“Ethan Coombe! Are you listening to what I have to say? Or are you having a wet daydream you’d like to share with the rest of us?” the teacher, Mr. Court, shouted.

That stupid teacher, always ruining the mood.

“No,” I said with a loud voice. Trying to convince him that his allegation was entirely wrong. As punishment for not listening, I was forced to put all the chairs on top of the tables when class ended. But it didn’t anger me, not even the slightest. I smiled towards the teacher, now I had something to do. He gave me a demonic look. “What’s so funny? Finish up here before you go.” He slammed the door behind him and went towards the teacher’s office. This won’t take long, I thought. And indeed, it didn’t take long. I was surprised at how fast I was going. Was it this fun to conduct a punishment? Maybe I should avoid listening to Mr Court altogether and just rack up punishment after punishment, it didn’t seem so bad. As I was standing at the door, ready to leave, I observed the classroom. Everything seemed to be in its order; Mr Court would be satisfied. Then the door opened behind me, without seeing who it was and why that person was there I began speaking.

“Mr Court, I’ve...” I stopped when I saw who it was. “Eh, you’re not Mr Court.” My face turned into a questionable look. A girl was standing in front of me. Beautiful, with black hair and brown eyes. Her height was average, but those measurements, a man not trained as me would already be breaking a sweat.

“You are staring,” she said.

I mean, who wouldn’t? Could a human even be this cute? I moved to the side as she made her way into the classroom. Right next to the front window seat, on the sill, she grabbed a phone charger.

“Thanks for keeping it safe.”

Thanks for keeping it safe. What was that supposed to mean? It wasn’t like I was guarding it or anything, I hadn’t even noticed it earlier. This all just came up to me as a surprise. I was standing in the same position as before when she walked out of the classroom.

“By then,” she said without looking at me, she dangled the charger which she just retrieved in her hand. Who was this girl even? I hadn’t seen her before, this was the first time. She must’ve been new, a cute girl like her wouldn’t stand out of my sight for long. There’s simply no way one single person could go around like that, not drawing looks. It’s as simple as that: she’s new.

On the next day, I walked up to my friend Avon. He was leaning against his locker, looking down at his phone. “Hear this out, there’s a new girl in our year.”

“In our class?”

“Nah, unfortunately not, but I saw her yesterday after last class.”

“Ah, so after you were forced to clean the whole classroom? That Court guy sure is an asshole. But if I know you right, you enjoyed it, right?” Of course, you know that I’ve been telling you this all the time, I need something to do. But you, you always run away. One day, he says he’s going to the grocery shop for his grandmother. The next day it’s a dentist appointment. Maybe Avon had a girlfriend? But that wouldn’t explain why he hid it. Wait, what if it were taboo? What if he was going out with a teacher? There was that English teacher in class B. We didn’t have her, but everyone knew her, for she was really hot. I didn’t take Avon for such a playboy.

“Hey, since you were alone yesterday, why don’t we go out today?” When he said go out it felt like he meant a party night, but it’s Tuesday. Who would go out on a Tuesday? “What did you have in mind,” I asked. He laughed right up in my face.

“You’ll see,” he said and walked away towards the class. The way he finished the sentence reassured me. Like this time, this time he wouldn’t vanish after school. Now don’t get me wrong, I’m not some sort of loner; I have friends, the thing is though, they aren’t funny.

Ian Southbridge: weirdo, stupid, and a wannabe stand-up comedian. He was the head of the school’s comedy club. Yes, you heard it right: COMEDY CLUB. The times he has tried to get me to join are uncountable. And his strategies to recruit new people were so weird that calling him weirdo would be a compliment. Like that one time when he tried to recruit this cute and innocent girl. Her name was Lydia, a student in our year but in class C. She was a straight-A student, and everyone liked her. Hell, even I liked her. That’s saying something, I think. Not that I have picky taste, it’s just that they need to look a certain way, otherwise I’m not interested. Yeah, I liked her a lot. Anyways, Lydia was casually walking in the hall when she came across the aforementioned Ian. According to Ian’s biased explanation, she was just stubborn. But everyone knew that wasn’t the case, everyone knew he was stupid. Apparently, he tried to blackmail her, or rather threaten her. According to her, Ian had said something like this: “If you don’t join, I’ll be telling my audience very weird things about you.” She simply answered with a: “When will you ever get an audience?” and walked away. Now you’re thinking: Wow, this Lydia girl is pretty cool! Sorry to turn your imagination down. Everyone could act cool, and much more important, look cool in front of Ian. Lydia was so innocent and pure that she would be the perfect housewife. Imagine being in your thirties, you own a nice house with a pool and an automatic garage door, you drive a BMW and you’re paid very well. Then you’ve picked up the children at kindergarten and when you come home, she stands there in an apron cooking for you.

Wait, what the hell am I even thinking?

Anyways, moving on in our little description of my not-so-funny friends. The way I got to know him was, and I hate to say this, it was that he managed to get me into the comedy club. I left 2 days later of course, but he wasn’t willing to give me away that easily. He forced me to watch stand-up comedy every week. And I eventually grew into it, till the day when I was the one recommending fun new stand-up comedians which we were going to watch. Yeah, he managed to get me into his little world, but I’m not regretting it, the bribes I received were definitely worth it. Now you’re expecting me to brag about me having befriended half of the school. Sorry to disappoint you, but Ian and Avon were my only friends. That’s fine though, two are enough. If one was sick, there was no need to eat lunch alone, you could just go to your other friend. Ouch, that sounded very harsh and selfish. Let’s say I take that back and we forget about everything.

“So tell me about that new girl,” Avon asked quietly from his bench, trying to not get the teacher’s attention.

“What is there to tell? I think it’s better if you see her with your own eyes.”

“So what class is she in?”

“How should I know? I’m not a stalker.” In his eyes, I was probably always a stalker. When class ended we went out to the hallways to go search for this new mysterious girl. It was Avon’s suggestion, after all, so he led the way. I was just acting as the second wheel, only obeying his orders.

“Oh, I see what you meant,” he said and stared at her. She had just walked out of her classroom. Under her arm, she held a textbook and around her neck hung a pair of in-ears.

“So now that you’ve experienced her beautifulness, what do you do?” I asked that question implying that there was nothing he could do. He had zero chance with someone of her cuteness and probably, intelligence. Now it sounds like I would have a chance with her. I mean, I had better looks than Avon if I could say so myself. But this girl didn’t look like that clique girl, I’d be genuinely surprised if she was drawn to the normies. Also, it didn’t seem like the normie-girls were all over her, maybe she’d avoided them or told them to know their place.

Wait, this is just my imagination going all over the board, there’s no way that could be the case, even I knew that.

So this is what you meant by going out, I was expecting something else, even from Avon. Going out apparently meant grabbing food at the cafe outside of the school for lunch. With our lunch break being extended, for Mr Court had a meeting, the timing seemed perfect from Avon’s perspective. I just went along and tried to enjoy the Bolognese I’d bought, it was mediocre at best, and I wasn't a picky eater.

“Hey, isn’t that...” Avon said.

Indeed it was, the girl was sitting in one of the cafe’s corners. No food; only a cup of a hot beverage in her hands. Perhaps, was she a coffee drinker? That would make her even more grown-up and cool. I’d never imagined her to go to a crappy place like this, a mere 2,5 stars on Tripadvisor. Who knows? Maybe the coffee was good here? I thought as I looked down on my plate of what was a disgrace to Italian cooking.

“I wonder why she’s here?” Avon asked.

She’s obviously here to drink coffee, are you completely blind, Avon? And besides, why is that any of your matter, and why are you even invested in knowing?

“Who knows?” I muttered, keeping my thoughts to myself to avoid starting an argument.

“Why so stubborn all of a sudden? You haven’t even touched your food.”

Does this look like something I would’ve wanted to put inside my mouth, I wanted to ask him. But considering he was paying for it all, it wouldn’t hurt being more gentle. “I’m not really that… hungry, I guess.” What’s this all of a sudden, why am I stumbling on my words? Nervousness, perhaps?

He looked at his watch. It appeared very expensive, with golden edges and a watch face made out of marble-looking material. “We should get going, Mr Court won’t go easy on us if we’re late.”

Without saying anything I grabbed my bag, which I’d conveniently placed right under the table, lying against one of the table’s legs. We didn’t have any outer layers of clothing, for it was still summer. Even if it was September there were no signs of the weather getting colder. The leaves were still hanging steadily on the trees; no change in colour at all. It was just a quick walk to school from the restaurant, a few crossings later and we were outside of the main entrance again. A quick look behind us and I could spot the girl making her way towards us, nothing special in that, her lesson probably also started soon. We headed up the staircase to the second floor, on the walls hung different works created by the students of the school. Some of them were science-related, others art. I’d always admired people for their tenacity to be able to display something like that on the wall, especially when you put your name on it. I’d been asked a couple of times by my teacher if I wanted to hang something on that wall. My answer was always no. Even if I did something really good, my answer was always a no. Back in year 1, my former biology teacher, Mrs Groove, or whatever her name was, wanted me to display my analysis on frogs. Yes, you heard it right: FROGS. It was a pretty good analysis if I could say so myself. But hanging it on the wall, that was obviously out of the question, no matter how much Mrs Groove tried to encourage me. Sometimes I regret not hanging that work on the wall, but after all, I believe it was just some stupid little kid complex. I’m a year older now, and I can determine what’s best for myself, and not get mad about small stuff like that.

“Imma’ bounce,” Avon said when he saw Ian walking straight towards us. And just like that, Avon was gone, leaving me all alone with Ian. What would he go on about now, I wondered as I saw him get closer and closer. I smiled sarcastically.

“What are you up to?” he asked me.

“I have class… so I don’t have time for this…” He decided to ignore my answer to his question and instead, decided to start talking about, you guessed it, stand-up comedy.

“Still not thinking about joining the club?”

“You already know the answer to that question, so you don’t need to be asking me.” I decided to give him an angry look, so I could imply that I really, and I mean really, didn’t want to join that shit club of his.

“Yeah, yeah… But I’m sure you want to hear this out, hell, maybe it will even change your mind.” He had an excited look in his eyes. “Lydia, well she finally decided to join!”

“If that’s what you're going to use on your debut, I’d advise you to declare your career over before you even start it.” Wait, was he actually being serious? It wasn’t like Ian to lie if he didn’t try to make some stupid joke.

“You’re a funny guy, Ethan. No, actually, she’s joining.”

I’d believe it if I were to hear it from her. I still couldn’t take this man’s words seriously.

“If what you say is true, I’ll definitely be joining… Goodbye, I have class now.” Trying to finish the conversation as fast as possible, that's what I was aiming for. And if I’m being honest, I was pretty proud of myself. But man, if Ian’s words were anything to believe; Lydia was joining the comedy club! Almost like a little excited child, I made my way to the classroom, jumping around like a little bunny.

Nevermind, that sounded weird.

Most of the class was already sitting in their seats, Mr Court gave me an angry look which was saying that I was late. I quickly made my way to my seat before he began speaking. Another boring lesson, during which I didn’t do anything of importance. Time went by so slowly, almost so slowly that it seemed that it had stopped completely. After an hour, which felt like an eternity I finally closed my textbook and packed down my things into my bag.

My family was nothing out of the ordinary. When I came home only my little sister was there. It used to be like this most days, both my parents worked shifts and were therefore rarely home at the same time as us. But that didn’t stop us from looking like a normal family, no. Our typical family SUV stood on the driveway. My environmentally anxious parents always seemed to bike or take the bus to work. I mean, what’s the reason to have a car anyway? The last time I was in it was probably when dad had to drive me to the hospital. It was over two months from now; my little sister, whose name is Olivia, slammed a baseball bat into my forehead. I’d never imagined she was that strong, but after all, a baseball bat is nothing you casually get in your head. It wasn’t her fault, but she was so sad and was full of regret afterwards. Nothing wrong with that, I would probably do the same thing. But it didn’t change the fact that it was an accident. You’d imagined that it was always the mother in the family that was overprotective, that wasn’t the case in ours. My father really thought that I was dead; even Olivia, who was full of tears at the moment, knew that wasn’t the truth. So when I later woke up in the car on the way to the hospital, he was full of relief. So full of relief in fact, that he nearly drove off the road, and we all knew that would end in an even more serious accident.

When I was discharged from the hospital a mere 5 hours later; only a few stitches to my forehead were needed. My dad was waiting for me in his car, he didn’t have the guts to enter the hospital after being laughed at by the receptionist earlier when he left me there. The entire staff must have said something like this: “I’ve never seen a man being so worried about his son after a little accident like that.”

When we got home, my mom had prepared a very special dinner, so special in fact, that we had a few special guests. My grandparents on my dad’s side were sitting right across the table, munching on their steak with fried potatoes. They rarely came to visit us, that’s why I was so surprised. For after my mother had called them they’d travelled right home to us, worried about me of course. It felt nice being worried about, at least, to an extent. I guess you now get where my dad’s overprotectiveness comes from.

“You’re taking me to school tomorrow, right?” Olivia asked.

Her voice was full of excitement. So I was surprised since she never really got excited when she was with me. In fact, I was probably a boring old brother; a nuisance. “Get yourself there.”

“So angry,” she said and sighed.

I was definitely not angry, I was full of excitement. Tomorrow was the first day of my return to the comedy club. Don’t get me wrong here, I’m not interested in the comedy club at all. If there was a chance to get closer to Lydia, you bet I would take it.

Olivia was only 2 years younger than me, and she was supposed to start secondary school next year. Their school was only a couple of minutes away from mine, so it seemed normal for me to get her there. But you think I’m that nice of a person? Ha, you’re completely wrong. You see, I don’t have time for that kind of crap. I couldn’t be seen with my little sister on the back of my bike, people would get the wrong idea.

“You have to take me tomorrow.”

“Why is that?”

Unauthorized content usage: if you discover this narrative on Amazon, report the violation.

“I’ve got to prepare for tomorrow, so I need more time. And since I don’t have a bike, well, you’ll have to get me there.”

“Just wake up earlier.”

“I need my sleep, otherwise my face will turn ugly.”

Did she believe in those weird conspiracy theories? That’s my little sister for you.

“Then go to sleep earlier.”

“My friends will think I’m weird if I don’t reply to their messages after ten.”

Grow up already, I wanted to say. But she seemed like she was hurting, that excitement she had exuded was now completely gone. She was lucky to have to handle these things, she had more than just two friends. Her looks were also good, there was no problem for her to get a boyfriend; any guy would probably go out with her. That said, I would help her! I would help her so that she didn’t have to go through the things I had to. I would make sure she never would lose her popularity!

I felt like a hero when I said those words in my head. But I knew it was just a glamorous take on her life. No one was perfect, not even her.

“Fine, I’ll take you there.”

“Oh, I’m so glad. THANK YOU!”

The alarm rang at 7:30, and so came the morning. I stepped out of the bed and got changed and then, went straight to Olivia’s room. The light was seeping through the door which meant she was already up. I made my way downstairs quietly, trying not to wake up my parents who had worked the night shift. I skipped breakfast as I usually did, only grabbing a glass of concentrated orange juice. I can’t say I enjoyed drinking it. Olivia came rushing down the stairs. She didn’t have her uniform on, but instead, a costume that looked like it belonged in the 80s. I never asked anything but presumed she did have a play or something. But it still didn’t make any sense; why would she not just change at school? Was she shy to get changed in front of her friends? Why not use the toilet if the changing room was too much for her? All these questions, which I shouldn’t ask, echoed in my head. After spending only a couple of minutes in complete silence, we went outside. The weather was still warm, but because of the morning, we both decided to wear a shirt, mine over my normal, pretty comfortable school uniform, and Olivia over her costume. She avoided putting her arms around me and instead held on to the side of the bike. Her feet were dangling close to the ground whilst I tramped it up the hill. We passed our local supermarket, the pharmacy, and the little clothes shop; it was probably hard for it to survive now with all the online shopping. The park in which we always held our graduations appeared on the left. I glanced at the little statue in the middle of the fountain surrounded by roses in different colours. It was only recently erected after a gang had vandalised and destroyed the old one. Sad to massacre such great art, I thought. This statue was so ugly it’d be good if they’d destroyed this one. “Awful, just awful,” I said and looked at it again.

“What?” Olivia said. She was barely audible because of the wind.

“The new statue,” I said.

I turned around and studied her face for a brief moment. The impression she was giving me said something like this: “A statue, where, and is it new?”

“I never imagined you’d be interested in art.”

“I’m not,” I said out of breath. “It’s just that... destroying something the taxpayers paid for, it’s just sad.”

When did I become such a guy, when did I ever care about the taxpayers? I guess I would become one eventually, that is to say if I were to get a job.

I dropped Olivia off at her school and cycled the few minutes it took to get to mine. In fact, it wasn’t minutes, probably more like 45 seconds. I put the bike in the stand outside of the side gate and went inside the building in which I’d spent a third of my life. This day would probably be the slowest of my entire life because I was going to the comedy club. I giggled for myself whilst I walked up the stairs. Could this be the best day of my entire life? Only time would tell. And why was I imagining stuff? Was I seriously thinking that something between me and her could ever happen? She had probably forgotten my name already.

The first time we met was outside of our classroom last year. I was on my way to see Ian because we were going on a comedy show that night. I didn’t know where she was going, and it wasn’t my right to know either, but she was probably heading home or going to a friend’s house or something. Her red hair was blowing in the breeze the open windows left, and that precious smile she gave me… I wanted to protect it forever! At that moment I had a sense of relief; it was the first time a girl my age, excluding my sister, spoke, directly to me. I got so caught up in the moment that I can’t remember what we were talking about. Nothing out of the ordinary, if I could locate those vague parts of memory still in my brain. But still, it was a conversation; a fucking good conversation.

And then all this time I have thought of reasons that could grant another conversation with her like that. But it never happened. I guess I’m just too shy. But now, thanks to that clueless Ian, I could see a reason for me to speak to her.

Was I seriously in love, just after one single conversation? Was it all just looks, or did personality have anything to do with this? None of that bullshit, I thought. So I kept my cool, entered the classroom, took a seat, and decided to enjoy the view out of the window. For this was one hell of a day to look forward to.

“Oh, you’re already here,” Ian said when I entered the clubroom. Nothing was like the last time I was there. The posters on the walls were different, the microphones on the stands were changed out and the walls were now filled with even more audio treatment foam. Then Lydia entered the door, and followed did the two other members. I’d never seen them before, but this school was pretty big so I guessed that was nothing out of the ordinary. She sat down at the circular table in front of me and Ian, and the other two took a seat on the respective sides of her.

“Today we welcome two new members,” Ian said.

We started to introduce ourselves to each other. Apparently one of the unknown guys to me was an up-and-coming comedian. He’d surely gotten way more gigs only in this month than Ian had gotten in his entire career. And my suspicions were true; Ian looked at him with a jealous face when he counted all the numerous times he’d performed in front of an audience. That’s really arrogant, I thought for myself. Then it was my turn, I kept it very quick and simple, trying to avoid any follow-up questions.

“You’re the first girl ever to join,” Ian said and looked at Lydia. She seemed very nervous, almost like she didn’t want to be there at all. She stuttered when she introduced herself, but I could stop cringing pretty soon anyway, for she kept it as short as me.

And that was it, we didn’t do anything more after that. Nothing at all. Ian only told us about a few famous comedians which according to him, WE SHOULD KNOW. Of course, after always enduring Ian’s bullshit, I already knew all of them. But man, I could see Lydia hurting. She probably already wanted to take her own life, putting a 9 mm into her mouth, that seemed like the best way to do it. Of course, there would be a lot of blood. But Ian could handle that, after all, he was the one who had convinced her to the suicide if that sort of thing were to happen.

I and Lydia were the last ones to leave the clubroom. So when the others and Ian had separated from me, I saw her walking behind me. What’s this? My body got all excited. She yelled at me, but very carefully. “Hey, Ethan!”

“Huh?” I answered. Acting surprised that she talked to me. But to be honest, the way she walked behind me, I already knew.

She put her feet together, acting very embarrassed. “You know...the reason why I joined. Well, it’s because I wanted to get closer to...Ian.”

Thank god! I just got my sign, nothing could happen between us. You’re probably surprised, but this is the second to best answer I could get, especially the first day. Since I now knew that there was no way I could ever get close to her, I didn’t have to endure that piece of shit which was the damn Comedy Club. Of course, I was sad, but when you’ve been like me your entire life, you stop expecting wonderful things to happen. Yes, that’s how sad it is.

“I see,” I said. She was really embarrassed. I mean, why even talk to me about it? Not that I am angry at her, but just, WHY?

“You know…the reason I wanted to talk to you, well, I WANT YOU TO HELP ME!”

She was now on her knees, bowing for me. But wait, there were tears in her eyes, why? Seriously, what’s gone into her?! I felt guilty, was she some professional intimidator, was this all an act to get me to help her?

I reassured her that she definitely didn’t need to be on her knees if she talked to me because even I got embarrassed by that.

“Okay,” I said, very confident. A mixture of snot and tears ran down her chin; she really looked disgusting, but cute at the same time.

Like an excited child her eyes glowed up, I could hear a “Thank you,” even if it got heavily dampened by her crying.

What have I gotten myself into? Why did I say yes? For fuck sake, where will this end now?

Lydia’s sudden desire to talk to me had glued to my mind. Of course, I would help her, if it meant getting closer to her at least. But I had to make it clear for her and Ian that I intended to leave the club. There was simply no way I could stay there, it was just too boring. Come to think about it, why did I ever even join it in the first place? Even if Lydia hadn’t confessed her feelings there was probably no way I would’ve been able to stay. I’d gotten an extremely important mission; I had to pick Olivia up from school. Thankfully she already stood there when I came cycling. If she was late I’d had to stand there and wait. I couldn’t imagine what the parents of the children had thought if a guy my age was standing outside of a primary school. I’d probably gotten thrown into jail. But I guess a few years in prison wouldn't be that harsh. It could surely not be more hectic than life right now.

“Hello bro!” she yelled and waved her arm up into the air.

Hello bro? Who in their right mind would add bro at the end of their greeting? I noticed that she no longer wore the costume she had in the morning. “I didn’t see you bring your uniform in the morning?”

“Nope bro.”

There it was again, why in the world would she follow up that word with such a pronoun?

“Learned a new word?” I said and chuckled.

She looked at me and sighed. “No bro, I’m just thankful that you picked me up from school this wonderful evening.”

“What do you want, Olivia?” I asked, and yes, I was fully aware that she wanted something, never was she this nice to me if she didn’t have a secret motive.

“I want ice cream bro!”

Ice cream? Disgusting, I thought. Way too sweet and way too cold, how could one like it? Seriously, sometimes I didn’t understand humanity at all. “Fine.”

“Oh, I’m so glad!” She hugged me so hard that my bike which I was leaning against fell to the ground. Don’t get too excited, I wanted to tell her, but kept those words to myself.

Seriously, this place? Of course, she’d chosen that terrible cafe outside of our school. I mean, it was close, and there was that positive thing with me not being forced to take any detours just to satisfy my sister’s craving for ice cream. I hardly had the motivation to cycle any more than I needed to today, so it had to be that cafe. No worries though, I wasn’t going to eat anything anyway.

“I can get anything I want, right bro?”

Stop it already with the “bro” thing, please. “Yeah sure, go ahead.” And after that my bank account was no more. 25 pounds for ice cream, admittedly it was big, but there was no way she’d eat that whole thing. Five scoops stacked on top of each other in a glass bowl, loads of cream on the side, chocolate sticks stuffed inside the scoop of vanilla, and a cocktail cherry on top.

I was wrong; how in the world could she eat this much, and this fast? I swear, she had to be of a different breed.

“I’m stuffed.”

“No shit.”

“Oh bro, I-I don’t think I can make it on my own to the bike.” She tried to make a cute smile but failed miserably. “I think you need to...c-carry me.” My face and mood turned into a shock-like status. No, that will never happen. Absolutely not, there’s no way I’ll do that, not even for a thousand pounds. A silent “No” came out of my mouth. Olivia glared at me, obviously angry.

“I’m just joking bro, there’s no way I’d let you carry me.”

When I said that this would be the best day of my life, I was wrong. However, somewhere deep down in my consciousness I already knew the outcome. But I wasn’t expecting it to arrive so early in my love mission. It is what it is, I thought. There’s no need to be depressed about it, you weren’t expecting anything anyway, you know that! All those words I kept on saying to myself got my head aching when I lied there on my bed. It’d been carefully made by my mother who probably had noticed it when she woke up. Now they were gone again, working another night shift. Thankfully, I wasn’t tasked with the horrible mission to make dinner for me and my sister. She would always complain about my cooking, that nasty bitch.

Oh, maybe I should take that back. Hey you! I take that back, OK?

Anyways, we had some take-out. And no, it wasn’t from that horrible cafe. I didn’t even have a clue if they did take out. Pray to God they didn’t. I had thought that she’d already cured her hunger with that enormous ice cream I’d spit out almost 30 quid on. But no, obviously not. She was still hungry, extremely hungry, like a dog. Is that the saying? I didn’t even know because my head was aching so much. I stood up from the bed, my head got all dizzy. It felt like I’d just downed a litre of Scotland’s finest single malt. I almost tripped on the carpet on the floor when I made my way to my desk. In the second, no, in the third drawer I found my PC. When I opened it, with the mindset of continuing my career in Twitter role-playing, I found it out of charge. I sighed and started looking for the charger. Where could it be? I looked through all the drawers on both sides of the desk; it was nowhere to be found. Where the hell is that damn charger? I couldn’t take this anymore. I was already tired, depressed and now I wasn’t even able to find my charger. What’s gotten into me? Unable to stand anymore, I dozed off right there, on the floor. At least my head was on the carpet, but I’d surely be waking up with terrible neck pain the next day.

How should I put this? The next morning, guess who actually had texted me? Lydia! Yeah, I know right, unbelievable. Am I really this popular now? A simple joining of the comedy club and I was just texted by a girl who wasn’t my sister. Oh my, what magical powers does the comedy club possess? What if I got the Nobel prize? Don’t know in which category though. Maybe magic? Does that category exist?

“Why are you smiling?” Olivia, who sat across the table, said. She was back to her normal self after receiving that ice cream; she’d stopped calling me bro even.

“None of your business,” I assured her. She looked suspicious at me, like if she was saying: “I already know everything, so just go ahead and say it!”

So what was in Lydia’s text then? I didn’t have the faintest idea. I was way too excited about opening it, that I’d just let it stay there. Unopened, untouched, its virginity had to be preserved, for I wasn’t ready for what could be inside.

“You should’ve watched my performance yesterday. I totally won over their hearts.”

Oh right, I’d forgotten. Olivia was in a costume yesterday, so there was no reason for her to not brag about it over next day's breakfast. “I’m thankful I didn’t,” I answered with a smirk on my face.

She stared at me. “You’re always so toxic.”

“I’m the exact same as you, Olivia. We’re siblings after all.”

She muttered something I couldn’t hear. She was obviously angry, I mean, who wouldn’t? She’d just gotten rekt by her older brother, but saying it like that—old. Should I really brag about it? She was two years younger than me after all. And sadly, she was the one humiliating me most of the time. We brothers need to stand up; no more getting humiliated by our little sisters!

I feel ready now, I thought. So I opened up the text, and inside was...well, let’s say I wasn’t surprised. Lydia wanted to meet outside of the school after the last lesson. Didn’t seem so bad, she probably wanted to talk about the ways she could get closer to Ian. I didn’t have an idea on how I was supposed to help her. I didn’t know much about Ian at all; reason: I didn’t want to. It’s not like we weren’t friends, but he’d never been home to me, and I’d never been home to him. All we did was talk during lunch break or go and watch stand-up comedy. That’s it: we should go and watch some stand-up. It would be the perfect date for them, at least when she’d gotten the valiancy to ask him out. Besides, it would be much of importance for her to experience it, she was after all a fully fledged member of the Comedy Club. With my mind already set on everything, I didn’t need to be worried anymore. I could just go on as usual the rest of the day; chatting with Avon, and maybe, just maybe, get a glimpse of the new girl. Now that Lydia liked someone else, I could go after her. As if I would’ve gotten a chance with her. To be honest, from what I’ve experienced of her, she seemed to be a loner. Yeah, even lonelier than me. But it’s all just wishful thinking, sadly.

It was almost 4 o’ clock. All lessons had ended, and a steady flow of leaving students were exiting through the main entrance. In a corner stood Lydia, she looked restless, like she’d been waiting for hours. But not in a bitchy way, no, she actually looked really cute. A silent “Hello” came out of my mouth. She turned her eyes up from her phone screen.

“I’m glad you could help me,” she said and smiled.

Don’t thank me yet, I haven’t done anything. Besides, it’s not like you need to thank me anyway. I should be the one thanking you, after all I get to spend time with a beautiful girl.

“No problem, I guess. Although I’m not quite sure how I would be able to assist you.”

“Don’t speak so formal. We’re friends now,” she said and chuckled.

Friends? If it was this easy to befriend someone, why haven’t I tried it more often? I chose to ignore her assigned name to our relationship.

“I’m sorry for causing you so much problems yesterday.”

Wow, she looked even cuter when she apologised. “Don’t sweat it. It’s fine, really.”

“If that’s how it is...then I’m really happy. But what did you have in mind...I mean for our, no...for mine and Ian’s first date. I mean, it’s not like I’m going to ask him out right away, I just wanted to know...you know, what he likes to do...and stuff like that.”

“That’s a lot of requests,” I said and smiled. She got embarrassed. Her pale white skin turned red under her eyes; she looked down to the ground to avoid eye contact. I probably should’ve kept those words for myself, now she was avoiding me. “Ehm, let’s go outside for a minute.”

She followed me through the door. The hallway was much quieter now; it was remarkable how quickly the school was emptied with students. We took a seat under a tree, most of the leaves were still hanging tight to it even if the weather had gotten colder over the past days.

I looked at her and began speaking. “You know, me and Ian usually go and watch stand-up comedy on our days off.”

“I can imagine.”

“Did you join the club only for Ian or are you actually interested in stand-up?”

“Huh? That’s a rude assumption. Of course I joined it because I like comedy.”

I’d never imagined that she would be this bad of a liar. To be fair, she looked so innocent. But no one could be this bad at lying, right?

“You see right through me, don’t you?” She looked at me if it was like tears were forming in her eyes. But they didn’t come out just yet.

“I guess,” I muttered. “But it’s not like I feel bad about it. I mean, I technically did…” Yeah, I did the same thing. I wouldn’t have joined if it wasn’t for Lydia. But could I admit that now? Haha, no way. I would be humiliated, teared to parts by this majestic, yet innocent girl who was sitting right next to me.

“You didn’t finish your question?”

“Nothing. Let’s learn to like comedy, then. I will take you to Saturday's amatuer show. I’ll be texting you the details.”

“Sure... let’s do that, I guess.” She sounded disappointed, was my suggestion not good enough? Did she despise me so much that she didn’t even want to go on a friendly amatuer’s comedy show? I felt a bit let down, but she’d said yes, and that was the most important part. Besides, why did it matter? Let’s just enjoy this time with her, I thought for myself. I stood up, ready to leave.

“Wait!” She grabbed my arm and I turned around.

“Thank you!”

Oh, my, god. She’s so cute!