Lovers From Another Life

Birthday Boy Struggles

I spent my day walking in a daze as worries and doubts that hadn't crossed my mind until now flooded my head. I sighed and glanced at my schedule for the day, looking over the classes I had to go to and trying to plan out which ones would be the best distraction. "Hey Beverly!" A voice yelled out in my direction making my skin crawl. I turned my face away hurrying my footsteps to class and trying to put more distance between me and the voice calling out my dead name. "Beverly, wait up! What's wrong aren't we friends?" The voice began to call out again behind my back. I cringed more as I heard his voice knowing that despite it sounding light of heart and with good intentions, he was just mocking me. Everyone at this school by now had known I changed my name to Juniper and was identifying as male.

Still, he refused to stop following and annoying me as he kept calling out my dead name. I felt my blood begin to boil as my eye twitched a little bit but I took a deep breath and kept my cool. "What do you want, Jefferson," I said with annoyance, lacing my tone. Matt Jefferson and I used to be the best of friends back in elementary school until he moved away one summer. We had tried to keep in touch but as most long-distance friendships end up we lost touch. That was until he moved back to my school right in the middle of my freshman year of high school. "Geeze I just wanted to wish you a happy birthday! What's the sour tone in your voice for Bev?" He asked me as his lips curled a bit at the ends to form a grin. I glared at him and stood my ground not backing off. "Thank you for the birthday wishes but I have to go to class and your ugly mug is hurting my eyesight." I shot back, turning away to leave the conversation and not give him any more of my time. Matt didn't seem to understand this though as he reached out and grabbed my wrist with a light blush over his cheeks and pulled me in close. "Wait Bev, I want to give you something!" he said shyly as he fumbled into his backpack that was slung over one shoulder and ignored my rude comment.

"Whatever it is, I don't want it. Let go of my wrist and stop calling me Beverly! My name is Juniper and I am a boy!" I said, giving a glare that would make even medusa shiver in fear as I yanked my wrist away and marched off leaving him. I didn't dare to look back over my shoulder at him as I marched to my next class. Though as I was walking I imagined he must have looked shocked or maybe confused...maybe he was wearing a mix of emotions on his face like me. I kept going until I was outside my English class and sighed heavily as I pressed my back against the wall, and slid down it to wait for the teacher to open the door and let me in. "This day is gonna be the end of me I swear....First I don't get a gift and then I have to run into Matt and get dead named..." I groaned out in frustration as I vented to myself and hid my face away on my knees. I sat like that for a few minutes letting my thoughts eat away at me until the teacher finally arrived and unlocked the door. "Sorry, class I was in a meeting this morning! Please everyone take your seats and hand your assignments from yesterday in on my desk today before you leave class. Today we'll be reading "When the stars align," I think you'll all enjoy this one. It's about two star-crossed lovers that get separated by fate and have to find a way back to one another." Mrs.Green our English teacher began to say as she rambled on about the new book we were to read in class and let the students file in and take their seats.

I took my seat in the back of the class and sighed more. "Hey Juniper, why the long face? Isn't today your birthday? You should be smiling and brimming with excitement!" Grace stated as she took her seat next to me and jumped eagerly in her seat next to me. I looked over at her laying my head down on my desk now with a sigh. "Mmmmmhmmmm Grace you have to save me...this is turning out to be the worst birthday ever!!!!" I said whining to her as we waited on the teacher to take her place in front of the class. "Why do you say that Mr. Pouty's whiskers?" She said bumping my nose to make me smile a little. I sighed and filled her in on how my day had been going so far being careful to leave out the part about not getting my soulmate mark yet. "Wow sounds like you've had an eventful fun day! I don't get why you're so bummed out! I mean besides Matt misgendering you and everything." She said giving me a simple shrug as she placed her stuff on her desk and then reached behind into her a bag. "Oh, this is for you by the way!" She said cheerfully pulling out a small box wrapped in blue paper with a silver bow on top.

I looked at the small box smiling and feeling special because she didn't usually do small gifts like this. "AWWW Grace you didn't have to get me anything for today!" I squealed a bit as I rushed to wrap the paper off but was careful to protect the bow. "Omg, this is the bracelet that we saw in the mall window last week! How did you know I wanted to get this?! The wait wasn't it a pair though...did you get one too!" I asked smiling for the first time since I entered school as I looked at the small charm bracelet in my hand. Grace scoffed softly at me as if I had just asked the dumbest question in the world. Instead of chewing my ear out for not having more faith in her though she just held out her wrist as a small jingle reached my ears. I smiled more seeing she had the same bracelet with a matching charm on hers as well. "What kind of friends would we be if we didn't get matching bracelets!"

I laughed more and nodded agreeing with her statement as the teacher walked back into the room following the last student who had arrived a little late. "Alright class now that everyone is here we're going to jump right into the readings! I want everyone to grab one book and pass it back to the person behind you. Juniper can you start us off on today's reading?" I nodded and flushed a little red because I knew she only picked on me since I was squealing with Grace in the back of the classroom loudly. Grace shot me an apologetic glance in my direction as she opened her book to chapter 1 and waited for me to start reading. I smiled gently at her and took a deep shaky breath scanning to see that everyone had their books before I began to read out loud.

Sam had never thought he would see the day when he finally meet his other half Jazz. It was a bright and cool august day when Sam first met Jazz. She was standing in the park zoned out starting a field of flowers on the grass. Sam felt a light blush form on his cheeks as he slowly took a step closer approaching the fairytale-like girl. "Um...excuse me...I just wanted to see if you were okay? If you keep staring at those flowers I'm afraid you'll burn holes into their petals." He said softly making a light-hearted attempt at jokes to ease the tension between him and Jazz. Jazz blinked and looked up at him flushing red when she saw the boy who was standing in front of her with a confused and worried look on his face.....

I read the first paragraph out loud and paused to see if the teacher wanted me to keep going. "Great job Juniper! Alright who would like to pick up where he left off in the book?" Mrs. Green asked as scanned the classroom for her next unsuspecting victim.