Waiting To Blossom

Chapter 3

It scared Blossom. It was already Thursday and the feeling hadn't gone away. She smelled more things than usual that made the nausea come back. The dizziness too didn't go away and these days she felt a small headache every now and then. She prayed every night that her fear was incorrect, just to be sure. She didn't want to know, she could if she wanted to, but she didn't. She just wanted everything to go away. She didn't want to be in this situation. It takes time to let the mind know that there's no reason to stress and even if it knows it takes time before it actually goes away, right? There was still a possibility, right? Blossom brushed it off. She just didn't want to think of it anymore. 'Talk to me, Katie, say anything', she said desperate to Katie. Katie didn't seem to think it was weird of Blossom to ask that. 'Well about the party of Jay...' Blossom leaned back. 'Anything but that', she said. 'Hey you said anything.'
'Wasn't it the party of one of his friends?'
'That doesn't matter, we won't be there for any of his friends, well except it they're cute of course.' How could she be friends with her? They had so little in common. 'We won't be there for Jay either IF we're going at all.'
'So you haven't made up your mind yet?'
'Yes I have, I'm not going. You can go if you want it that bad.' Blossom had enough of talking about Jay, they didn't even speak before this at all, now every time she saw him pass by he said hello to her and even though it was kind Blossom did not appreciate it. 'You never have had any boy who talks to you, I thought you would be happy.'
How could she say that? Didn't her best friend know her at all?
'Don't you think there was a reason why nobody talked to me? Maybe because I didn't want to talk to them? I thought you knew me better than this.' Blossom noticed that she was getting fed up at Katie. That never happened before, how annoying, pushing or not understanding Katie could be. 'Okay sorry, I didn't want to upset you', Katie answered. Blossom rubbed in her eyes. 'I'm sorry Katie. I just don't like the idea of Jay getting involved with me. Different worlds, you know? He goes to parties, I study at home.' Katie nodded as if she understood. She looked nervous. 'What is it?' Blossom asked. 'Nothing. Well kind of something. I already promised Jay that we would come because I've kind of been matching you.' Katie looked guilty. Blossom knew that there was no such thing as fate. Katie had probably been talking to Jay behind Blossom's back all this time. The only reason that Jay is talking to her is probably because he thinks that she is madly in love with him. How embarrassing. Blossom took a deep breath and let all her negativity slide off her.
'Well, I guess that we have no other option then to go in that case', she answered with a sigh. 'So you're not mad at me?' 'No, I'm never mad at you.' Katie smiled and gave her a hug that squished Blossom. 'I'm so happy! This is going to be so much fun!' Blossom thought about it, would it really be fun?
While Blossom thought about that question while she was walking alone through the school halls, her mind wandered off to a different topic. Suddenly she was sure of one thing. All the fear and doubt inside of her could only go away if she did something about it. She needed to confront the person who possibly caused her all this trouble. She needed to feel that it was real and not just in her head. But how can someone confront their worst fear? Well she wasn't really that afraid of it anymore, maybe she blocked it out or maybe she just let it go. She was actually surprised that the fear had gone away a little, she didn't think that it would go away that fast.
If she was really going to do this, she needed to make a plan. Confronting the main suspect was already a burden, but confronting him where his friends also were was a little too over the top. There had to be a way she could get him alone. This sounded crazy, was she really going to do this? Maybe at night he would be alone. This really was craziness, but it was her only way to solve this. She couldn't tell it to anyone, not even to herself, before she would have confronted it first. She decided that she would sneak out of her house at night and go to where it all had started. But sneaking out of the house was another obstacle. Her parents were watching television in the living room. Blossom slowly walked down the staircase. With every small noise she made she stopped for a few seconds to hear if her parents had heard her. Somehow she made it down. Now she needed the keys. Her key for the front door were in her keyring with all her other keys. They were in a kitchen drawer and to come to the kitchen she needed to cross the living room. Why did she go through all the trouble of coming down the staircase so silently? She opened the door of the living room. 'Hey', she said to her parents. Her parents greeted her back. Blossom walked to the kitchen normally and grabbed a glass of water, as she filled the glass she opened the drawer and took her keys with as less sound as possible and put them in the pocket of her jeans. She shut the water, drank her glass and walked back. 'I'm going to sleep.'
'Goodnight', her mother answered. 'Sweat dreams', her father said. Blossom gave them both a hug and then walked out of the living room. She waited a few minutes to let her parents think she was already gone upstairs. She then quietly put on her jacket and her shoes and walked to the front door where she put the key through the lock. Blossom waited a few seconds and took a deep breath. Just two weeks ago she would never do something like this. She turned the key and slowly opened the door, she stepped outside and closed the door behind her with the same silence. Blossom smiled, she made it. She had to admit is was quite exiting to do this. With all the adrenaline she had inside of her, she ran until she was out of breath. The rest of the way she walked normally.
When she arrived at the scene she quickly hid in the bushes. Her calculations were right. The same group of boys were still standing there. Blossom looked carefully at every one of them. She remembered some of the faces, but one face she didn't see. She focused even more and then she saw him. She felt a sting in her stomach and her heart began to race. This was the boy she was looking for. He was smoking as if nothing was wrong, but everything was wrong. He was wrong. Blossom didn't know how long she had to wait until she could confront him, she didn't even know if she could do it at all, but she hadn't come this far to let it go. Just looking at them wasn't enough. She needed to look him in the eye and remember everything. Why am I doing this? That question ran through her head over and over again, even though she knew exactly why. A wave of nausea came over her, but this wasn't the time to surrender to it. She fought it until it calmed down a bit. It felt as if hours passed by. How long could these people stand in the cold at night? Speaking of which, Blossom hoped she wouldn't really get sick now, sitting on the floor at night, that couldn't be healthy. And then, finally, it happened. Some of the boys walked away and left three boys, including the one she was waiting for, behind. Maybe this was the moment she had been waiting for the whole night. Blossom wasn't sure if there would be another opportunity and she had waited long enough. She slowly stood up and walked, trembling, closer to the group. Her heart began to race as the moment she had to face him was getting closer. Suddenly she stood still. She couldn't do this. What was she even thinking? Coming here in the middle of the night to come to talk to some boy and do it all over again? Wasn't the first lesson enough? How could she think that this time it would be different? She wanted to turn around and run away as fast as she could, but she couldn't. She was frozen to the ground and looked at his back with big eyes. She was too close. The boy turned around and looked straight into her eyes. Her nausea came back as a grin appeared on his face. 'Look who's there', he said and the other boys looked up. Blossom felt a lump in her throat and thought about how she would die first. She tried to hide her fear. The boy slowly walked closer to her while his friends stayed where they stood. Blossom made a fist out of her hand and tried to calm down. This was what she wanted, to face her fear, right? Well, some fears are there for a reason, she concluded, not all fears should be faced. It was a bit unlucky that she didn't see that a bit earlier. Could she still run away? They would definitely catch up with her, but what if they didn't? The boy now stood right in front of her. Blossom didn't dare to look him in his eyes. Come on, Blossom, at least try to look at his eyes. Then your death wouldn't be all for nothing. Slowly Blossom looked up and stared at the boy's brown eyes. A sudden dizziness made her take a step back. She kept staring at his eyes. He is just a human like you, she told herself. Actually she found his eyes kind of charming, but that disgusted her and she quickly ignored that thought. 'You came back', he said with the same grin on his face. She tried not to throw up. He remembered her. It certainly had happen. He came even closer, but Blossom didn't look away. Is this enough confrontation? She thought. Is he going to-. Blossom's heart raced and tears slowly filled her eyes. But, although he was so close, he didn't do anything. He waited a few seconds, but then stepped back.
'What are you doing here?', he asked. Blossom didn't understand. Why did he talk to her? Why didn't he kill her or anything? Okay, maybe that was a little too extreme, but still. Blossom didn't respond. She couldn't even if she wanted to. They weren't friends, They were nothing that even came close to that. She hated him. But, although she didn't want to talk to him, she felt she needed to say something to feel that it was real. This was the final step. '...You', she said slowly. As she couldn't finish the sentence, she decided that this little word was enough for her. He opened his mouth to say something back, but before he could say anything Blossom's dizziness took the best of her and she lost conscious.
'What-', without thinking he caught her. He looked at her face and at her closed eyes. As she laid in his arms he remebered the first encounter they had. Then, he clearly wondered why he had caught her, because he quickly let go of her as if she were something really hot. The girl fell on the ground.