Girl. (polkadotted_) wrote, @ 2006-11-18 17:12:00

Story.
Um, here's a story I wrote. I'm not too good at writing. But I wanted to write this. So, uh, yeah. LOL. Basically, this is a semi - fiction story. The general story happened to me, but I changed a lot of things and events in the story.

_______________________________



I believe that people change. Even after one day, you're a different person then you were the day before. I definitely was a different girl a year ago. In my sophmore year of high school, I made choices that I would definitely not make now in my junior year. Like getting drunk on the night before my father's birthday. Or going out with a boy that had just come back from juvinille hall only two months before. But my biggest mistake in my sophmore year? Being with Ryan Bourke.


The homecoming dance was supposed to be one of the biggest events of the year. I had missed homecoming my freshman year due to my mother's illness, so of course I was excited to finally go to my first. My friends and I had picked out beautiful dresses to wear. Upperclassmen told me that homecoming should be one of the best nights of your life. My friends that had gone last year told me that buying a dress, getting your hair done and going to a huge dance with your friends and your date was basically worth almost everything.

My date was Zachary Crew. Also known as one of the most popular guys in our class. He wasn't on the football team, but he was on our school soccer team the year before as the best high school goalie in Michigan. He was cute -he had shaggy long, blonde hair, crystal blue eyes, and a great build. I was suprised when he asked me to go to homecoming with him, and of course, I was the envy of every sophmore girl at our school.

But being Zachary's date wasn't as fun as I thought it would be. Once we got into the dance, I soon learned that Zachary loved himself more than the girls at Westview High School did, and he was suddenly the most annoying guy I had ever been stuck with. He didn't seem to mind whenever I wandered off, so finally, my best friend Allison and I decided to ditch him.

An hour after the dance started, Allison and I were dancing, having a good time, when a boy that I didn't recognize came up to me. He pulled me aside.

"Hey." He smiled at me.

"Hi..." I looked at him. "I'm sorry, do I know you?"

I was hoping I did. If I hadn't known better, I would have thought he was God's gift to women.

"Um, I think so." He looked embarrassed. "I'm Ryan Bourke. I went to this school last year. I think I recognize you."

I studied him for a couple moments. "Oh, okay," I acgknowledged. "I'm sorry. My name's Brooke."

"Hi, Brooke." Right when I was thinking that this had to be the most awkward conversation I had been in in my life, he asked me, "Do you want to dance?"

The next two hours seemed to go by faster than I had ever hoped. Ryan was everything I could ever ask for in a guy. He had cute, brown curly hair. He wasn't too tall, and he had dimples. He could make me laugh without making a fool out of himself. He was extremely smart and he knew what he was talking about. Spending the last two hours of the dance with him could not be any more perfect.

By the time the dance ended, I had given him my number and we had made plans to hang out over the weekend. But, with prior experience with guys, I didn't really expect him to remember to call me, so it took me by surprise when he called me the following morning.


Everything changed after spending a day at the park. We were outside Baskin Robins, eating ice cream, when he asked me.

"So your date at homecoming. Is he... your boyfriend?"

"Zachary? Please. I'd die before he was ever my boyfriend. But no, I'm single."

"Really?" Ryan looked off in the distance. "Yeah, me too."

Once again, awkwardness set into the situation. I looked down at my feet. Was he trying to ask me out?

I didn't know what else to say, so I just looked at him and said, "That's, uh... that's pretty cool."

"So..." Ryan seemed at a loss for words. And then suddenly, he seemed to gather courage when he said, "So if you're single, you won't mind me doing this."

He stepped in front of me, grabbed my waist, and kissed me.


That one kiss may have been the best kiss I had ever had in my life, and for the next couple days, we were inseperable. We weren't officially a couple, but anyone who saw us as two random kids on the street could have guessed that we were, based on the facts that we held hands and hugged each other while we walked. We told each other anything and everything. He could make me laugh like no one else, and he constantly reminded me of my cuteness and beauty. Every night I would consider the fact that maybe, just maybe, I was falling in love with Ryan Bourke.

What happened on Wednesday afternoon was far from expected. I was sitting in my room when I got a phone call from Rachel.
Rachel was one of my best friends, and apparently, she had become friends with Ryan ever since the dance.

"Brooke. You have to listen to me. It's about Ryan."

"What?" I was worried. I didn't think I'd be able to stand it if Ryan had a crimminal record, just like my ex-boyfriend.

"You have to stop seeing him, Brooke."

There was silence. I didn't understand her at all.

"Rachel... what are you talking about?"

"Listen. I've heard so much stuff about him... he does this with girls all the time, Brooke. He lies and does whatever it takes just to hook up with girls."

"Rachel, we can't be talking about the same guy here. Ryan isn't using me. I know he's not."

"You don't know what you're talking about." Rachel seemed annoyed with me.

"What, and you do?" My voice rose. "Rachel, you don't see us together. You're not with us when he cuddles with me, or when he makes me laugh, or when he plays with my hair. He looks into my eyes and he sees me, not some random girl. Rachel," I added, "I love him."

"Brooke. Are you listening to what you're saying right now?"

My eyes started to fill with tears. "I'm not kidding, Rachel. I'm in love with him."

"Honey... I didn't want to resort to this... but there's something I have to tell you."

"Which is?"

"He's not sure he wants to continue things with you."


After talking to Rachel, I found out that even though he liked me, he had just gotten over a serious relationship and wasn't ready for a new girlfriend. He didn't really like the thought of friends with benefits, either. He was stuck, and Rachel interpretted that he was having a relationship with at least four other girls at the same time as me, trying to find out what he wanted to do.

Of course, being the young, immature girl that I was back then, I didn't believe Rachel. But her phone call led me to think about something that I didn't even imagine considering for a long time.

Maybe, to keep Ryan from wandering off, I had to give him my virginity.

That night, Ryan and I both snuck out of our houses, and we had found a place at the park. Cuddling turned into kissing, and you could probably figure out the rest. He seemed to know what he was doing, so I felt okay with him. He knew it was my first time, and he didn't mind. At the time, it seemed like the best thing to do.

I couldn't get any sleep when I returned home at 3 A.M. My head was swarmed with thoughts of guilt and feelings about Ryan -how could I be so stupid? What had just happened?

The next day, I refrained myself from calling him, but surprisingly, he had done the same thing. I wondered why he didn't call, and on Friday, I picked up the phone and called him myself. The answering machine picked up, though, and after leaving a message I prayed that he would call me back.

I didn't hear from him all weekend. Nor the following week. Every day, I was consumed of thoughts about him and what to say to him when -or if -I talked to him about what had happened the week before. I wanted to tell him so badly about what a mistake I made, and how sorry I was, and how I had come to realize that everything between us was a lie.

On a Saturday afternoon, ten days after I had given Ryan my virginity, I called him for the fourth time since then and left my second message. Shockingly, he called me back only five minutes after I left it. I let the phone ring three times, then picked up.

"Hello?"

"Hi, Brooke." He sounded nervous. "How are you?"

"I'm doing okay." That was a lie and we both knew it. "I wanted to talk to you. Where are you?"

"I'm actually out right now," he told me. "What did you want to talk to me about?"

What do you think, dumbass? "I wanted to talk to you about what happened."

"Okay?"

I wasn't really expecting him to give such short answers, giving off the impression that this wasn't exactly on his list of things to do. I knew it wasn't, but given that we had spent so much time together in the weeks before, I was hoping that maybe he had missed me just a little.

"Ryan. I'm really sorry about what happened a week ago. We went way too fast. It was definitely my fault."

"It's fine. We did go too fast, but don't worry about it."

What was he doing? Why was he not taking any responsibilty?

"And, um..." I was running out of things to say. Admittedly, I was expecting him to say sorry to me, but of course you can never expect too much out of these kinds of boys. "Where are we going?" I finally managed to blurt out.

"What do you mean?"

"You know what I mean." Courage started to flow through my body. "Are we just going to keep ignoring each other like this?"

"No, of course not."

"So do you want to keep seeing me?"

"If you want to." He sounded unsure.

"Wrong answer."

"What do you want me to say?"

"I want you to tell me what YOU want, Ryan. Forget about what I want." In my head, I knew that couldn't be very hard for him, seeing as he had forgotten about what I wanted for about a week and a half.

"I... I don't know, Brooke. I guess we'll just wait and see."

My heart stopped. How come Ryan was being like this? This boy that I had spent such a long time with, believing that he was all good and perfect, was too good to be true. We'll just wait and see? Selfishly, I was filled with a feeling of jealousy due to the fact that he had not even thought about where he wanted to go with me for the past week and a half.

Silent tears were falling from my eyes. "Ryan, I have to go. But I still need to talk to you about all of this."

"I know, Brooke." He sounded sincere for the first time. "I know. But it needs to be in person. I'll call you tomorow. I promise."

Needless to say, I never recieved a phone call from Ryan. I waited all day next day, and by Wednesday I was lower than low.
That's when Allison, determined to get me out of the dumps, took me out for manicures and pedicures.


At the nail salon, Allison told me that I didn't need to talk about Ryan. She told me that I could talk about whatever I wanted, because she knew I was at a low point. But I needed to talk about Ryan to someone. Only a couple close friends knew about what happened that one night, but no one knew the whole story, or why I was upset.

"I didn't want it to happen this way," I started.

Allison looked up from her magazine. "Didn't want what to happen? Losing your virginity?"

The nail filist looked up from doing Allison's toes, but Allison ignored it.

"No. I mean, no and yes. That and how things have turned out with Ryan."

"Hmm." Allison put down her magazine. "What do you want to do, B?"

"I don't know. I guess it would probably be best if I broke things off with him for good, huh?"

"Sorry, Brooke, but probably. The guy's a dick. You can do way better."

I looked at Allison. Was she right? "Thanks. But I don't know if I can do that just yet."

"Why? Do you still like him?"

"It doesn't have anything to do with liking him, Al." I looked down at my fingers.

"Then what's up? Are you pregnant?" Once again, the nail filist looked up from her job, but again, Allison pretended not to notice.

"No, Allison. Don't worry." I took a deep breath. "It's more of a self esteem issue. I'm... I'm afraid that if I tell him I want things to end, he'll just say, 'Okay' and walk away."

"What do you mean? How is that bad?"

I looked out the window. "I... I want him to fight for me. That sounds dumb, I know. But I just don't want to realize that the guy I care so much about couldn't give a damn about me."

"Babe." Allison reached over and took my hand. "I understand what you want, because you're right -it would hurt to realize that the guy you love is really just a fake looking for a one night stand. And I don't want to hurt you, B, but that guy's a jackass and he was just using you. You could have been anyone."

"But it was me," I said. "It was me. A real girl. He took away something from me that some girls consider holy, and he didn't even look back after taking it." I started to cry. "And what I want to know is what I did wrong, Allison. What did I do that caused him to not want to talk to me anymore?"

"I have no idea, Brooke, but it's nothing to do with your personality. I promise."

"How do you know?"

"Because. If he spent so much time with you before and made sure that he always hung out with you, then he must not have minded your personality that much." She smiled at me. "Brooke, you're a great girl, and if you asked Ryan, I could swear to you that he'd say the same thing. It's not you, it's him, Brooke. And I hate to say this, but maybe it's already over to him. I don't know, maybe everything's already over to him. Maybe it's just obvious to him."

"Maybe WHAT'S obvious to him?" I was confused. "Whatever's obvious to him apparently isn't that obvious because I can't figure it out. That's not fair to me if it's already over for him."

"Yeah, I know, Brooke, but it also wasn't fair to him that he had sex with you and then dropped you. This guy doesn't play by the rules. 'Fair' isn't in his vocabulary."

"I'm not giving up without a fight." I looked at Brooke. "No matter what, he's not getting out of this without knowing how I feel and how much he hurt me. I can't make him care, but I can inform him." I laughed softly. "I'm not the kind of person to just let this go. I need to tell him how I feel before I can fully let go."

"Well how are you going to tell him, Brooke? He won't pick up his phone." She gave me a look. "This sounds lame, but why don't you write everything down on a piece of paper and send it to him as a letter? Writing everything out will help you get it out of your system, and by sending it as a letter, you won't have to know his initial reaction."


Dear Ryan,
So, it's been about what, two weeks? Ryan. We both know we went too far that night... and apparently, it's ruined everything between us. I tried to warn you about why I was worred and what I was scared of. And I thought you reassured me that what I was afraid of wasn't happening. But was it? I don't want to hate you, Ryan. I want to be your friend. I definitely wish I could be more to you, but something inside tells me that that's definitely never going to happen. My friends are telling me that you're using me and that I should end everything with you, and I'm sorry, but I trust their judgement a little more than I trust yours. And by a little, I mean a lot. But I wish that things didn't turn out like this. I wish we didn't have to end this. I liked being with you. I liked YOU. And I thought that maybe, just maybe, you might like me too. You acted like you did. I believed you, Ryan, but then I realized that you were most likely lying, because you've lied to pretty much every girl you've met to see if you could get into their pants. I know that, Ryan. So I mean I know that what happened between us wasn't a boyfriend - girlfriend thing. It probably never would be, I don't know. But whatever it was, it was special to me, and even though things are over between us, I want you to know that I could never hate you. I'm sorry that this was how it ended.

Brooke


For the next month, suddenly wanting to find my meaning in life, I joined clubs and sports teams. I wanted to get Ryan out of my life. I thought that writing and sending that letter would get him out of my system, but it didn't. I realized it took more. I wanted him to reply to my letter -I wanted to talk to him again, to see his face, to hear his voice, to read his handwrting, but in the back of my mind, I knew it would never happen. Each day, I got over him more and more, bit by bit. A month and a half after that life changing night, I had classified my situtation with him as a work in progress.
Almost completely over him, I was part of the track & field team, the beginning lacrosse team, and the American Cancer Society. I was done with expecting things from Ryan -I no longer cared about what he did. I thought of him less and less each day. Songs that used to remind me of him no longer had any meaning in my life.

But along with my sudden passion to find what it was I wanted to do in life, my friends started to worry about me. I no longer took much interest in hanging out with them after school. People thought I was dealing with anorexia because I didn't eat in front of anyone. I picked up the habit of writing about things and would spend hours with a notebook and pen in my hand.

Looking back, I realize that I might have made a big deal out of nothing, but I know that I was sad because Ryan had never bothered to contact me again. So of course, when I saw Ryan at Winter Formal, my heart stopped.

He saw me, and I saw him. We both knew that the other was there, but we had to pretend like we didn't see each other. There was a passage of awkwardness between us and I knew that I couldn't face him. We had both resorted to pretending like the other didn't exsist. The thought saddened me, but I knew that I had moved on and obviously, so had he. It had just taken him less time than it had for me.

About two hours into the dance, I was standing by myself when I felt someone tapping me on the shoulder. I turned around and found myself looking into Ryan's eyes.

"Hi," he said.

"Hi." I looked away.

"How've you been?"

I looked at him again. "I've been fine."

"No, you haven't." He took my hand. "Rachel told me you've been acting pretty dead. Anything you want to tell me about?"

I took back my hand and stared at him with disbelief. "You want ME to tell YOU what's wrong in my life." It was more of a statement than a question.

"Yeah. You've told me that kind of stuff before." He smiled lightly.

"Yeah, I've told you stuff before. When we didn't pretend the other didn't exsist." I shook my head. "You want to know what's wrong, Ryan? What's wrong is that I'm over you. Completely done with you. You have no meaning in my current life whatsoever. When I look at you, I don't get butterflies in my stomach. Instead, I pretend like I don't see you. I pretend like you're nothing to me. But the major problem is that you have the biggest impact on my past, Ryan. You were my first. And after that, you just walked away. I'm going to think of YOU when someone asks me about my first time. You have the biggest impact on my past, and you didn't care. You still don't."

He was speechless. "I didn't know it meant so much to you."

"Then you obviously don't know anything. Unlike for guys, sex for girls isn't a competition."

I walked away.


That night, I realized that that was what I needed to get out of my system. I needed to admit to him that he was a big deal.
I don't think I could ever admit that I loved him, though. I loved him for what seemed like the right reasons, but horribly, they turned out to be the wrong ones.

Now, as a junior at Westview, I realize that I have to test the water before I jump in. I can't immeadiately put my whole trust into any guy and I don't think I ever will be. But I'm more careful.

People change all the time. I'm a different person than I was yesterday. One can only hope that the same thing has happened for Ryan Bourke.