The Downfall of the 'It Girl'

Let's have ourselves a little talk here, shall we??....

Whelp, this was it. It was now or never. It was Do or Die time, Jenna Matthews. No time like the present, after all. 

Taking another deep breath, I counted slowly to five before mustering everything I had inside to make myself look up at him. Swallowing the massive lump that had spontaneously formed in my throat, I lifted my head slowly upwards, my stomach a myriad of nervous knots the entire time. 

“Um…” I began, finding it somewhat difficult to make direct eye contact with Calvin for some unknown reason. “I thought that maybe we could talk…” I added, a hopefulness in my voice.

“About what?” came his brusque reply as he remained in the same spot, his arms crossed over in front of his chest, a mixture of irritation and annoyance displayed on his face. Oh, I was really in this one now, wasn’t I? 

“About…stuff…Us,” I answered, peering up at him meekly.

“Jenna,” he started, quickly glancing over his right shoulder, “I just really don’t know, to be quite honest with you. I really don‘t think that this is the time, nor the place.”

“Why?” I asked, rising to my feet. No way was I going to take his aloofness sitting down. 

“Why?” he said, releasing a small sigh, a slight look of bewilderment spreading over his face. “Jenna, I have seen and heard enough in the last couple of days to more than prove to me that your heart and mind are elsewhere other than with me.” 

“But, Calvin, that’s not true! Please, if you would just let me explain…” my voice pleading.

“Jenna…right now just really isn’t a good time,” he replied, shifting impatiently on his feet. 

“Why isn’t it?” I insisted, refusing to let him slip through my fingers that easily.

“Because it just isn’t, okay?” he said, and I could hear the irritation growing in his voice. I had never actually seen Calvin mad, and now that I thought about it, I wasn’t real sure that I wanted to, but I had to talk to him. I had to. “How did you get here, anyway?” he asked, peering out a large bay window that looked out over the front yard and part of the driveway. My car was just out of view, I noticed, following the direction of his gaze.

“I drove,” I said simply, praying that he would just leave it at that, and I wouldn’t have to elaborate.

“Drove what? Your mom’s car?” Crap. 

“No…” I said slowly, trying to come up with some sort of excuse as to why I was driving a brand new vehicle when the reality was that Mom and I were broker than broke. Pausing to glance at Calvin, it was more than obvious that I couldn’t just come out with, ‘Oh this new car, a Chevy Cruze, I think it’s called. Landon gifted it to me. I had no idea, though!’  Yeah, that’d go over like a freaking lead balloon. Calvin remained silent, the look on his face was clear that he was expecting a more detailed answer than what I’d already given him. Then the perfect little fib popped up into my head like some sort of epiphany. “Here quite awhile back I was at the mall and I entered my name into some random drawing for a new car. Turns out: I won. I picked it up after school today. I was going to surprise my mom with it, but she wasn’t home when I stopped by the house, so I came out here,” I lied. It sounded feasible, though, didn’t it? I certainly prayed that it did.

“Huh,” was all Calvin said in response. I was unable to tell if he had bought my story at all or not. “That’s awfully generous of you,” he said after a couple of the longest minutes of my entire life.