Lefty's ✓

two.

June

My favorite part about Lora was how easy it was talk to her. Or at least how little she responded when I rambled on and on about something that didn't even matter. My obliviousness to her ignorance only fueled the fire even more. Me not caring whether she did or not made her believe that being a shitty person was okay. It wasn't.

Being loved has never been my forte. Something about me screams "treat me like crap!". I've never understood why countless relationships of mine end up spiraling into the dirt. I always think they'll be different, but they never are.

Lora is only one of the many examples I have of failed relationships. There's nothing I have that others guys don't. There's nothing I have that girls want instead of me. I'm not rich or popular; there's nothing they'd want to take from me. So what's the reason? Why can't someone love me?

____

"Have you looked around yet?" my dad asks.

I nod my head while keeping my focus on the plate in front of me. In reality, I went to the cafe and nowhere else after that. To me, there was no need.

Melissa caught my eye the minute I saw her. Her ability to capture me made everyone else in the room disappear and I hoped that would happen again in the future.

So I did what any logical teenage boy would do: I asked Melissa about herself to hopefully get to know her. We had talked for a few minutes and she told me all about herself, or as much as there seemed to be. Her life didn't seem very interesting and the way she talked monotonously made it more believable. To me, the more emotion in your voice, the more emotion you've experienced. The bland way she talked was merely a symbol for how she lived.

Apparently Melissa has two younger brothers. To her, they mean everything. Those two boys are the deepest piece of information I got out of her. Never once was there a smile on her face until she brought them up; Ethan and Luke. Nevertheless, the smile small, her lips barely turning up. Her brothers love baseball and she always has to drive them to practice, which I can tell she secretly doesn't mind.

"Son, get out of that head of yours and answer my question." Dad yells.

I lift my head from the table to look up at him. His arms are crossed over his body like a guard. The deep wrinkles in his face seem to become more and more defined the longer he looks at me. The anger in his face slowly mixes with concern as he awaits my answer.

"What was the question? Sorry," I say.

Dad shakes his head and leans back on the counter, his back digging into the cold, stone counter.

"Have you met anyone yet?" He says. "Any friends you might want to invite over once the house is finished?"

"We just moved here, Dad," I say. "Give me at least a week to make some friends."