Chapter 2 time! This is the flashback supplement for chapter 1. Like I said, this is a parallel plot thing that's going on.

 "When I was a little girl, I always thought fairytales were magical. Now that I think about it...all fairytales have been meticulously thought out and scripted. What's so magical about that? The magic element is spontaneity."  -- Ash

            I met him in seventh grade. Technically, we knew who the other was in sixth grade, but seventh grade, due to The Curse of the Last Names, was when we officially met. In sixth grade, I had seen him once, but he wasn’t an “Art-Fart”—the name designated to the Gifted and Talented students atCreekmooreMiddle School.

            I quietly settled myself in the hard, grey plastic chair attached to the desk. I was the first seat in the fourth row. Damn it, now I couldn’t goof off in class. My desk was in front of the podium, where my geography teacher always stood whenever he lectured about Napoleon or the world’s first known player, King Henry VIII.

            Last year, we had the exact same kids in this class, and I comfortably sat in the back. I glanced to my left, and raised my eyebrows in surprise. New kid. Glancing at my classmates from last year, I saw that they were all glancing at him too, trying to see who the newest addition to our little “family” was.

            I turned straight ahead then, waiting for Mr. McPherson to get his things together. I pulled out a compact mirror, checking to see if my thick black hair stayed perfectly straight on my walk over to school with Christian. It looked great. Thank God.

            When I snapped the mirror closed, I mindlessly looked to my left. That’s when my eyes connected with his. Huge dark brown bug eyes magnified by thick rectangular frames. The first look to pass between two people who would spend the next five years as friends and enemies.

            He never did quite grow into those eyes until now, senior year. They were huge for his small face. His eyes made him the butt of jokes about how his eyes were the biggest things about him in comparison to his small body.

            Mr. McPherson started taking attendance, and for the most part, we all sat bored because we already knew the other fifteen students well. But everybody’s attention was on Mr. McPherson when he called on the new kid.

            “Hamza Musa-Ali?” He pronounced it uncertainly.

            “Yeah. It’s pronounced like Hum-za Moo-sa Al-ee. Hum like in hummingbird.” For a kid that was barely four-foot ten, he was pretty bold. I was probably a whole head taller than him.

            Seeing how tiny he was, I slid lower in my seat. I had just hit my growth spurt in the middle of sixth grade, and I was finally shedding off those ugly-duckling pounds.

            I was down to a size nine, but even sitting next to this shrimpy Hamza Musa-Ali guy had me feeling like an elephant.

            Mr. McPherson continued with roll call. “Eiliyah Suleiman?” I awkwardly raised my hand.

            “Here.” He nodded and checked off my name.

            “Ok, class. The school news is coming on. No talking.” We all settled back in our seats. When the school news came on, Zach Lewis started off by welcoming everyone to another great year at Creekmoore. I glanced at Andrea, who was sitting on the other side of Hamza.

            She glanced back at me and giggled. She wrote something on a piece of paper in sparkly pink gel pen and slipped it Zeffrey Neiman to hand to me. He did, and I shot him a big smile. He looked away, and I felt a chip of my fragile self-confidence fall off.

            The note said how cute Zach was. I looked up at the screen, and saw him reporting on volleyball tryouts. Grinning, I wrote her a note back. Zeffrey wouldn’t look my way, no matter what I did. So I did something completely stupid.

            I tried throwing the note at Andrea, but the paper was so thin and so light, it didn’t even get past Hamza’s desk.

            No, it got better than that. Not only did it miss Andrea completely, it landed directly on Hamza’s crotch. So it wasn’t even like I could have picked it up and handed it to Andrea.

            “Can you like…give that note to my friend?” First words I said to Hamza. He nodded and handed the paper over to Andrea.

            And that’s how we met. Over a piece of paper that landed on his crotch. I don’t know who writes fairytales or those best friend stories these days, but they are way out of touch with reality. There’s no bumping-into-each-other-in-the-hallway story. There’s no civil introduction.

            It always has to be something utterly mortifying and ridiculous, right? Or maybe that’s just my life.

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Love,

Ash ♥