Tear In My Heart

5th Grade

You're sitting on a bench when he approaches you and you think that he doesn't know that you've seen him in the years leading but you have. He's wearing faded jeans and a striped shirt with his light hair hidden under a worn out baseball cap and you think to yourself that for an outfit so simple he looks very good. You used to watch him at recess and from your desk, you could see him through the windows in the doors across the hall and that had been going on until he finally got put into the challenge class with you during your fifth-grade year. His name is Lucas and he is the tallest one in your grade. He is missing a top tooth which makes you giggle because it makes his smile seem lopsided, and you talked to him once in the classroom when he asked you how his picture looked and once more in the cafeteria when he suggested that you get yogurt that comes with a granola bar instead of buying one for extra and not eating whatever meal you get, but that was it and you hadn't said another word to him until today when he sat beside you while you were reading Matilda and piped out a hello.

"Hello," you say awkwardly because you'd never really been good with friends or classmates. You don't do well with others and you dread group assignments, though having to make a poster on the Egyptians with Lucas doesn't seem that terrible at that second.

"Do you love me?" He speaks his words without hesitation, something making his eyes seem lighter as your face scrunches in confusion. Love? you ask yourself, Do I love him? You want to think no, and you know it is no, but a tiny part of you wants to say yes because he has freckles that you can count and you had never really wanted a new friend before seeing him and now you do.

"No. I hardly know you." You decide to answer truthfully before you go back to your book. Honesty is the best policy, you think before you grimace at the rhyme spoken by your school librarian when you see him once a week. "Well..." Lucas speaks again, shuffling for a second before he pulls a crisp ten dollar bill from his pocket. He makes a scene out of unfolding it and you try to hold back a smile but the only way to describe it is dorky and cute and that only makes you want to grin more. He sets it down in the tiny gap between you and slides it over, a smirk on his lips as he crushes it into the side of your dress. "Do you love me now?"

You pick up the money and you laugh a little, turning back to him. "For only ten dollars? Not even close," you tease and he laughs and you can't help but think that his laugh sounds like angels. He rolls his eyes and he completely turns his body before he talks again. "I think that ten dollars is more than enough," he starts, "but if you're really that pricey, I have a Snickers in my lunchbox with your name written all over it." You tell him that it's tempting and he says that after recess he'll get it for you and you guys can split it during reading groups. You agree before he turns again and swings his legs.

"My older cousin told me that this is...well...'how you get the ladies'," he explains, lowering his voice while his fingers hung in the air to represent quotes. "I told him I needed help because there was this girl in my class I wanted to talk to that I always see sitting alone, and, it was you, obviously, and so he told me that this always works on his lady friends and all the lady friends of Zeta Omega Mu and if I wanted a lady friend that I should use this method and I do want a lady friend- You- So if you'd want to be my lady friend that'd be super cool and really you should because he said that it always works."

He's rambling and you're laughing because he's talking so much he's almost out of breath and you'd really like to be his lady friend, whatever that means, so you tell him that and suddenly his face is red and he looks like all the air dragged out of him while he was babbling on was just pumped back into his lungs.

"Lucas Friar!" He announces before shoving his hand towards you.

You chuckle again and shake it. "Maya Hart."