Jane Austen Lied

Mike

Returning to Our Lady was hard, there was the friend that no one had seen in a long while that returned to school and was loved by everyone, then there was Esse. Still new and still no one liked her. She figured having bangs cut would freshen up her look and that would at least be more pleasing to the other students. Sadly, it wasn't even noticeable to her classmates. It was still the same routine. Her ongoing problem of being the "new girl" seemed tiresome and vivid dreams of Nick haunted her while she slept. She saw that same expression of him trying hard not to notice her at the dance. Sometimes, she dreamed that he was still arguing with Casey and Lance M. about who she really loved and who was the better bachelor. They made her want to cry, as often as she crossed paths with them in public or online. Their faces only brought sadness and a longing for their embrace. As much as she hated to admit it, her feelings for Casey were still strong. She wept bitter tears for him and wished that he wanted her as much as she wanted him. Her heartache turned to hurt and the hurt he gave was the worst of all. If being hated and having heartache were on two sides of the same scale, the mass would be even for both of them. There was not one that had a greater impact, or at least not that she could tell. Trying to explain that to Annie was a little hard to bring up when all she cared about were boy bands and Esse's older brother Lance. She seemed to have an obsession with him and trying to break past that wall was like breaking through bedrock. Still, Annie couldn't hear her even after that amount of force. Her twin brother Mike seemed to take interest in her feelings and often challenged her to videogame battles. She won most of the time since they involved racing or melee battles and he complimented her on her skill for finding all the special techniques. He was a prime gentleman at their age, but her heart was mourning three boys. Esse thought it was time to focus on more important things since she was soon to be 15 and she would be starting high school in half a year.

In any sense, it would keep her mind off of guys and she would be getting better grades in Algebra. That was something she lacked talent in and needed a dramatic change in if she wanted to pass the 8th grade. It became hard when Annie invited her after school every weekend to play video games and a sleepover followed every month. Mike always interrupted their schedule for a brief battle that she thought none of for a moment. Then things started to get strange. He wanted to converse with her about similar topics and ask for more faceoffs in games. Their every so often relationship became well acquainted and after each encounter, he would give her a smug grin. The kind that seemed equally charming and cocky. He would even come up behind her and tug on her hair. It made her angry since it was something one of her uncles used to do when they were younger. He often asked for her at school according to Lance and kept saying that he was going to beat her at some point. It wasn't hard for her family to start noticing that he spoke of her often. By then her siblings began to poke fun at her every time the name Mike came up. It got to the point that Uncle Mort decided to have in on the joke and by then Esse had about had it. Unfortunately, it didn't stop there. Lance started inviting his friends over from high school and to no surprise, Mike was also present among the group. There was Colby who she thought was sort of cute in a shy kind of way, Nathan an obnoxious mega nerd that was very friendly, Jake who was shockingly taller than her brother Lance, but only stared at her from time to time and refused to talk to her and of course Annie's brother Mike. Each time the group came over for boy's night Mike would grin and shoot her a wink before making his way downstairs with the other four. It made her face flush in an irritated manner as her younger siblings poked fun. It was time to retreat to her bedroom and draw something to keep her mind at ease. She had a lot to think about since her fifteenth birthday was drawing near among other things. Aside from teasing, the thing that stressed her out more was algebra. Math galore stared at her from her desk with a few unanswered questions involving fractions. On it was scribbles of formulas that wound up inconclusive and had a bunch of question marks by it. How she wished she could ask Lance or her dad for help, but doing that was as easy as pulling teeth.