Let Me Count the Ways

 Author's Note: This is just a story I started and have no idea exactly where it's going. I hope you enjoy it anyway. I wirte a lot so there will always be plenty for you to read. :)

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 I have loved you since dinosaurs roamed the earth, since the beginning of time, since the day I met you. I love you more than Romeo loved Juliet. I love you more than the dark hates the light. I love you more than the sun is hot, Antarctica is cold, or the sky is blue. I love you around the world a million times, to the core of the earth, and across the galaxies. I will love you until the seas dry, until it snows in the Sahara, until pigs fly.

                    Love, Your Not So Secret Admirer

                                                                              ~^-^-^-^-^~

 I read the note several times before tucking it into the pocket of my jacket. This one had been hidden in the rosebush by my front door. The day before, the note was taped on the bottom of my school lunch tray. Every day there was a new note. Every day it was in a different place. Each note was signed "Your Not So Secret Admirer." After four months of finding the notes, I still had no idea who they were from. 

 I had started receiving the notes on the first day of school. At first, I'd notice them once or twice a week. But then I started looking for them. I realized there was one each and every day without fail. Each day, the notes were a little different. That day, the theme was metaphors. One day, it had been a haiku. Another, it was lyrics to a song, or a quote from a movie. I had started saving them and had a shoebox full of them.

 It was the last day of school before Christmas break. I wondered if I'd still get them over break and I decided to be on the lookout for who was giving me the notes.

 My thoughts were interrupted by my best friend. "Clarabelle!"

 I sighed. Honestly, couldn't I have one moment to think to myself? "Yes, Persephone?"

 Persephone's parents were Greek mythology buffs. Her dad taught at the local college and her mother was a patron of the arts. She breathed old musty artifacts and stories. So, of course, their children were Persephone, after the goddess of the underworld (cheerful, right?), Hercules (you should know who he is), and Iris, goddess of the rainbow. I think Iris got the better end of the name deal.

Persephone was my age and I had known her since her family moved next to me. Despite her unfortunate name, she was a great friend, kind, cheerful, fun to be around, and definitely not "goddess of the underworld" material.

 Persephone was arguably goddess material, though. She was, as all the boys put it, stunning. Honestly, she could be Aphrodite's long lost sister. Her straight black hair cascaded perfectly down her back, all the way to her hips. She had long black eyelashes and bright, almost piercing, green eyes that glittered entrancingly. She was thin and could pull off anything from a volleyball uniform to sweatpants. She had boys around her everyday, multiple people asking her to dances, countless invitations to parties, that I was graciously allowed to tag along with her to, and love letters and flowers almost every day.

 I, on the otherhand, was more likely related to Athena. I was definitely more intelligent than beautiful. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying I was ugly. I was just not Aphrodite material, like Persephone. I had wavy darker blond hair and hazel eyes that didn't quite attract attention like Persephone's. I was athletic and active, but not nearly as skinny. But I was smart. I could not only memorize academic things and useless information, but I was also intuitive. I knew when someone was angry and how to calm them down, when someone was sad and how to cheer them up, and when someone had a secret, exactly the right way to get them to tell.

 That was one of the many reasons the notes were driving me insane.