Totally Crushed

Chapter 1 _ Hearts and Flowers

SPIRIT WEEK, DAY 1 ---- Monday: Valentine's day

"Pretend you're me, looking at you." Jieun said over the phone. It was the first thing Monday morning and she'd me for a Spirit Week Outfit Check.

"We really should get videophones if we want to do this right," I said.

"Forget the videophones," Jieun said, "Now, look at yourself in the mirror. How many hearts do you see?"

What was this - Sesame Streets? I counted up the numbers of hearts on my clothes and jewelry. Two hearts earrings, plus at least six hearts on my belt, plus dozens on my red-and-white top . . . can't forget my socks . . . yikes. Too many to count.

"Suzy?" Jieun said. "I don't like that silence. If it takes you this long to count up your hearts, you're wearing to many."

" I thought I was restraining myself," I said. But I knew she was right.

Lee Jieun, my best friend, is the practical type. She always goes for comfort over style. Normally, I'm the one prodding her - ever so gently - to kick it up a notch, fashion wise.

But Valentine's Day is my weakness. And this year was a double whammy: Valentine's Day happened to fall on the first day of Spirit Week. The theme for the day was Red and White. We were actually required to wear valentine-inspired clothes. The invitation to turn myself into a walking valentine was more than I could resist.

If there's one day holiday I'm prepared for, it's Valentine's Day. I love hearts and flowers, and my wardrobe shows it. I have a closet full of red and white, sprinkled with a liberal dash of pink and a touch of sky blue. I've got heart t-shirts, heart sweaters, heart dresses, a heart tote bag, and so much heart jewelry I could open my own store. I'd called it: I Heart Jewelry.

"Suzy," Jieun said. "Take off at least one heart garment now. Remember what Jinyoung told you last year? Girls like hearts. Boys are scared of them."

"Last year? Jieun, I told you never to mention last year to me again."

"Come one, Suzy." Jieun said. "You've got to get over the Gongchan thing. You cant spend the rest of your life refusing to speak about tenth grade."

"I don't see why not."

[[[[ Tenth grade was torture. I had a major crush on this totally cute boy named Shik Gongchan. But he barely knew I existed. So last year on Valentine's Day I decided to make sure he couldn't ignore me any longer. I had a Brilliant Plan.

I decided to send him a valentine. I made it myself - a huge red lace heart covered with smaller hearts. It was a big as Gongchan's head and much . . . heart-ier.

At first I planned to send him the valentine anonymously, but then I realized that might not help me win Gongchan over. I f he didn't know who I was, how would he realized his undiscovered crush on me? So I decided to sign the card. But I wanted it to be perfect, so I practiced my signature about a thousand times before I sign the card. I wrote Suzy Suzy Suzy over and over again until my hand hurt. After practicing for hours I had a lovely, grown-up-looking signature, the kind my father uses when he signs a check. A big swooping S followed by a long squiggle. An illegible squiggle seemed much more sophisticated than clear-as-day grade-school block printing. And so I signed the beautiful Valentine. It looked tres chic.

The next day I went to school early and taped the valentine on Gongchan's locker. Then I went around the corner and waited for him to find it. Jieun found me hiding there.

"What are you doing?" She asked me.

"Waiting to surprise Gongchan." I pointed to the huge valentine I'd struck on his locker.