they are speaking?" Mr Richards sighed, sitting up in his chair.
I stood awkwardly at the front of the room, trying to not look into the eyes of the whole classroom. Panels of bright orange sun shone through the window frames, and into my face. This sucked, like everything else in my life right now. I didn't say anything. I didn't want to, even less so than I did when I first walked into this school. I wanted to go home, munch on some chips. With my phone. On Youtube. In the shower. Forever.
Mr Richards leaned forward on his desk, combing his fingers through his greying hair.
"So sorry Ms Watts. Please tell us more about yourself." 
My brain went into overdrive, attempting to conjure up a way to get out of this situation. Like Sherlock would, if you've ever read or watched an episode of that. Like Benedict Cumberbatch.
Mimicking Mr Richards, I straightened my dirty blonde hair out. Shit. I realised I mimicked the teacher. Would he be mad? If would be bad if he got mad. Already. During the first class of my first day in Jaxon High. Bad, mad. Huh, that line rhymed.
"Coughhh....wheeze."
I stared Alex down with a resilient glare. A deep growl rumbled in my throat. My hands rolled up into fists.
Everyone 'oohed' and 'aahed' like a bunch of kindergardeners. Alex raised an eyebrow and his upper lip. Mr Richards just rolled his eyes, like he was watching a crappy sit-com play out.
"Well Jenny, if you have nothing else to say, you can sit down...um..." The aged man -maybe in his late thirties- swept his hand across the class, "...there."
His index finger fell upon a lonely desk at the far right of the room, next to the window.
Groaning under my breath, I walked down the aisle, averting stares.
Needless to say, this wasn't going well. I had prepared a whole monologue for today. Technically, my Mom had, while I lay on my bed in perpetual agony at the thought of leaving my hometown and coming here. The very thought of thinking of that made me wanna explode. Like seriously. Hopefully the explosion will dislodge one of my ribs and send it into one of Alex's eyes.
Splat. Yell. Blood everywhere. Holy crap I'm weird.
Loud claps rang around the room. Mr Richards had miraculously overcome his tubbiness and somehow appeared at the front of the class, where I was just moments ago. Spectacular.
"Right people! We have exactly 45 seconds until the lunch bell rings. I want you all here tomorrow, in this very same place, where we'll discuss literature!"
An audible groan that no one bothered to hide hung in the air.
"Literature!" Hollered Mr Richards, "Read up on Romeo and Juliet!"
Jesus, that was cliché.
The scraping and heaving of chairs moving back and the clatter of bags being taken swallowed whatever the teacher had to say next. What was it he had said again? 45 seconds until the lunch bell rang? Yep. 45 seconds.
Time slowed, like that Quicksilver scene from X-Men.
Alex stood up, knocking over his pencil case, sending stationary raining down. Mr Richards tripped slightly on a desk leg.
Bending over, Alex's back revealed somebody.
Somebody.
Our eyes met.
A guy sat at the other end of the room, almost diagonally from my desk, his head resting in his hand. 
He had golden hair, messy but kind of neat.
A nice chiseled chin, sharp but tough.
His skin glowed and his eyes. Oh God, his eyes. Sky blue orbs that glittered like dancing stars, kind and beautiful like a summer's day sky, but fierce and cool like the waves of the Pacific.
A plain grey shirt clung to his body, and I was jealous. Damn, what I'd do to be that shirt.
I'd kill Alex, for one.
The guy looked at me for a split second, his stare snatching my breath from my lungs. And all too soon, he gave it back with a warm smile.
I wanted to say hi. I wanted to walk up to him. Maybe I'd smile back. Maybe I'd hug him. I wanted so desperately to kiss him. Feel his soft lips. His cool saliva. 
Emotions were bubbling up inside of me, filling my head, my body, with the warm wonderful sensation of love. It was swimming inside of me, doing tricks and flips in my gut. 
I was in love, and it was insane.
Then the bell rang. 
------- (After school)
Walking back from Jaxon High. The evening sun at my back, and the gently descending darkness at my chest. I loved this time. It was quiet, but not deserted. If it was one thing I could enjoy other than that guy, it was walking back from Jaxon High.
Looking up to the purple sky, I gazed at the clouds. One of them looked like a baby. The other looked like a giant hand flipping the bird. Hm. Was that a sign? Maybe the Greek Gods were mad with me. Maybe that guy was a demi-god. Wait no, that was Percy Jackson I was thinking of.
I strode down the sidewalk, my destination a 7-11 down the road. I raised my left leg, and then gently let it down. My right leg swung around and hit the ground. Dancing. I thought of a song in my head. Despacito? The Pinã-Colada song? My mind settled on a hybrid.
Mhmm...do you like pinã-colada....getting caught in the rain...coming over in my direction..
A car passed, but the drone of the engine barely registered to my ears. I was in a world of my own, like I usually was. A world where all I heard was that cricket in the bushes. That cat on the other side of the road. The soft 'ding-dong' of the convenience store as I entered. Glaring blue fluorescent lights. Gah. 
Walking down aisles of cheap snacks and pointless souvenirs, I grabbed a coke from the fridge and swung around to the cashier, music still in my head.
I put the bottle on the table, the attendant scanned it and I passed him a fiver. 
"Do you want a plastic bag?" He muttered.
"Despacito. Quiero respirar tu cuello despacito."
"Lady, what?" 
Snapping back into reality, and taking the needle off the music in my head, I apologised and shook my head. 
He frowned. "Holy crap, you're weird." 
I looked up to glare in his eyes. But a cascade of dyed green hair was draped down his face, leaving only a pierced nose and grouchy mouth to be glared at.
"Yes, thank you....um..." 
"Henry." His finger lazily struck the badge on the breast of his uniform. 
"Henry. Could I get my Coke now, Henry?" 
"Sure, whatever man." He rolled it across the counter. "Could I interest you in a souvenir?" His finger then moved to a rack of wooden tags with various names on them in comic sans not far away.
"Haha. No." 
The automatic doors roved open to let the outside world overwhelm Jenny Watts again.
Ding-dong.
Those wooden tags were stupid.
I looked up into the sky again, but this time cold infested my chest. I tried to sing again, but for some reason, I'd caught emo disease from Henry The Angsty Man. 
Loneliness. 
For those who don't know, loneliness sucks. Big time. So does not-belonging. But they're basically synonyms anyways. As a teenager, it is my duty and responsibility to feel lonely. That's just what we teenagers do. We need care, we crave love, and we just want to belong somewhere. With a group of friends, in the family photo, in someone else's heart. 
I wasn't popular before in San Francisco, but I belonged. The store owner gave me extra treats every day after school. Principal Skunner did let me off those few times I left school boundaries on the excuse of 'extreme I-can't-take-this-anymore-itis.' 
It felt like Jenny Watts was a important, like she mattered there. Here? Jenny Watts was a passing name that faded into the sky like a cloud torn apart by the rushing wind.
I could be happy, and forget for a minute. But every once and a while, I'd glance at the sky, and it'd glance back, and I'd feel small. So infinitely small. And alone.
I took a gulp of my Coke and walked some more down the cobbled path, letting darkness eat me up.