I didn't feel the ground under my feet while walking towards Ira's house. The weather seemed to reflect my mood, crispy blue sky radiated freshness, every breath of air was intoxicating. This happiness was too huge to handle, almost scary how out of this world I felt. In no time I crossed the distance, time was fleeting and meaningless. I knocked on the door and still somewhat disheveled Ira opened it.
"I need few more minutes. Want to come in?"
"Ahh, no, I'll wait outside." There was no way I would be able to sit still inside, it would also be hard not to start talking and the chances of being overheard by her parents were too great.
While she went back to finish getting ready, I was getting bored and a bit chilly on the bench near her door which happened to catch the building's shadow. So, I got up, roamed around, and ended up basking in the sun on a small road in front of her gate.
As my gaze wondered around the flowers she had planted, the scenery, the sky, a movement caught my attention in the corner of my eye. I looked down the street, and on the crossroad few men were crossing the street heading towards the city center. I immediately recognized him, he was walking closest to me, with others on his other side. We both saw each other, but it was too far to say anything, so I just waved at him. Vova waved back while still walking, and immediately two heads popped on both sides of him to look at me. I could feel my face getting red instantly since I didn't know them and their open curiosity was too embarrassing.
It was a mixed blessing that they quickly went out of view. I was glad for the embarrassing situation to be over. However, I realized that I was quite a bit disappointed that he didn't approach me. Some part of me wished we would ditch our friends and spend the rest of the day alone, or pull both companies together and hangout in a big group. Regardless of my desires, it was what it was, and I resigned myself to look forward to hopefully seeing him tonight.
After a while a tall goddess emerged from her home.
"Wow! Looking awesome!" I complimented.
"Ha! Thanks, look who's talking, looking great yourself! Vasya will be meeting me tonight, so I put a bit of effort into my look." She answered grinning.
"Yeah, I get it." I completely understood her. As we headed towards Lana's home, we compared notes on how we spent the rest of last night. When we picked up Lana and headed to one of the small back alley park benches for privacy as our stories got quite a bit more detailed and steamy. After a while we decided to head to the town square and see who's there before going dancing.
Quite a few people were out and about. Among them was our other classmate Seta, she just had her sixteenth birthday and her mom let her go dancing with us. She was on a gloomy side, the skinny, pastel clad blonde gave off more of the dark emo vibe that clashed with her dolled up look. It was hard to tell what she was really feeling with her emotionless expression and monotonous speech. Regardless, her wild stories were always a good entertainment.
Andrew found us in the town square and we became a group of five, I was longing to see Vova soon and was growing envious of the merry couple. Eventually, the five of us headed to the club a bit after ten in the evening. True to his word, Vasya was waiting for us in front of the club with a tall rose for Ira. The mood was good, the songs were great, the dancing was fun, but I was getting quite nervous as the midnight was approaching and still there was no sight of Vova.
The moment I almost gave up hope, he sheepishly approached our dancing circle.
"Hey, can we talk outside for a bit?" He murmured in my ear. The butterflies stirred in my stomach and fluttered towards my loins. I could only nod in reply. He took my hand and we waved through the mass of dancing bodies towards the exit. We exited the dance hall, and headed to the side of the building. The dark corner illuminated only by moonlight, with still loud enough to hear music permeating through the walls created a romantic atmosphere. We stood quiet for a moment, as awkwardness was creeping in, I remembered and pulled out his handkerchief from my pocket.
"Here, thank you for lending it to me yesterday." I gave it to him, hoping icebreaker would get us out of this weird mood.
"Ahh, no problem…" He answered as he took it. He looked like he was thinking hard about something.
"…I'm sorry." He said after a while.
"What?" My excitement was waning at this point, worry begun to creep in.
"I didn't mean it yesterday, I'm sorry. I was high, and didn't realize what I was doing." He continued.
Is he worried that he moved too fast? Or that we have gone too far on first meeting? This was salvageable, I thought still hopeful.
"Ahh, no worries, I understand…" I answered, we could start fresh today when everyone is sober. "...Wanna go back inside and dance a bit before closing time?" At this point I was forcefully pushing the conversation along.
"Ehh, about that… I kind of had a crush on Veronica… I want to give it a chance with her." He answered without looking in my eyes. A deep pit opened inside me, dark hollow that was sucking my soul in, which made it really hard to think as my vision begun to spin.
"…"
"…"
"Ok, I understand." I answered after a pause when I got my breath back. "You know what? I'll help you! I'll call her out for you, she seemed interested yesterday." I continued with exaggerated good will.
"You will?" He looked at me for the first time, with baffled expression full of questions plastered on his face. Thankfully this humored me a bit.
"Yeah, I mean it." Two things pushed me forward: I didn't want to show how hurt I was at all cost. A dumb, ugly, fatty getting her hopes up for the guy leagues out of her range, deep seeded desire to get out of here without being mocked felt like the only essential thing to my survival at that moment; and somewhere in the back of my mind, I honestly believed that true love meant caring about the person you love more than yourself, so this was the right thing to do anyway (but this was a very tiny thought at the time).
Moving away, my heart was trying break out of my chest with loud bangs, pushing away from my bloody soul that was struggling and slipping into the dark vortex sucking my insides into oblivion, ominous ringing in my ears threatened to pop my eyes out. I wasn't gonna cry. There was no bloody way he'll get to see my despair.
Before disappearing around the corner, I turned around and asked question that begun bothering me:
"Why did you insist to walk me last yesterday?" This whole misunderstanding could have been avoided if he did as I asked and dropped me off first.
"You live closer to my house. I wasn't thinking about dating yesterday, since I just returned from the army. Going back with you made more sense at the time." He answered honestly.
"Ha! I got it. Well, good luck…" I said walking away.
I entered the club, and like a hunting equipment locked in on Vera's location, with quick steps I approached her, spooking her a bit with my abrupt appearance.
"Hey!" I got her attention, good…
"Hi?" She was definitely confused at this point.
"Victor wants to speak to you. He's waiting outside." I didn't have time to mince words.
"What? Why?" She looked even more confused.
"Well, it's important! You better hurry so he can tell you!" I was close to losing my composure. Thankfully she grabbed her things and headed to the exit without asking more questions. With the mission complete, I looked for my friends, as I approached them Ira and Lana noticed that something wrong. I guess the fake smiley expression mask was gone.
"What happened?!" Both of them asked simultaneously.
"He's in love with Vera…" I could barely get it out of me; it was still hard to convince myself this was real.
"That Jerk! Let me have a word!" Ira was ready to go and straighten him up. While Lana grabbed back of Ira's shirt, stalling the war cry.
"Hold on, let her finish." The sound of reason she was.
"Yeah, I called her out to see him outside… I need to get out of here, but I don't want them to see me running with my tail between my legs…" I didn't need to say more.
"We got it, I'll go pretend to use the outhouse outside, while Ira checks another side of the club's perimeter. Stay with Seta, we will call you when the coast is clear." I nodded, appreciating having them in my life.
After few moments they came back.
"It's clear, it looks like they headed towards the city center. Her friend was with them, so I don't imagine it to be a very romantic outing." Ira snarled in disgust.
"Come-on, we'll walk you home." Lana said.
"Uhh, you don't have to, it's not far for me." I answered, didn't really feel like bothering them more.
"Stop the bullshit, and let's go!" Ira said with a no-nonsense attitude. She was getting very angry in my stead it seemed. The three of us slowly left the club, leaving Seta and the boys behind. Thankfully, I didn't have to talk, and the topics the girls shuffled between them were humorous enough that even I let out occasional snort.
When we reached my home I shooed them away after many hugs, kisses, and assurances that I was fine. No one bought the last one, but eventually they headed back while I went inside. I saw the kitchen light on, and drifted towards it. My sister was drinking late night tea, she looked like they had another fight. I collapsed at her feet and cried. I did not cry this hard since my father died, no matter how shitty things got. It feels like as soon as one hole in my soul was slowly closing with time, another deep rip just tore it apart.
Thankfully she didn't say anything, and just let it all pour out while she was stroking my head gently. After a while, words were leaking mixed with sobs and salty water, with time I poured out everything. The sobbing was subsiding and I felt empty. My sister took it as a cue and begun consoling me after hearing the whole story. According to her since we didn't end on bad term there was still a chance, and first crushes are always hard when they break, pretty much not to worry and go to sleep since I had school in the morning. I was pretty numb at this point, and took her optimistic words with a grain of salt. However, since I had to face Vera in the morning, I did not want to show up looking like a puffer fish, that would be a dead giveaway of how I felt; so, I trotted straight to bed and did my best to stop thinking, somehow, I managed to dose off.