My (Not So) Charmed Life

You've Got a Little Drool....

I speed walked to school, annoyed that my abilities to teleport had not yet manifested. Imagine how much more time I would get to sleep if I didn't have to spend ten pesky minutes walking to school every day?

Running up the steps to the school, I hurried through the throngs of people still making their way to class and slid into my seat in first period trig with seconds to spare. The bell rang, an annoying chime that made me want to rip the thing off of the wall and banish it into nonexistence.

My friend Shira sat across the room from me, shaking her head at me for once again making it to school with no time to catch up with her. My friends knew all of my horrible sleeping habits, but if Shira knew that the only reason that I was able to make it to school on time was by using my powers, she would probably freak. I loved my friends, but some secrets weren't mine to share, so the only people that knew that I was a witch were my parents.

My eyes glazed over as I took notes, wishing that I could freeze the class for a minute while I summoned myself a grande iced coffee. By the time lunch rolled around, my stomach was rumbling again and I was super glad that the cafeteria at my school had good food. I'd heard horror stories from other schools whose cafeteria food was awful, and I smiled to myself as I grabbed a slice of pizza and one of those awesome big chocolate chip cookies and a soda. Lunch of champions.

I settled in at my usual table, surprised that I was the first one there for once. My hunger had clearly fueled my hurry, and I was already halfway done with my pizza when Shira and Max sat down. Aside from first period trig, I shared no classes with either of them, mostly because they were quick to sign up for any AP or honors classes and me, I was cool with scraping by in most of my classes. I waited until they were done talking about some upcoming People, Power and Politics project that had them stumped, and then Max looked over at me, as though he had just realized that I was sitting there.

"Hey, Liza."

I was used to being ignored by Max. We'd known each other for years and lived in the same neighborhood, and he had a wicked crush on Shira. When she spoke, he was usually so engrossed in whatever she was saying that he completely lost sight of his surroundings. Being that Shira was oblivious to his crush, poor Max was pretty far deep in the friend zone, an area that I would have been queen of if there was any type of ranking put in place.

I had the unfortunate tendency to crush on a guy and suffer from afar until I couldn't take it anymore and blurted my crush out, only to be rejected, albeit mostly in as nice a way as the guy could manage. I wasn't the hot girl that every guy drooled after.

I was the girl who was everyone's best friend. No matter how cute I dressed or how many times I batted my eyelashes, I was always the girl who guys came to talk to about their girl problems, namely, girls who weren't me. And let me tell you, it was pretty rough having to listen to the guy you like talk about how much he likes someone else. And while I was everyone's buddy, Shira was the other kind of girl, the girl that everyone noticed and crushed on and lusted after.

Max was definitely not the first, nor would he be the last guy who was smitten by Shira. There were more guys than I could count that had flirted with me and gotten my hopes up, only for me to find out that they had only started talking to me in hopes of getting close to Shira. And I hated it, but I had dug myself far too deep into the friend zone hole to crawl out of it at this point. My biggest goal was to find a boyfriend before my hair started to go gray, something that my mom informed me had happened to her at age nineteen, so I didn't really have a lot of time left.

Across the room, Bradley Thomas rose from his chair at the popular table to get back on the lunch line for something. I couldn't tear my eyes away from his body moving, his butt flexing with each step, and Max had to wave his arms in front of my face to alert me to the fact that the bell had rung. Bradley was already back at his table by now, finishing off the last bite of an ice cream sandwich.

"Liza, I think you've got a little drool on your face," said Max, and I surreptitiously rubbed my sleeve against my face while Shira and Max dissolved into a fit of laughter.

"Yeah, yeah, yuk it up." I played it off, but my traitorous cheeks felt hot and I knew that I was as red as a fire truck. Even though we weren't in the same classes, all of the junior classrooms were in the same wing of the school, so we all headed to fifth period together.

I wanted to be like that lady from Bewitched, who could just wrinkle her nose and magically have her way. But no, I had to save my powers for other useless things, like laundry and dishes and making my bed. I loved my powers, but I hated hiding them. I could be the coolest girl in school if only I could be my witchy self.

I plopped down dejectedly in my seat, having once again allowed myself to waste precious break time literally drooling over a guy that was incredibly far out of my league. Bradley was the football team quarterback, dated the most popular girl in school, Lacey Lawley, and was student body president. And he didn't even know that I existed.