Aquatic

 

Chapter One

“Melita! Get your ass down here!” My mom yelled at me from the top of the stairs that lead to my bedroom/basement. And trust me, living in the basement is always as cool as people try to make it seem. It’s cold as fuck, there are tons of rats that my cat Bojangles doesn’t like to catch anymore because she’s gotten so fat, and your mom and dad still expect you to clean it up, even though half the crap in there isn’t even yours. It’s your stupid older brother and younger sister’s old toys, that don’t feel like throwing out in the dumpster.

I’m not usually this cranky. I’m just anxious today because I have my Spanish finals today.

“Mom, stop yelling at me! I can’t go to school without my Spanish binder!” I yelled back as I brushed my growing hair out of my eyes, looking for my binder under my covers. Last night, I had stayed up super late studying for Spanish, and I had fallen asleep halfway on the bed and halfway on the floor. I was really paying for it now, since my back felt like I had gotten a spinal tap or something, where they insert this HUGE needle into your spine.

And the only reason I know that is because my dad is a doctor, not because I’ve had that happen to me before. Because that stuff hurts like hell.

“I’m not driving you to school again,” Mom continuously yelled at me. Apparently, she didn’t care if I couldn’t find my Spanish binder. “If you would wake up at the time you needed to, then this wouldn’t happen!”

I bit my tongue from cursing back at my mom. The only reason I had woken up late is because I had to study for Spanish, because I couldn’t study at the library with my friends because I was grounded for not cleaning my basement room. And then, I had to study and wait for Andre to text me back, who I was crushing on, but I don’t think he really noticed. He’s completely hot too, with his sexy brown eyes and his somewhat Californian slang accent. Man, what I would give to have seven minutes with him…

Sorry. I just have a terrible attention span. One minute, I’m yelling at my mom while looking for my school stuff, the next, I’m practically fantasizing about Andre. God, I really need to get a life. Instead of just pining after a guy that only looks at me as the girl who actually understands Call of Duty on a PS3, and not a girly girl that doesn’t know a damn thing about what a PS3 really even is.

Finally, I spotted my binder under my pillows, and hurriedly snatched it up to my chest. I stepped into my battered up blue hi-tops, barely even pausing to tuck my shoelaces into my shoes, and ran up the stairs, grabbing my book bag from the top of the stairs next to my angry mom.

“Melita, honey, you really need to get on schedule,” She scolded, although lovingly, as she handed me my lunch money from the counter.

Personally, I really didn’t have any motivation for school anymore, after the seventh grade. You work your ass off, but the slackers get the same grade as you, even if they didn’t do half the work. So now, I’m just a breezy tenth grader passing by with an A minus. And, life is good. Well, except for the part where Andre won’t notice that I’m pressing my newly formed C cups up against his arm, and he still DOESN’T NOTICE ME RUBBING UP AGAINST HIM. He just thinks that I’m tired, and lets me rest his head on his shoulder. Usually, that would cheer me up, but that’s just a natural, friendly gesture for Andre.

“Move over, assface,” My brother greeted me as usual as he reached for piece of toast popping out of the toaster. “Some of us actually have friends at school.”

“STFU,” I said, knowing that my mom would seriously get pissed if she heard me cussing at the house. I didn’t cuss like a sailor, (well, maybe I do cuss a little too much) but I don’t cuss in front of her. Plus, she would probably kick my ass if she heard me.

“Ma, Melita and Marshall are c—,” My younger twelve year old sister Mya stopped mid-sentence as my sixteen year old brother Marshall slapped a hand over her mouth.

“Tell Mom, and I’ll slit your freaking throat,” Marshall threatened, his eyes narrowing down at Mya.

I know, my brother seems really violent. But, then again, none of us in the Young family are really morning people. My brother goes through a violent streak, I get easily cranky, and Mya gets really talkative for an odd reason. But either way, we all have our moods in the morning.

“Jesus, calm down,” I said to Marshall, giving him an evil look. Although I don’t really appreciate Mya’s talkativeness in the morning, I knew that Marshall could be an ass sometimes. “Don’t worry My, he’s just mad because his girlfriend Criss wants to secretly wants to break up with him.” I teased.

Marshall flipped me off and stuck in his earbuds as we filed out the door to the bus. It didn’t bother me though; I just walked up the bus stairs, politely said hello to the bus driver, and sat next to my best friend Brite.

I know, it’s a pretty weird name. And Brite hates it to death. She told her mom that as soon as she’s 18, she’s changing her name to something cool, like Azrael or something. Personally, I don’t really like that name cause there’s this total slut named Azrael at our school, and I think she has eyes for Andre.

Actually, I think every girl who’s not lesbian (yup, a few of them are actually brave enough to say so at our school) at Williem Ocean’s High has the hots for Andre. I mean, how could you not? He’s so sweet, and nice, and if he was ass ugly (he’s totally not) I would still pretty much be in love with him, we’re so compatible. Brite says the reason Andre hasn’t recognized his love for me yet is because he was abused by his father as a child, and doesn’t know how to unlock his feelings for me yet. She says that all he needs is a true “woman” like me to let his feelings burst like a erupting volcano, and he’ll be able to love me.

I hope so, because I don’t know if I can contain my love for Andre for much longer.

“Mrs. Young,” Brite greeted and smiled at me, using Andre’s last name. You see, it proves that we really do belong together; he already has the same last name as me. I wouldn’t really even have to go through any paperwork to marry him.

“Miss Brite,” I said, and set my book bag in front of me between my legs. “How’s it going?”

“Pretty good,” She said, adjusting her beanie on her head more to the side. She crossed her legging-clad legs and adjusted the straps on her boots. Unlike me, Brite has a sense of style, and could look good an anything. I swear, the last time I slept over at her house, she was wearing a stained T-shirt when she went to bed, and she still looked like a supermodel.

Was I jealous? Maybe sometimes. Had I gotten used to it? Definitely.

But there was something different about Brite today. She was basically glowing, like a pregnant woman. Whoa, weird analogy. But that was the thing; she just looked that pretty that day.

“Pretty good, huh?” I said, eyeing her curiously. “Something tells me that maybe someone had a pretty good day last night.”

Brite let out her nervous laugh, which instead of her usual crystal-twinkling sounding laugh, her nervous laugh sounded like a muffled snort. “What? W-what are you talking about, Mel?”

I raised my dark eyebrow at Brite and put my hands on my hips. “Dude, spill now.” I said, referring to her sudden good mood.

“I, nothing…” She paused and then buried her face in her hands, sighing in an elated tone. “CharlieaskedmetobehisgirlfriendandIsaidyes.” She said in one big rush of air.

Being Brite’s friend since the third grade, I was used to her fast talking. “Oh my, that’s…great!” I said, and gave her a double thumbs up.

It’s not like I didn’t like Charlie or anything, in fact, he was frickin’ hilarious. But, even though Brite is my best friend, I still don’t know how to really react in these situations. I’m not a girly girl; hell, Marshall even called me an “emotionless robot” once. Was that mean? A little. Was it true? Again, a little. I wasn’t the most emotional of people, but I still cared. I mean, if I was emotionless, then how would I realize that I love Andre more than anything and the world? That I loved him so much, that every time I saw him, my brain seemed to seize up like I was having a brain aneurysm and I would totally spaz out. That’s how crazy in love I was with Andre, so I definitely couldn’t be emotionless.

This time, Brite was the one who raised her eyebrow at me. “Really, dude? This is my first frickin’ boyfriend, and you give me a thumbs up? Come on Mel, you can do better than that.”

I rolled my eyes at Brite’s scolding. “Fine. I’m really, really excited for you. The best piece of advice I could give to you is don’t let him convince you that it’s okay to have unprotected sex,” I said, half kidding and half serious.

“Yeah, I’ll make sure to do so,” She said, eyeing me curiously. “What, is there a stick shoved up your ass this morning?”

I let out an exasperated sigh as I slammed my hands onto my knees, frustrated. “Just the usual, ya know? Andre, Spanish, school, my dumbass brother…” I trailed off, and let my mind rest.

“Don’t worry,” Brite smiled at me as she patted my shoulder. “I’m pretty sure, any day, you and Andre will be getting it on a bathroom soon enough.”

I slapped her hand off my shoulder. “That’s not what my mind revolves around!” I said, my cheeks turning a little red.

“Yeah right,” Brite snorted. “That’s why your cheeks are turning red. You probably picture him, every night, naked. I wouldn’t have let you be my best friend if you had such a perverted mind.”

I rolled my eyes again. “Says the person who probably jacks off to Charlie every night,” I said.

“God, that’s nasty!” Brite shouted, causing a few people to give her some curious glances. “I think that’s enough of talking about Charlie and Andre.”

I nodded and made a clicking sound with my mouth. “Yeah, that’s for the best.”

The bus ride to school was normal, mundane. We stopped to more times, to pick up a kid named Dominic, and a girl named Angela. We drove past the museum, and after a few more busy streets and intersections, we were at the school.

Brite and I walked Mya to the middle school building, which held the sixth to eighth graders in one building. Then, we walked over to our school – the high school – and walked inside the cafeteria. We were walking through the doors when I saw Andre.

God, I know I’ve mentioned it before, but he’s so hot. With is brown eyes, his black wavy hair, and man, I know I shouldn’t have, but I was totally checking him out all over. On the days he wore T-shirts, I could see the muscles in his arms, which weren’t too bulky and monstrous, unlike some of the douches and football jocks that go to my school. He looked up, as he saw me and Brite going up to him.

“Mel,” He said, as he half sort of guy hugged me. Yup, it was that bad; he only guy hugged me, not a full on hug, where I could get close enough to smell him. Because goodness gracious, he smelled like the heavens. Well, I’ve never smelled the heavens, but you get the point.

“Dre,” I said, kind of frozen, staring at him. It was like I was in a trance, he was just so charming.

He blinked at me, and I realized that I had been standing there like a blithering idiot, staring right at him. I struggled for words, and my hands started twitching at my sides.

God damn it Mel, say something! At least stop from twitching your hands! I yelled at myself, but it barely did anything. I was like Ricky Bobby on Talladega Nights, where he just stands there during the interview saying, “Yeah, um, I don’t quite know what to do with my hands…”

“Uh, actually, Mel was going to show you something Dre,” Brite interrupted, noticing the awkward silence between me and Dre. “Right Mel? Here, show him that, uh, thing…”

“Oh yeah, the thing,” I mumbled, my lips barely moving. My hands seemed to kick back in action, and I bent down to take something out of my book bag.

“Oh look, there’s Charlie! I’ll get him…over here!” Brite yelled, and sneakily scrambled away.

Damn! I cursed in my head. What in the hell was I supposed to do now? I stared down at my book bag. There was barely anything in it; just a book titled Supernatural: A Realm of Dreams, a pack of gum, my history textbook, and my Spanish binder. I pawed around frantically, trying to look for that “something” Brite had made up to make the silence between me and Dre end.

I spotted my sketchbook, and drew it out. I flipped to the last page and practically shoved it in Dre’s hands, not able to look into his eyes. “Um, here you go,” I said nervously.

Dre just smiled at me, and took the sketchbook from my hands. His eyes widened with surprise, and his mouth dropped open in amazement. “Oh wow…” He breathed.

My eyes opened with alarm. Oh no! Was there something bad in there? Had I accidentally showed him the page of his name scribbled all over it in Graffiti style? Shit!

“Oh God, did Marshall draw penises all over it again?” I said, craning over Dre’s neck to see what he was looking at.

“No,” Dre said, still looking shocked. “It’s just, this drawing is really, really good,” He complimented me. He looked up tome, and flashed me a smile.

I basically could have thrown my arms around his neck, stuck my tongue down his throat, and flipped off the teachers on morning duty when they scolded me for PDA. I was that head over heels for this guy, and the dam of emotions I felt for him were starting to burst.

“Thanks, a lot,” I said, smiling back at him, getting the courage to actually look him straight in the eyes. “It means a lot to me.” I said, staring straight into his brown eyes.

“You’re welcome,” He said pleasantly, and stared right back at me. I swear, if it had been a romantic comedy movie, that would have been the moment where he would kiss me, sweep me up (even though I always hated movies like that) and told me that he always secretly loved me, even before I loved him.

After I had gotten my “Dre nerves” as I called them, whenever I had the inability to talk to him because I was stunned by…just everything about him, we had a normal conversation. I talked about Marshall, we talked about his brother Derek, and about school. Whenever I talked to Dre, I would get lost in his words, like I was in a trance. He had a special effect on me, like no one else in the world could pull me out of his gaze.

The bell finally rang, and we had to go to first period. I hated all my morning classes, mostly because neither Brite nor Dre had any classes with me then. It was after I had gym that I had myths and legends with Dre, and we didn’t have assigned seats. I sat next to him and Charlie, and we had a pretty good time talking about how Mrs. Hawkinson really did look like a hawk.

During Trig, I was sitting in my seat innocently, drawing pictures of a male and a female sharpening knives. I know, I have a weird sense of humor, but I wasn’t gonna drawn a whole stupid sentimental picture of a guy and a girl holding hands on the edge of a dock. Talk about all emotional and stupid.

It was then that a folded up piece of paper hit the edge of my desk, and I looked up. No one was looking back at me, everyone was just writing down notes from the board that Mr. Anderson was writing down. Curiously, I opened up the paper slowly, since I didn’t really know what to expect.

Dre asked me to the dance. My eyes froze on those six words. At first, I thought I was just being dyslexic or something, because I knew that couldn’t be true. Dre didn’t believe in things like dances, in fact, a few weeks ago, we decided that we would go together as a joke, to make fun of the people that went there just so they had an excuse to shack up without their parents watching. Then, once I read it about 50 times over, my hands started shacking again controllably. I looked around to see who had sent this note – who in the hell was messing with my Dre? – when I noticed Lynne Davis staring at me.

Lynne Davis. A biggity bitch, in my opinion. She was a total priss, and a girly girl. She always curled her hair in these perfect little ringlets, and applied pink lip gloss about every five minutes. She was really annoying, especially because she thought that she was the hottest girl in the school, when she’s really not. I mean, everyone can tell that her supposed D’s is an A cup bra filled with tissue and tissue rolls. Yet, somehow, some of the dumbasses at my school love the fact how fake Lynne is, and go out with her all the time.

But just about everyone knows that I like Dre! Brite said my love for him is clearly visible to everyone but him. So why would Lynne try to steal him under my nose from me, huh? I know that there are lots of mean people out there, (and well, I can be mean too) but I’m only mean for a reason. Lynne was just being a bitch because she wanted to be mean to me. Personally, I’ve just never really thought much of Lynne. I didn’t talk to her, I just observed her mean actions towards others and hated her for her. That’s the perfect American citizen, right?

I wasn’t gonna let Lynne take Dre from me. No one could, he may not have known it then, but Dre was mine. I don’t care what anyone else says.

Oh really? I said, posing as an innocent observer to find out her real intentions. When did you guys start going out? He didn’t tell me. I added, and slipped it to a girl named Bonnie in front of me, who passed it diagonally to Lynne. I watched anxiously as she bent down and scribbled onto the paper. It seemed like eternity, and the whole time, my mind was racing. What was she going to say? It couldn’t be true; Dre would tell me. And, on second thought, Dre didn’t like girls like her. He liked real girls, not fake ones like Lynne freaking Davis. And, come on, Dre and I have been best friends for about four years. I haven’t noticed him admiring any girl that whole time, and I’m pretty sure that he would tell me if he had a girlfriend.

Finally, after what seemed like fifteen minutes but was probably five seconds, Bonnie passed Lynne’s note back to my desk. I practically ripped it open, and laid in front of my eyes.

We aren’t going out…yet. J But I’m gonna use my “skills” on him, ya know? And then, well come on, he can’t resist these rights? I felt like a rock sunk into my stomach, as I realized that she was talking about her fake boobs. And well, if he does, then he’s probably gay or somethin’ like that.

Although Dre hadn’t really shown any interests in any girls at our school, I was sure that he wasn’t gay. He just didn’t have a lot of time, since his mom was in rehab because well, she had a few problems with cocaine. And, he had take care of his brother Derek while he also had a job at Best Buy. So I guess that’s kind of another reason he hasn’t noticed me literally trying to grind up on him. I know, it’s kind of slutty of me, but I just want him to notice me a little. That’s all, just a little smidgen of maybe, “Geez, Mel looks pretty hot today” or at least something along those lines maybe.

The bell rang, dismissing me to go to gym. As I was walking out the door, I noticed Lynne giggling with her friend Christine, who’s twin was Cristen, who was also my brother Marshall’s girlfriend. I watched her with scorn written all across my face. I ripped up the note to pieces, and threw it in the trash on the way out.

 

Finally, after running for 10 minutes straight in gym and totally sucking at a sport called Handball (WTF kind of a sport is something called Handball?) I was finally happy, because I got to see Dre in my Myths and Legends class with him.

For the actual class, Myths and Legends wasn’t too bad. The worst thing we had to read was The Illiad and The Odyssesy, which takes thirteen pages to read about a guy walking from one place to another. Yeah, it was pretty boring. But, we sometimes even get to watch the T.V. show Supernatural, because they incorporate legends and myths all the freaking time. Plus it doesn’t help because the guy that plays Dean on there is really hot.

Usually, we’ll do one specific type of creature or something, like a vampire or werewolf. Then, we’ll read a book about it from the past, like Dracula, and then we’ll watch the movie of the book, or another movie that revolves around the same subject. So basically, the whole Myths and Legends class is reading books, watching movies, and then getting tested on how many guys Dracula killed while he was still alive.

So yeah, to me, it’s a pretty sick class.

I walked into Myths and Legends, and looked at the board to see what we were doing today. Before the weekend on Friday, we took a test over Irish myths, which included leprechauns, banshees, elves, and of course, pixies/fairies. Just about every culture has a pixie or fairy in them, but Irish fairies are way cooler. They like to play tricks on people and stuff like that.

According to the board, today we were starting a new unit on sea creatures. As soon as I saw the “sea” part, my blood ran a little cold. Ever since I was a little kindergartener, I had always been deathly afraid of water. When my parents tried to take me and Marshall to the beach, I had screamed my face off, and we were “expelled” from the beach for an entire year. My dad was convinced that if I faced my fears, I would be able to get over it.

But he was totally wrong.

They took me to the local YMCA pool to try and give me swimming lessons. But while all the other six year olds were having fun paddling their feet and splashing water, I was the only one who was screaming, crying, and punching anyone who tried to get me in the water. By the time dad finally let me leave, I ended up almost drowning, since I panicked and sank towards the bottom of the pool.

Ever since then, I’ve avoided water. I have hydrophobia, which is obviously a phobia of water. Well, except running water, because then I wouldn’t even be able to drink. And you need water to survive. The thing that scares me are things like pools, seas, and oceans.

I guess I didn’t really need to overreact, though. We were just learning about creatures from the sea, not actually going into it. I don’t know, it just made me panic at first.

I took a deep breath and sat down in the seat furthest away from Mr. Michaels desk and the front board. I got out my notebook and folder, and started drawing out a picture. As I drew, my mind began to wander, of course, about Dre. We were graduating in two years, and that meant I wouldn’t see him everyday. In fact, he might even move somewhere else, or maybe even I would. I didn’t want that to happen. I really needed to make a move or something fast, before I time together was up.

I was finishing the drawing of a girl starting a food fight in the lunchroom (if I ever did that, my mom would kill me) when I felt two hands cover over my eyes. I instantly knew who it was, and a smile lit up my entire face. Then, I doubtfully remembered that I was supposed to be mad at him, since apparently, he asked f-ing Lynne Davis to the dance.

I forced myself to take his hands off my eyes, even though I just wanted to turn around and give him a hug. I folded my arms across my chest instead. “I’m mad at you, Dre.”

He raised his eyebrow at me (goodness, he looked even more hot when he was puzzled or confused). “Why? What did I do?”

I swiveled around towards Lynne, who was sitting in the middle with her lackey Christine. I turned back around towards Dre, and narrowed my eyes. “I just received the news from Lynne last period,” I said accusingly.

“What?” Dre’s eyebrow went even further, like it was about to fly off of his face. He looked over to Lynne, and then his eyes widened a bit. “Oh, you mean Lynne? Oh yeah!” He started laughing, his cheeks turning a little red.

It was then my turn for me to raise my eyebrow at Dre. Was it funny that I thought it was odd for them to be going on? Was it that obvious to everyone else? A cold grip of fear stabbed me in the stomach, and I began to feel a little sick and nauseous.

“You guys are going out?” My voice went up an octave, and I hoped that he didn’t notice. I needed to play it calm and cool, like I didn’t care that he was going out with Lynne. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

Dre wiped the few tears from his eyes. “It was a joke, during English when I had to play Romeo and she was Juliet. At the end, I said, ‘Usually, I don’t just kiss girls and leave, so I guess I’ll have to make you my girlfriend’. She knew I was playing,” He stopped for a minute, and then noticed my frightened expression. “Right?”

I blinked at Dre, and he realized that I wasn’t playing. He ran his fingers through is wavy black hair (oh, how I longed to run my fingers through it, too). “Aw shit, man,” He said, and he just stood there, staring at the ground with his eyes widened.

It was sort of awkward for me to watch Dre realize his demise. I mean, how could have I been so stupid? Of course Dre wasn’t going out with Lynne; that would be the starting of the Apocalypse, seriously. Now, I felt really bad because Dre wasn’t very good at being mean. Well, at least to girls. When this football jock named Ryan Sopera slapped me smack on the ass – and I was too embarrassed to even slap him in the face – Dre went ape-shit on his ass. He punched him square in the face with such intensity and animosity that I had never seen from Dre before.

He was a really nice guy, and he didn’t make fun of anyone. He didn’t resort to the fake popular people like Lynne Davis, and he was just so…nice to everyone. There wasn’t any other way to describe it, he was just kind to others. Which, in his case, wasn’t the easiest thing to do for someone like Dre.

Dre was born in California, in a place that was just basically a ghetto. When he was five, his dad left him and his pregnant mom. After his brother Derek was born, his mom started messing with cocaine and meth, and she’s been in and out of rehab millions of different times. They then moved to Los Angeles, then Phoenix, Dallas, Houston, and then finally here, to Baltimore. During that time, his mom went through a lot of boyfriends, and the majority of them physically abused Dre and Derek. And even though all this horrible stuff happened to Dre, he’s not mean or anything to anyone, and he treats everyone equal. That’s another reason why I’ve fallen so in love with Dre. He’s just himself, and he’s seen the good and the bad, and he’s chosen to be good. I don’t know, that’s just how I viewed him in my mind at least.

The bell rang, starting class, and Mr. Michaels walked to the front of the class. “All right students, take out your notebooks.”

Dre sat down next to me, but robotically as he still seemed a little frozen. I watched him worriedly as I flipped to a new page in my notebook. I passed the page which was filled with Dre’s name, and my cheeks heated a bit. Mr. Michaels started passing around a sheet of paper that was about our new unit. While he was talking, Dre finally snapped out of his trance with my help.

“Dre, just calm down,” I whispered and scooted my desk a little closer so that he could hear me. “She’ll understand, don’t worry about it.”

He looked up at me, his normally bright brown eyes clouded. “No, it’s not that. It just that you know, I was shocked that you would think I would ever go to the dance with someone like Lynne Davis,” He said, starting to smile. “God, look at her. She’s trying to flirt with Mr. Michaels right now.”

I looked toward Lynne’s direction and cringed. A lot of the girls at school liked Mr. Michaels (not including me), but I don’t think any of them tried to throw their chest right in front of his face.

“Why thank you, Nathan,” She smiled saucily (J) at him and took the paper from his hands. “Oh, I’m sorry, I called you Nathan! I just thought we knew each other enough to call you by your first name,” She crossed her legs over each other and blinked up at him.

“My name is Mr. Michaels to you,” He said, in complete monotone. Lynne’s “charm” definitely wasn’t really working on him. He walked back up to the front of the classroom. “Alright, now, I’m going to show you a little video clip about our new unit,” He said as he put a DVD into the hanging T.V. in the corner of the room.

I laughed inwardly as Lynne pouted and pulled on her hair in frustration. “Sorry Dre,” I apologize, turning to him. “Why would it be so wrong for me to think that you were going out with her? She’s the prettiest girl in here,” I said.

Dre looked at me dubiously. “If that’s what you really think, then you need to get your eyes checked out,” He said sarcastically and began doodling around the margins on his page.

Suddenly, my heartbeat started to quicken. What if Dre thinks I’m better looking than Lynne? I echoed in my head. As soon as I thought it, I crushed it like a ruined drawing. There was no way in hell that I was prettier than Lynne. She had perfect hair, perfect body, and perfect everything else. My hair was as black as night, so if someone just decided to throw a pencil or paper in there, I couldn’t even see it since my hair is so thick. And, might I add, I have long feet. Some people don’t think that 8’s are big shoe sizes, but if my feet were cut in half in length, I could probably fit into a 5 or something.

“Really?” I asked, like I was just genuinely, and my heart wasn’t about to beat out of my chest. “Who’s prettier than her?”

Dre shrugged, his eyes glued to the T.V. “I don’t know, man. Brite, the girl right up there named Audrey, and you know, you.”

Why did it excite me that he called me prettier than Lynne Davis, the prettiest girl in the school? I mean, he put my best friend and another girl in front of me, and he called me man at the end of his sentence. But he still said I was pretty. That means he would have looked at me, to say that. I mean, was I catching his attention?

“Me?” I tried to ignore the fact that my voice turned into a squeak. “You think I’m pretty?”

Dre finally tore his eyes from the T.V. “Der,” He said, like I was the craziest person in the world. “You’re like the prettiest girl at school. Don’t act like you don’t know it. Now pay attention and take notes like the rest of us, so that Mr. Michaels will stop looking at us weirdly.” He turned back around and began jotting something else down.

But I couldn’t take notes. I was frozen in my exact position. My mouth opened up wide, and I dropped my pencil on my notebook. It rolled off and hit the floor, but I didn’t even notice it fall. I was just too shocked. Dre had admitted that I was hot. Well, he hadn’t said hot, but that’s what guys called girls who they thought looked pretty, right? I, I couldn’t believe it. Dre thought I was hot…hot enough to be his girlfriend?

“Mel!” He shout-whispered at me. “Take some freaking notes!” He urged me, picking my pencil up from the floor.

I snapped my mouth closed, my teeth tinkling together. “I, uh, okay,” I stuttered, and then wrote on the top of my paper: Aquatic Creatures and Legends.

I was extremely elated that Dre was showing at least a little bit of physical attraction to me, but I didn’t know that just a few weeks later, I wouldn’t be as happy as I was that day.