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Slap.

Slap.

Slap.

Dirty grey converse slapping against concrete. A relaxing sound that should be the background to every song, the rhythm to every melody, the pounding to every human heart. Or at least, that was what I thought. It was a sound I heard every day and it held a million emotions and memories.

My new lip piercing itched. It probably wasn't the best idea to let Gaz do it for me. If I hadn't been so fucking high then I wouldn't have let him.

A couple preppy girls walked by and practically scoffed at me. As they passed I turned around and looked at them. Skirts that were actually an appropriate length, covered cleavage, and matching swinging blonde and brunette ponytails. A year ago I would have hated that type of girl and craved for…well, basically a slut. Now I missed the preppy ones. Probably not girls like that but someone who didn't throw herself and everything with a dick.

A year ago I would have been pissed at those girls for scoffing at me, but now my world had been submerged in one word that defined everything, but nothing at the same time. Whatever.

If you looked at me from pictures just a couple years ago, you wouldn't recognize me at first glance. But those were my small, preppy catholic school days. At the time I had hated them and longed for the day Id graduate and finally get out of there and get into high school. But what I didn't get was those days were a safe haven. A glass of cool water. A freaking meadow. Now it felt like I was in a war, being fought by sluggish, drugged soldiers that were that sad type of "whatever" guys. Like me.

Slap.

Slap.

Slap.

My hair was jet black now-practically blue- with blonde streaky highlights and I straightened it all the time, always covering my eyes. Lip piercing, an ear piercing and some clavicle piercings and I was probably getting more. Black skinny jeans, a BVB t-shirt, striped jacket, some wrist cuffs and my beloved, ragged converse. Big difference, from the short, blocky, mousy brown haired kid with glasses I used to be. The only thing that was the same now, was the converse.

Slap.

Slap.

Slap.

The sun was setting in the Arizona sky, turning the clouds pink. I was nearing my bus stop. I turned my hood up and plugged my IPod into my ears, but not too loud that I couldn't hear the slap of my sneakers.

I kept my head down, watched my sneakers slap. I didn't feel like looking at people that were better than me, not druggie, emo kids.

There was also something obviously different in my face, if you compared it to my 8th grade face. There was something darker, sullen and almost sunken in look to my face now.

I was so focused on my feet I practically missed the bus stop. One side of the bench was occupied by someone but I was really just too tired to care. I fell onto the bench in heap and sighed.

The person next to me wore a oversized bright red hoodie with the hood up, black cargo pants and muted blue converse. At this point, I honestly didn't care who it was and it was kind of dark so I just hung my head back and turned up the volume on my Ipod.

The sun continued to set, darkening the sky but the heat didn't let up. That was an Arizona summer for you. But I wasn't about to take off my jacket so people could ogle at my scars.

Every day of summer after hanging out with my friends down in Tempe I'd take the bus up to Mesa, the more ghetto area, but also where I lived. And every day there would be that same person in the red sweatshirt sitting next to me. We would never talk or even lift the hoods of our sweatshirts, but I couldn't help but wonder.

Sometimes I would tell myself I'd talk to that person but then I'd always think… why would anyone want to talk to me?

Two weeks passed. My curiosity grew more and more everyday but I didn't have the balls I told everyone I had. I wasn't one for confrontation at this point. That made me angry. I didn't understand why I couldn't just strike up a conversation with this stranger.

Was I afraid of rejection? Nah. I didn't care enough. Or at least that's what I made myself believe.

Then one day changed it all.

It was a much hotter day then others. Even though it was still the usual walking to the bus time, the sun seemed to be taking a much longer time to set. It was uncharacteristically sunny.

Today had been a really slow day. Gaz and Ig had nothing to smoke, and no one had been in the mood to tread through the heavy, dry air outside. So we had just played video games and lounged around Iggy's place until Iggy's girlfriend, Ella had shown up and Iggy kicked us out.

Probably a good thing too. With the mood we were in, we probably wouldn't have left till the next day and what would my ever so spiritual mother have done with all her little chicklets out of the house?

But oddly enough, on the way to the bus stop my nerves were on fire. I felt like running under some sprinklers or jumping into the street or some crazy shit. I was anxious; I blamed it on pent up energy.

It was too hot to keep my hood up and when I reached into my pocket for my Ipod, it wasn't there. I must have left it connected to Ig's speakers. I just about turned around to get it, but I knew Iggy would have kick my ass if I interrupted whatever he was doin with Ella.

It was too hot to just stroll down the shade-less sidewalk. I jogged to the bus stop taking off my jacket on the way. Let 'em look at my arms- it didn't matter.

As I got closer to the bus stop I saw the familiar red hood wasn't there. Instead I saw the back of a blonde head. The hair was wavy and was a little longer than the middle of her back. She was wearing a bright, neon tank top and grey skinny jeans.

I started wondering where the red hooded person was, when I noticed she was wearing the same faded blue converse that I'd seen on the person with the red hood.

That didn't mean they were the same though. Lots of people could own those.

I was almost scared to go up to the bus stop, but then mentally kicked myself for even thinking that I was scared. I had made out with a ton of girls in the past few years, some after minutes of meeting them. Why was I scared of meeting this stranger?

Naturally, I pushed through the silly fear and walked up to the bench by the bus stop and sat down, trying not to obviously look at this girl. I actually turned my head away from her, as if I was suddenly very interested in what was to my right. I felt like an idiot, but I was just too scared (stupid) to turn it. I sucked it up and decided to just glance to the side for a second and was met by curious eyes that were staring at me.

There next to me, sat an incredibly hot girl. A girl, with big chocolate brown doe eyes, a splash of freckles across her otherwise flawless face, and full lips. I also recognized this girl.

"Ni… Nicholas?" she said stunned. I almost looked over my shoulder to see who the hell she was talking but remembered. Heh, that was my name. Weird. I had almost forgotten. For most of my life people had called me Nick, or Fang, more often. A nickname I had gotten as I kid for my sharp, shiny canines and just my overall pretty white teeth. It was kind of like my only feature that stood out. When I had gone to Catholic school, there had been a more popular, jock-ish Nick in my same grade so to differentiate us, some of the kids called me Nicholas.

That's where I knew this girl from. My old school.

"Max?"

"Uh… yeah. Wow, Nicholas, it's been awhile, huh?" I could see her eyes flicking about my face and my clothes, probably still shocked with my transformation. I wondered how this would look to her, if this was even a transformation for the better. I had never really known this girl even though we'd gone to school together since kindergarten. We had never been put in the same class as me (the classes didn't mix much) except in 5th grade, where I had developed a lil crush on her, but definitely just a crush from afar. I had gotten over it after a little while.

"Oh yeah. Well um… where do you go now?" I said hesitantly. This was so out of character for me.

"Marcos. You?"

"Mclintock."

"Ohh." She said it like it totally explained what had happened to me. I snickered a little at that. One of her eyebrows twitched up a little, so it was hidden behind her blonde side bangs, which I found surprisingly attractive. I blinked at my own thought.

"So, what have you been doing these days?" she said. Trying to make small talk. Funny. She sounded nervous. She had never been the type. Even I knew what a fiery little thing she had been in school, always beating up the boys.

"Uh well I've been practicing my music a lot. Otherwise not much else has changed."

"Oh really? With James and Zach? What do you play?"

"Yup. Guitar." She immediately brightened up and got this glint in her eye.

"No way. Me too. I love the guitar. And piano." I tried to smile a bit, just to be polite but it probably ended up looking like a grimace or something.

"Sweet. So where are you heading to?"

"Just home. I live down in Mesa." I tried to conceal my reaction. She honestly looked like a little innocent, cute girl but I knew the type of mouth she had. I didn't want to know the kind of trouble she got into down there.

"Oh cool, I live down there too. Down on Stapley, the neighborhood near the Walgreens."

"And the pizza place? You're kidding me. I live down there too. I just ride the bus up here to see some friends sometimes." What were the odds.

"Sweet." Then the bus showed up. We piled onto the already half full bus and surprising enough she sat down next to me. All the way home she asked me about school and how things were and we just chatted about normal meeting-each-other-for-the-first-time-in-2-years things. Surprisingly enough, I was actually listening instead of just tuning her out or nodding. It was interesting. She was interesting. Something, some thing was different about her.

20 minutes passed and we were down in Mesa. I walked her home and saw that she only lived 2 streets down. After I said bye and headed home, I had the weirdest feeling. Like someone had just poured hot molasses across my insides and it was traveling slowly, filling up every corner. I couldn't decide what this feeling was but I knew she had triggered it. I felt like an idiot. Even if I didn't know what this was, I knew some girl I had just re-met shouldn't be making me feel anything.

But I still couldn't get those big, brown, doe eyes out of my head.

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