it's complicated.

chapter one

My name is Lauren. I'm a tenth grader in Cadence Middle School, CMS. My friends always ask me who my crush is. The thing is I don't have a crush. My friend, Brooklyn, is dating a boy named Brandon. He has dirty blonde hair, green eyes, and he's the captain of the school's football team. Brandon's a total catch. Brooklyn and I have been friends since elementary school. We started hanging out in then fourth grade when we were learning how to play volleyball. I'm not exactly the athletic type, but Brooklyn really got me into it. Now we play on the school's volleyball team together. Adriana and Jennifer, my two other friends, aren't dating anyone. They do have is a massive crushes though. Adriana has a crush on this boy named Nick. He's a total book nerd, but then again so is she. He has brown hair, blue eyes, and thick black glasses. Jennifer won't tell me who her crush is. She said that I have to tell her who I like to get her to tell me who she likes, but I don't like anyone, so I guess I won't be knowing anytime soon. Cristina is another good friend, and she is dating a boy named Nate. He has blonde hair, hazel eyes, and freckles covering his face. I hate to be rude, but Nate isn't exactly the trustworthy kind of guy. Nate has dated so many girls and cheated on so many of them and I don't think Cristina realizes that she's going it get hurt. We all met in volleyball, and we are extremely close. We know everything about each other without a doubt, but sometimes, I think we know too much.
It was fifth period. Lunch time. We all sat together, like always. "Who do you like?" Brooklyn asked, winking at me. I rolled my eyes. "Nobody! Won't you give it a rest?" Adriana laughed and looked at Jennifer, and then Jennifer started to laugh. "What?" I asked, I was really frustrated. "We all know that you like Shawn, Lauren." Adriana said smirking. Shawn was in all of my classes last year. He has blonde hair, blue eyes, and is super sporty. Shawn was genuinely nice, and he always sat next to me in classes. Then I finally found out that he had a crush on me. It was pretty obvious, but I didn't really notice. "Just because he liked me doesn't mean that I like him, gosh you guys drive me crazy." Jennifer just shook her head in disagreement. "He's in my seventh period class I'm going to talk to him." My face turned bright red, I don't want her to talk to him. It's not that I secretly do like him, it's just if she says anything about me then he will get embarrassed. I would feel horrible. "Don't you dare!" I said as I took a bite of my sandwich. "Why? Because you like him?" Brooklyn added in. "No! It's just- never mind." Adriana laughed and took a bag if Cheez-It's out of her lunch pal. "Guys you really should leave Lauren alone, I mean if she isn't going it admit that she likes Shawn that's her problem." Cristina chimed in. My face flushed red with anger and embarrassment. Mrs. Larkowski walked by our lunch table and told us it was time to clean up. We all stood up and started to walk to the garbage cans, to throw our garbage away. Randomly they all starting giggling like crazy. I looked to my left and there he was. Shawn. Shawn and I were walking side by side. Gosh, I knew this wasn't going to end well. "Uh, hey?" Shawn smiled one of those cute half smiles, well it'd be cute if I liked him anyway. "Hey." I nodded and noticed my cheeks starting to flush a pinkish red. Why did I always get so uncomfortable around Shawn? Last year I was fine... "Um, uh.. How's has day been?" Shawn intrupts my thoughts. "It's been-" Suddenly Jennifer rushes over and inturpts our conversation, and to be honest our conversation was going pretty well. "Hi Shawn," Jennifer quickly glances over at me and continues, "let's talk seventh period, kay?" I quickly waved Shawn a simple goodbye and threw away my garbage, then practically ran to sixth period, there was no way I was waiting for them to taunt me about Shawn.
Sixth period always goes by too fast. Sixth period is my favorite class, not just because I love art, but because I get some peace. No Shawn. No one to taunt me about Shawn. No one to embarrass me about Shawn. Does everything in my life revolve around Shawn? As sixth period was getting closer and closer to ending, I started dreading seventh period more and more. I would say seventh period is the worst period ever. First of all, Jennifer and Cristina have a class alone with Shawn. Second of all, I'm in a class with Adriana and Nick. All she does is gush over Nick the whole time, I wish she would just date him already. And lastly, Brooklyn is in a class with all of Shawn's friends. Brooklyn is the only friend that listens to me about Shawn, but that doesn't mean anything really. She still brings up Shawn everyday, taunting me about him and whatever she can do to get on my nerves. Then, interrupting my thoughts, the bell rings repeatedly and I quickly gather up my things and rush to the worst part of my school day.