Ugly Love(6)

Me: New girl enrolled today. Senior.
Ian: Is she hot?
Me: Haven’t seen her yet. About to walk her to class.
Ian: Take a picture if she’s hot.
Me: Will do. BTW, how many times have you had detention this year?
Ian: Twice. Why? What’d you do?
Twice? Yeah, I need to rebel it up a little before graduation. I should definitely turn in some homework late this year.
I’m pathetic.
The door to the principal’s office opens, so I close my phone. I slide it into my pocket and look up.
I never want to look down again.
“Miles is going to show you the way to Mr. Clayton’s class, Rachel.” Mrs. Borden points Rachel in my direction, and she begins to walk toward me.
I instantly become aware of my legs and their inability to stand.
My mouth forgets how to speak.
My arms forget how to reach out to introduce the person they’re attached to.
My heart forgets to wait and get to know a girl before it starts to claw its way out of my chest to get to her.
Rachel.
Rachel.
Rachel, Rachel, Rachel.
She’s like poetry.
Like prose and love letters and lyrics, cascading down
the
center
of
a
page.
Rachel, Rachel, Rachel.
I say her name over and over in my head, because I’m positive
it’s the name of the next girl I’ll fall in love with.
I’m suddenly standing. Walking toward her. I might
be smiling, pretending I’m not affected by those green
eyes that I hope will one day be smiling just for me. Or
that red-as-my-heart hair that doesn’t look like it’s been
tampered with since God created it specifically with her
in mind.
I’m talking to her.
I tell her my name is Miles.
I tell her she can follow me and I’ll show her the way to Mr.
Clayton’s class.
I’m staring at her because she hasn’t spoken yet, but her nod is
the nicest thing a girl has ever said to me.
I ask her where she’s from, and she tells me Arizona. “Phoenix,”
she specifies.
I don’t ask her what brought her to California, but I do tell her
my father does business in Phoenix a lot because he owns a few
buildings there.
She smiles.
I tell her I’ve never been there but I’d like to go one day.
She smiles again.
I think she says it’s a nice town, but it’s hard to understand her
words when all I hear in my head is her name.
Rachel.
I’m gonna fall in love with you, Rachel.
Her smile makes me want to keep talking, so I ask her another
question as we pass Mr. Clayton’s room.
We keep walking.
She keeps talking, because I keep asking her questions.
She nods some.
She answers some.
She sings some.
Or it sounds that way.
We get to the end of the hallway, right when she says
something about how she hopes she likes this school because
she wasn’t ready to move away from Phoenix.
She doesn’t look happy about the move.
She doesn’t know how happy I am about the move.
“Where’s Mr. Clayton’s classroom?” she asks.
I stare at the mouth that just delivered that question. Her
lips aren’t symmetrical. Her top lip is slightly thinner than
her bottom lip, but you can’t tell until she talks. When
words come out of her mouth, it makes me wonder why
words are so much better coming from her mouth than any
other mouth.
And her eyes. There’s no way her eyes aren’t seeing a prettier,
more peaceful world than all the other eyes.
I stare at her for a few more seconds; then I point behind me
and tell her we passed Mr. Clayton’s classroom.
Her cheeks grow a shade pinker, like my confession affected
her in the same way she’s affecting me.
I smile again.
I nod my head toward Mr. Clayton’s class.
We walk in that direction.
Rachel.
You’re gonna fall in love with me, Rachel.
I open the door for her and let Mr. Clayton know that Rachel
is new here. I also want to add, for the sake of all the other
guys in the classroom, that Rachel is not theirs.
She’s mine.
But I don’t say anything.
I don’t have to, because the only one who needs to be aware
that I want Rachel is Rachel.
She looks at me and smiles again, taking the only empty seat,
all the way across the room.
Her eyes tell me she already knows she’s mine.
It’s just a matter of time.
I want to text Ian and tell her she isn’t hot. I want to tell him
she’s volcanic, but he would laugh at that.
Instead, I discreetly take a picture of her from where I’m
seated.
I send the picture in a message to Ian that says, “She’s gonna
have all my babies.”
Mr. Clayton begins class.
Miles Archer becomes obsessed.
? ? ?

I met Rachel on Monday.
It’s Friday.
I’ve said nothing to her since the day we met. I don’t know
why. We have three classes together. Every time I see her, she
smiles at me like she wants me to talk to her. Every time I work
up the courage, I talk myself down.
I used to be confident.
Then Rachel happened.
I gave myself until today. If I didn’t work up the courage by
today, I’d be giving up my only shot with her. Girls like Rachel
aren’t available for long.
If she’s even available.
I don’t know her story or if she’s wrapped up in a guy back in
Phoenix, but there’s only one way to find out.
I’m standing next to her locker, waiting for her. She exits the