First Love Story

Chapter 1: Desperation

May 22, 2016

Exam season.  Might as well be known as Hell season.  God, I'm not gonna survive it.  I have about three weeks to live and once I walk into my Bio exam, I'm gonna choke, see spots, foam at the mouth and die.  What a wonderful future I have, eh?  Especially this year, cause, I'm gonna be completely honest here, my grades have sucked ass.  Worse than ass.  Wait what's worse than ass?  Whatever's worse than ass, that's what my grades have sucked this year.  And they're probably gonna just get worse cause I am not feeling motivated to work hard at my exams at all.  That whole feeling that all the girls at my school are feeling?  The "holy shit exams are in three weeks I gotta eat, breathe, and sleep trig" feeling?  I've yet to experience that.  Meanwhile all my friends are messaging me on our group chats like "oh my god what's the process of digestion in the small intestine?!?!?" and I'm back here like "ah it's fine don't worry about it."  I am way more chill about this than I ought to be.  God.  My mother's gonna kill me.  

Well, at least we have the day off tomorrow.  I can stay home, in my room, at my desk with all my Biology notes spread out in front of me, and pretend to study while I watch Bones on Netflix.  I'm such an idiot.  But I can't help it.  I just have to see the season 9 finale!  I've been binge watching it pretty much the last 2 years on and off.  I'm just about to finish season 9 and I'm not gonna be able to focus on schoolwork anyway if I don't finish cause then I'll just be thinking about it the entire time.  

Yeah ok I know.  Excuses, excuses.  I just can't bring myself to work.  I will eventually, but not now.  I mean I still have three weeks left, right?  

"LUCY!" My mom called from downstairs.  I ran to my bedroom door so I could open it.  I didn't feel like yelling at each other through the door.  

"Yeah?" I responded.

"Can you take Zorro for a walk?" 

Zorro's our three year old Havanese dog.  They're the national dog of Cuba, hence the name "HAVAnese."  It comes from the city name, Havana.  He's small and fluffy and adorable and we love him to bits.  We might actually be a little obsessed.  My older brother Sam came up with the name Zorro.  Cause Spanish is the national language of Cuba, and Zorro was a Spanish character (even though "zorro" in Spanish actually means "fox"), and the breed Havanese comes from Cuba, it sort of fit.  

"Yeah, just a minute!" I called back.  So for the past couple of years, during the summer months, I've started doing this thing where I gladly take Zorro for lots of walks, and whenever I do, I make sure that I look at least kinda nice.  Cause, ok yeah...I'm desperate for boy action.  But I have an explanation.  

I've been going to an all girls school since I was 12, and it was ok at first.  I liked not having boys in the class cause I felt like I could be more myself rather than constantly trying to make sure I didn't look ridiculous.  Sure all my friends outside of school had the same reaction when I told them I was going to an all girls school.  They either said "so....you're gonna be a lesbian?" or "oh, you poor girl, I don't know what I'd do if I were you" so not a lot of confidence coming from my friends, but really it was nice.  I made a circle of friends on the very first day of school, and I've been besties with them ever since.  But the last couple of years, I've started really wishing for boys in my life.  Because I had no male people in my life at all except for family members.  Except for one boy, Gabe, who is the son of my parents friends, and I've known him for as long as I can remember.  I developed a crush on him a few years ago, which made my mom ecstatic.  My whole life I've kind of felt like my mom was kind of playing matchmaker, trying to get us to like each other.  I can't tell you how long I spent stalking Gabe's Facebook page, fantasizing about him, and taking "does he like you?" quizzes online.  I still have no idea if he ever liked me that way.  But my crush on him faded a little while ago, although I still make sure I look attractive whenever we see their family. You know...just in case.  

Anyway, back to my story of desperation.  So other than my family members and Gabe, I have no guys in my life, and I've been getting just a tad bit desperate.  Insert video clip of me calling on the dark forces to attract guys to me.  Haha just kidding I totally didn't do that.....*crickets, crickets*  I'm sure part of the reason is that I've never even known of any boy liking me that way.  At all.  Ever.  Sure I've had crushes, but no boys have ever given me the time of day.  I was always just that strangely quiet, shy, apparently annoying to some people, redheaded girl at the back of the class.  So, yeah.  I'm desperate.  So for the past two years, during the summer months, I take Zorro for lots of walks, and make sure that my hair and a little makeup is done nicely.  But nothing has ever come of it.  Well actually that's not entirely true.  I got hit on once when I was 13, but that doesn't really count, cause a) I hadn't been trying to be attractive, which should be a good sign, but nope cause b) he was being a perv.  He said "You've got a nice ass!  Can I get your number?"  Also, my dad was right up the street talking to some lady, but he didn't notice.  

I've been thinking lately that maybe I should just give up.  I've been going around the neighbourhood for two years now searching for boys my age, and I've never once met anyone.  If I haven't seen any guys by now, there probably just aren't any guys in my neighbourhood unfortunately.  But maybe I'll try it just one more time today.  

I put on a nice grey and white top, my jean shorts, a little eyeliner, mascara, and lip balm, and wandered downstairs to get Zorro's leash and harness.  

"Good boy" I told him as we left the house.  We live right across the street from a Catholic school that goes from grades JK to grade 8.  I never went there though.  I'm not really sure why, but I just didn't.  But on the weekends and the summer, sometimes I like to hang around in the courtyard of the school, cause the gate from the parking lot to the playground is open most of the time, so I can just wander in.  My friends and I hung out there a lot last summer.  It was pretty fun.  

It was a nice day.  The sun was out, wind was blowing, and it wasn't terribly hot.  I liked it.  I walked down the sidewalk, and crossed the break in my street to the other side where the rest of the sidewalk continued.  As I was passing by, I noticed some people out on their front lawn on the corner of the street.  A short, very skinny woman was turning on their sprinkler, and a boy who looked older than me was sitting on the grass with a big black labrador.  I noticed though, as I was walking that the boy was looking at me.  He had a snapback hat on pointing forwards, and a blue t-shirt on.  I didn't really think anything of him.  To be fair, I only glanced at him for a little more than a second, but I didn't think he was too attractive, so I kept walking.  I think my standards of how attractive I want a guy to be are a little high though.  Because of all the models and inhumanly attractive actors they cast in tv shows, I expect the good looking guys to look like that, and everybody else is garbage.  I know that's not fair, but it's not my fault.  My culture and media has raised me to be picky and judgemental.  

I continued my walk with Zorro, making sure to keep an eye out for guys when I passed by the park, but there were no guys, so I walked back home, depressed and desperate.  Back up to my room to continue my non-study session.  I will probably repeat the events of today tomorrow as well.  And then back to school the next day for more exam season hell.  God, when will this school year be over already?