| Just so you know, I never wanted this to happen. And don't look at me like that either. I didn't. I mean, I feel like I've found a part of myself that I never knew existed.. but instead of taking this opportunity to grow as a person, I feel like I am more lost now than I ever was. For so long, I've trained.. no, begged myself not to notice the little things that she does. The way she walks into a room and everyone holds their breath. The way she captivates her audience with a simple smile and a wave. The way she moves through ambits of space like it was never really learned, but rather instilled in her before she ever even knew what popularity was. And I ignored it.. for the longest time, I ignored it.. to the point where even I believed it had no affect on me what-so-ever. But as it goes.. little by little, I began to reason with myself.. asking questions I surely didn't want to know the answers to. And I found that as much as I've denied myself the actual truth, I've also been denied of my freedom and the right I have to my own happiness, however scary that might be. All this time, I've been wearing this mask of erudition, disguising my naiveté like it was something to be ashamed of... the walls I've built in and around myself were mere testaments to my own stupidity. (And to think, I thought I was oblivious to Harrison's feelings.) And I realized that up until now, I've been obligated to feel a certain way, to be with certain kinds of people.. namely guys; and all I could think of was how empty it felt, how.. incomplete I was. Sure I've liked guys in the past, and I am not gonna sit here and invalidate those feelings, because I know that they were real. But Brooke... Brooke sets my whole body on fire. My mind, my heart, my soul... I can feel her presence from the tips of my toes, to the top of my head, and back down through my body again. When we look at each other, it's like, there's this fusion of souls, binding us together for that exact moment, without ever even uttering a single word. And I have to ask myself.. did I always feel this way? Deep down, did I always know that behind every snide remark, every vicious accusation, there was a love so intense that even I couldn't explain it to myself? I wonder... I wonder why it had to be me.. why I had to be the one questioning and second-guessing myself - when she gets to be the one who I have to second-guess myself about. I wonder why the way I feel about Brooke defies every single speck of love I have ever known, and yet at the same time, makes me feel like, until she came along, I hardly ever loved anyone at all. Does she know how my eyes trace the curvature of her body when I think she isn't looking.. and how, as hard as I try, I can't seem to find the will to fight with her anymore? Does she notice the blood rush to my cheeks and the way I immediately avert her gaze the second she says something that gets to me? And that sometimes, I just completely avoid her at all. Does she know how angelic she looks in the morning with her misplaced hair and her pajama ensemble.. and how sexy it is when she doesn't have to try so damn hard at fitting in. I wonder... I wonder if she knows how much I despise her. How much I wish she wouldn't make me feel this way and how it's all her fault that I'm confused and bitter and suffocated by my own impatience, grabbing at me, wanting a definitive answer.. am I straight, or am I not? I'm probably just looking for a defense though. A safeguard. Or maybe an excuse.. to preserve and protect my sanity. I mean can I really be in love with another girl? Well.. no, I don't think so. But it's not just another girl… I am in love with Brooke McQueen. There. I said it. I am in love with Brooke. What? Stop looking at me like that. I told you, I never wanted this to happen... When I think about all the possible people that I could have fallen in love with, Brooke is at the absolute top and bottom of that list. From day one, it's been a constant battle of emotions.. trying to decide wether I hated her or wanted her in the worst way. And I realized that all this fire, all this angst, wasn't ever really hatred at all.. it was attraction. Pure, animalistic, Discovery Channel attraction... But it wasn't just about her looks. Don't get me wrong, I think Brooke is absolutely breathtaking. But there's a river that runs deep inside of her, one that she tries to hide from everyone.. and there's really only a select few who can see through it. I like to consider myself one of those people. Where I used to think she was vain, I found a genuine insecurity. Where I thought she was insensitive, I found it was only a mask to disguise her own fear of being hurt as badly as she had been in the past. Where I thought she was sarcastic and unnecessarily rude, I found it had been provoked, and that I was just as much to blame for her outbursts as she was. And when I think about it, all this time, I sought her out… I had it in my head that Brooke McQueen was this self-righteous leader of the Fascist Brigade at Kennedy, and that it was my job to make her realize the damage she was creating in all the undeserving students she had been mistreating over the years. But while in the process of making Brooke realize what a total bitch she was.. I found she wasn't like that at all. She was one of the sweetest, most caring and loyal people I have ever met in my life. I suppose as a journalist, but more importantly, a writer, I am expected to be a good judge of character. To go beneath the surface, and discover things that most other people don't. But if I was ever wrong about something, it was most certainly Brooke. Maybe I didn't want to see it. Maybe I didn't want to admit I might feel something for her outside the enemy territory she resided in. Maybe her fire is what attracted me to her. Because as much time as I spent dishing out criticism and denouncing the validity of her clique, she spent as much time defending it.. and at the end of the day, we were just two people who were one in the same.. scrambling around, trying to find something to believe in, even if we knew it was wrong in our hearts. So what am I trying to say here? I guess what I'm trying to say is that through all the arguing, the petty name-calling, and the invasion of space, I fell in love with everything about her. Brooke. I fell in love with Brooke. Brooke, who comes into my room at night and pretends it's because she has nothing better to do than to talk to me. Brooke, who takes decade-long showers and leaves the toothpaste sitting at the bottom of the sink. And Brooke, who despite everything that we've gone through, still manages to send a smile my way, at least once every day. Yup, I am a sucker for Brooke McQueen... So help me god. ____________________________ |