Give It A Shot | Peterick

Chapter One

Chapter One! Super excited for this story! Gonna keep this note short, so dedication to MelodyHoward , thanks for being my first reader!

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Peter

I grazed my finger along the name tattooed on my wrist. I wish that I could do what Pete Davidson had done and just burn the name off. It wouldn't be that hard, all I would need was an open fire and a lot of pain tolerance. But every time that I had planned to go through with it, part of me would hold back.

As much as I didn't believe, a small part of me did. I always wondered what would happen if I actually did meet my soulmate. The countless scenarios would run through my mind. I haven't met a Pete since I had stopped dating over a year ago. I would remember what it was like to feel like I was in love. Every touch would send sparks throughout my body and every time I heard his name, chills would shoot down my spine.

But he had hurt me. I was nothing to him, just a toy that he could use. I still think about what happened between us all the time. I didn't miss him, I missed what we had. I wasn't angry at him anymore, rather than angry about what he had done. It was the cruelest prank anyone could ever pull, and of course I had to be the victim.

My eyes flickered around the coffee shop, jealous of all the people. They were all laughing and talking to other people, like nothing else mattered in the world. Everyone had a spark in their eyes and excitement in their voice. It was crazy to think that one person could mean the world to someone. I didn't even want a soulmate, I had just wanted a friend.

All through high school, I was bullied for having a guy's name on my wrist. I was the school faggot, the outcast, the loser, the emo, the kid that no one cared about. I couldn't tell you the number of times that I would go home at night and take a razor to my skin, and slashed at that name until I cried myself to sleep. Peter.

It's not that I didn't believe in love, it's that love didn't believe in me.

"Hey, Stump!" I heard my boss yell from the room next to the kitchen. I nearly dropped the cup that I was holding.

I cleared my throat. "Uh, um, yes?"

"You have people to serve, you know!" He called back, with just the right amount of sarcasm and sass in his voice.

I looked up and saw a line of about three people waiting to order. "Right, uh, yeah, got it!"

I put on a fake smile for the customers and tried to be polite as possible. It was difficult; the first customer was a businessman who was obviously late for some "super" important meeting or conference that made everyone and everything else around him irrelevant. It took all of my willpower not the slap the arrogance out of him. Then I had to deal with the joy of serving a mother who kept yelling at her three kids who insisted on annoying everyone in the shop. And last but not least, there was your basic white suburban mom who insisted that her venti skinny hazelnut macchiato was not heated to exactly 120 degrees and I had to re make her drink three times.

My job wasn't the most labor intensive one in the world, but the people I had to deal with made it the most exhausting thing in the world. If I had to deal with one more obnoxious customer today, it would probably be enough to set me off and blow my brains against the ceiling.

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I slammed my apartment door shut behind me. It wasn't intentional, and it was out of relief more than out of frustration. Relief that I no longer had to be around people, and that I was able to come home to my empty apartment and be myself. No fake smiles, no forced politeness, no trying my hardest to avoid any conversation whatsoever.