Untouchable

Do I Have Enough Time?

"In another universe I had one more day with you." —submitted by hidingfrompast 


Throughout September, time passed slowly. The time left me wondering what would happen next. So far, I only told Brooklynn about him. I have a feeling Nia was catching on. Kayla has no idea, and Jessie, don't get me started. She was much too detective-like, which is a positive thing, but not necessarily in this situation. Could the hints be too much? Should I tell Nia? She's the key to getting closer to him. What would I even tell her? Oh sorry, somehow I have a crush on your brother's best friend who's 18 months younger than me? These worthless thoughts only made it more difficult for me to come up with a reasonable argument.

Brooklynn, as clever as she was, helped me find his schedule. With this, bumping into him and changing my routes was easy. I may or may not have been the stalkerish type, but what I was doing is honestly just funny to me. I don't think I've tried hard like this before.

I've always believed love was something subtle, something you were supposed to share in secret. So why did I find myself in such a dilemma?

"Do any of you need water?" Nia asked our group. In the time I had spent observing my last year, I noticed a pattern during lunch. Sometimes it changes, but most commonly, Oli finishes lunch, walks by, and I stare. Then he proceeds to walk into the middle school building. Nia, as if scheduled and designed to ask at the perfect moment, will ask if we need anything from our classroom. At this point, I'm excited and giddy. Someone, whether it be me, because no one else wanted to go, or Brooklynn, will say yes and our whole group migrates to the entrance of said building and walks in. We walk to the steps where the second floor is and low and behold, there he is. From my knowledge, he will either be with a friend, coming back from the bathroom, or getting a drink from the water fountain. His reason for being in the hallway didn't exactly matter to me. As long as he was in my peripheral vision and I got to see him, it was fine. I was only able to look at him for periodical moments before he would look back and I'd have to look away.

Finally, the day which I dreaded came. I was unable to cover up my secret and Jessie, Nia, and even June knew. A few weeks back, June had said she would rather not be friends anymore.  I knew she wouldn't tell anyone, so it was fine. Since Nia knew, and her being the closest person I knew to Oli at the time, she helped me out. She made excuses so we could go into the building and into the holy ground that I call the hallway. Once we'd made it there, he would be walking towards us. She would call him over and talk. He even hugged her once, and you know what she told him to do? She said to hug me too. He stood there and looked at me. Would he really hug an utterly complete and random stranger who's friends with his best friend's sister? The moment I thought otherwise, he wrapped his arms around me and held me tight. I don't know if it was just me, but I remember that point in time so clearly. It won't even be an exaggeration when I say time stopped because it did. It stopped for me and him. If this world was a simulation, and nothing was real, that hug was. It was just a hug, and he was just a boy. He shouldn't have been a big deal. But somehow it was, because of Oliver. One thing I learned was that he had a very big presence. When he was in the room, I could instantly tell. Not only that, he made things funnier, more hilarious than stand-up comedy. That's what made him so enticing.

I took note of every single detail that includes him which is why I remember this day so well. The day before, we were in the hallway once more. He gave me a hug, which turned weekly almost, for whatever reason, and I asked what his favorite candy was.

"Hm? Oh, I like Trolli! Like the gummy worms." He told me. I liked his voice so much. I got so used to hearing it that when he said my name, it replayed in my head like a lovesong. Will you ever understand the effect you have on me, Oli? If you were sad, I was too. If you were happy, I was too. As he waved goodbye, a sense of calmness but also yearning washed over me like a wave. This might have been the definition of now or never. That night I distinctly remember begging my dad to bring me to the store so I could buy him the biggest bag of Trolli I've ever seen. I'm surprised how much effort I was putting into my not-even-close relationship with Oliver. Not once were we ever going to date, and I'm pretty sure that younger me knew that. Nevertheless, I bought the enormous bag of candy, which most likely was why he got braces a few months later. That bag was a total of 7.49. The next day was Halloween, and all of my friends were in my homeroom. I asked them to accompany me while I gave the oversized bag to him. Nia knocked on the door closest to his seat and gestured for him to come out. Looking back on this, I shouldn't have let Nia do everything for me. It reflected my shy demeanor, which didn't make the best impression.