The Hidden Dark Side of Things

She shows up, uncomfortably, bag in hand filled with convenient distractions for when things could potentially get awkward while she is stranded here. Her eyes dart around the room, a friendly smile on her face as an uncertain look wavers in her eyes. The host leads her into the kitchen, where she deposits her contribution to the snack stash and to the dinner funds. Eyes take in the Styrofoam cups, the wooden table, the old tiled floor. Attention fixes to the strange gadget hanging on the wall, red numbers blaring mysterious information she understands not.

Friendly host-like words are spoken, she selects a cup and meticulously proclaims her name upon it. Then she slips into the back, where the other girls are lurking, watching a movie she has no attachment or interest in. She feels out of place, yet not altogether uncomfortable.

Eventually people bunch in this small, back room. Strange exchanges are made, none involving her. She throws in a sweet word or two amongst the war of dirty innuendos and jokes. She doesn't belong here.

With a deck of cards she lures a number of people out to the wooden table that is not quite round, with mismatching chairs squeezed around it. Her game is unknown, but already liked. More chairs are mismatched, squeezed around the table. The game begins, her lips moving rapidly to explain each mystery to their untouched minds, trying to get them to understand. What they begin to understand is the game, not her mystery, not her discomfort.

The door opens behind her. Hopeful eyes wander over to the door, only to be disappointed. When glancing at the list of invitees, only one of them had been her friend friend, and he had yet to show up. Until that anticipated moment, she was left here, surrounded by friendly acquaintances that would never reach the realm of friendship.

The game continued, her eyes wandering occasionally (reluctantly yet inevitably) over to the boy who had once tried to court her. He was the one who had made the decision to avoid her after it failed, to pretend that she didn't exist at all, and she was the one who had followed that created standard religiously. Not that she believed in religion anymore.

Every time she would turn a cold eye away, she could feel her internal walls building up, hating the world around her, trying to protect herself, reject the others. Trying to be safe. Unafraid.

But none of these worries seemed to matter anymore. He'd found a new object of his affection. She was no longer obligated to feel awkward around him, like she disappointed him in some unspeakable way and now he hated her for it. His girlfriend seemed to be the cure to their poisonously hostile current relationship, making the tenseness slowly get eaten away by her limited antidote that could never eradicate all of the poison.

She is the one that you can never obtain, not really. You'll feel so close, and then you'll realize that you're actually so very far away from her heart. You are only close in comparison to all the others, trying to get at her heart. And eventually you'll see that she's not letting just anyone into her heart. You'll see hints at the painful bits of her past that made her this way. So...distant. Unreachable.

You tell her about others' affection for her because you know it's better to just let them get it out and over with. She'd never notice otherwise, and really, she'll never love you or anyone else. Not in the way you love her.

It's just fleeting affection, anyways. The immature love of a teenager. Something that won't last forever. The pain will be gone soon.