Changing Seasons

Rejection

Leslie walked into school with a sly smirk on her face. It was 2009 and she was in ninth grade. It was November, she had been in school just long enough to gain a label: The Nerd. She had glasses, braces, and a bad popularity status. But today was the day; she was gonna ask out her crush, a tenth grader, Justin Hall. He was perfect to her. He was six foot four and had dirty blonde hair. But he was popular and played football. Leslie walked to the courtyard of the school where Justin stood in the corner with two friends, talking and drinking coffee. Leslie confidently walked to him and smiled, "Hey, Justin, I was kinda wanting to talk to you." She said as she placed her hand on her hip. Justin stepped away from the brick wall he was leaning on and walked to the other side of the yard with the nerdy girl. He looked at her and sighed as he waited for her to speak. She found her words as she spoke, "So me and you usually talk in class a bit and I was just wondering if you'd like to go out for dinner tonight?" Justin chuckled and looked down at her. There was a plot scheming in his mind. He accepted the offer and walked back to his friends. Leslie did a silent cheer in her mind as she ran into the school to go to class. That day she could only imagine how amazing and fun her date with a football player would be. She went throughout school bragging about how he accepted her request. Some girls merely sneered, others giggled mischievously. At the school's end of day, Leslie walked out and walked home. It wasn't that far away. It was only a block or two away. She walked for maybe five minutes before she reached her house. Once there, she put on a dressy shirt and leggings. It was an outfit that would have shown off her curves, given that she had any. She pulled her hair into a fishtail braid and she slipped on some of her favorite brown leather boots. She looked in the mirror and smiled before walking downstairs to wait for her ride to her first date. After about thirty minutes, she heard a car horn. She walked outside to see Justin's shiny black Chevrolet had pulled up in her driveway. Leslie smiled and smoothed out her shirt with her hands before striding over to his car confidently. The sad thing though, is that once she saw the passenger side window roll down, all of her confidence left her body. There, in the front seat and holding Justin's hand, was Carmen Watters. Carmen was a cheerleader and a softball player. She had long, light brown hair that fell past her bottom and she had perfectly sun kissed skin. She could get any guy she wanted in the entire school, yet she wanted this one. Carmen just laughed as he looked at Leslie and rolled her eyes, "Did you honestly think that Justin would ever even think about dating you? Get real Les. He wants a woman; he doesn't want a little girl that keeps her nose in a book." Leslie felt the heat rise to her face. She couldn't believe it; she looked over to Justin, hoping this really wasn't what was happening. He just laughed and leaned over to let his lips connect with Carmen's right in front of Leslie. Carmen laughed and let him kiss her as Leslie began to cry. How could he treat her like this? Wouldn't a simple no have avoided all of this humiliation? She ran into her house and up the stairs. She opened the door to her room and ran in, slamming and locking the door before running and collapsing on her bed. She laid there for about an hour or so, crying and feeling so humiliated. Then, the worst sound She could hear at the moment rung in her ears. It was a notification ring. She pulled her mint green phone from her pocket to see the bright words flash: FACEBOOK: Carmen Watters tagged you in a video on Facebook. Leslie quickly slid her phone to unlock and saw it was a video shot from the car that was just at her house. It was the entire confrontation that just went on. Now everybody in school knew what happened. She never would live this down. The caption just said, 'Leslie Summers is thinking she can actually get a date with Justin lol. LOSER. 😂😂😂'. Leslie watched the video wth tears in her eyes. She threw the phone across the room and let it hit the wall with a thud. She laid on her bed and cried. She wasn't about to go back. He parents didn't love her enough to care if she was at school anyway. So who cares? She laid on her bed and slowly drifted off into sleep, one thought was on her mind. And that was that Leslie Summers would never be made fun of again. They'd all pay for making fun of her.