Stephani, Steph for short, strolled down the street reminiscing about her wonderful high school years and how sad it would be to graduate in a few days. The goodbye would probably be very teary and near unbearable as she cut ties with friends she had come to know and love over that four—year period. So many memories would be left on that football field, on that campus, and in those hearts, and it was dreadfully sad that most of that would probably fade away in a year or two as friends move away and lives change and college starts. Soon all that would be left of those days would be contained in that memory—inducing relic, the yearbook.
Well, that was not completely true... in fact that bears no semblance whatsoever to the truth. The real truth was that her high school experience sucked and over the space of four years her life had altered, and never in her favor it seemed. She had had four or five crushes and despite her looks she was turned down for others and ended up with a couple loser boyfriends that probably could have won Academic Decathlon competitions in their sleep. Again it could be mentioned that beauty was not a factor for why she ended up with two geeks that she dumped within a week of hooking up. Steph had plenty of pretty, "more than her fair share" some girls would whine, yet she did not know how to use those looks to her advantage and that's where she got stuck.
She slowed down to look into a window at a mannequin that had a mini skirt and crop top on, wondering how it would look on her. Her reflection shone back at her in the mirror: a shorter (5'4"), slim figure with beautiful straight black hair that framed her naturally tan complexion and which she liked to keep in a pony tail but fell halfway down her back when she let it out. Her small, rather petite physique compromised her chest but let her retain a cute B cup that was enough for most guys. She had slightly crooked front teeth but they were not so horrible she had to keep her mouth closed in pictures; in fact, even with the minor problems with her teeth she had a dazzling smile that could be contagious when she was really happy.
Sadly enough those smiles were becoming less frequent. It used to be a common occurrence to see Stephani smile with such enthusiasm that you could not help but smile back at her and be happy. All that was before boys were a factor in her life and way before she decided she was extremely inadequate in the field of romance, in fact the decline had started when she hit puberty and carried on through to the end of her high school career. Things in her life and her own decisions had effected a buffer between her and all the boys she had ever wanted to date.
Silently she studied the outfit and decided that it would never look good on her, much less great, and though her mind filed away the shop for future reference, she still moved on and now just a touch more depressed that she had been before she stopped.
This lack of self—confidence and unwillingness to take a risk is what landed Stephani with two loser boyfriends and what had eventually driven away all of her friends. She was now forced to face that fact that no one wants to live with someone who will not take the chance and jump into the fire when life presents its opportunities. The main problem was that she did not realize this primary edict and no one had shown her that she was disobeying it each and every time she sold herself short or worried so much that she stood off to the side while everyone else jumped into things.
Guys and gals alike shied away from the person she was growing into and none yet had had the courage or compassion to help her. She was in desperate need of a male (or female) companion that could show her what life was about and all the bits and pieces she was passing up that led her bit by bit away from a happy life to a boring and dreary one. Now it was senior year, one week before she had to go out and face the world she needed to be prepared for, one week before childhood officially kicked her out on the street to fend for herself, one week left to cram for the biggest test of all: adulthood.
Later that day when she finally got home after passing up a few more of those vital prospects, her mother asked her again for what seemed the millionth time, "When are you going to get a job?"
"I don't know, Mom," she whined, "I've been trying so hard to get one. Today I went out after school for probably two hours speaking with managers," she paused, wincing inward at the lie and trying hard not to show it on her face, and went on, "Can we please not talk about this today? I am so tired and I have a horrible headache."
"Fine, whatever, Steph, but you know that you are going to be out of this house before the summer is gone and I'll be right there telling you, 'I told you so.'"
Stephani let out a squeal of frustration at her mother and stormed off to her room and sulked for a while, while she glared at the wall. After a while she pulled off her clothes and slipped into bed.
***
The next week went by uneventfully, as did graduation ceremonies and the following dance (she played the perfect wallflower). One of the greatest nights of any high school student's life was just another day for Stephani. She was racing her life downhill and there was no way anyone could hope to stop her. That's when the phone rang.
"Hello, Stephani? My name is Todd Parker I was wondering if I could talk to you for a little." Todd had seen her picture in the yearbook and was blown away that he had never heard of such a dazzling girl. "You see, I saw your picture in the yearbook and I was wondering how I could have gone a whole four years without noticing you. I guess maybe I never really looked for anyone out of my own little clique but there it is. Now I know this is kind of weird, but who are you exactly?"
"Well you're pretty damn right, this is weird. I don't know of anyone who would call to ask 'who' someone is. Huh, well..." Steph was trying to actually make something of this conversation at the moment. Such a strange phone call surely needed to be worked out———this could be interesting! But then that other part of her that seemed to surface the most told her, "Just hang up and forget about this loser."
"You're right, this is really weird. Umm let me start over," he paused, took a big breath trying to overcome the sudden shyness that had sprung up within him, and with a shaky voice due to the intimidation her beauty had on him he continued, staring at the picture in the yearbook as he did, "Hi my name's Todd, and I sow you in the yearbook. I was wondering if maybe you would like to go to lunch sometime..."
Stephani was blown away at the simple question that carried so much weight. She knew this was not a question of whether she would like to be his boyfriend, but for some reason her mind was making it exactly that. The biggest thought that blew threw her mind about a thousand times in the space of the next few seconds was, "I can't have a boyfriend right now," and though she knew she was being irrational with that thought, she could not get it out of her head for the life of her. She tried to do some quick mental math with her time allowances made by her schedule, and reminded herself she was probably the most uneventful person in the US.
Her hesitation and silence was starting to become a deterrent for Todd now. He did not know what to think of the silence, because if she was not talking how could he know what she was feeling at the moment. The wait was starting to make him want to hang up and forget he called. He had already gone against his tentative nature in calling her and now he was so scared she would hang up or reject him in some other way that he could not take it anymore.
"Maybe this was a bad idea," he said with a tone of regret, "I probably shouldn't have called you. Umm I'll just go now," he let his words trail off and hesitated a moment hoping that maybe she would stop him from putting the phone down and tell him that 'yes' she wanted to go on a date with him. He was met with silence as he willed himself to wait just a second or two more and he just let the phone fall to the bed as he clicked it off.
Regret at even calling washed over him, relief from the release of the agony of waiting for her answer, and reprimanding thoughts all washed over him in an intertwined conglomeration of the three. He sat motionless for a minute or two and then called up Brad, his best friend, to tell him how it went.
Back on the other side of the phone call, Steph was still holding the receiver to her ear wondering whether she should be happy at being free of the choice or sad that she missed the opportunity to start something with a boy who had taken an interest in her and not the other way around. Her reasoning had also urged her to look at the fact that he was going off of a yearbook picture and probably only knew what she looked like and nothing else about her. Yet he did ask her to lunch probably in order to do just that and now she had pushed him away just like she had pushed everyone else away. Her indecisiveness, which had resulted from her fear of getting burned, had led her away from this relationship that had the potential to be something really great. She had messed up again and this time she realized it and she laid back down and beat herself up mentally.
The clock ticked by on the wall with unnaturally loud clicks as seconds of her life passed her by and she sat there on the bed doing nothing about it. If anything, the short conversation with Todd had been enlightening, showing her not only that she never took chances but also that she would live a boring life without taking those chances. Now the moment was upon her and she realized she could still take one of those chances. She picked up the phone and hit a couple of buttons and her phone dialed back the number that had called her only two minutes ago. She heard the line pick up and opened her mouth to speak and she got an earful of a busy signal.
