To meet You Again (2 page)

               
See, this is the bad thing about crushing on someone. Sometimes you like them,
and sometimes you want to just murder them.

               
Needless to say, I’ve kicked my enthusiasm for pictures and started taking down
notes the “normal” way.
Haven’t touched my digital camera in
two years.

               
“Ruby!”
Angelo’s voice pulled me back into reality.
“Don’t tell me you’re daydreaming about Vernal again.”

               
“Since when have I ever
daydreamed
about him?” I said
defensively, moving my arm as if I were trying to shoo away a fly. But Angelo
definitely was a pest.
My best pest friend.

               
“Always,” he answered matter of factly, “and I’m sure much more than you’ll
ever honestly say.”

               
“Shut up,” I slapped his arm… with my chemistry book.

               
“So you
were
thinking about him!” he accused. Oh, he was really asking
for it. “Well, I guess it’s the time of the year for that.”

               
“What are you talking about?” I asked, stopping myself mid-punch. Angelo
pointed towards the nearby cork board. The entire thing was adorned in red and
pink hearts of different sizes with a giant “Happy Valentines’ Day” in the
middle. “Oh, right.
Stupid, huh?”

               
“It’s not stupid,” he shrugged, leaning back against the lockers. “It’s
Valentines’ Day.”

               
“Valentines’ Day is stupid,” I commented.

               
“It’s not stupid,” Angelo disagreed.

               
“Look,” I sighed, “we have this same argument every single year. I say it’s
stupid. You say it isn’t. I say it is. You say it isn’t and then ask me why I
think it’s stupid even if you know the answer. I tell you because everyone acts
stupid. Then you say love is blind. Then I accuse you of calling blind people stupid.
Then you talk about your blind cousin who has a PhD in… I forgot.”

               
“Teaching,” he reminds me.

               
“Yeah, that,” I nodded and then turned to face my locker again, struggling to
remember why I’d opened it in the first place.

               
“You seem angry today,” he pointed out.

               
“Not angry,” I qualified. “Just… frustrated, I guess? You know I always get
like this at this time of the year.”

               
“I still don’t understand why, though,” he said.

               
“Like I said, because everyone acts stupid,” I repeated.

               
“You know when you say everyone you mean yourself, too, right?” he smiled
wryly. I chucked my chemistry book at him. Angelo always loved to annoy me most
when I was already annoyed. “Seriously, what’s the problem?” he asked.

               
“I was just thinking that I don’t understand why Don never talked to me about
what happened,” I murmured. While I was angry at Don for acting as if that
moment never happened, I respected his need for privacy. I never told anyone
about it except for Angelo. I never made a scene about it, a vague status
update.
Nothing.

               
“Well maybe now’s the time for you to talk to him,” Angelo shrugged.

               
“Why?
Because it’s Valentine’s Day?”
I scoffed.
“Yeah right.”

               
“Not so much because it’s Valentine’s Day,” he explained. “But that’s part of
it, I guess. The main part is that he and Melissa Kier broke up.”

               
“What?” my eyebrows scrunched together.

               
“Don Vernal.
Melissa Kier.
Splitsville
.
They are no
longer together. They have ceased to be-”

               
“I understood what you meant,” I snapped. “I’m just a little surprised. How do
you know?”

               
“I hear things,” Angelo said passively.

               
“Why haven’t I heard anything?” I challenged.

               
“Do you sit with anyone besides me at lunch?” he began.

               
“No…”

               
“Do you pay attention to girls gossiping in the locker rooms during gym class?”

               
“No…”

               
“Do you pay attention to girls gossiping in the girls’ bathroom?”

               
“No…” Angelo gave me a satisfied smile. “All right, I see your point.”

               
“So are you going to go talk to him or what?” he asked grumpily.

               
“I don’t think so,” I shook my head and turned to face my locker again. I still
couldn’t remember what I was looking for.

               
“Okay,” he said and bent down. He picked up my Chemistry book. “But who knows,
you might have chemistry.”

               
“Shut up,” I took the book and shoved it back in my locker.

               
“So, you and me still on for the anti-Valentine’s karaoke fest?” he asked.

               
“You mean our annual tradition of mocking Valentine’s Day by singing lame love
songs all night?” I chuckled. “Honestly I can’t remember how this tradition
started.”

               
“I told you that maybe if you sang love songs you’d understand why people love
Valentine’s Day,” he reminded.

               
“Oh, right. Looks like you were wrong,” I grinned.

               
“So is that a ‘yes’?” he asked.

               
“Of course it is,” I rolled my eyes.
“Unless you suddenly
have a girlfriend or something.”

               
“Nah,” he shook his head. “The only girl for me isn’t interested.”

               
“You know, you keep talking about this girl, but you never tell me who she is,”
I finally shut my locker, giving up any hope of remembering what it was I
needed.

               
“You aren’t interested,” Angelo leaned onto the lockers.

               
“You’re right, I’m not,” I turned to face him and laughed. He pressed his lips
together and nodded, and then shifted his gaze onto the heart-filled cork
board.

               
“So un-original,” he muttered.

               
“Yeah,” I agreed.

               
“Well, I’ll see you around, Ruby,” Angelo walked away.

               
“Looks like I’m not the only one in a bad mood today,” I muttered.
“Looks like my cynicism is rubbing off on him.”

               
I turned to face my locker. I knew there was something that I needed. I opened
it again and scanned the books, hoping I would be able to remember. I sighed
and slammed it shut again.

               
Just then I heard the sound of falling papers. I turned to see Don Vernal,
crouching on the floor and gather flyers. I found myself going near and
crouching down to help him. Keeping my eyes on the ground, I handed them to him
when I was finished, “Here.”

               
“Thanks,” I could hear the smile in his voice. We both stood up. “Ruby, hi,” he
said.

               
This time I looked up to face him. His hair was a little longer. He’d lost some
weight. His build was a little larger, too. But his eyes were the same.
Kind and dark.
“Hi, Don,” I managed to choke out.

               
“Thanks again for helping,” he fiddled with his stack of flyers.

               
“No problem,” I smiled. We both just stood there for a while. I was looking
down at the floor and, then, at the flyers. I tried to make conversation, “So,
you’re putting up flyers for the Valentine’s Day fair, huh?”

               
“Yeah, I’m part of the committee for setting it up,” he nodded. “We’re trying
to look for a decent band to play a concert, so we’re hoping these flyers will
draw in interested parties.”

               
“Oh, that’s a good strategy,” I remarked awkwardly. This was the most we’d
spoken in years… The only time we’d spoken.

               
“Do you still take pictures?” he asked.

               
I felt my mouth hang open, a low humming noise coming out.
“Not
really, why?”
I managed to say.

             
“We were hoping to get candid shots of people during Valentine’s week and I
remembered you were good at that,” he explained.

               
“I was never good at it, I just liked doing it,” my smile felt out of place on
my face.
“Emphasis on like-D.”

               
“Oh, well, that’s too bad,” he looked down. “Well, I guess we could just settle
for a photo booth.”

“You’ll figure it out,” I comforted. We both
stood there for a while just nodding. We looked like bobble heads. “Well,” I
broke the silence, “I’ll see you around.”

               
“Yeah,” he was nodding again. I had already turned to walk away when he called,
“Hey, Ruby.” I turned to face him. “Thanks.”

               
“For what?”
I asked.

               
“For not asking about what happened with Melissa,” he said.

               
“Oh,” I looked down. “You’re welcome.” I briskly walked away.

               
You’re welcome? You’re welcome?
Really?
What a
fantastic way to respond to a “thank you”. Gosh, was I stupid.

               
But the stupidity of that response was no match for the stupidity of what I was
about to do next.

               
“Hey, Don,” I called and turned around. He turned around to face me. “What are
you doing tonight?” I asked.

               
“Nothing.
Why?” he seemed sad.

               
“Well…” I hesitated. “A friend and I are going to go karaoke tonight. We like
to make fun of Valentine’s Day by singing popular love songs… Yeah, I know that
doesn’t make a lot of sense, but…”

               
“No, no, I think I get it,” he smiled. “I think I’d really like that. You sure
you don’t mind?”

               
“Of course not,” I felt my smile growing. I couldn’t believe that, not only was
I having an actual non-academic-related conversation with Don Vernal, I was
going to get to hang out with him tonight! I put my arms behind my back and
started pinching myself so I wouldn’t squeal. “Sometimes when you want to get
over something, you just have to surround yourself with it so much you get sick
of it, you know?” I said as if I was telling a joke.   

               
He chuckled.
“Yeah, yeah.
That makes sense, I guess.
So when and where?”

* 
   *     *    
*     *

During homeroom, our teacher was talking about
the Valentine’s Day fair. Angelo sat in front of me, and passed me a piece of
notebook paper. On top it read:

You going?

               
My smile was euthanized when I realised I had ruined our tradition by inviting
Don. I needed to tell him.

Yah I kinda need
to tell you something…. I sorta kinda maybe invited someone else to go
karaokeing with us

               
When I passed him back the note and saw his head tilt when he unfolded it. He
passed it back to me.

Who?

               
I took in a deep breath. I knew he wasn’t going to like this.

Don Vernal

               
I reluctantly passed the paper back to him. He unfolded it and paused. I heard
a light slam on his desk as he turned sharply to face me.

               
“Vernal?” he whisper-shouted.
“Why?” I opened my mouth
to say something but he whisper-shouted some more, “And how did that even
happen? I thought you two don’t even talk? Don’t tell me you actually feel
sorry for the guy because he just lost his girlfriend or something like that.”

               
“Well,” I whispered back, “you can’t exactly blame me for feeling sorry. I
mean, the guy was posting flyers and they fell over.”

               
“Your point?” he raised an eyebrow.

               
“And then he was having some sort of trouble with photo services,” I tried to
find the words.

               
“Your.
Point?”
Angelo was ticked off.

               
“And he thanks me for not asking about Melissa,
which
makes me think he must be feeling really-”

               
“
Your point
?” he interrupted.

               
“Well,” both Angelo and I turned to face our homeroom teacher standing right
beside us, “aren’t we feeling in a chatty mood today?”

               
“We were just really excited about the Valentine’s fair,” I smiled awkwardly,
obviously lying through my teeth.