LOVE WITHOUT SLEEP

THE CHAPTER 1

It started when we were sixteen. Young, and fragile at the mind. Not weak, yet blind. With our only worries being if we looked cool enough, and who was dating who...looking back, it wasn't too bad. That being in comparison to the worries I would later face...such nonsense harbored our minds from reality, which was soon to pull us in and never let go. We liked the sense of escapism, though we took it for granted.

My hair was ghastly, it was dyed jet black, and cut short to my shoulders. My bangs fell over my face so much, that I always had to hold them aside in order to allow myself sight. It was the only thing my parents would allow me change about my appearance...and even barely that.

George and I road our bikes through the streets of Macclesfield. I followed close behind, struggling to hear him as the chilled wind gushed passed my ears with every pedal. He looked back at me, his brown medium length hair blowing swiftly...and then I knew. It had absolutely nothing to do with anything he said or the moment at all, for he was going on about his band he was part of with a couple of school mates...but I knew, I was in love with him.

I was in love with his voice, in love with his smile. In love with his laugh and in love with his mind. I guess he could be quite immature, just like all the rest of the boys in year eleven...but, he was the only boy who understood me.

I nodded as he laughed, with no idea of his last words due to my own thinking. I faked a quick laugh myself as he slowed down. I looked around for any reason of why as he climbed off his bike and walked with it. I continued to ride mine, slowly as we approached a group of guys.

"George, hey man." A boy with dark hair turned around at the sight of the other's eyes wandering over to us. Overhearing his last words being that he was stoned out of his mind, I began to bring down my posture a bit. I couldn't look too prim or annoyingly posh...

"Hey." George said, "whats up, what are you doing down here?" He asked, looking over to the others who waved. Both were taller than the one he spoke too.

"We were just about to smoke a little, d'you want to join? Dank." He raised a brow with a crooked smirk.

"Uh," I remember the way George looked back at me as he said it. As if I wasn't supposed to know what I already did...that he got high with his friends all the time. I shrugged slowly, allowing a smile to spread across my face.

He turned back to the boys, "alright, sure. This is Jude," he pointed to me as I climbed off my bike. My name is actually Judith...he called me Jude because of my favorite song by The Beatles. "And Jude this is Matty, Adam, and Ross."

I waved shyly, looking at them. I'd always heard about them from George, and I'd seen them around, especially since he spent so much time with them during school lately...the fun of our school's music program being the only thing keeping them from ditching.

"Hey Jude," said Ross as he pushed his hair aside slightly, before digging his hands into his coat pocket.

I smiled, feeling awkward. Their hellos were welcoming, yet there stood a barrier between me and them. That barrier being that I didn't belong. I always associated myself with school mates who also went to the same church as my family...and they recognized me as being part of that crowd...and that crowd, shunned anyone unlike them.

I wasn't like those kids though...at the time, I hated church. I hated the theory of God. I hated everything about my Christian religion and what I felt was a false faith. I had my reasons, and the reasons hurt. Far more than anything else in my life and to my knowledge.

"Is she your girlfriend?" Matty asked, looking around as he pulled out a white rolled paper from the pocket of his gray hoodie.

"Yeah." He said, "Jude's cool. She's like me a bit." He added. They soon went on into discussion about their music teachers and what they should learn to play next.