Chapter 1: Boy Meets Girl

Once upon a time, in a city quite like the one you live in now, there was Boy, and where there is Boy, there must also be Girl. Now, already, I'm sure it is obvious to you that Boy and Girl were meant for each other. This fact had never been a doubt in Boy’s mind. Girl knew it too of course. The problem: Boy didn't know that Girl had seen their destiny, and likewise, Girl was clueless of Boy's infatuation.

Boy was a prep. He wore polo shirts, had long, brown hair, smiled all the time, and was friends with everyone. He was a theater kid. Boy was in all the school plays. Boy’s greatest feature was his ability to get along with everyone. Even though he was a prep and a theater junkie himself, he was friends with the skaters, the punks, the emos, jocks, cheerleaders, you name them, he knew them. Not to say he was extremely popular. He wasn't. Just an average guy, but he broke the barrier of cliques. He was easy to get along wit. It was well known that he did well with the ladies, but Boy had a problem. He never could hold a relationship. Though Boy dated many girls, he always felt like something was missing. He was always searching for a girl to make him truly happy. He had a fear of commitment. He told himself he wasn't afraid, he merely hadn't found the right girl yet.

Girl was scene. She had jet black hair with streaks of pink in it. Her pale skin was hidden by a thin layer of cover up. Her bright blue eyes were brought out even more brilliantly by the mascara that thickened her lashes. She wore bright colors. Tight jeans and flashy belts were her style. Her favorite outfit was her red and white striped shirt with her black mini-skirt. She was a happy girl. Girl had a good life for the most part, trustworthy friends (or so she thought), good grades, a roof over her head. Music was her passion. Anything from the Beatles to Black Sabbath could get her going. She knew everything there was to know about every musical artist, living or deceased. It was very easy to get her talking about music, but almost impossible to complete the opposite task. As Boy had an artistic channel in the theater, Girl played guitar. Her cherry red acoustic was the passageway from her heart to the world. More than anything in the world, Girl was a guitarist. When nervous, worried, depressed, or just suffering from a case of insomnia, Girl would play her guitar for hours on end in her bedroom. With the door shut and the rest of the world in dreamland, or so she imagined, she could let all her feelings out. Girl's guitar was her therapy and her lover. Though Girl lived a fulfilling life, there was something missing. Girl's father had left her and her mother when she was young. Shortly after, he had died, but that's a story for another time. Girl never had a man in her life. She told herself she didn't need one, although that hole in her heart never seemed to close up.

Boy awoke to the unwelcoming buzz of his alarm clock. Though not exactly the wakeup call he was looking for, Boy jumped out of bed readily. It was the first day of Junior year. An upperclassman, Boy was ready for an exciting year. An hour later, walking through the familiar, and surprisingly missed, hallways of Strenton High School, "Home of the Pegasus," Boy caught up with his old friends. Already, the cliques had seemed to re-form. The jocks all huddled together. He gave a them a nod of his head and continued down the hall. The stoners were in the corner of the C hallway. Giving a few handshakes, Boy passed them up. He walked past a few freshmen. Confused and frightened, they reminded him of his freshman year. Boy walked intently down the hall. He told himself that he was just wandering, catching up with old friends until the bell rang, but subconsciously, he was looking for the scene kids.

Rewind to the second week of third quarter the year before. Girl was new. It was her first year at Strenton High. Her mother had forced her into a new town. In search of work, Girl’s mother ventured to this unfamiliar place. She wasn’t really nervous about being new, it was just annoying parting with the familiarity of her former residence. She quickly made friends. Her new group was much like the friends she had back home. The “scene” kids as others called them. She didn’t care what they called her. She had her own style, and if people classified her as scene, that was their choice. Girl fit in with her new group quite quickly, but she was very quiet. Many just assumed she was shy, but Girl just felt like something was missing. It wasn’t a new feeling to her. Girl had felt the same in her old town; however she had anticipated the change of locale to fill the void. This turned out to be a pipe dream, until Boy came along.

For Boy, today was no different from any other. School went by at the same pace as always. The turtle-like speed of the clock drove him mad. As the lunch bell rang, Boy jumped out of his desk and started to walk towards the cafeteria. Normally, Boy didn’t go to the cafeteria for lunch. Most days he would go to lunch at the burger joint down the street. He had planned to head over there today as well. Some may call it fate, others a mere coincidence, but on this day, Boy wasn’t in the mood for burgers. He decided to just grab a snack from the vending machine and catch up with some friends he hadn’t talked to in a few weeks. Walking the cafeteria, he saw a friend from the scene crowd. Boy joined the group and soon they were in a heated debate over their favorite bands. Boy favored My Chemical Romance, but the group admonished this statement, arguing that they were “sell-outs.” Boy started to realize he was on the losing side of the argument, and was about to leave to meet up with some of the cheerleaders who were beckoning him over when a group of girls who had been in the lunch lines joined the group. Girl stood in the back of this group. Though she was hidden behind three other girls, clad in tight tees and skinny jeans, Boy noticed her immediately. Something about her pulled him back to the group. He pretended to listen intently to the jabber of the My Chemical Romance hate club, while trying to sneak a glance at the new girl in the back of their group. Was she new? He didn’t remember seeing her around before, and there was no way he would have missed a girl like her. To him, it seemed as if her skin glowed, like a beacon calling out to him. One more glance over at her. She was looking back at him. Their eyes met for a split second and Boy’s his visual reconnaissance retreated back to the protesters, trying to persuade him to, “stop listening to that garbage.” He was unable to think clearly and made a poorly contrived excuse why he had to go “Get a missed homework assignment from a friend.” Walking away, he didn’t dare to turn back around for another glance.

Girl stood in the lunch line with the rest of her new-found friends. In the back of the group, not saying anything, Girl stood, alone in a crowd. It had been this way since she had come to Strenton. Not to say anyone was mean to her, they were more than welcoming. Girl just sort of kept quiet and listened. She liked to observed and only talked when she had something interesting to say, a skill that, as she had noticed, none of the other girls in her group possessed. She zoned out a bit, as her friends began to talk about the concert going on the next Saturday. Girl wasn’t able to go, so she didn’t pay much attention. Girl spent the duration of their conversation pondering her new life. She had hoped that it would be different here. Her dream of a more fulfilling life in Strenton had not been realized. It had only been a couple weeks, but Girl didn’t see anything here different from where she had come from. Before she realized, it was her turn to order. She snapped out of her trance and ordered her lunch quickly. Again, this was the same as where she had come from. She wondered if cafeteria tacos were made in a factory and shipped out to schools around the country, just to make sure they were all equally disgusting.

After getting their food, the girls joined the guys, who usually were talking about music, video games, girls, or their favorite topic, food. Today the subject happened to be music. She heard some chatter about My Chemical Romance, but Girl didn’t bother to pay attention. Usually, she jumped at any chance to have a musical conversation, but she had already made that mistake. These people didn’t understand music the way she did, and it was useless talking to them. She had become rather skilled at tuning out the voices around her. She sat down and started to eat her factory made tacos. She heard a voice coming from the group that she didn’t recognize. This was an odd thing to notice, considering she wasn’t even listen to them, but this voice rang out to her, as if beckoning her in. She looked up from her plate in search of the source of this intriguing voice. Immediately she saw Boy. He was looking at her out of the corner of his eye, and she blushed as she turned away. Girl was not one to believe in love at first sight, but at that moment, she felt something change. She could feel the emptiness being filled, as if his voice seeped into her veins and flowed into her heart, sealing the hole shut. She didn’t have the guts to look back up at him. Girl ate the rest of her meal with her head down and her cheeks red. Only did she look up again when boy started to walk away. She glanced at him and turned her head back down. Girl regretted the fact that she didn’t say anything the entire time he had been part of the conversation. She knew that he must think she was an introverted, boring, and probably stuck-up brat already. She wondered what his name was, but wouldn’t ask anyone for fear of being too obvious. As the bell rang, Girl said goodbye to her friends and started to walk to class. She spent the next three periods thinking about the boy who had finally filled her heart.