Falling in love again... chapter 1

I’m walking down the hallway of a hospital. He might die. It was my entire fault. He saved me that one day when we met, but I didn’t save him. I didn’t do anything to save him. A tear ran down my cheek... I’m sure your wondering what I’m talking about and whom “him” is. This is our story…

Chapter 1
My mom woke me up for yet another day of school. I changed my outfit about six times until I found a pink mini-skirt and a white sleeveless top. I tied my hair back and ate an energy bar. Then my best friend Lia knocked on my door.

“Heather, hurry we're gonna be late again!” I opened the door.

“That’s not a bad thing.”

She giggled as we walked out the door. This is basically what happens every morning. We both walked to school everyday because we were only a couple blocks away. As the bell rang Lia and I ran through the door.

First period for me was English class. I had the worst teacher, Miss. Scallion. She was horrible because she gave you essays and packets with tons of questions that made no sense! Then again it wasn’t that bad because Brian was there. I loved Brian. We've been going steady since 7th grade. Miss Scallion started yapping about somthing completely pointless. Brian blew me a kiss. I put my hand on my heart and mouthed, “I love you.” Everyone thinks our whole relationship is really corny, but I think it's cute. Later at lunch I sat with Brian, Lia, Amy, Joe, and Brad. We have a clique problem at central high. Everyone hates everyone that doesn't sit at his or her lunch table. People that didn’t really fit in with us use to stare at us when we ate. They were just jealous because we have more money. I know Lia can get a little mean but it's not personal.

After school Amy and I went to the mall to look for dresses that we could ware to the winter formal. I saw this short little strapless black dress. It was 800 dollars, a little expensive but worth it. I tried it on and bought it.

Then walking out of the mall we saw these people from our school. Most of them were really scary, but one wasn't, Jake. He was kind of cute but he wasn't popular because he was really shy. He just started hanging out with these creepy Goth freaks that believe in vampires and stuff. Jake didn’t act like them he just hung out with them because they had no one else to hang out with. I accidentally bumped into one girl who was wearing a black slipknot t-shirt and had her hair dyed red. She hissed at me like some cat.

“Sorry,” I apologized.

“Sorry,” she imitated me in a high voice. She started laughing.

“Listen creep she was trying to be nice!” yelled Amy.

The girl mumbled some poem. “Whatever,” I said. The girl slapped Amy.

“Stop,” said Jake.

“What are you my mother?” asked the girl.

“No listen to him we shouldn't fight over something stupid,” said Amy.

“I'm sorry, I don't understand you, I don't speak brainless idiot,” said the girl. Amy punched her in the nose.

“Amy stop! Now!” I yelled.

“Stay out of this Heather,” said Amy. Amy blew misplaced strands hair off her face and walked away.

That night I thought about what happened. It was kind of my fault for bumping into that girl and that started everything. I felt so bad. Then I realized that I also stopped the fight so I felt a little better. The next day was the usual routine. Went to school and everything was totally fine. Then between sixth and seventh period Lia and I ran into the same people we ran into at the mall. The girl said “sorry” in a high pitched voice and laughed.

“What’s your problem? My friend didn't do a thing to you! Your probably just trying to get attention. That's why you wear ugly, freakish clothes and dark makeup. You’re trying to cover up for your poor pathetic life! ” yelled Lia.

“You people think you’re so cool with your preppy skirts and tiny shirts. Well just for your information, your not!” exclaimed the girl with a smile on like them he just hung out with them because they had no one else to hang out with. I accidentally bumped into one girl who was wearing a black slipknot t-shirt and had her hair dyed red. She hissed at me like some cat.

“Sorry,” I apologized.

“Sorry,” she imitated me in a high voice. She started laughing.

“Listen creep she was trying to be nice!” yelled Amy.

The girl mumbled some poem. “Whatever,” I said. The girl slapped Amy.

“Stop,” said Jake.

“What are you my mother?” asked the girl.

“No listen to him we shouldn't fight over something stupid,” said Amy.

“I'm sorry, I don't understand you, I don't speak brainless idiot,” said the girl. Amy punched her in the nose.

“Amy stop! Now!” I yelled.

“Stay out of this Heather,” said Amy. Amy blew misplaced strands hair off her face and walked away.

That night I thought about what happened. It was kind of my fault for bumping into that girl and that started everything. I felt so bad. Then I realized that I also stopped the fight so I felt a little better. The next day was the usual routine. Went to school and everything was totally fine. Then between sixth and seventh period Lia and I ran into the same people we ran into at the mall. The girl said “sorry” in a high pitched voice and laughed.

“What’s your problem? My friend didn't do a thing to you! Your probably just trying to get attention. That's why you wear ugly, freakish clothes and dark makeup. You’re trying to cover up for your poor pathetic life! ” yelled Lia.

“You people think you’re so cool with your preppy skirts and tiny shirts. Well just for your information, your not!” exclaimed the girl with a smile on her face. Lia put her hand up in a “leave us alone” kind of way and we walked away to class.


After school I had to go to the gym for a meeting because I was on dance committee. It was a big thing for me though because usually only seniors get to be on the committee. I was so lucky. We were talking about what the theme should be. I suggested “the future” and everyone loved it. I was so happy. It was so amazing that seniors liked my idea.

After that I went home to play tennis with my mom in our back yard. I wasn’t much of a sports fan but I liked tennis for some reason it always cheered me up. I would play tennis anytime I’d get a chance.

When the dance came around me and my friends were getting ready together. The dress looked great on me. As I curled the last strand of my hair Lia said “Listen, Heather, I know your all nice and all but sometimes your too nice, so try to stand up for yourself tonight and give those freaks that bothered you a piece of your mind.” I turned around and let down the curling iron.

“But”, I muttered accept Amy interrupted me.

“No buts, just do it.”

I smiled. They smiled back but I didn’t understand the smile. Was it a “Thanks for listening” smile or a “You better do it” smile? I hoped it was the first one.

We all to the dance together. We made a stunning entry because I knew everyone was staring at my dazzling dress. The dance was great! Great music and great food but the gym was wrapped in aluminum foil and fake robots were dangling from the ceiling (my “future" idea wasn’t so great.) Oh well, it didn’t matter because I was with Brian the whole time. Brain went to go sit down and Amy and I were talking when we saw Jake walking towards us.

“Remember what his friends did at the mall? Well get back at him,” whispered Amy.
“Hi”, greeted Jake.

“Hi!”

“Do you want to dance?” Jake asked. Amy glared at me. I took a deep breath.

“No, sorry, I only dance with guys!” I exclaimed. Jake looked down in absolute disappointment and walked away.

“What was that? Not really what I had in mind. It was kind of stupid,” said Amy. I felt horrible.

I got over it after a while and went back to my normal perfect life. School was going good.


One day I was walking home from school by myself. I saw Jake right across the street. As I walked on I remembered the dance. I got to the corner and crossed the street. In the middle of the street I got this weird feeling. I turned around and saw a car coming strait toward me going so fast it couldn’t stop. Suddenly Jake grabbed me and pushed me aside from the car.

“Are you ok?” he asked nervously.

“Yeah, Yeah, but ah, you saved my life! Thank you so much I owe you everything!” I exclaimed.

“Oh, um, no sweat.”

“I’ll do anything for you whatever you want”, I told him. I put my hand on my head because I had the worst headache after all that.

“You don’t owe me anything Heather”, admitted Jake. I stood up and brushed the dirt of my shirt. We both continued to walk home and everything was normal. It was like it never happened.

I fell asleep. I had a dream. It was like when Jake saved me. I was walking across the street and Jake didn’t save me. I went under the car and I wasn’t alive. Then the dream was over. Just like that.

I woke up and it was already ten o’ clock so I called Lia to see what she was doing. We decided to go for a walk in the park with Brad, Brian, Amy, and Joe.

“So what happened today?” asked Amy.

“Nothin’ much”, I replied.

“Today I went online, went to school, and went to a pizza party with the rest of the football team,” said Joe.

“Same with me,” said Brad.

“Me to,” said Brain.

“Do you guys always do the same old things always?” asked Lia.

They smiled and in unison said, “Yeah!” Amy and I giggled. Brain came up to me and kissed me on the cheek. After an hour they all left except Brian and me. He started talking about the pizza party he went to. I didn’t want to tell him about when Jake saved my life or about the dream. So I just decided to go home after another thirty minutes.

I went inside. I saw Jake waiting for me. “Hey Heather, remember when you said that I you’d do what ever I wish. Well I was kind of wondering if you could help me with my physics”, he said.

“Yeah sure but it’s kind of late. Want to meet tomorrow at, I don’t know, maybe seven o’clock?” I asked.

“Sure, thanks again!”


The next day I woke up and put on sweats and a tank top. At exactly seven o’clock the doorbell rang. It was Jake holding three huge textbooks. We sat at the dinning room table. We began. It was good that he asked me for help because I could already tell he didn’t know it by the way he stalled when ever I asked him the question.

“I’ll give you an easy question first. Ok if you are going at a rate of three thousand meters/per second square and you weigh fifty kilograms what is the force?” I asked him. I saw him look down frustrated. He had no clue what the answer was. He sighed.

“ Um…ah… got to think about this one… ah… let me see… I think… I guess…um…I don’t have the slightest idea”, he said impatiently.

“Well if your mass is fifty and your acceleration is three thousand and mass multiplied by acceleration is force than what is fifty times three thousand?” I asked.

“Um, hundred fifty thousand”, he answered.

“Good”, I said. I felt something crawl up my hand like a bug. It was Jake’s hand. I felt like pulling my hand away and yelling, but I didn’t. I interlocked our fingers. He asked me a question about something but I wasn’t paying much attention so I just ignored it. I began to stare at him. His short shiny blond hair was messy and scraggly. I loved it. I could see my reflection in his hazel eyes. He smiled at me. I smiled back. What was happening? Am I flirting with Jake? We decided to take a break and go up to my room.

My room was all pink. I had a huge canopy bed. In the right corner there were 5 huge yellow butterfly pillows. Next to the pillows were my magazines. I loved just sitting on the pillows, reading my magazines, and looking out my window a rainy day. My walls were covered with “6 Seasons” posters everywhere. “Wow! You like 6 Seasons too?” he asked.

“Yeah! I love them!” I exclaimed. He sat on my canopy bed and looked out my window.

“You must be rich to have a tennis court! I love tennis. I’m not much of a sports fan but it always cheers me up! Can we play?” he asked.

“Sure!” I answered. So we played. We didn’t keep score, we just played. We played for three hours everyday after school. I hate to brag but I was getting pretty good. I was even starting to become good friends with Jake. He was really nice to me and I really enjoyed being with him. I was happy when I was with him. We had so much in common and we could talk about almost anything. After a while I even started hanging out with him in school. You couldn’t see us apart.

After a while I noticed I haven’t seen Brian in a while. I didn’t even feel like talking to him so I decided, we needed to talk. I invited him over. He greeted me with a kiss and flowers. He was so sweet. It was too bad what I had to say next, “I really love you and you know that I’d never do anything to hurt you, but I think we should start seeing other people.”

“What? Why? I don’t understand.”

I could see the look of terror in his face. I felt really bad. “I think I like someone else. I just don’t feel like we belong together.”

“You’ll regret this!” he yelled. Now he was angry.

“Ok”, I said. I wasn’t sad. Normally I would cry a river but now I just took it. I really didn’t mind. He stomped out the door.

One day after tennis in the snow we went shopping together. We walked past a toy store. I saw a teddy bear that looked like one I use to have. I had it when I was little but I lost it and cried for a week. I pointed it out to Jake and told him the whole story. He looked at it, nodded his head and smiled. I leaned on his shoulder.


“Hey um, want to come to the Christmas party with me on Thursday?” I asked.

“Sure!”

When I got home I thought about what I should get Jake for Christmas. Since I knew he liked 6 Seasons I decided to by him concert tickets. I went online to find the tickets and bought them.

Thursday came along and I started getting ready for the party. I put on jeans and a pink and white sweater. I curled my hair and put it in a half ponytail. My mom drove me to the party. I saw Amy, Lia, Brian, Brad, Joe, Jake and ten other people I didn’t know. I went to go hug Jake. Brian stared at me. I mouthed “Hi” to him. He ignored me. I started talking to Lia. Then Amy came over to me and asked how Jake was. I told her about us.

“Why are you hanging out with him?” asked Lia.

“Yeah, he is such a dork!” agreed Amy.

“No. He’s different. I feel great whenever I’m with him. He makes everyday feel like my birthday. He doesn’t say much but his eyes just tell you he loves you.”

I grabbed Jakes hand and lead him to the kitchen so we could be alone. I pulled out the tickets.

“Merry Christmas!” I exclaimed.

“Oh, thank you so much! Thats so awesome! I can’t believe you did this!” he exclaimed. He pulled out his gift. It was the teddy bear I saw in the window. In its hands was a red velvet box. I opened the box and saw a beautiful pair of diamond earrings. I put my hand on my heart. I loved it so much. I felt great, I felt amazing, I felt loved. I closed my eyes. Then the world stopped. It was only us. I felt his hand crawl up my shoulder and a tingle went up my spine. His lips touched mine and we kissed. I opened my eyes. Did this mean that we were more then friends? I hoped so. Later, Lia came over to me and told me that I could sleepover at her house tonight but I didn’t want to; I had other plans.

After the party I went over to Jake’s house. We sat on his couch. His parents were on vacation so we had the house to ourselves. He made us hot chocolate.

“What’s your favorite Christmas gift of all time?” he asked me.

“My little red bike that my parents got me in preschool. It was my first bike. I loved it so much that I rode it everyday. This may sound silly but I kept ridding it until I was 13. I really loved it!” I giggled.

“So did I! The same exact thing happened to me!” laughed Jake.

“What an odd coincidence!” I set down my hot chocolate carefully. Jake and I got closer. I looked into his eyes. “Christmas is so beautiful”, I said looking out the window seeing a winter wonderland of snow. I looked at Jake.

“It is beautiful. Like you”, he whispered. His eyes twinkled. I closed my eyes and kissed him.

I took a breath and stood up. He smiled at me. I smiled at him. I started laughing. I didn’t know why. It was kind of weird. I loved it. He grabbed my shirt and pulled me down on the couch. He hugged me and we lied down together. He kissed me. “I love you”, he said. “I love you”, I replied. We said those words to each other about fifty times that night and each time we meant it more.


The next month we had school again. Jake and I walked through the hallways together talking about our future. He told me how he wanted to be a professional tennis player when he grew up. I told him how I wanted to be a fashion designer. We decided that I could design tennis clothes that Jake could wear and he would model them. It made me laugh every time I thought of it. One day after school Jake came over. I told him I had a present for him. I showed him a drawing of tennis clothes. We both started cracking up. It was our little inside joke.

Lia still didn’t like Jake. She started making fun of him. I couldn’t do much about it, no matter what I said she wouldn’t stop. I came to believe that she was a little jealous so I promised her a girl’s night out with just Lia, Amy, and me. First we went shopping like we always use to.

“I’m so happy were finally getting time to spend together. Boys totally get in the way of our friendship!” I exclaimed happily.

“I know, right?” said Amy. Lia smiled in agreement. I could tell she was happy. First we went to our favorite store, “heart you”. I think we spent over a thousand dollars there. Then we went to a couple other stores and spent all our money! After that we went to my house for a sleepover. We watched tons movies and had a great time! We didn’t mention Jake once so I thought that Lia was over it.

The next day at school Lia and I were going to our sixth period when Jake came up kissed me and gave me a rose. “What for?” I asked.

“It’s are five month anniversary!” Jake explained. I kissed him and hugged him.

“Oh puh-lease! Heather I can’t believe you would actually kiss Jake! Eww! You should have kept Brian! Jake is so wierd and totally creepy!” exclaimed Lia. I rolled my eyes.

“He’s not”, I tried to explain but Lia wasn’t listening.

“Your different Heather! You’ve changed!”

“No, I’m the same you are just jealous!”

“You are different! ”, said Lia. I sighed, took Jakes hand, and stomped away.


Jake and I got closer as time went by. Four months passed by quickly and it was already summer. One day Jake and I went up to my summerhouse at the beach. His mom picked us up and dropped us off. No one else was there so we had the whole beach to ourselves. The water was about five different shades of blue and green. It was constantly beating against the sandy shore. I was sitting on my lawn chair, tanning while Jake swam. He floated on his back and his shorts bubbled up. I heard him laughing so I pulled my sunglasses down to my nose to see him splashing around trying to put on his swimsuit. I start cracking up. Leave up to Jake to do something like that! What if there where people there? That would have been so embarrassing! He is such a klutz! I guess that’s why I love him.

The sun began to set. It was so beautiful. The sun was a bright red, it was amazing. We ate hamburgers for dinner then we sat on the porch and looked up at the sky. I remember it so clearly. He put his arm around me. His hair smelled like salt water. The waves grew smaller as the night grew darker. The stars twinkled so brightly and the full moon shined on Jake and I. Everything was so perfect.

“Ever wonder how nights like this are made, how the sun set was so perfect for us? I mean how can any one or anything imagine something as beautiful as this?” I asked, not expecting an answer.
“Well that’s funny because I wondered the same thing about you”, Jake said. I simply smiled and gave him a kiss on the cheek.

“I love you”, he whispered. I pulled back.

“What does that mean? What is love, to you?” I asked him. He whispered the answer in my ear. I knew his answer was right.
(more later!)