Moon Struck

Chapter 4

The next morning I wake up, and all I can think about is my new decision: I will stop calling my sister when I have panic attacks, so I won’t wound anyone besides myself. Its like I’m a volcano; I sit silently for a long time until one day I have no patience with the conflicts I’m surrounded by and I’ll burst, harming all the people I love. Then they’ll see the real me: vengeful, virulent, and vicious.

After lying in bed for what seems like hours, I decide to dismiss myself, finding out that I am home alone. Usually when this happens, I turn on my laptop and watch the latest episodes from the innumerable shows that I watch while cozying in my duvet and fastening Winston to my fragile body like a car seat. Winston was my teddy bear that I bought from ‘Build A Bear’ a while back, but he meant much more than that to me. It’s something about his flocculent mocked fur or his humanitarian eyes that made me feel acknowledged; he made me feel like I wasn’t alone, like someone was relying on me, unlike anyone does or ever has or ever will. So I decided to take Winston outside the room that shielded him from the dangers of reality and to sit downstairs and make myself some breakfast. Today I felt remorseful yet uncommonly positive because from now on, I wouldn’t hurt Sarah anymore but it would also mean that I would be hurting to an extent by breaking the crucial promise I owed to her.

Thinking profoundly throughout my meal, I finally made it to the last bite of burnt toast and I decide to talk a walk around the neighborhood. I put on my unvarnished shoes and set off for another way to waste time in this game we call life. As I leave the walls separating ‘home’ from the real world I feel free, almost like turtles hatching and being released back into the tranquil ocean. Here, I am a person that no one knows, a person that people wouldn’t have any opinion about: I could be someone new. Walking through the drastic heat wave that crushed against me, I stumbled upon a boy. He was no ordinary boy; his eyes were oceanic blue, like a sapphire crystal sparkling in the blazing sunshine, his messed up hair was dirt coloured and his muscular body managed his bike with strength until he stopped abruptly.

“Excuse me but is that book you’re holding ‘The Kite Runner’?” He says, removing his earphones from his ears hurriedly. His voice was masculine, not the awkward and breaking kind that occurred during the stage of puberty.

“Well, yes actually it is.” I say, almost forgetting that I was carrying that book.

“I really love that book, the way that Khaled Hosseini writes,” he says, smiling at me as if I were a gem; the opposite of what I really am.

“- At the end of the book he leaves you smiling yet brokenhearted,” we both say at the same time, and I let out a laugh that I hadn’t truly meant for a long time.

“You have a really nice laugh, you know that?” he says, followed by a smirk.

“Thanks but I really don’t”

“Don’t deny that, and you should really laugh more often, it really flaunts your good book taste” he giggles and chains his bike to the lamppost we were stood by.

“How do you know that I don’t laugh often?” I ask.

“I live right down the road. This may seem creepy, but I see you walk around all the time, and a lot of the time you don’t seem like the happiest person in the world but you do seem like the prettiest.”

“I bet you tell that to all the girls, don’t you?”

“Frankly, I’m not that kind of boy, but I’ll leave you to decide that for yourself.”

“Hmm.. Well I better go, um - I think my mom wants me back now.” I say, already walking.

“I highly doubt that, your mom left a while back for work, and don’t deny that.”

“And how would you know that?”

“Well I heard her leave this morning. Melissa, I don’t think you understood that I do live opposite you, and I can hear that damn garage door opening every morning.”

“Well then what do you want me to say, because clearly you know everything about me already?”

“All I know is that you’re a beautiful girl with a good book taste. I know that you’re not the best at sneaking out, I know that you point your own flaws out too much, and I know that you really want this conversation to end so why should I end it?”

I don’t reply.

“My names Jason by the way, and we are going for a walk.” Without letting me answer, he reaches out his rather large and stained hands and slips them into my minuscule, spotless and delicate hands.

For once after a long time, my sadness hadn’t controlled my actions; we walked and smiled and shared laughter between cups of coffee and not once did I feel like a burden, because to Jason I wasn’t the strange and quiet girl; I was the beautiful girl with a reputable taste in books.