The Wallflower Effect

Prolouge

'I don't understand people!'  I thought tiredly. So, a psychotic goth girl falls in love with a guy she's only seen over the counter at the coffee shop where she works, and falls in love with him. So she stalks him and it turns out he's some mafia prince. So obviously, she falls in love even more. He gently tells her to stay away, for her own good. The rival family's mafia heir falls for her, and she likes him, but she's still head-over-heels for the other guy. A war starts between the families. It turns out that the first mafia prince coffee chick fell in love with was gay. But the other dude still liked her, so she ends up with him. I'm all for exciting book plots, but come on! I shook my head to myself in quiet disbelief, remembering my surroundings.

I was in Asheville, North Carolina's public library with my bestie, vainly searching for good books.

"Gage, can you believe this?" I fumed, angrily pointing the ridiculous excuse for a romance novel, which had an unrealistically beautiful girl and two hot guys with guns on it. I probably shouldn't have been so loud, given that the old-fashioned high ceilings and wooden furniture were just begging to echo.

"Oh, Zoey. Not every author can live up to your Jane-Austen standard." He pointed out sensibly. Gage was like that. I liked that about him. But I didn't like that he was right. I did expect a lot from books. His warm brown eyes alight with laughter, his pearly teeth an display from his wide grin. He blew his shaggy hair out of his face with an gentle puff of air. In short, he was pretty cute by most people's standards. Okay, my standards. But he was never going to know about that.

Gage Prince was my best friend, he'd been my other half since I moved to Asheville, North Carolina, at 12 years old. That meant we'd been besties for five years. We'd been through thick and thin, and our friendship has still stayed the same. The day I moved in next door to him, I was just sitting on my lawn as the movers went about their business, halfheartedly kicking a soccer ball. Gage came outside to meet the new neighbors, being the old-fashioned southern gentleman he was, even at that age. He offered to play a game of soccer with me. Being ridiculously shy, I hid my face in my long blonde hair, acting as if he was invisible.

And Gage did the thing any 12-year-old boy would do, southern or not. He ran off with my soccer ball, and I promptly ran after him. This resulted in a long chase, and eventually, me eventually catching up and tackling him.

'What was that for?' I'd demanded from the cute, and evidently athletic new neighbor boy. We'd ran to the park across the street from our house, and gone pretty far.

'You looked sad, so I thought angry would be better.' He'd replied from the ground, not sounding out of breath. I remember thinking that he should've been.

'Oh.' I'd mumbled, reverting into my usual shy self.

'I'm Gage, I live in the house next to yours.' He'd offered cheerily, trying to get me to smile. His prodding little way prompted me to give him my name.

'My name's Zoey.' I'd whispered, ducking my head again. I didn't like my eyes, they were a strange shade of grey that no one else had. I'd been made fun of for them, so I wore my hair down to cover them. I grew much more confident in my physical appearance later on, but I wasn't so good with that when I was smaller. At the time, I thought he'd never want to be friends with me, so I mumbled a quick 'Bye.' With that, I'd picked up my soccer ball and ran back to my new house. He didn't run after me. 

However, he didn't back off for long. Gage had pestered me for weeks after that, slowly nudging his way into my life. Eventually, I opened up a little bit, and it got to the point where we were almost joined at the hip. We did everything together. Some days, he was the only person I'd say a word to all day besides teachers, if they asked me a question. Gage was my rock. He was the only one I ever really let in. So I sighed, conceding that he was right about the book thing.

"I guess so. But come on, did that one dude really have to turn out gay? " I argued, my accent making a strong appearance. When I was upset, it came out a bit. And oh boy, did over the top 'romance books' make me upset.

"I think it's time to leave the library, Zoe. Crabby ole' Mrs. Dalca is giving us the eye." Gage leaned closer to me, not breaking eye contact with the grouchy librarian.

"Apparently, there's no good books, so I'll be reading Jane Austen, again." I lamented. No offence to the wonderful Miss Austen, but reading the same book every day got boring. No matter how absolutely perfect the book. She was the only author I'd found who did love any justice. So I just rotated books while hunting for more potential reads. I rarely found any.

I made some noise re-arranging books into the right series order- a bad pet peeve of mine. The ornery Romanian librarian shushed me, and some patrons looked up at me briefly. One slim, brunette girl eyed me for a moment longer than the rest. I blamed the hot guy next to me.

"I'm sure someday, Zoe, you'll find what you're looking for." Gage was staring down at me from his impressive 6'2 height, speaking cryptically. I looked over closely at my best friend, wondering what he meant. I was usually the one that made mysterious remarks.

"I wish I were as certain of that as you, Prince. Come on, to the impala we go." I sang, heading to the exit with a spring in my step. Gage followed me.

"Only you, Zoe, only you." Gage whispered, sounding oddly sad. I wasn't sure what he meant by that, but I decided to let it go rather than asking about it. We walked out arm and arm, and I instinctively felt the sensation of being watched.

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Comments and suggestions are always welcome!

~Rachael.