May 30th, 2008
When I finally got home from school, I couldn’t help but feel relieved. I had finished freshman year and now I was going to be a sophomore. As exciting as that thought was, it still didn’t make me feel any better about what had happened over a month ago.
Now fifteen, I hadn’t talked to Dallas since the day after the prom. I didn’t even speak to him on my birthday, though he did try to talk to me. But just like the first time, I had my friends to protect me from him.
So I plopped down on the couch, ready for the summer that was ahead of me. I was glad that Dallas was going to be going off to college soon, and I wasn’t going to have to deal with him any longer.
“Jordan…” my father suddenly said only a few hours after I had gotten home, but he didn’t need to finish what he was saying. I already knew what it was about.
“I’m not going,” I said, crossing my arms over my chest and not even looking up at my family as they stood before me. “You can’t make me.”
“Stop being so bullheaded, Jordan,” my mother sighed, sitting down next to me on the couch as I continued to stare right at the television screen. “You probably won’t even see Dallas.”
“Then what’s the point of even going?” I snapped, scooting away from her when she reached to sooth my hair. “It’s his graduation. His and his lovely girlfriend Trinity’s graduation. Even if I won’t see him up close, I still have to see him on stage and hear his name be called. It may have been over a month since the prom, but you can’t expect me to just run up to him and jump in his arms after everything that happened.”
My mother sighed, and my father said nothing. Austin was just staring at me, looking like he understood what I was going through. He hadn’t talked to Dallas since what had happened the month before, and I was glad that he didn’t. My parents still talked to Dallas’s parents all the time, as if nothing had happened at all. It annoyed me a lot, but that didn’t change my parents’ minds at all.
“Jordan, Dallas’s parents really want to see you,” my father now informed me, crossing his arms over his chest as he continued to stand next to Austin. “You don’t have to see Dallas, but it would be nice of you if you went to his parents.”
“You want me to be nice to the parents of the boy that shredded my heart completely?” I snapped, not believing that my parents were actually trying to get me to do this. “Whose side are you even on?”
“We’re not on anyone’s side, Jordan,” my mother tried quietly, reaching for me again, but this time I jumped up from my spot on the couch to avoid her touch.
“No! You are choosing sides! And you chose Dallas’s side!” I shouted, shaking my head at my parents in disbelief. “I can’t believe this! I’m your daughter, not him! Do you seriously think that what he did wasn’t bad?”
“We think what he did was horrible, Jordan, but you can’t hate him forever,” my mother said sternly now, standing up from the couch as well.
“Yes I can!” I spat, stomping my foot against the carpeted flooring of my living room. “Just watch me!”
“Jordan Elaine Emery,” my mother spat, her voice dangerously low. “We all agree that what Dallas did wasn’t acceptable. It was rude and upsetting, but he’d obviously sorry for it. He already came over to apologize to you, but you just wouldn’t listen. I think it’s about time you forgive and forget.”
I crossed my arms across my chest defiantly. “I can’t forgive him for what he’s done. And I won’t ever be able to forgive him.”
“Jordan, if you don’t go, you’re grounded,” my mother threatened now. I could tell that she was very stressed out, which she always was whenever we were late or something wasn’t going her way…
I bit the inside of my lip, surprised by what she had said. I hadn’t ever been grounded before; not ever in my life. I didn’t even know what it was like to be grounded. And I really didn’t want to find out anytime soon.
“Fine!” I shouted, sick and tired of fighting with them now. “I’ll go, okay? But don’t expect me to be all happy about being near him. Because I’m not about to forgive or forget anything that he did to me!”
I headed toward the front door, right by my mother. She grabbed onto my shoulder before I could get outside. “Can’t you change into something more… pretty?”
“No,” I deadpanned, obviously not amused. “I’m going, aren’t I?”
My mother took this into consideration and didn’t fight with me about it any longer. She sighed, placing her hand more lightly on my shoulder and leading me out of the house before I could change my mind, which I was seriously considering doing.
I didn’t care if my family was wearing nice, elegant clothing that people were supposed to wear at graduations while I wore a grungy old T-shirt and jeans. It didn’t matter to me what I looked like in front of Dallas anymore…
“Don’t worry, Jord,” Austin sighed as we piled into the back of the car, his arm wrapping around my shoulder before squeezing me tightly. “You won’t even have to see him or Trinity. Everything will be fine.”
But I didn’t agree with him. This was going to be the first time I was going to be near Dallas since the prom, and I wasn’t looking forward to it. My parents might have thought that it was time to forgive and forget, but I didn’t think that that time would ever come.
When we got to the school, it made me really happy that my parents had enough money to send me to a school as great as Adeline. It might have been an all-girls school, but it got me away from both Jesse and Dallas, which was really what I needed most of the time. If I had to go to the same school as them, I probably would have dropped out.
I wasn’t allowed to sit down right away; I had to stand there and say hello to Dallas’s parents to be polite. But they were really one of the last people I wanted to see. Dallas’s father looked just like him, only older, and his mother was a pretty blonde like Trinity. From far away or behind, you would have thought that they were Dallas and Trinity from the future…
“Jordan!” Dallas’s mother smiled, squeezing my shoulders tightly as she hugged me. “It’s so great to see you! We haven’t seen you at all in ages! How come you and Austin never come over anymore?”
Did they seriously not even know what Dallas had done only a month before? Did he not share anything with his parents or did he not want them to know how much of a screw-up he was? I was growing angrier and angrier as every second passed, but Austin seemed to be the only one who noticed it.
“Joy,” Dallas’s father said, referring to his wife. “You remember what happened.”
The look on Dallas’s mother’s face told me that she in fact did remember what had happened, and I almost scowled at her. How could someone forget something like that?
“I’m sorry, Jordan,” Dallas’s mother now apologized, placing a hand over her heart as she frowned at me. “I shouldn’t have reminded you of something so horrible like that. I assure you, Dallas is very sorry for what he did to you.”
That didn’t mean I was going to forgive him. I had forgiven Dallas for a lot of stupid things that he had done in the past, but now it was different. He hadn’t ever done anything this horrible to me before. He had cut my hair, ripped up my clothes, and even physically hurt me before when we were children, but this was different.
I was finally allowed to sit down now, and I sat between Austin and some stranger that I didn’t know. I didn’t feel like sitting next to my parents or Dallas parents, because it would have just been too awkward for me. They would have just talked to me about Dallas the whole time, and I definitely didn't want that.
“We’ll be doing things a little bit differently this year, just to shake everything up, aha,” was the first thing the principal chuckled into the microphone, and I almost groaned. Something was telling me I wasn’t going to like it. “This year, we’re going to be reading the names off backwards, starting from Z to A.”
I almost laughed, because that meant that Dallas was going to have to wait for a hell of a long time, but then that reminded me that I was just going to have to sit there and wait until he was called. I was going to have to sit through this entire graduation ceremony, and I had no idea how long it was going to take.
“They better not do this next year,” Austin murmured to me, almost causing me to laugh. “I’d kill someone if I had to wait for my name to get called longer than I had to.”
“Obviously someone with a name farther down on the list was complaining,” I drawled, my arms crossed over my chest as I slumped down on my chair. My mother looked at me disapprovingly, but I said nothing to her. She might have said I had to go, but she never said that I had to sit the right way.
“Brendan Zucchini,” was the first name that the principal had called into the microphone, and I just had to laugh at that. I hadn’t ever heard of someone with a last name like that, but it was actually kind of cool when I thought about it. The principal now said, “Taylor Zarro.”
And it went on. It was as boring as I thought it would be, and I dreaded as we got closer and closer to the beginning of the alphabet. I didn’t know if Dallas knew that I was there, but if he did, I sure hoped he knew I wasn’t about to cheer for him.
No one in the senior class really caught my attention until the principal called out, “Erica San—put your phone away, young lady!”
I laughed at this, along with my brother and a few other people in the audience. I looked up to see who he had been talking to, and I saw a very bored looking girl with tan skin make her way onto the stage, popping her gum as she did so. Though she was kind of far away, I could tell that this girl was beautiful, and I could even tell through her graduation gown that she was curvy and had long legs. I immediately felt intimidated and jealous as I sat there like a pig in a T-shirt and jeans.
“That girl will definitely be missed,” Austin sighed, crossing his arms over his chest and also leaning back into his seat. “Not like it’ll be that much of a difference anyway. She’s been dating the same guy for almost three years.”
I was about to ask who this girlfriend of his was, but I was cut off when the principal said another name. “Trinity Robertson.”
At the sound of this name, I felt my stomach lurch. I didn’t even look up at her, because I was sure she was going to look as pretty as ever. I didn’t want to look at the girl who Dallas had left me for. I didn’t want to look at the girl who had won his heart. I didn’t want to look at the girl that he was probably going to marry.
Austin said nothing, obviously understanding the way I was feeling. This just made me want this whole graduation thing to be over even sooner, and I hated that I had to wait through a whole bunch of other names for the one I was truly dreading.
I looked around the crowd as I waited, utterly bored since I really didn’t know anyone else that was graduating. I was just happy that once this was all over, Dallas was going to be gone. In only a few weeks, he was going off to college somewhere and I probably never had to see him again. I survived my first broken heart, but now I was just going to have to live through it.
“Dallas Berg.”
I heard the name called, but I didn’t cheer or clap like everyone around me. Dallas was one of the most popular guys in school, so everyone in the crowd clapped and cheered for the longest time while I felt sick to my stomach.
Just as the cheering died down, I could have sworn I heard someone shout out, “Boo!”
And whoever that person was, I already loved them so much.
J~J~J~J~J~J~J~J~J~J~J~J~J~J~J~J~J~J~J~J~J~J~J~J~J~J~J~J~J~J~J~J~J~J~J~J~J~J~J~J~J~J
Jesse’s P.O.V.
The last place I wanted to go was the graduation at my sister’s school, because I knew that Dallas and his slutty girlfriend Trinity were going to be graduating. And as great as it was to see them go, I didn’t really feel like having to watch them walk across the stage.
But Camilla and my mother dragged me along anyway, just so we could watch some of Camilla’s friends graduate. I thought that it was just a huge waste of time, but the females that I lived with sure thought differently.
It made me wish that my dad was still around. He probably would have agreed with me, and my mother and Camilla would have let me stay home. But no, my dad was still around and I was stuck watching people I barely even knew graduate. Besides Erica…
The last person I was expecting to see in the crowd was Jordan, who was looking very unhappy. I would have thought that she’d stay home, since it was Dallas’s graduation and everything. I hadn’t been playing any major pranks on her for the past month after what had happened, and I knew I was going to have to start up again if I wanted to stay in her life.
The last time I had really had any big interaction with her was the day that that redheaded chick kissed me, Aimee or whatever. It wasn’t bad or anything, but I just wasn’t expecting it and I wasn’t being kissed by the person I wanted to be. There was no denying that Aimee was hot, but she was no Jordan. It was the same way with Erica… They were both great looking girls, but they just weren’t Jordan.
While her family was wearing nice clothing, she was in a plain t-shirt and jeans. She looked as cute as ever, even when her face showed that she’d much rather be somewhere else. I was pretty used to that look… mixed with a scowl.
I watched her cringe as two adults that weren’t her parents hugged her, and I assumed that they were Dallas’s parents from the way she was acting, and because the older man was almost a mirror image of the boy that had broken her heart only a month before…
She looked like she didn’t want to be here, and I didn’t blame her one bit. I was surprised that she had even come at all, so I was sure that her family had probably forced her to come along.
“Come on, Jesse, we’re sitting over here,” Camilla told me, grabbing onto my arm and tugging me away from Jordan and her family. I made a face, wanting to see more of Jordan, but I knew that I couldn’t complain. I had the entire summer to think of things to do to her and her friends. Anything that would get her back to her old self and not the depressing person Dallas had made her be.
I didn’t pay attention when Erica got called up, and I only scowled when Dallas’s whorish girlfriend got called as well. They weren’t important. Dallas wasn’t even important. I really had no idea why I was even here.
I heard Camilla cheer next to me, and I then remembered. I had to watch some of her stupid friends graduate even though I couldn’t stand most of them. They were either completely bitches to me or would hit on me, even though I had been a freshman and they had been seniors. At least none of them had been as clingy as Erica… I probably would have died from suffocation.
“Dallas Berg.”
At the sound of this name, my ears perked up and I started paying attention once again. The crowd roared louder than they had before, and it made me scowl. This guy thought he was so cool just because everyone seemed to love him so much… If only he knew how much I wanted to (and could) kill him right then.
I waited until the cheering died down before I shouted out, “Boo!”
“Jesse,” Camilla snapped, hitting me in the stomach as hard as she could have. I feigned pain, but in all reality it really didn’t hurt at all. “Don’t be mean to Dallas! You don’t even know him. He’s amazing.”
I scowled at her, saying nothing. If only she knew that this guy was way more of a creep than he was amazing. She probably wouldn’t have even believed me if I told her. She’d probably believe this guy’s stupid façade over her own brother.
I looked over to my left to see Jordan, who looked surprised that someone had actually booed her precious childhood crush. I smirked at her, even though she couldn’t see me, and I was glad to see another look other than depression on her face.
“Who are you staring at?” Camilla asked me out of nowhere, her head suddenly next to mine as she tried to look in the same exact direction as she was.
“N—no one,” I told her, nudging her away and biting the inside of my lip when I saw that I had stuttered. “I’m not staring at anyone.”
Camilla smirked, obviously noticing that I was staring at someone. She looked off in the direction even more, and her smirk only grew when she said, “Are you staring at that girl next to Austin Emery? Isn’t that his sister Jordan?”
I bit down on my tongue now, hardly believing she had seen through me so easily. I was in a gang! I should have been able to act normally… But Jordan just made me act differently around everyone.
“I’m… I’m not…”
“Mom, Mom!” Camilla whispered, turning to our mother, who was on the other side of her. “Guess what, Mom! Guess what!”
Our mother gave Camilla a weird look, but said anyway, “What, Camilla?”
“Jesse likes a girl!”
Correction: I loved a girl.
But it wasn’t like I was about to say that.
“What?” my mother squealed, embarrassing me greatly when a few people around us turned to stare. “Who? How do you know, Camilla?”
“He was staring at her all lovey-dovey, and then when I asked him about it, he stuttered! When does Jesse ever stutter?” Camilla giggled, and I hated to admit that I felt my cheeks heat up. “He totally likes her!”
“Who, Camilla?” my mother asked again, leaning over her to get a better look. I couldn’t help but scowl at this.
“You see that girl sitting next to Austin Emery? The boy I was partnered with for our English project in sophomore year?” Camilla asked, pointing in the direction of Jordan and her brother. “Remember? I dated him for a few months in sophomore year, too.”
She had to be joking. My sister dated Jordan’s brother? That was just creepy.
“Yes, I remember,” our mother nodded now. “I see him… It’s the girl sitting next to him? The one in the grungy clothes?”
“Hey,” I snapped, not even meaning to do so. I bit my tongue, wanting to just hit myself over the head for what I had just done. There was no way I could deny it now.
Both Camilla’s and my mother’s eyes widened in surprised. “Jesse’s blushing!” Camilla shrieked, and I couldn’t tell if she was scared or just teasing me. “That never happens! Mom, that never happens!”
“She’s cute, Jesse! Very cute,” my mother now gushed, clasping her hands together in an embarrassing kind of way. I wouldn’t just call her cute… She was so much more than that. My mother then turned to my sister. “What’s her name, Camilla?”
“Why not have Jesse tell you?” she now asked, and I knew now that she was definitely making fun of me. “He seems to be quite smitten with her.”
“Define smitten.”
“Um… uh…”
“Exactly.”
“What’s her name, Jesse?” my mother now asked, completely ignoring the bickering between Camilla and me. “Her last name is Emery, isn’t it? Like her brother’s? What’s her first name? How old is she? What grade is she in? Does she go here?”
“Her name is Jordan Emery,” I sighed, knowing there was no point in fighting with them anymore. “She’s fifteen, in the same grade as me, and she doesn’t go here. She goes to Adeline Academy for Girls.”
My mother looked relieved. “So you’re not gay!”
My eyes widened at my mother. “Ma!”
“Well, you can’t blame me for wondering,” my mother shrugged, trying to act like it was no big deal at all that she thought that I was gay. “You’ve never had a girlfriend before, you’ve never even shown interest in a girl before, you go to an all-boys school! What did you expect me to think?”
“That I go to a school with no girls, therefore I cannot have a girlfriend,” I snapped, not even meaning to sound as technical as I did.
“That sounded pretty gay,” Camilla nodded, crossing her arms over her chest and smirking.
“I’m not gay! I’m in love with her!”
Their eyes widened even more, and I bit down on my tongue so hard that I wouldn’t have been surprised if I chopped it off.
I was such a dumbass.
“My little boy is growing up!” my mother cried, tears suddenly brimming her eyes as she held her hands over her heart overdramatically. Why did she have to be so embarrassing? “He’s in love! At only fifteen!”
“Seems to me like he’s too young,” Camilla informed me honestly, but I didn’t agree with her. I knew that I was in love with Jordan. “But still… it’s sweet, nonetheless.”
I was never going to hear the end of this from either of them. They now knew my most important secret: I was in love. Now just as long as they didn’t find out that I was in a gang, I would be just fine…
Now I just had to make sure that they never came into contact with Jordan, because I was sure that they would have blown the entire thing for me. And if Jordan knew that I was in love with her… She’d probably never want to have anything to do with me ever again.
“Does she know how you feel about her?” my mother asked, her grin growing even more.
“No,” I answered, shaking my head and looking over at the beautiful girl once again as she spoke to her brother. “She doesn’t know. She hates me.”
My mother gasped. “What? Why?”
“I haven’t exactly been… the nicest guy to her,” I sighed, really not wanting to admit how much of an asshole I had been to her in the past. “So she hates me for it. It’s my fault for being an idiot.”
“That makes it even better,” Camilla now smirked, crossing her arms over her chest as she leaned back in her chair.
I couldn’t help but disagree.
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The song on the side... absolutely perfect. :D Pretty much every The Wanted song fits Jesse and Jordan perfectly... it's kind of scary. It's like they took the story and wrote songs for it. ;D
This is the last chapter as them as a freshman... Finally. ;)
What pranks would you like to see happen between Jesse, Jordan, and their friends? Their sophomore year is when all the pranking really kicks off, since Dallas isn't there to make everything so dramatic anymore. ;D
Please COMMENT, VOTE, and FAN! <3