Øn yøur mind // Tyler Joseph

Baller

I walked to school, my head hung down in shame. Tyler and I had a good night on Friday, but he'd completely forgotten about me the rest of the weekend.

And so I walked, Tyler not offering to drive me to school. But saw his car drive past me, then reverse, him rolling down his window.

"Aye girl, lemme give you a ride." He joked and as mad as I wanted to be at him, I smiled.

"Hey." I saw Josh was in the passenger seat, so I crawled into the back.

"Ready to learn?" He asked and Josh fiddled with his hair.

"Nah." I sighed.

"Hey Ro, did you do something to your hair or am I just being dumb?" Josh smiled and looked back.

Oh yeah. It was probably the twenty pounds of makeup I had to pile on thanks to another beating.

"Oh no, just changed my makeup routine." I smiled back.

"Looks nice." He blushed and rubbed his stubble.

"Thank you."

"So we're early, wanna get some coffee?" Tyler asked.

"Yes please!" I now happily sat up.

"Ohh is it bad that I want a smoothie this early?" Josh drummed his fingers on the dashboard.

"Sure bro, get a smoothie. Ro, I got this." He paid and knew my order. A grande chai frappéchino. For some reason, little things like him remembering stupid stuff about me, made me beam.

"Thanks Ty." We waited for our drinks at the coffee shop just off campus, and started conversations.

"Hey, Tyler, can Ro join the guys and I at our little basketball game outside after school?" Josh asked and smiled.

"Huh... oh yeah. Sure. I forgot to tell her about that... " Tyler obviously lied.

I let out a long deep breath. "It's fine if you don't want me there... "

Josh's eyes widened. "No of course I want you there, it's just, gonna be all guys." He made up an excuse.

"Okay. And I'm fine with that. So I'll see you guys after school then?"

"Yeah! Can't wait." Josh put a hand on my shoulder as the lady called our coffees.

"Rowan?" I got up, Josh objecting, grabbing my drink for me.

"Awe thanks Josh." His face burned red.

It was hard to hate him, even though Tyler liked Josh more than me now. I understood why, Josh was such a gentleman, caring, he thought a lot and spoke a little, he was special.

Well as I, wasn't.

Tyler drove us to school, the three of us walking towards our first class. Emma, the head cheerleader purposely bumped me in the hallway, making my books fall, coffee almost, but Tyler caught it, and Josh glared at her.

"Oops." She giggled. "My bad." She fluttered her eyelashes at Tyler suggestively. No way in a million years would Tyler ever–

"Say? What's your name?" Tyler grinned back and I wanted to hurl. Josh noticed my uneasiness and whispered a "sorry" in my ear.

"I'm Emma, what's yours?" She knew his name, she'd mentioned him to me. Gosh I hated her so much.

"Bye. I'm leaving." I announced and for once, Josh followed me, letting our friend betray us by talking to that bully.