Nathan Bransford has a competition!! I didn't even read what the "prize" was, it's a Bransford Blog competition, so - I'm in!
I started writing something entirely different but I was never happy with it. Great words - angsty and tortured - but I kept hearing Jess' voice, "Aren't I angsty enough for you?"
She had a point.
There were two places that stood out as being ripe for a diary entry. Day 1 - Jess bumps into Caleb and Day 19 - just before Jess' friends perform an intervention (the clothes, and make-up, Jess had decided to wear - to force Caleb to pay attention to her - had crossed the line marked "Decency".)
Changing the work into diary format took time - more time than I would have thought. I could feel the writing becoming all Jess, that was an odd realisation!
Hey, Diary
24 September - Wednesday
It’s me, Jess – not writing about Caleb again, because I said I was done with that, but I’m going to make such a fool of myself (I don’t mean here) and I don’t care. I slip out of focus and into daydreaming in school. I catch a glimpse of him, track him down... pounce. I imagine us together – in the stockroom, lunchroom, library, Headteacher’s office – my head says public places aren't too extreme, at all.
It's not that I'm a stalker, if Caleb isn't interested - he isn't interested. That’s life. But when he held my hand and rubbed circles on my wrist, I didn’t dream that look on his face. He wanted me. He cared. I know he did. He is interested.
So, why are their times when he pretends I don’t exist? One thing, or the other, would be... fine. Then, I’d know what to do–how to be–when he’s near. But, I see him looking when he thinks I’m concentrating on something else. (Like that happens, often.) I don’t get it. But why should I, when I don’t even understand me? Something is driving me–pulling me–almost out of control. Attraction, maybe? I feel it somewhere in the space just below my stomach. I’m living... desperate.
Have to stop thinking this way, even if I can’t stop feeling it.
I’m going back into training. If I run more–run and swim and get a life–it’ll be a change from balancing on the never-knowing knife edge. Is this love? Hell, no! Love is easy like skipping in sunshine not the twisted mess I’m feeling now.
I keep thinking it’s all about his body–ripped and tanned, true–or that face, but it’s not. I know that better than anyone else because, if that’s it, I’ve got early birthday presents: my boy comes in a matching set and everyone says the Ridgeways look way-similar. I could, maybe, stretch to saying that I like his interfering brothers, but, I’m TOTALLY immune to them – this insanity is all Caleb.
So, if anyone asks, I’m never thinking about him again. Again!
