After school, Luna goes to this after-school program. She used to always love being there because she was always with her friends, but now she has no one and after her meltdown in class, she knew she’d never make friends. The counselors either took the students outside to play or they would split everyone in groups and place them in different rooms for a certain amount of time.
Today was a nice day. The counselors brought her group outside because it was a nice day. She wanted to stay inside, especially after the crying she did earlier, but they could only sympathize with her for a bit and told her to head outside with everyone else. She sat in front of the baseball field on the picnic table. Oliver came over.
“Hey, are you okay?” He sounded genuinely concerned about her, but she had to face facts he didn’t care about Luna.
“It’s been a rough few days, that’s all. Why do you care?” She knew that if she told him the truth, then she would deal with a lot more issues than she needs. She was already fighting with herself to figure out how she was going to write an essay about her family.
“I care because you are still my friend. Girlie, when I saw you put your head down at first, I thought you were trying to get all the attention, but when I saw all the tears coming down your face…” he hesitated, “I was worried about you.” Luna was trying to keep a straight face, because she knew if she started blushing she knew he would ask why she was getting red suddenly.
“Last time I checked, Oliver, but you said we aren’t friends. And that you thought I wanted attention tells me what you think of me. If you are that concerned, then why didn’t you ask at the moment?” She could feel her anger, pain, and tears showing right in front of Oliver. She didn’t want him seeing her this way, so before he could even respond to her question. She got off the table and started walking away to sit somewhere else. Oliver followed her to a tree in front of the basketball court.
“Why are you following me? What do you want?” He didn’t know what to say at that moment. He just hugged Luna. She didn’t know what to do. She just started crying in his arms. She didn’t let him go because she didn’t want him or anyone else to see her crying… again.
As he was still hugging her, he said, “At the moment, I was scared that you wouldn’t tell me the truth. You are always good at lying about what’s wrong with you. Whatever happened, just know no one deserves your tears.” Luna remembers that line because he was right.
No one deserved her tears.
Ever since that day, Oliver and Luna were friends, but with a twist. She didn’t want to let Oliver feel like he was the “tough guy” in their friendship, so she became something that she never thought she’d become. She became his bully and his best friend. In class, they were the best of friends, making inside jokes and laughing. Outside of class, she was chasing him, tackling him, and showing her strength.
Oliver was the only person who knew how to keep her from crying. It didn’t always work because she had a war within her and she hated that most about herself. As time passed, Luna’s crush for Oliver became a big thing. She was always thinking about him. She could be home with her family, and she couldn’t help but think of him and start smiling. Thankfully, her parents never noticed it. Luna wanted to tell someone, anyone, about this crush. This crush was crushing her daily; because all she wanted to do was tell Oliver that she was falling for him, but she couldn’t because she didn’t know what half the feelings were and how to explain it aloud to him.
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