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significant. He’d played well
when I wasn’t there, but he didn’t know I knew that. I think he was
just trying to make me feel part of the whole group.
    I wanted to, but I was more
interested in being with Logan than ‘one of the guys’.
    “ Yeah sure. I’ll bring my books
with me and study.”
    Baseball wasn’t the kind of sport I
was into. I wasn’t really into any of them, except gymnastics, but
I supported Logan with his.
     
    “ It wouldn’t hurt to watch
sometimes.” He said, with a smile but I knew he wanted me to watch
them play. The thing is; I couldn’t do it. Not much anyway. I’d see
him running round, his muscles flexing under his T-shirt and his
thighs tensing under his pants as his legs powered around the
field. My mouth watered just thinking about it.
    “ I do watch. All the time.”
I lied. “I just have to study too so I’m multi-tasking.”
    “ Ok, sure.” He said as we walked
along the corridor to our next lesson. “Free period after lunch.
Ok?”
    “ I’ll be there.” I said, and then
we went our separate ways for our different subjects.
     
    “ Chase the Ace!” Poppy, my lesson
partner greeted me when I sat down.
    “ Hey Poppy. How are
you?”
    Poppy wasn’t like me. She didn’t
hang out with guys, and she wasn’t into rock music or ‘guy’ stuff.
She was a typical girly-girl, but she was one of the nice ones. She
didn’t care that I looked completely different to her and she never
tried to get me to ‘girl up’ whatsoever. She liked diversity and
thought that everybody had a right to be what they wanted to be,
and she wanted to be girly. I liked her a lot, but we never got
together out of school because we actually didn’t have any other
common interests that would bring us together.
     
    “ I’m great, thanks!” She replied in
her enthusiastic tone. “So, I heard that you and Sian had a bust up
last night.”
    “ What? What do
you mean a bust
up ?”
    “ Oh, apparently Lex dumped her
because she was mean to you, and then she called him to give her
another chance.”
    “ Oh God.” I groaned.
    The gossip had already spread and
that was one thing I hated in school. Everybody talked about everybody .
    “ Who told you?” I asked her. It
obviously wasn’t Sian. She wouldn’t willingly make herself the
topic of conversation if it made her look bad.
    “ Well, Sian told Gretchen, and
Gretchen told Charlotte. Charlotte told me.”
    Gretchen was Charlotte’s ‘BFF’ but
that didn’t matter with those girls. If it were juicy, they told;
regardless of the friendship status.
    “ How nice of her to gossip about
her friend.” I said, sarcastically.
    “ Come on, Chase. Everybody
talks.”
    “ I don’t talk about my friends.” I
told her. “It’s nobody’s business what anybody does.”
    “ I suppose guys are more secretive
than girls.” She said with a shrug.
    “ Excuse me?”
    Did you just say I was a
guy?! I thought.
    “ I mean guys in general.” She
laughed nervously, obviously realizing what she’d said. “I know
you’re not a guy, Chase.”
     
    Well that just pissed me off. The
night before, after the Sian incident, I was happy. Now, I was
annoyed.
    I was so sick of being labelled
because of how I looked or whom I chose to spend my time with, or
not.
    I know Poppy didn’t mean to sound
like she was calling me a guy, but it hurt all the same. I clenched
and released my fists, taking a deep breath to calm myself
down.
    I tried to listen to the teacher,
as she started the class, but I couldn’t focus.
    I barely heard Poppy when she
started talking about cheerleading and holding tryouts for junior
members when the current squad moved to seniors. Her voice sounded
as though it was coming from the distance as I tried to block out
exactly what I was feeling.
    I felt alone.
    *****
     
    “ You’re quiet
today.” Logan said as I sat on the bleachers, ready for his
baseball practice. “Is everything ok?”
    I hadn’t said much through lunch.