It All Comes Down to This

Lyle positioned his feet around the sink, careful to avoid the puddle that was growing ever larger underneath the leaky faucet. He looked carefully at his reflection in the mirror, examining every little feature, criticizing each misplaced strand of hair, cursing himself for not shaving that morning, even trying to get the few random wrinkles out of his shirt. He practiced every sentence in the mirror, smiled at himself, no… more sincere… not that sincere… less obnoxious… whatever, he’ll wing that part. He fixed his hair, wait messier, no neater, why is that part sticking up? Ugh… He was ready. Well, not ready, but fairly presentable. He stepped casually into the hallway, conveniently right as Rebecca walked by. Then he tripped. Then he fell. Then he scrambled and got up in a rather awkward manner. Rebecca just laughed and said,

“You alright…?”

“Yeah… yeah I’m good…” He said, walking with her now, dusting himself off. “How bout you? You okay?” She laughed again before saying,

“I didn’t fall, you did.”

“Oh yeah… So umm…” He blanked. Every line that he rehearsed vanished, as if mocking him silently from the back of his mind where he couldn’t get them. “I… Um… How bout… Ummm….” Her classroom was coming up. He had to say something, he had to ask her now. He could only make a fool of himself so many times in one short walk before she would never talk to him again. He was raking his brain now, what did he want to ask her in the first place?

That’s right… now how can he ask without sounding desperate… No luck… His hair probably got messed up when he fell, things just kept getting-

“Hey. You like horror films?”

He looked up at her, his face blanker than his history assignment. Did she just… ask him…? If he liked…. Wait… “Umm, yeah, I sorta like them. Why?”

“I just kinda wanna see that new movie, Halloween number whatever it is. None of my friends will go with me though. I was wondering if you would wanna go?”

He stared at her blankly, not entirely sure what was going on. They had arrived at her class, but she stood outside, waiting patiently. “Ye-yeah! I mean, yeah I’ll go I guess. It looks pretty good and all, so…”

“Great! Here…”

She tore a piece of notebook paper out and quickly jotted down ten digits. Ten… that’s a number isn’t it…? Her number…? Wow… She handed Lyle the small scrap then ran into the room, screaming over the bell.

“Call me!”

Lyle stood there for a few seconds before realizing his history class was at the other end of the hall.