Chapter 2
I felt incredibly guilty afterwards, and I spent the whole weekend dreading the next Monday.
As I reluctantly got out of bed to prepare myself for another humdrum day of school, I had a twinge of excitement in me. I didn't want to see him, but yet I did. He might be a nerd, but he made me smile. I smacked my head in a useless attempt to rid my brain of these thoughts. Falling for him was not an option.
Eventually, I met up with Mia in the parking lot, and we tried our best to dodge the upperclassmen. We safely made it across the lot, until I heard a familiar voice. I reckognized him to be Ethan, the toughest jock in the whole school. He had a kid who was wearing a plaid shirt and who was much smaller than him in a headlock. "Do you think you can get away with this?", he asked rhetorically tightening his grip on the poor boy's neck. Of course, he was surrounded by many of his jock friends who were chanting him on as if it was a wrestling match. I failed to notice who the boy was until Ethan let him go.
"Let's go, Soph, before Ethan notices us!", Mia shouted pulling me into the school.
"But it's Liam!", I shouted even louder.
"I thought you didn't care about him?", she questioned.
"I don't", I barely whispered.
"I'm s-sorry. I-I didn't mean t-to scratch your c-car.", Liam stammered looking down at the pavement. He glanced up, and I saw he had a bloody gash on his forehead. For a moment, he caught my eye, and just looked at me. It was as if he was begging me to help him without even saying a word.
"Whatever. Just stay out of my way!", Ethan warned him as he pushed Liam down and he and his gang headed inside. Liam was just left there like the remains of a prey after a predator had attacked. He just sat there on the ground looking so... helpless.
"I'll meet up with you later", I told Mia as I walked over to Liam. He kept his head down in shame. He didn't want to look up at me, so I sat down next to him.
"Why are you here?", he asked.
"You looked like you needed someone to help you", I responded.
"Now, why would you want to help me?"
"Because.... I shouldn't have been so mean to you."
He remained silent as I proceeded to get a tissue from my backpack, and cleaned up the blood on his face. I tried to attend to the cut, but his messy, curly locks of hair kept getting in the way.
"As good as new", I stated standing up and wiping the dirt off of my pants. I helped him up, and he winced in pain. His neck must be really sore.
He looked me in the eyes. "Will you please go out with me?", he begged. I hesitated, and he got the hint. "Can we at least be friends?", he asked.
"I can't promise you that, but will you stop asking me out?"
"I can't promise you that", he grinned. There was that adorable smile that made my heart melt.
"I will promise you that I won't be mean to you anymore." He nodded as if he thought this was progress.
I examined his plaid shirt. It was very similar to the one he wore Friday.
"Do you wear plaid shirts everyday?", I asked.
"There's nothing wrong with plaid!", he exclaimed adjusting his already neat and securely buttoned shirt.
"Okay, but you don't have to wear it buttoned all the way up", I advised as I unbuttoned the top two buttons. "There you go."
He grimaced at the exposure of his neck. "This feels weird."
"Look, in this school, you need to do your best to blend in", I pointed out.
"I don't know how to blend. It's like trying to fit a square into a circle. I don't want to be someone else; I wanna be me", he explained as we we made our way into the school.
"I wish I could do that", I said.
"Why do you have to be someone you're not?"
"I don't want anyone to make fun of me."
"Why would they make fun of you?"
"I don't know."
"You're so insecure."
"Well.. you see... I'm only fifteen, but the math class we are in is full of older kids. That's how I met Mia; she's actually a year older than me. I was always in more advanced math classes.", I explained.
"Really?"
"Please don't make fun--"
"Me too."
"Really?"
"Yah. I'm really good at math."
"Wow, we have one thing in common."
"Yah, we're both nerds."
"I'm not a nerd!"
"Whatever you say... nerd."
I laughed. "Just please don't tell anyone."
"Don't worry. Your secret is safe with me", he said as he walked off to his first class.
Liam was a dork, but he was sweet. I started to wonder if being with him would be that bad.
"Hey. Why were you talking to that geek?", Chase asked. Chase was my lab partner in Biology, so I talk to him a lot, but I wouldn't say we were friends. He was really cute, but he never would think of me as more than a lab partner.
"He's not a geek", I argued.
"Yah, he is. Wait.... you like the new kid!"
"No, I don't. He had a math question. That was it!"
"Geez. Sorry", he apologized walking away.
"What's wrong?", Mia asked as she came up to me.
"Just something Chase said. It made me upset", I explained.
"Was it mean?"
"No. It was true..."