Love and Betrayal Sucks

As I sit here, on the day of the new year, I look back on my life so far.

I remember the stupid things I did "back in the day". Sneaking out of the house for those late-night drives to wherever I could get to, before reminding myself I had to go back to the dull routine of school in the morning, "sleeping over" at a friend's house to party like there was no tomorrow, and making out in the backseat of different cars throughout my early teenage years. But I'm getting ahead of myself.
Back to the wonderful subject of school. Ah yes, school. 12 years of it to be exact, and what do you get out of it? Heartbreak or betrayal? Love or lust? Oh no. That's not what school is really about. Or is it?
You learn who your real friends are. Sometimes you have to figure things out the hard way though. Like when your best friend stabs you in the back to get the guy you stare at endlessly in Health class? Fun times. Either way, you get yourself through it to move on to bigger and better things, such as the days when all your immature friends are finally kicked out of their houses and are forced to fend for themselves.

Anyways, school is the ever-so-lovely place where I met the so-called "love of my life".

It was the middle of my senior year. Everyone was so excited to finally be leaving to go on to college. The first day of the school year, I see all my friends that I've known forever. They can't wait to graduate and have a huge party. I thought I wasn't even going to make it to my first class, as I spent all my time catching up with friends I hadn't seen all summer.
As I gracefully ran back to my locker, while trying not to trip and embarrass myself, to shove the heavy load of stuff I had been carrying around all that morning into my old locker, a familiar face taps me on the shoulder.

"Long time no see!"

That's what she said to me. She, of course, being a popular, yet reasonable new student from the year before. Her dyed red hair was like fire that burned through my soul. But that wasn't even the start of it. You could lose yourself in her stunning green eyes. I must've been doing just that, because she playfully whacked me on the side of the head with her notebook.

She claimed she wasn't a goth, yet I couldn't help joking about such gothic things with her. I, myself, am not a goth in any way, but she was. Deep down she knows she was. Or at least she was last year.
I still remember the first time I ever set eyes on her. I saw her walk through the doors of my school, wondering who she could possibly be, and how someone could look so positively beautiful. I didn't see her again until I finally noticed her looking back at me one day in the hallway when I was at my locker a few days later.
"What are the odds?" she asked me. I didn't have a clue what she was talking about. Apparently, she knew a little bit of kanji, because even though I hadn't really paid any attention to what I was writing, I drew the kanji symbol for fire on the palm of my hand. She ended up grabbing my palm just to look at what I had done.
As we went through the year, I would walk the measely 6 or 7 feet across the hall to lean against the locker next to hers to say hello. Sometimes it would bother the person whom the locker belonged to, but I didn't care. People let those kinds of things go. It seemed perfectly harmless at the time. I would make fun of all the emo bands she had pictures of in her locker like most girls did, she would punch me. I never really knew why she did that. It never really hurt unless I really put in an effort to bother her. I guess I got what I deserved back then. As long as I made her smile, my day was complete.

This year was different. Oh so different. I don't think I ever even said a word to her until the third week of school. I don't really know why. By then, the innocent flirting that meant absolutely nothing, had grown into a crush. Of course, she had no idea, and I wasn't about to walk up to someone who I hadn't talked to in so long, and tell them that I liked them.
In society today, it is far from being entirely "socially acceptable" to be gay, or bi, or whatever your heart desires. It is especially "wrong" to ask out a popular person if you are one of the aforementioned orientations. I am by no standard a popular girl either, I wouldn't want to be. Some of my best friends are though, but I don't mind. As long as they act who they are and don't change, I can deal with it. It's just the stuck up snobs that get to me. What I didn't realize though, is that, that is exactly who this girl I had developed a crush on was beginning to be.