Electrically Charged

Chapter 10: A Thousand and One

Cecily stared at the pink ribbon hanging from her mirror. Eight days had passed since she had left Will on the dark cross country field. Eight days of confusion and thinking. Of wondering if any of it was actually real after all. What was the possibility of running into Will again? A yet she had. And not just that, but they had spent time together. They had gone out to lunch. They had hugged and stayed out on the cross country field at night. She had cried on him. 

The last though made her wince. She kind of hoped she hadn't done that, but if the rest of it was real, so was that. She flopped onto her bed and let out a long sigh. What was with this stupid, idiotic, terrible boy who she definitely hated. He was so horrible with his smile and blue eyes and dark hair. And the way he smelled like mint and something else she couldn't quite put a finger on. And the way he wrapped his arms around her and just let her cry. The way he smiled and laughed at something she said. The solidness of his chest and shoulders. Yep, she hated him. Definitely hate. 

Cecily unlocked her phone and thumbed through her contacts before reaching his name and stopping. She hovered above the message button before locking her phone again and dropping it onto her pillow. She was such a coward. And she really didn't want to bother him. But she needed to prove to herself that she hated him. He pretended to die in a crawl space next to her and she was forced to beat him up. He was horrible. She definitely hated him. 

Will fidgeted as he looked up at the blue June sky. A couple white wisps of clouds stretched across the vast expanse of blue. The porch swing underneath him squeaked as he bounced a leg and then stopped. It had been a little more than two weeks since the horse show and it still crowded his mind with racing thoughts of that girl. He had come up with at least twenty elaborate schemes of how he was going to "accidentally" run into her and strike up a competition. But then the thoughts of negativity swept in. What if she wanted nothing to do with him? What he was just annoying her? What if she had a boyfriend? A girl like that, who was so fascinating should definitely have a boyfriend. She hadn't texted him, but he hadn't texted her either. What if she was waiting for him to text first? But what if she didn't want him to text he at all? Maybe she had already deleted his contact and was enjoying her life with no thought of him. 

He let out a frustrated sigh and went back to bouncing his leg. This shouldn't be so complicated. This didn't need to be so complicated. And yet, it most definitely was. Maybe he should just text her and see what happens. But did he really want to face reality? That was the real question at stake here. He had built up a thousand perfect scenarios where he would run into her and she would be overjoyed to see him. A thousand perfect scenarios that would never happen. And he didn't want to face the reality of that. Part of him wanted to continue to float in the world of the imaginary perfection that was only attainable within the human mind. But imaginary got you nothing in the end, and Will wanted a lot more than nothing. 

Four more days went by and Will became more and more anxious with each passing day. He wanted to contact her, he wanted to hear her talk, but he just couldn't bring himself to pick up the phone and call her. He couldn't even text her. The whole thing was a mess and it was driving him insane. Finally, he sat himself down on the porch swing and made a promise to himself. He had five days to contact her and if he couldn't do it by then he had to stop. There was no point waiting for and wanting something he wasn't ever going to have. He had five days to get an answer and then it was time to move on. 

Cecily watched as Steel moved around his pasture swishing his tail and grazing. The sun was sinking slowly below the horizon and the stars came out in the approaching darkness. The clouds were pink. She thought of Will. It had been so long since she had thought about someone this much. She had had "boyfriends" since she was very little. She had always made friends with the boys first because the were the only ones who could keep up with her. Then one boy out of the group always ended up spending more time with her than the others and they would become close. It would only be a short while before the serious affection started and the talks about their plans for the future. When she was little, that happened very easily. She would get close to a boy and they would become as much a couple as little children could be. They loved each other fully and in the purest kind of way that only a child can accomplish. As she got older things got harder. She liked boys, of course, but they seemed less willing to establish friendships and thus she could not get close to them. In middle school she managed to find a boy who liked her enough to take on her strange tendencies toward serious relationships and they remained a couple for almost two years before the prospect of high school caused a fight and a break up. Entering her freshman year of high school Cecily had almost started a thing with a boy in her history class, but a rotation of classes caused them to lose contact and fall out. Since then she had crushed on a couple guys for a month of two before moving on, never letting herself get serious enough to truly like them. But Will was causing a problem in her perfect plan. She knew what crushes felt like. Those happened when she was bored and wanted to entertain herself with the prospect of like someone without really knowing them. But she wasn't bored right now and this wasn't entertainment. Will was too close already. They were friends, sort of. She couldn't pass this off as boredom or a lack of excitement. She wasn't feeling the need to entertain herself. This was starting to be real. And that was scary. 

Today was the fifth day and Will stared at his silent phone. There had been no messages, no texts and no calls. He hadn't done anything about it. And it infuriated him. He wanted to reach out to her, he wanted to rip of the Band-Aid and deal with the pain quickly and easily. He needed to get over her. She was a figment of imagination at this point; a ghost of good times and the ever existing possibilities of "what if". He sat down to dinner with his dad and they ate as the sun vanished and darkness swallowed up the kitchen. Will curled himself up in his room and sat alone in the dark letting his brain just think. He wanted to relive every last moment with her before he let go. He needed to let go. She wasn't real anymore, she wasn't going to happen. The thousand possibilities Will had thought about in his head hadn't happened. He had driven to the gas station and stayed for almost an hour before continuing on his errands and she hadn't pulled up to the pump next to him. He went to the grocery store and spent almost two hours examining eggs and milk hoping somehow he'd run unto her. He'd eaten dinner at the popular restaurant for four days waiting for her to walk in with her friends. He'd even driven to the local horse store and browsed around aimlessly for the better part of the day and jumping every time the welcome bell rang hoping it was her. And yet, she never showed up. The uncross-able divide between the imaginary "what if" and the harshness reality had caught up to Will and now he had to deal with the consequences of getting carried away. He had to let go. He had to break the beautiful, perfect, imaginary version of her that existed simply in his head. A thousand possibilities, none of which were real, none of which would ever happen. 

Cecily pressed the call button, heart pounding against her chest. 

Will's phone rang, screen lit up with a name that made his heart leap. 

A thousand and one possibilities, one of which was real.