A Life Like Mine (5 page)

“How could you say something like that? Jack is adorable!” Lena put her head in the curve of Jack’s shoulder. “I’ve got to go, lover!” She walked off. (Again, I think I’m going to puke.)

“You think that she’d only like me to get back at you?” His eyes were wild with fury.

“Jack, you can’t do this.”

              “Says who? I like her. You can’t stop me!” He objected.

              “What about Betty?”

              “What about her? If you think Lena is just doing this because she wants to get at you, you’re wrong. Lena likes me for me. Get over yourself,” Jack walked away, slamming his locker.

              I sat there in disbelief. I knew Lena was awful, but to do this to one of my closest friends was even beneath her.  I didn’t know what to do. As I left, I heard a group of girls laughing. (You know, the unnaturally high cackling sounds that come from girls.) I thought maybe that it was my friends, so I went to go check it out. Instead of seeing my friends, I saw Lena, Liz, that other girl that I never knew her name, and Alan.

              “Why are you looking at us, geek?” Liz asked.

              “Sorry, I didn’t know I was.” He answered.

              “Oh, you knew you were. Why?” Lena inquired.

              “Well…there was a reason…um…Jill?” Alan said. (I guess Jill was the name of the other girl.)

              “What do you want?” Jill said hotly.

              “Would you like to go to Homecoming dance with me?” He looked so nervous. I felt bad for him.

              “With you?” Jill questioned in disbelief.  The girls started laughing hysterically. “Why would I ever go out with you? You’re a major loser. Gross!

              “Oh. I’m sorry I bothered you,” Alan turned around.

              “Oh, Alan?” Lena said.

              “Yes?” He turned back hopefully.  Then the girls pelted him with water balloons. I watched in horror. I couldn’t move. It was as if I was paralyzed. He started crying, and he fell to the floor. He was soaked.  As if that wasn’t bad enough, they threw a few eggs at him too. With each thing that hit him, Alan shrieked even louder. For a moment it looked like he had stopped moving, but then he’d try to get up and they would hit him again. Each time they hit him, they’d laugh more. They’d say more vile things that would make him feel worse.

              “That’s what you get for asking me out, you pathetic loser!” Jill screamed with laughter.

              “Think twice before wearing black, Spock!” Lena wailed in joy.

              “Oh my gosh.  He’s crying! The loser is crying! Cry some more you baby!” Liz added.

              I got up and ran towards them, “Cut it out!” I screamed. They looked at me in surprise. I helped Alan to his feet. “Are you okay?” I asked him.

              “I think so,” He whispered.

              “What makes you think you can treat him this way?” I was hot with anger. “He hasn’t done anything to you. He’s been nothing, but a nice guy to everyone, and all you want to do is humiliate him.”

              “Whatever.” They said together.

              “It’s amazing,” I said.

“What is?” They asked.

“I didn’t know that three people could share the same brain. You guys are the losers. You can’t see how great he is. You do this every year. Each year it’s a new victim. Well, it stops here!” I turned around and had Alan lean on my shoulder as I took him to my car.

“Do you mind your seats get a little wet?” He looked at me.

“No, of course not.” The rest of the car ride was pretty much silent. Neither of us knew what to say. It was very hard for both of us to accept what had happened. Alan broke the silence.

“Thank you,” He said barely above a whisper.

“You don’t need to thank me,” I answered.

“Yes, I do. You defended me. No one has ever done that for me before. I don’t really have any friends to help me out.”

“Alan, why would you let them do that to you? They don’t deserve to talk to you, and you don’t deserve their treatment. I mean I used to be like you where no one really wanted to hang out with me, but I’ve changed.”

“I don’t want to change. This is who I am, and if I get hurt for who I am, then so be it. I won’t let them change me.” He responded.

“You don’t have to change, but you don’t have to let them talk to you the way that they did. It’s not right. I mean, if you ever need anyone to talk to… I’m here. You don’t have to have a limited amount of friends. It’s just I can’t hang out with you in school.”

“Why? Because I’m a dork?” He inquired.

I looked at him in surprise, “I didn’t say that.”

“That’s what you meant. You’re afraid to be seen with me because then you might lose some of your friends. Or you might even lose the reputation that you’ve worked so hard for.” He reasoned.

“No. That’s not true. I can’t hang out with you in school, because I have other friends and I like to be with them. I like you and all, but I never see you during the day.”

“You see me in English.”

“Yes. And I will keep seeing you in English. We will always be friends,” I said.

“I understand.” Alan looked at me, “Can I ask you something.”

“Anything.”

“Why did you do it?”

I turned into his driveway, “Do what?”

“Help me.”

“Because you needed help and I couldn’t stand to see you in such pain.” I helped him out of the car, “Can I ask you something?”

“What?”

“Why did you ask her to Homecoming?” I let him lean on me, “Did you think that she would say yes? Don’t you know what kind of a person Jill is?”

“I do now. I thought she was like me, afraid.” He opened his door and stepped inside. “Can I give you a hug?” He looked imploringly at me.

“Yes.”

“Thanks!” He gave me the tightest hug anyone had ever given me. At first, I just sat there stiff as a log as he hugged me. Then I hugged him back. We both had tears in our eyes. It had been a very, very long day.

“Um…Alan?”

“Yes, Ashley?”

“I kind of can’t breathe.”

“Sorry!” He let go of his jaws-of-life hold on me. “Go in peace.” He gave me the Star Trek hand gesture.  I went back in my car, and he watched me until he couldn’t see me anymore. It’s amazing how dorks can be the nicest people you’ll ever meet. He may be a crackpot with a screw loose upstairs, but I had learned something from him. Nice people come in strange packages. As I was thinking this, I opened the door and picked up my cell phone. Then I called up Allie.

“Hello?”

“Allie?”

“Yes.”

“It’s Ashley. I really need to talk to you. Is anyone at your house besides you?”

“No, but I can’t invite you over. Sorry.” Allie apologized.

“I just wanted to make sure that Betty wasn’t there. We’re in trouble. Jack is going out with Lena. I just had a faceoff with them. It wasn’t pretty. I don’t know what we’re going to do, but we’d better do something.”

“Whoa! Slow down. This doesn’t make any sense. It sounded like you said that Jack and Lena are going out.”

“I did! They are, and it gets worse because they’re going to Homecoming together,” I finished.

“No way! This isn’t happening.”

“I know, Allie, that’s why I called you.”

“Oh.”

“What?”

“What about Homecoming? Are we still going if we know that Lena and Jack are going to be there? It’s this Saturday.”

“I don’t know. I think we should, but maybe we could get Betty to not go. Someone has to go and check up on Lena and Jack to make sure that they don’t do anything.” I answered.

“You should go, Ash. Take care of this.” Allie assigned me my job.

“Ok. I’ll talk to you tomorrow.” I hung up. I knew what I had to do. And I was going to make sure that in the end it was Betty and Jack that were together.

Chapter 3

Homecoming

              Homecoming: the night of a thousand dances and fancy dresses. (HEY! That sort of rhymed.) The first Homecoming I ever went to opened my eyes to the new world of high school. I wasn’t used to the drinking and the nasty dancing, but there were good parts too. Now here I was, again at homecoming. This time was different. I had a mission. I had to save Jack from the evil clutches of Lena. There was no way of convincing Betty into not going, so Allie, Tina, Keri, and Jennifer were busy keeping her on the other end of the dance floor.                                                                                                                                    “Wow! This music is great,” Keri yelled above the speakers.

              “I know. We should request a song,” Ben added. He and Keri had come together as friends. This was something that I didn’t understand. I mean, I guess if someone wanted to go with me as friend…maybe then I’d jump at the chance, but I still think going stag is much better.  That’s what I had done. I had come without a date, but with friends. Jennifer and Tad had paired up as friends for the night as well.  The thing that amazed me most was that Allie was somehow able to make Big Al go with her. And Tom, as always, had come alone. Everyone said that Tom and I should go out, and for a time I believed them. I finally realized that I just didn’t like him like that, and that I was only into him because my friends had pushed it. Now we were just friends. He was always a little detached from us, and there wasn’t anything that we could do to get him to talk more.

            
 
“Check me out!” Big Al started to do the worm on the floor. We all started laughing and dancing.

              “Go! Go! Go!” We all yelled together, cheering Big Al on.

              “When do you think that they’ll get here?” Jennifer asked me.

              “I don’t know, but why don’t we just enjoy the time that we have right now, okay?” I started to do the robot.

              “Okay.” Jennifer replied, giggling.

              Just as we were about to dance more, I saw Alan. I went over to say hi. Right before I could, some guy ran past me, and knocked me backwards. He ran to the garbage can and threw up big time. I’ve never seen someone puke that much. Then he wiped his face and went back onto the dance floor to get down. Is it just me or did that not make any sense? I know that people don’t like to stay away from the party long, but don’t you think that if you barf that you should kind of take a rest? That just totally freaked me out. I didn’t know that if you barfed you could just go back to your normal life. Ah, the joys of high school.

              “Ashley, can I talk to you?” Betty walked up to me.

              “Sure.” I stopped dancing.

              “No, let’s take a walk.”

              “Why?”

              “I just want to make sure that only you hear me.” Betty continued to walk.

              I followed her, “Okay. What’s on your mind?”

              “Jack. I’ve heard the rumors. I know what’s going on.”

              “You do?” I frowned.

              “Yes,” Betty responded.

              “Oh, I thought that you didn’t.”

              “I know that’s why I told you. I didn’t want you to think that I was out of it. I want to help you get Lena. Now I know why you don’t like her. She just likes to torture people.”

              “You’ve got that right!

              “So what’s your plan of action?” Betty questioned. (Can’t you just hear the mission impossible music?)

              “I don’t have one. I’m going to go up and talk to her.”

              “That’s it? You’re just going to talk to her? Shouldn’t we have some sort of diabolical plan that’s incredibly ingenious?” Betty looked at me.

              “Be serious, Bet. This is high school. Unless you have some sort of plan that’s better I suggest you be realistic. We’re not in Hollywood.” I said.

              “Right…sorry.” Betty and I had just reached the others and started to rejoin the group.

“Incoming, I hear a loud shrieking noise coming from the general direction of the double doors,” Tina danced over to me with her date. I didn’t know him, but I think he was from another school.

              I nodded, “Lena.” I turned and started to walk towards the doors in order to get them. There was Lena and Jack just like expected. Lena was sleazy as always. She had on a see-through gold tinted halter top with a black bra underneath. Her skirt was knee length and had the shredded look at the bottom. She had on stiletto heels.  I hoped that she would trip on them and break her neck. Well, I didn’t mean that, but still.

              “Lena,” I said simply.

              “What do you want?” Jack looked at me with warning eyes.

              “I came here to talk to Lena,” I answered.