Chasing Charming ✔️

2 - I Wonder Who He Is?

The 'perfect' summer that Carla had described turned out to be a lot lonelier than I originally anticipated. Even though that was due to my apprehension with moving my Junior year of high school, with Carla and Mike officially together, maybe I would have felt this way no matter what.

Although I had quickly forgiven Carla for the sake of our friendship, there was an air of sadness over everything I did. Everything we did made me think, "maybe this is the last time I will ever do this with my friends," and it was hard to shove that to the side.

Then there was the fact that I was a naturally jealous person. Even though I agreed with Carla that she was right and that it was not fair of me to call dibs on a boy that I had never made a move on, I was envious of their growing relationship.

She was apologetic about her and Mike's relationship. The next time we spoke, which happened to be the day after I walked home at nearly 2 AM, Carla brought over a big bag of candy and two pints of ice cream to my house. She was right anyways, I was leaving, so it should not matter.

Carla tried to push me to date another one of the boys over the summer, but she promptly backed off when I made no moves to make a reality of her idea. When she gave up on that, she tried to convince me that I would meet a new boy in New Mexico. Although I wasn't exactly holding onto that reality, it did make me feel a bit better. A million different scenarios of the perfect Prince Charming shifted through my head at night.

Even though I tried to put energy into this 'new boy' that did not exist, seeing Carla with Mike hurt for a while. Particularly because she was living the summer I wish I could have. I opted not to hang out with them the majority of the time, even though they had been gracious enough to let me be their third wheel.

It was easier when our other friends were there, and I didn't feel like so much of an outsider. I felt like I was on the outside for the first time in my life. Growing up with the same group of friends had left me with a cushioned childhood, and my fears of never having a friend again became a reality for me for the first time.

Carla and Mike tried to convince me I was ridiculous. I was kind, I was 'the nice one,' and people wouldn't overlook that. But I knew I needed to be a bit better than sweet to make new friends.

I watched too many 'new kid at school' movies over the summer, hoping to come up with ideas, but I had an apprehension to the idea of 'reinventing' myself to fit in as many of them seemed to suggest. I knew who I was, and that wasn't changing.

My fears only increased as the final night in my childhood home grew closer.

On my last night, Carla and Mike threw me a going-away party. Almost my entire grade had shown up and given me big hugs, with empty promises to keep in touch.

All night, people were talking about how exciting Junior year would be. It stung to know that I would get to graduate with everyone. Even though they tried to be sensitive to me, I couldn't blame them for being excited. I would have been too if I had been in their position. It wasn't their fault I was leaving.

---

The goodbyes in the morning were short. We had to get going since the drive was 10 hours away, and we wanted to arrive before it got dark.

My mom had sold her car, saying she would get a new one soon, and the three of us piled ourselves in dad's truck. I squished myself in the backseat with the stuff that we would typically use for camping. Movers had already taken the majority of our stuff last week, and my dad had flown out to the new place to set up. So my mom and I had been living out of suitcases and off of take-out, which is the only part I hadn't minded. At least I got to go to my favourite restaurants for one last time before we moved on.