When Anna Met Josh

Chapter One - Another Heart Brake

I looked at the screen, and read the message over again.

Should I have sent it?

I nibbled my lip nervously, my hands trembled slightly. I'd loved him for months and now after all that time, I had finally worked up the courage to do something about it. Despite the fact that minutes earlier, he'd told me to "Fuck off".

My chest tightened as I saw dots in the corner of the screen that indicated that he was typing and my pulse began to beat like the dots did. This is the thing that I wanted more than anything in the world. I had never loved anyone like I had loved him. Everytime I passed him, I couldn't help but smile and get butterflies in my stomach. I frequently stole glances at him in classes, and he'd began to return them; looking away when I looked. I stuck up for him when my friends ridiculed him, saying that he was different from all the others. I was totally and completely in love with him. I thought he was perfect.

My phone pinged. It was him.

"I'm gay." was the response.

I stopped dead. All these months, loving him, thinking I maybe had a chance of being with him, and he wasn't even straight. I felt physically empty, like someone had come and ripped out my insides. Like I was missing a limb. Like my stomach was a bottomless pit.

He didn't love me. He didn't even like me. I thought that this time was going to be different, but it had ended up just like the rest. I'd been rejected again.

"Oh. Well we can still talk and be friends can't we?" I asked to try and relieve the awkwardness of the moment.

I turned my phone off, threw it across my room and flopped down on my bed as tears began to roll down my checks. I thought that I was so close to finally having someone to love, and who would love me. I thought that we'd be up all night talking and getting closer to each other and within a week we'd be the gossip of the school. I thought that within a fortnight we'd be lying in his bed, cuddling and watching movies. I thought that I was so close to having everything that I longed for. And I wasn't even remotely close.

I just wanted it all to end now. To go to sleep and never wake up. I'd definitely be the talking point of the school now; for all of the wrong reasons.

I picked my phone back up, still sobbing and opened my messages. He'd seen my text, but ignored it. I felt another blow to my stomach. He didn't even think enough of me to respond to that. Why did I think I had a chance? He'd declined my friends request, unfollowed me on Instagram and even after that I still thought that I had a chance with him.

I tired to calm down, and mesaged Milly;

"Meet me in the park.... Please" I typed, my hands still shaking.

"I'm out walking the dog, I'm here now" her reply was instant. I'd told all of my friends what I was planning to do. They were all on stand by.

I put my shoes on, grabbed my jacket and began walking towards the park. Milly, had been one of my best friends for the last five years, since we'd started high school and we'd been forced together after no one else we knew was put in our registration class. She wasn't someone that I'd normally choose for a friend; she was short - just under five foot - had short, cookie monster blue hair that stood spiked on end, various facial piercings and had a thing for heavy metal music, horror films and baking. We were the exact opposite of each other, but you get close to someone when you're with them, 7 hours a day, 5 days a week.