Fear coursed through me as the hairs stood up on the back of my neck and then anger took over.
“Brian, I told you not to ever contact me again!”
“I am so sorry, I never meant to hurt you. You have to give me another chance! I can’t live without you!” He was sobbing hysterically and I felt nothing but anger and disgust. I wanted nothing to do with him.
“Brian we are over! Don’t call me again!” I turned off my phone so that he wouldn’t be able to reach me. A minute later our house phone started ringing and I saw that it was him on the caller ID, so I unplugged it. I knew that I couldn't keep the phone unplugged forever so I was going to just tell my parents that Brian was taking the break up kind of hard and I didn’t want to deal with his constant calling. I figured if I put that kind of spin on it I wouldn’t have to tell them what really happened, and I was hoping the whole thing would just blow over and go away.
Hours passed and before I knew it, it was just about dinnertime. I loved to cook so I decided to surprise my parents with dinner that evening. I made chicken Parmesan, roasted potatoes and salad, and I set the table so that they wouldn’t have to do anything but sit down and eat.
I checked my lip in the mirror and, thankfully, you could barely tell that it was swollen the day before. I put on some lipstick to cover up the tiny cut in my lip, my makeup covered the bruising on my face, and I dished all of our plates since I knew my parents would be home at any minute. I was getting the lemonade out of the fridge when I heard my parents come in.
“What’s all this?” My mom sounded pleasantly surprised as they walked into the kitchen and saw the beautiful spread I had prepared.
"I thought I'd make dinner for you guys for once since you always make dinner for me. So you can just put your things away and then sit down and relax, and I will pour a glass of lemonade for all of us.”
My mom looked a little bit concerned as she looked at me and put her hand in my shoulder. “Laney, are you sure you’re okay? I know you probably don’t want to talk about Brian but honey, I just want to make sure that you’re okay.”
“Yeah sweetheart, you didn’t have to do all of this after what you went through with Brian yesterday.”
My eyes flew to my dad’s face. Did he know what happened?
"I know breakups can be rough sweetie, so you didn't have to do all of this, but thank you. You can just relax for the rest of the night and we will take care of everything else.”
"Mom, dad, I'm fine, really, you don't have to worry about me. It's for the best that we broke up anyway, it was getting serious and I’m going to be leaving for college in a couple of months. I just needed a day to myself, but I’m fine now and I’ll be able to go back to school on Monday. So don’t worry about me, really.” I did my best to brush it off. “Let’s not talk about this, let’s just have a nice dinner. So, how was work for you guys today?”
My parents looked at each other and they both knew me well enough to know that if I wanted to drop something then we should just drop it. We had a nice dinner and didn't talk about Brian, which made me really happy. After dinner we all watched a movie together and then turned in for the night.
The weekend flew by and Monday came before I knew it. Chloe didn’t leave my side all day because she wanted to make sure that Brian stayed away from me. I saw him in the halls but he kept his distance until the end of the day. Chloe was giving me a ride home since Brian used to always do that and as I was walking to her car to wait for her he came up behind me.
“Laney, you can’t keep pushing me away like this. Please give me another chance, I miss you and I love you. I promise I will never, ever hurt you again.”
I spun around and glared at him. “I have nothing to say to you, leave me alone!”
He grabbed my arm but then quickly let it go. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to do that.” He looked desperate and I just wanted him to go away.
I looked him squarely in the eye. “Brian, you need to move on because we are never getting back together. You hit me and that is something that you can’t take back.”
Just then Chloe walked up and asked if everything was okay.
I looked at Brian, and looked at her. “Yeah, we’re done here, let’s go home.”
We walked away from Brian and he stood there watching us, not saying a word. He didn’t plead for me to give him another chance and he didn’t make a scene. It was almost eerie the way he just stood there looking at us but I shook it off and told myself that maybe it had finally gotten through to him that we were done.
The week passed uneventfully, thankfully with zero communication from Brian, and by Friday I was so ready to have fun with Chloe that weekend. We were going shopping all day Saturday and I couldn’t wait. The final bell rang and as I neared my locker I saw Jeremy standing there waiting for me. Jeremy had had a crush on me since the ninth grade but he never mustered any courage to ask me out. I remembered him as a scrawny freshman and since I had been with Brian for the past year I had never really given another guy a second look. Well Jeremy definitely deserved a second look. When did he turn into this tall, gorgeous guy? I felt my belly flutter as I walked up to him and looked into his bright blue eyes that were smiling at me.
“Hey Laney.”
“Hey Jeremy. What’s going on?”
He shuffled his feet a bit, shoved his hand into his front pocket and glanced down at the floor before he looked back up at me. I could see the apprehension in his eyes.
“Well, um, I kinda heard that you don’t have a date for prom and I was wondering if you wanted to go with me?”
Really? It never even crossed my mind that another guy would ask me to prom. I thought for sure that everyone would have a date by now. I was really flattered and there was no way I was going to say no.
I looked at him and smiled. “I would love to go with you Jeremy.”
A huge smile spread across his face, we exchanged phone numbers and he told me he would let me know all of the details the next week. I couldn’t wipe the smile off my face as I got into Chloe’s waiting car.
“Somebody looks happy! What’s going on?” Chloe had an inquisitive smile on her face as she raised her eyebrows at me.
“Jeremy just asked me to prom.” I was cheesing all over the place.