LENNON WOKE up that morning like she had gotten zero sleep.

She sat at the edge of her bed as the thought of nothing ran through her. Do you know how out of it you have to be to think about nothing? She hadn't felt this way ever, she could barely remember what happened yesterday. This was different than just zoning out. If she was being honest, she could only remember sitting in the room and talking to Luke and essentially, her mother.

She stood up slowly, stretching her arms out and sighing at the process. She needed to feel somewhat awake, so she walked over to her record player ( previously known as the seven-in-one dream machine ) and dug through the box of CDs with different artists.

Her tiredness had gotten the best of her and hadn't noticed that she hit another box while grabbing the one currently in her hands.

The box fell onto the ground and with a sigh, she bent down and picked up the miscellaneous items off the ground.

She threw the stuff back inside the box. It was either stuff she hadn't seen before ( or acknowledged before ) or stuff she knew was her mother's.

As she threw things back into the box a CD caught her eye. It was an unlabeled, white CD. She hadn't seen it before and had no idea if it was her mother's or not.

She took the CD out of the case and put it into the record player.

The start sounded familiar, she couldn't put her finger on it. That was until the singing started. She quickly hit stop and ejected it out of the machine.

She hadn't seen the CD ever. She hadn't heard that song, that loud, ever.

She put the CD back in its case and sat back down on the edge of the bed, but before doing so she grabbed the notebook off her desk.

She flipped through the pages and finally found it.

TOP ONE HUNDRED PLUS SAD SONGS
one hundred sixty-two: unsaid emily?
favorite line: "if i could take us back. if i could just do that."

She shut the notebook and fell backward onto her bed. She knew from the get-go that the song was sad. She didn't know who Emily was at the time, and now that she knew it only made the song ten times sadder than what she had originally thought.

LENNON SHUT her locker and was instantly faced with Carrie.

"Feeling better?"

"I'm fine."

Carrie raised her eyebrows, "Lennon, you almost passed out on me last night. Like, I didn't know you could grip a person's hand as hard as you did mine."

"Look, I just... I'm fine."

Carrie crossed her. She felt that Lennon was lying. She knew that Lennon was lying. That whole drive to Lennon's house was dead silent except for the radio. Getting Lennon into the house was a different type of struggle.

"Talk to Luke recently?" Carrie asked, "Tell him how you've felt?"

"I did talk to him, actually, but, um, not about whatever happened last night. I don't know what's going on, and he doesn't have to worry about it, right? He's all the way in Switzerland, remember?"

"But don't you think it's important he knows?"

"I do." Lennon answered, "But, I don't know what's going on in full yet, and until I figure out why, he doesn't have to know. It might've been something I ate that night."

"Lennon-"

"Hey, I'm fine. I'm up and I'm here and I am focused, so, nothing to worry about, okay? Besides, I, uh, remember you calling me. Something about Nick?"

Carrie gasped as she rested her hand against the locker beside her, "Oh my, God. He broke up with me!"

Lennon held a tight lip and held her wrist ( the one with Caleb's stamp ) in her hand. She felt like it was burning but didn't put full attention toward it because if she did she knew that Carrie would call it out.

"Like, broke up with me for real this time! For Julie? Like, I just don't get it!"

"He broke up with you to ask Julie out?" Lennon asked.

"I know she's your friend and all, but I just-"

Nick had broken up with Carrie for Julie. What if Julie said no? Lennon let her mind wander. She knew it was rude to completely ignore what Carrie was saying for the second time now, she felt like she just had to think about it.

What if Julie said no to Nick because of Luke? What if Julie said yes to Nick and Luke felt off about it? Why did Lennon care so much?

"Lennon?"

She pulled away from her thoughts and focused on Carrie.

"Your arm."

Once she was fully focused again. She felt her arm shaking in her hand, the burning sensation growing stronger.

"Oh," Lennon said. She let out a breath of uncomfortableness, "are you cold? Because that's why my arm is shaking. I'm pretty sure there's a jacket in my locker, so I'm gonna open that now."

She knew she didn't have a jacket in there, but that was the best she could come up with to get Carrie to at least draw back into her story.

Once she opened it, she let her unconvincing smile drop. She pulled the purplish-red corduroy out of the locker and held it in her hands. It hadn't been there before and she didn't he was around.

"That's cute. Where'd you get it?"

"It's Luke's."

"Wow, he must really like you to send his clothes from Switzerland to here."

"Let's just hope it's clean."

She pulled the shirt over her body. If it looked big on Luke, it would look bigger on her.

As Lennon pulled on the sleeves to bring them down, Carrie caught a glimpse at her wrist. The stamp on her wrist looking like a tattoo.

"Hey, when'd you get that?"

Lennon looked up at Carrie who's hand was now wrapped onto Lennon's wrist.

"It's one of those temporary tattoos, you know? Like, I could wash it off with a wet towel if I wanted to."

She really wished it was that easy.

"Oh, it's just cool looking."

Lennon pulled her wrist away from Carrie and let the sleeve of the shirt fall to cover it.

"Anyway, uh, Nick?"

"Right. I just think that it's so unfair. First, I didn't get the chance to break up with him, secondly, he broke up with me for someone who I hadn't been friends with in, what feels like forever."

Lennon's phone buzzed in her back pocket. She pulled it out as Carrie kept talking about Nick.

Hey, can we meet after school?
- Julie

She sent her a quick reply and looked back up at Carrie.

"...Like, that's unfair right?"

Lennon nodded, not completely sure what she was referring to. The more she thought about it, the more she began to feel her arm burn.

"Anyways. Enough about him. Whatcha thinking about?"

The way Lennon just wanted to tell someone everything about how things were going and just life in general. It was hard to tell Carrie anything about Luke anymore because he was a ghost and she didn't want to reveal that. Her father just found out about Luke, so adding on that to him being dead and her soulmate was going to be hard. Then there's Julie, if Lennon didn't feel the way she did when Luke and Julie were mentioned she may have to her everything.

She felt like she had no one to talk to. So, keeping it to herself was the best she could do.

"Um, nothing. Nothing at all."

The bell rang causing crowds to disperse.

"I'll see you later."

She shut her locker once again and headed to class; leaving Carrie behind as she headed in the opposite direction.

Carrie watched as Lennon left. Her wrist back in her hands.

Her walk seemed slower than normal. Carrie brushed it off with a sigh and headed to class.

- lucy has something to say !!
( word count: 1343 one thousand three hundred forty-three )

no because this leaves off so AWKWARD 🗣️
dang no luke in this chapter... tuff 😔👎

anyways back on my grind of bully charlie because i am NOT a simp 😁👍

yes lennon says switzerland yes it was an accident no i'm not changing it. i think it works because she didn't remember where julie said they were from.

important question: put yourself in lemon's shoes and ask yourself "is luke singing unsaid emily out loud right now?" like i need to know 🗣️

imo: i don't think he's singing out loud because like i don't i'm not about to get into the physics of things. just let me know what you think because it tells me what to and what not to write about 😁👍

anyways

bye:))))