I Can't Be This Way [part 1]
Title: I Can’t Be This Way
Author: Beacbutt (me)
Rating: PG 13
Genre: Teen fiction, I suppose. ?
Warnings: swearing, smoking, attempted suicide, hallucinations, Word Count: 1,600 (part 1. Whole story pt 1-4 is 6,400)
Disclaimer: There are some lyrics used later on in the story [part 4] (which I will probably forget to say about, so yeah. they aren't mine heh) This is all fictional and all the characters are people that I made up. They are in no way meant to resemble real people.
Dedications: I'd like to 'dedicate' this fiction to my boyfriend Kaelan. I love him so much and he has inspired me to write some parts of this story. So if he ever reads this....... ;) yeah, you'll have to read the whole thing. xx
Notes: is in 1st person. Please take your time to give this a read. I love writing and I would love some feedback for this. I welcome all feedback. So hit me up with a comment! Audra lands herself and her best friend in shit when she decides to make a big change to her life to get out of people spreading rumours.
Enjoy.
I Can't Be This Way
part 1
I sat at my grey desk looking sideways at Alex, watching him twirl a black pen between his fingers.
I recalled meeting him back in grade six...
It was his first day at our school. He was shy and looked nervous. I remember seeing him sitting by himself at lunch. And I left the group of girls and decided to introduce myself. “Hi, I’m Audra... You’re Alex, right?”
“Yeah.” Alex replied.
I put my ten and a half year old butt down on the seat beside him. “I really like your name, Audra.” He said.
I smiled at him. “Thanks.” I replied. After much talking I found that I kind of clicked with Alex.
From that day on, I thought of Alex as my best friend.
When we both moved up to high school, nothing changed between us; Alex is still the little boy I met three and a half years ago, only not so little. He was a whole head taller than me by grade nine.
I blinked and Mrs Pierce’s voice filled my ears again. I looked at Alex’s silver watch on his wrist. It showed a quarter past twelve. Almost over.
Alex’s hair was in his eyes, which were so green. I’ve always liked them and Alex had mentioned once that he like my eyes too. I guess my eyes were kind of unique, a colour somewhere between blue and grey I suppose.
I saw Shelbi smirking at me.
“What?” I whispered at her and she ignored me, but kept staring.
I tried to ignore it. It’s not as though she hasn’t acted like this before. Shelbi and her friends gave me shit because my best friend, maybe only friend, was a guy. I couldn’t help who my friends were and who I liked. That was just the way things were.
I turned away from the nasty, skeletal creature and noticed Alex was looking my way.
“What’s her problem?” He asked.
“I have no idea.” I replied then turned back to the front of the room.
At our second break for lunch, Alex and I went to our place called ‘the wall’. (We called it that because it was just where we hang out at the back of the science block. ) Somehow we started discussing the whole ‘werewolf vs. Vampire!’ thing.
“Okay, okay. Twilight is pure bullshit, so why does it even matter?” Alex procrastinated.
“Oh, I’m just curious.” I said.
Alex swung his legs down over the side of the concrete block we were sitting on and shuffled himself off it.“Well, vampires are just... I don’t know. Plus, werewolves are Beast, so werewolves.” He stopped wondering back and forwards and faced me. “What about you then?”
I swung my legs over the edge of the concrete and put my thinking face on for no apparent reason. “Werewolves.”
Alex walked up to the concrete block and leant against it. “How come?” he asked.
“Well, vampires are monsters, I guess. How they… devour innocent people.” I said enthusiastically.
“Yeah I s’pose.” Alex said.
I looked across at Alex, but he didn’t look back at me.
“But you’re right,” I said. “Twilight really does suck.”
Alex laughed. “I knew you would come to your senses one day, Audra.”
I frowned at him. I’ve seen that smile on his lips before. He was either about to expose one of my secrets, pay me out or embarrass me...
“Shut up.” I warned.
“Oh, but he’s sooo hot...” Alex intimidated.
I punched him quickly on his shoulder.
“Oww! That one actually hurt, y’know.”Alex said and grabbed my foot, trying to pull me off the concrete block.
“Oh, no you don’t.” I muttered and tried to wriggle away from him. I felt my shoe coming off my left foot so I let him pull it off and I darted, rather slowly for ‘darting’, away.
I jumped off the opposite side of the concrete and ran towards the field. I had a pretty good head start, but Alex was fast.
I was almost half way down the field when I realised I was about to corner myself.
Something solid hit me on my back and somehow I tripped over my own feet. I rolled for a second and lay on my grassy back, looking up at the patchy blue sky.
It was a beautiful autumn’s day.
Alex’s head appeared above me, the gold chain around his neck reached down to my face, it was a couple of inches away.
“Gotcha.” Alex said happily.
“Yeah, I know.”
I bit at his necklace and he backed off.
Alex pulled me to my feet and I retrieved my other shoe and pulled it on without undoing the laces. The bell rang for our next class.
“Maths. Yay.” Alex said sarcastically. I smirked at his stupid attitude towards math class. Like, it isn’t all that bad.
Alex looked at me. ”What?” He asked.
“Nothing.” I said.
He raised an eyebrow at me. “Okay then?”
I rolled my eyes and elbowed Alex in the ribs.
That was when I realised I would be hopeless without a friend like him.
The next day at school wasn’t the best.
I was sitting at my desk in English class, minding my own business, when the teacher had to go and get something from her office.
The moment the teacher shut the door behind her, the whole class started talking, or everyone except me. Alex was in the other English class, so I didn’t have anyone interesting to talk to.
A little huddle of girls were having yet another intense gossip session. I could have just overheard what they were saying, though something made me actually listen in.
“She doesn’t even have any friends.” Tasha spat.
They couldn’t mean me, could they? I wondered.
“Like, who would even want to be friends with Alex? He’s a creepy Goth boy!” Elle sneered.
What the hell, judging much…
The four other girls made, what I think were satisfied grunt kind of noises, through their noses.
Shelbi leant closer into the huddle. “Well, I reckon they’re secretly dating each other.” She said. “What else do they do behind the science block at lunch?”
I couldn’t believe my ears. So they were obviously talking about me and Al and Shelbi thought me were dating! And…Oh, God.
“I know!” Exclaimed Sarah. “They are like, so totally together.”
“Well I think they suit each other.” Said Phoebe.
The other girls gave her quizzical glances.
“They’re both total loser Goths, aren’t they?” Phoebe folded her arms.
Sarah flicked a few strands of half dead hair from her face. “They are.”
By this point I was just about ready to kill someone. They can’t talk about Alex like that! Or me for that matter!
Shelbi shuffled her chair over to the other group of girls and whispered in their ears. Some screwed up their faces and some nodded while continuing to text on their phone.
By the time English was over the whole class thought that Alex and I were together.
I was walking downstairs for lunch break.
“How’s Alex goin’?” Josh asked as he passed me, followed by his mates.
“Ha ha, you’re so funny.” I said. How immature can you get?
I decided to tell Alex about this. He’s the one person who would understand.
We walked casually down to the wall. Alex jumped onto the concrete and stood up, high above me. “So,” He leant against the wall. “what is it you mentioned earlier?”
I sighed and got onto the cement block. “Well, y’know how people give me a bit of shit about you and...”
“Oh, don’t tell me they’ve started this again.”
I looked at him and see the annoyance flickering in his eyes. “Hmm, well.”
“Can’t they just forget it? Move on?”
Alex was starting to lose it. He started playing with the pockets on his school shorts. “Don’t they have someone else to piss off?” I guess he had every reason to be annoyed at this. People, particularly our grade, had been at it for about a year now.
“Sorry, you were saying?” Alex looked down at me again.
I wondered if I should go on or not, but if I didn’t Alex would be really curious, thinking that I’m not telling him something important. “I heard some girls in English spreading rumours about us two. They said that we’re ‘a couple’ and stuff.”
“Great.”
“Yeah.” I said.
There was a few seconds of silence.
“Don’t worry about it Audra,” Alex reassured me and sat down, back against the wall still. “It’s not the end of the world.” He said in a slightly cheerier voice.
I squeezed out a smile and sat next to him. I was still feeling worried about the whole thing for some reason, but I guess Alex was pretty good at calming me down.
A couple of minutes later, when I thought Alex was fine, a few grade eights came around the corner of the lab. We eyed them down and one of them said something to the others which made them all looked at us as though we were monkeys in a cage.
Alex tried to get up but I quickly grabbed his wrist and stopped him full on attacking the brats.
“Just shut up! Okay!? You can’t just believe every fucking lie you here from anyone!” He howled.
The younger kids kept walking, looking a little scared now.
Alex cursed at them again and said something else in another language. He looked close to murderous.
“Hey. Alex?” I put his hand upside down in my palm and began rubbing small, slow circles on his hand and wrist.
He looked up at me, and his eyes jumped into mine, angry, tired and confused. “Just settle down, okay?”
He tipped his head back to the wall and exhaled. His eyes closed themselves. “I’m sorry.” He apologized.
“It’s okay.” He sat like that for a while and I realized I was still drawing circles on his hand. Jesus Christ, no wonder people think we’re together.
[read part 2 here]