Her fingers tighten around the cold steering wheel, her very light, almost colorless, green eyes sweeping over and surveying the road in front of her, though she isn't really seeing anything. The drive home is routine, and she sometimes thinks she could do it with her eyes closed, but she's too scared to ever try. Her gaze diverges from the scenery in front of her to the green LCD numbers on her radio --no worries, she's early for Weekend Night Curfew-- and then to the gas gauge. Her lips purse slightly at the sight of the meter leaning too far towards the first line above empty for her liking, but she looks back at the road and remembers that she didn't ask her parents for gas this week and so they shouldn't have a problem with buying some for her soon. They never really have a problem with it, or they don't say they do, but she's always worried about being in trouble and messing up, even when her relatives are involved.
The thought of gas and her parents seems to spur on a whole train of thought; it's like her brain is defrosting along with the rest of her body and car, all thanks to the heat she cranked up the second she got in the car, even though it only blew cold air for a long while. She flicks her finger up, turns on her blinker, presses her foot lightly on the brake, and takes the turn that will bring her to the road before the road before the road that she lives on. She starts to ponder all that has happened in the past twenty-four hours. She feels mean, this has not been one of her better weeks. The friends she normally loves have only annoyed her, and the friends that normally irritate her have come to be her favorites. It doesn't matter who her favorites are in her head though, all that matters is their opinions.
They're getting sick of her. The whole lot of them, the 'group' as they all so often refer to themselves. Especially after the past seven or more or less days. She can't be at all sure though if her perception of the time is real or not, because she seems to see an askew version of things, and she takes things harder or softer than others. It's never right.
Two of her 'best friends', as they often refer to themselves as and she does sometimes when she's feeling in the mood for affection or she's worried about how they will feel if she doesn't use the term, have started to date. She does not approve, whatsoever at all entirely. She tells, half yells, at the girl over text. Saying that she's going to ruin the boy, that it's not fair of her or for her to do something 'only for his happiness', but now that she drives home by herself and her head is free to roam she wonders why she is so opposed. She made the boy cry on the bus that morning, not on purpose; no, never would she do that to someone. He does not understand, he listens but he does not hear what she is saying. That is the start of her feeling mean.
As the day fades into night and a field trip fades into a basketball game, she talks to the girl again. She tries to force her to see that this relationship is doing absolutely positively one hundred percent no good for anyone. She changes her points in this conversation, flips it around so everything is not benefiting the girlfriend and hurting her, instead of the other way she had posed it for the boyfriend. She does see what she says, but she is not sure the girl hears either.
Later, at a movie night afterwards, a boy she has told to ask her other friend to prom comes back with flowers and some random girl pulls up the projector that covers the whiteboard. The girl he is asking is overjoyed, it is so obvious that her statements of not wanting to go to prom at all were false. She had known that before anyways, was sure that the only reason she didn't want to go to prom was because she wasn't going. She was happy for the girl and boy, all smiles and teeth and shouts of "GET SOME BABY", but now she frowns.
The boyfriend and girlfriend fought in the lunchroom, and she sits and watches and listens and commentates the whole thing while finishing a bag of Hersheys Cookie Drops and sipping on Sunny D with her friend and the boyfriend's best friend. He tells her of his plan to ask a girl to prom, and to ask her out. She sees that he is stressed, she says he does not have to do both at once. He can ask her to prom now, and to be his girlfriend later, and she reminds him of this fact because she does not want her to say no and him to be hurt. That is what she thinkshopesprays the reason is, at least.
The boyfriend and girlfriend are still together when she decides she wants to leave and calls to the girlfriend. She asks about the status of the relationship on the way to the car, leaving the boyfriend sad and inside the building, after his failed attempt at being chivalrous and listening to what his girlfriend tried to tell him to change about himself. The fact that they have not broken up angers and saddens her for reasons she does not wish to pursue. In the car on the way to the still-girlfriend's house, she continues to point out every flaw in the relationship that she should not be a part in or care about at all.
Why does she care so much? It has nothing to do with jealousy, she knows that much. The boyfriend has been making her so beyond annoyed all week that she has blatantly refused to even talk to him and look at him until today. What is wrong with her? She acts like all she wants is others' happiness, but then she finds a way to sabotage it.
Love makes her sick, relationships make her mad. Some would say it is because of the lack of both in her life, but it is something she chooses. There are boys she thinks would be interested in one or both with her, but she says no.
Slamming her foot on the brake, she locks her elbows to keep her arms straight and flings her head to the side. False alarm, that's not the road she wants. It's the next one, not far off. She presses the gas hard to get there faster, because all she wants is to be home. She wants to cry, even if she's not entirely sure why, but she can't in her car. If her family is awake at home, they can't see it. She never wants anyone to see her tears. They are weakness and wrong, just like she is. But if she keeps it inside, nobody ever has to know.
The second to last road is short, and the road she lives on is even shorter. She goes twenty over the posted speed limit without caring, because all she craves is her bed and sleep and a break from her own head.
She is often overly emotional about stupid stuff like this.
Jessie, that was beautiful. Sad, but beautifully written xo
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