The Same Mistakes Club

Chapter Three

I felt lost.  I needed to hide away.  Escape.

There was only one thing I could do to ease the pain.  I turned to the only five guys who'd never let me down.  The only five guys who'd never broken my heart, who'd never disappointed me.

Zayn, Liam, Louis, Harry, and Niall.

Anybody who has ever clung to a song like a musical life raft will understand.  Or put on a song to bring out an emotion or memory.  Or had a sountrack playing in their head to drown out a conversation or a scene.

As soon as I got back to my room, devastated by Kevin's rejection, I turned up the volume so loud on my stereo that my bed began to shake.  One Direction had always been my security blanket.  They were a part of my life.

Now, I tried to drown out Kevin's words.  While I did, I reached for my journal.  The leatherbound book felt heavy in my hands, the years of emotion inside weighing it down.  I opened it up and scanned the entries, most of them filled with 1D lyrics.  To anybody else, it would seem like nonsensical associations, but to me, the lyrics meant so much more than their words.  Snapshots of my life: the good, the bad, and the boy-related.

So much heartache.  I started to scan my past relationships.

Daniel Walker, senior and, according to Margaret, a "major hottie."  We dated for four months at the beginning of sophomore year.  Things started out decent enough - if your definition of decent was going to the movies and then for pizza every Friday night with every other couple in town.  Eventually, Dan started to mistake me for this character in the movie Almost Famous.  She was a glorified groupie, so Dan got it in his thick head that if he played "Little Things" on the guitar, I would give up.  I quickly learned: Looks does not a decent guitar player make.  Once Dan realized my pants were staying on, he changed his tune.

Then there was Derek Simpson, who I was pretty sure only dated me because he thought my pharmacist mother could get him drugs.

Darren McWilliams wasn't much better.  We started dating right before this summer's Kevin-craziness set in.  He seemed like a sweet guy, until he started hanging out with Kendal Boris, who happened to be a good friend of mine.  He ended up double booking us for the same day.  Little did he realize we would compare our calendars.

Daniel, Derek, and Darren - and that was only sophomore year.  I was cheated on, lied to, and used.  The lesson I'd learned?  To stay away from guys whose first name began with the letter D, since they were all the Devil.

Maybe Kevin's real name was Dante the Destroyer of Dreams. Because he was ten times worse than the three Ds combined.

I put the journal down.  I was mad at Kevin, yes.  But mostly I was furious with myself.  Why did I let myself do it?  What did I get out of any of these relationships besides a broken heart?  I was smarter than that.  I should've known better.

Did I really want to keep getting used?  Was there anybody out there who was worth it?

I'd thought Kevin was, but I was wrong.

I got up to call Margaret - misery needed her company - when something caught my eye.  I went over to One Direction's first album, Up All Night, and looked over the songs on the back.

What Makes You Beautiful... looking over..... Taken... looking over.... I Want... hah! so inappropriate... Same Mistakes...

Two words separated from the list, and I saw something completely new inside.

Same

Mistakes

And that's when it happened. Something about those words. Something about the lyrics.

"We're making all the same mistakes..."

The Same Mistakes Club

In theory, it may have sounded depressing.  But there wasn't anything depressing about the music.

No, this Same Mistakes Club was the opposite of depressing.  It was alive.

The answer had been in front of me all along.  There was a way to stop getting cheated on, lied to, and used.

I would stop torturing myself by dating loser guys.  I would enjoy the benefits of being single.  I would, for once, focus on me.  Junior year would be my year.  It would be all about me, Alissa Elizabeth Madison, sole member and founder of The Same Mistakes Club.