Forever Yours

chapter twelve

The following Monday, I'm waiting for Joel in front of his locker. I arrive a little early, so I pop in my headphones and blast some Blink-182. I start to bob my head back and forth to the beat and hum to myself, getting lost in the music. I send a couple snapchats to a missing Mia. She hasn't answered any of my texts and I have no idea where she is. This is a time I would usually hide away by myself, but now I have Joel. And I could not be more grateful for him.

I'm turned to the side, so I don't sense Joel's presence when he approaches. He pulls out one of my headphones, scaring the crap out of me. "Hey there good looking," he says and plants a kiss on my cheek. He puts my headphone in his ear and listens to the song All the Small Things with me. "Who is this?"

I give him a dumbfounded look. He doesn't know who they are?! "Um, Blink-182! You don't know who they are?" I pull the headphones out of our ears and stick them back in my backpack.

He chuckles at my offended tone. "You know I don't listen to that kind of stuff."

I roll my eyes and giggle. "Yeah, I know." Joel listens to hip hop, something I'm not familiar with. We're vastly different, but somehow have a lot in common. Like our music taste and how we dress, polar opposites. But we both love the rain and scary movies. We learn so many new things about each other every day. It's thrilling getting to know someone. Joel and I are perfect together in our own little way and I cannot believe I haven't always been with him. Our relationship already feels like forever.

I've never had this feeling before. Like Joel is the perfect person for me. Like we've been made for each other. For a lot of people, I feel like it takes them so much time to develop feelings like this for someone. But with Joel, I already know. I know he's the one for me. I know we're meant to be together. The thought of not being with him is already unimaginable.

But I hold my tongue when it comes to speaking aloud about how I feel. I know Joel likes me, but is he feeling the same way as I do for him? Is he tossing and turning at night trying to understand how powerful this feeling is? Does he love me?

When Joel talks about something he's really into, like his favorite TV show, Supernatural, or his favorite football team, the Dallas Cowboys, he gets super enthusiastic and will rattle on and on. I love it; I love listening to him talk and tell me about himself. Sometimes, as I listen to him ramble on, I think over and over in my head, I love you, I love you, I love you. I want to tell him, but I need him to say it first. Because if he doesn't and I do, and he doesn't say it back, I would feel awful.

I need this constant reassurance that I mean something to someone, or I'll just be worried that they don't actually like me. Like with Mia and my dad, I have to say 'I love you' pretty much every time I part from them, and they'll have to say it back or I'll just second guess their feelings for hours. Like I don't know if they genuinely love me or not. I was never this paranoid before Jack. But now that I see someone can say 'I love you' and not mean it; say it and have so much hate in their heart, I don't believe it. Now, with Joel, I can't say it yet and it's tearing me apart. It is tearing me apart that I don't know his true feelings and intentions. But for now, I'll just have to suck it up and deal with it.

"So, what are we doing for Halloween?" Joel questions, pulling me out of my thoughts. Halloween is in about two weeks, so we've got to start planning.

"Um, I'm not sure, why?" I try to ponder over what we could do and think of date ideas until then. Scary movie nights at his house, pumpkin patches, pumpkin carving.

"I'm just super excited, I guess. Halloween is my favorite holiday." Another interesting fact about Joel and something we have in common!

I smile up at him. "Mine too!"