The Sun's Too Bright

Three

🎵Jack and Diane: John Mellencamp

High school...

"Cause the sun's too bright, the sky's too blue. The beer's to cold to be thinking 'bout you."

I sing along to Kenny Chesney, tapping my hands on the dashboard of Jack's Jeep. I look over at him and he has a big smile on his face.

I turn the radio down. "What?"

"Nothing." He says, but he can't hide the grin.

"Are you making fun of me?" I ask, a smile appearing on my face.

"No, you're just really cute when you're singing."

"Yeah, sure." I poke him in the arm.

"And I'm laughing at the fact that you're a horrible singer." He laughs.

"There it is." I roll my eyes. "You know, if you weren't driving, I would hit you right now."

"Bet," He looks at me out of the corner of his eye. I huff, crossing my arms and sitting back in the passenger seat.

By the time we get to school, I'm still mock pouting.

"Oh come on you goof, we're going to be late for school." He looks at me, grinning.

I try feign my laughter, but I fail at it. "You piss me off sometimes Jack Morrison. Since when do you care about being late?"

"I don't, but you do Diane Walters."

It's true. I get anxious whenever Jack picks me up late for school. He however, doesn't give a crap. Jack's always been easygoing in that way. I envy him for that.

I get out of the car and smooth down my uniform skirt. Jack whistles as if he's checking me out. I roll my eyes at him as a grin appears on my face.

We walk into Our Lady of Mount Carmel High School, the same place we've been going to for four years. It's almost the end of senior our year, meaning that the weather's nice and everyone's ready for summer.

We walk up to our friend group, consisting of the guys from the football team and my two best friends, Claire and Jenna.

The boys all mess around and we laugh along with them. It's these times that I feel the most happy. In our own little bubble.

The school bell bursts that bubble and we all head off in our separate ways. Jack hugs me goodbye and I head off to first period, biology.

I doodle in my notebook as my teacher gives a lecture. It's just a bunch of flowers, nothing special, but I'm obviously not paying attention, unlike the other kids in my class who are sitting around me, scratching down notes.

"Miss Walters."

I look up. "Yes?" I bat my eyelashes.

"What were the seven properties associated with life? I just went over it."

There was no chance that I heard anything that she was talking about, but like always, I know the answer. "Order, reproduction, growth and development, energy processing, response to stimuli, and regulating evolutionary adaption."

She nods her head and continues on with the lecture and I continue on doodling.

When the bell rings, signaling the end of class, my teacher asks me to stay back.

"Miss Walters, you show success any time you actually apply yourself in the lesson. You and I both know that. Why are you pretending that you don't care?"

I shrug my shoulders and stare at the floor.I get good enough grades to achieve straight A's,  but nothing extraordinary. The truth is, my plan, our plan, mine and Jack's, is that he'll go to college for football and I'll go with him. I'd rather not show people that I'm special because then my parents will expect more from me.

"I think you've got something special and I think it's a real shame that you won't show it to the world."

I nod my head, still looking at the floor tiles and she waves me away in dismissal.

The rest of the morning is terribly uneventful. I head to lunch with Jenna, who's babbling about some new guy from a different school. In truth, she can't get over Luca, a guy in our friend group, Jack's best friend, who broke up with her last year. The two of them were completely bipolar. One minute, they were all lovey-dovey and the next, they would be in a huge fight over something stupid. The dumb fights got to be too much for them and they broke up. She was devastated and now, she fills the void with random hookups.

We approach our lunch table, during the warm months, senior are able to eat outside, and I sit down next to Jack. He kisses me on the cheek and continues his conversation with one of his friends.

When he's finished with his conversation, he turns to me. "How was your day?"

I'm not going to tell him about my conversation with my biology teacher. If there's anyone who knows how smart I am, it's Jack. He thinks I'm crazy to follow him to Missouri State instead of going to a school ranked highly for academics.

"Better now." I smile at him as he puts his arm around me.

After school, Jack and I decide that we're going to study for a history test back at my house. As I open the door to my house, I groan, hearing my parents fighting upstairs. Jack gives me a weary look and I shrug. He knows how bad it sometimes gets between my parents.

"Mom, Dad, I'm home."

The fighting continues.

"Jack's over too."

That shuts them up.

My mom's the first to walk down the stairs. "Hi sweetie, how was your day?"

She acts like nothing was happening before I got home, but I know that fake smile all too well.

"Fine." I respond.

She nods. "Jack, honey can I get you anything to eat or drink."

"No thanks Mrs. Walters, I'm good right now."

My mom smiles at him. You see, Jack's from Georgia. His family moved here when he was in eighth grade. Boys have this thing when they come from the south that they can charm any woman. He claims he never did it on purpose, except to catch my attention.

Jack and I walk upstairs. Out of the corner of my eye, I see my dad punch the bed in frustration. I ignore it and continue to my bedroom.

I shut the door behind Jack and rub my temples. It's honestly getting harder and harder to ignore whatever's going on between my mother and father.

It was a lot easier to ignore it when my older brother, Nate was at home. He's an optimistic, happy person, similarly to Jack. He would brush it off whenever my parents fought. The two of them were high school sweethearts, he'd say. If they could get through high school, two kids, and whatever else life threw their way when they were young together, they could get over whatever they're fighting about. These days, it's getting harder and harder to see that young love between them.

"What was it about?" Jack asks as he sits down on my bed.

I sit down next to him and he slides his arm around my waist. I rest my head on his shoulder. "I have no idea."

Ever since my mom and dad started fighting regularly like this, they've kept me in the dark about a lot of stuff. That kind of makes it harder to deal with.

I pick my head up and look at Jack. I do this a lot where I just look at him and appreciate the beautiful boy I call mine.

"What?" He asks, grinning.

"Nothing."