On Purpose

Chapter 7:

I found myself in the library that morning, in my familiar chair, reading books who's feelings wouldn't change.

Leaving my phone at home on purpose, I didn't tell Riley where I was going. I wanted to be alone.

Or at least I thought so.

What I really wanted was for Riley to run in the door and kiss me and say he was looking for me everywhere and he missed me so much but I knew that would never happen.

My teenage fantasies were a waste of time.

I glanced back down at the book I had started early this morning, I was 3/4s of the way through, and it was good.

Being a romantic comedy, it was expected. I had chosen it but only because it was next in the stack of books I had picked out earlier this summer.

In the book, the girls best friend was a boy and they had been best friends their whole life, and the boy had a crush on the girl, but the girl liked the popular boy. It reminded me vaguely of pretty in pink, and the situation I was in.

They always chose the popular ones, and left the best friends in the dust.

Always.

I was angry at myself for caring so much about Riley.

I couldn't and wouldn't admit that I liked him because even if I did, it wouldn't matter.

He liked Laura. He was probably hanging out with her right now, laughing and smiling and calling her beautiful and kissing her.

My heart throbbed at the idea.

The book was slowly dying out and anybody who was anybody could've predicted the ending, she left the best friend in the dust.

I turned behind me and reached for the next book in the stack, it was a mystery, I silently thanked god it wasn't another romantic novel. The last thing I wanted to do was cry myself to sleep two nights in a row.

When Riley had dropped me off last night, I had jumped out of the car with a simple goodnight and walked swiftly into my house, tears falling before the front door had even opened.

And the tears hadn't stopped until I woke up this morning, and realized I couldn't stand to see Riley again, not because I didn't want to see him but because I had no explanation for why I had cried all night about him.

I was supposed to like Logan.

Speaking of Logan, he finally got back to me, but in a text message instead of a call. The text read, 'Hey baby, how about a movie tonight?'

I probably wouldn't have agreed seeing as it had almost been a week and a half, but the baby part won me over. And I wasn't gonna lie, I needed to get my mind off of Riley before it killed me.

Glancing up at the walk clock, I took in the time as 3:40 and set the mystery book I had just picked up, back down. I stood up and left the library, then started my walk home.

As I walked in the front door, no one was waiting for me, as expected, but deep down I wished somebody had cared to notice my absence.

I made my way up the stairs and into my room. Changing out of my jeans and into a dress this time, to make sure Logan was happy.

The dress was light pink and complemented my hair and skin tone nicely. I pulled on a pair of white wedges before walking over to my phone, which was right where I had left it.

I opened to the home screen to find 5 messages, one from Logan,

'Okay babe, see you at 4:30.'

One from Dylan,