Lost in Hollywood

Miss Americana & The Heartbreak Prince

He is just Eli.

Just the nerd, the lanky kid, too thin for his frame that has suddenly grown so tall, his hands and feet too big, his arms and legs weird, clumsy, barely a part of his awkward body at all.

He is that kid.

The kid whose voice is always hoarse and broken because he uses it so scarcely. The kid whose wardrobe consists of baggy jeans, plain, boring sneakers, and ugly, green and brown sweaters that look like they belong to someone's grandfather. The kid with the lame ass haircut. The kid with the lip.

He is in the library, with Miguel and Demetri, talking about which super power would be the best. Superstrenght, says Miguel. Invisibility, says Demetri, and Eli silently agrees. Invisibility, of course, because he is that kid, the one who wants so badly to be invisible so that no one could see him, his clothes, his lip. But no matter how hard he tries, it never works, and Kyler and the other bullies, they always find him, they always make his life a living Hell.

He is the bullied kid. The one who is beaten up, whose lunch money gets stolen, whose backpack ends up in the trash can. The kid with scraped knees and torn clothes he can't explain to his mother.

"What kind of girl would ever kiss this shit?"

The library isn't the sanctuary he thought it would be. Kyler's grip is strong, his fingers dig into Eli's face, but that's not what hurts the most. It's the words that kill him. Their truth is a punch in the gut. Oh, how they crush his stupid, fragile, dreams of the new girl in the school, the cutest girl he has ever seen, the one who sits at their table in the chemistry classroom, the girl who looks at him and talks to him as if he isn't a deformed freak, but a human being. Sky. Her name is Sky, and for the past couple of weeks kissing her has been the first thought in Eli's mind when he wakes up in the morning, the last one before he falls asleep. A dream, of course, he knows it's just a dream, but still—- there has been some sliver of small hope inside of his chest that maybe, maybe, maybe—

But Kyler's mocking words kill that hope, brutally ripping it out of his chest. Sky is a beauty, and he is the beast. He is that kid. A monster. So ugly and disgusting that no girl will ever kiss him. A Loser. Nothing but a freak.

Shitlip.

But Sky—

"Kyler is an idiot," she says. "There's nothing wrong with your lips."

Her words don't do the magic and transform Eli, but her lips do. Sky kisses him right then and there, on the front steps of the school, not giving a shit who sees them. Her hands on his shoulders, her lips on his mouth, her frantic heartbeat like a living bird caged in her ribcage. Her scent - girl, girl, girl, sweet cherry chapstick, vanilla perfume, like breathing in a cloud of vaporized sugar. Her scent goes into his head like a drug. She kisses him to erase the words that Kyler said, to prove a point, because she is not only pretty, she is brave too, and as their mouths crash together, he knows. This is not just a crush. This is the real deal. He is falling in love with her.

The kiss in front of the school is the most amazing moment of his whole fucking life—

Until the next day.

That night she comes to his home for the first time, rings the doorbell, climbs up the stairs into his room, drops her bag onto the floor, sits on his bed for the first time and there's a glimpse of her skin - smooth, white skin of her belly, so soft, so enticing. She's telling him something important, but he's just a nerd who has a hot girl in his room for the first time, and he is so horny it's impossible to think about anything else—