How To Love

Chapter 2

Hypophrenia: A feeling of sadness seemingly without a cause.

Three days have passed and all I could think of was what my friends were doing back home. I miss them so much but I didn’t have the guts to text them, since they didn’t bother texting me first. They were probably out somewhere enjoying their last day of freedom before second semester begins tomorrow. 

I wanted to go for a jog to ease my mind a little. However, mum said the weather was too cold and forbid me to leave the house so I was stuck at home. I slumped down into the bed and grabbed the photo of me, Lindsy and Cassidy, taken during homecoming night last year. They all looked so stunning whereas I, a pumpkin.

I felt a hot tear slide down my cheek. I was so afraid, I had no friends here at all. I was going to end up alone in school because who would want to befriend a girl like me? Moreover, my friends back home seemed to have forgotten about me. It did not seem like I was worthy of their attention. I'm not one of those that required herself to have a million friends to make her look popular. I just needed at least one friend, one best friend. That's all I'm asking for. But considering how socially awkward and insecure I became over this year, I doubt that that would even be possible. 

I wasn’t always this unconfident and miserable. I remembered being a fun and outgoing girl with lots of friends; I was into a lot of things such as cheerleading and playing the piano. However, everything seemed so different now. I lost interest in everything I used to love doing and one day, everyone started avoiding me. They left. They left me when I needed support from them. The only friends that stuck around were Cassidy and Lindsy. I don’t even know how they managed to tolerate my nonsense. I’m not exactly ‘best friend material’ considering how things turned out for me. I had no idea what happened that changed everything. How can everything changed before your eyes for the worse? Someone please explain to me all that because I, myself have major difficulties comprehanding it.

Forgive me if I have trust issues because eventually, everyone leaves.

Nevertheless, that doesn't explain why I feel so empty and broken ever since.

Overwhelmed by emotions, more and more tears started streaming uncontrollably out of my eyes, turning on the waterworks. Crying made me feel slightly better all the time. The rage and pain inside tend to force themselves out through tears and upset noises and when I had cried for long enough, I would feel really tired and fall asleep, forgetting everything for a while. When I woke up I would feel better, even if it was just a little. But it’s better than nothing. That weight pressing against my heart tend to lighten a teeny tiny bit and that was probably the most positive emotion I'd felt in that few months. 

Depressing, isn't it?

That night, I had the exact same dream and woke up screaming in tears as usual…

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“Enjoy your first day of school sweetie, I’m sure you’ll love it here.” Mum handed me my class schedules, giving me a warm and comforting kiss on the cheek.

I hope so.

With that, I turned and walk to my very first class, Literature. As I was wandering around, pairs of eyes kept staring at me from head to toe which made me feel extremely uncomfortable. I hated attention. Some of the bolder boys turned to stare at me while the even bolder ones, catcalled. I could hear their girlfriends beside them hissing at me, all ready to pounce on me. Why were they even paying attention to me?

"Ignore them and continue walking." I heard a familiar voice whispering in my ear.

I span around and to my dismay, I didn't see anyone within the radius. What in the world? What was that? Was it my conscience? Hah what else could it be, I'm being silly. I tried pursuading myself that it was nothing. However, deep down, I knew that wasn't my conscience.  But what else could it be? I'm either hallucinating or my conscience finally decided to make an appearance and have a little chat with me. Nowhere near freaky at all and I was totally not freaking out.