The Breakup Artist

by Shannen Crane Camp

  With a smile slowly spreading across my face and a plan fully formed in my mind, I waited for the bell to ring so that I could set everything in motion.

  Chapter Fourteen

  I scanned the crowd during break, a nervous anticipation growing in my stomach. This was the first time since I’d met David that I was looking for him because I wanted to talk to him, rather than trying to avoid him like the plague. I half expected him to just pop up behind me like he always did, but perhaps I’d hurt his ego during our last encounter. Trying to ignore that possibility, I walked through the quad and over to my spot near the library, hoping he might be waiting for me there. The spot, however, was empty, just waiting to absorb the girl who had no friends and no family. I looked glumly at the empty wall before sliding to my normal place on the ground and resting my head on my knees. I was wearing white pants, so this probably wasn’t the best place to sit, but I had far more important things on my mind at the moment. Perhaps I hadn’t thought my brilliant plan through all the way. I hadn’t anticipated the possibility that David might not want to talk to me now. After all, I couldn’t expect him to wait around forever, though you’d think after waiting for a year, one class period wouldn’t really break his spirit.

  I vaguely registered the presence of a warm body sliding down to sit beside me and when the miraculous smell that belonged to David hit my nose, a grin plastered itself to my face. I looked up at him, noting that he didn’t look particularly mad at me, just a bit resigned. “I wasn’t going to bother you but you looked a little sad,” he said dully. I could see his green eyes scanning my face, and when they took in the smile that I’m sure looked a bit maniacal, he smiled back tentatively. “So are you okay?”

  “I’m wonderful,” I replied happily. “At least I think I am . . . or I will be.” He looked at me as if I were crazy, which seemed to be a normal expression for him, and I simply beamed back. “I think this could work,” I said finally.

  “Wait, this as in this?” He motioned to himself and then me, implying that I meant “us.”

  “Well, I was thinking about it, and maybe it wouldn’t be so bad to actually talk to someone other than myself, and make plans with someone other than myself, and . . . oh that’s right, actually have a friend other than myself.” He smiled at this and scooted closer, apparently coming to the decision that I wasn’t about to bite his head off.

  “I’m glad you find me worthy to be in your presence, oh great one,” he said dramatically. I shoved him in the shoulder but went on, undaunted by his sarcasm.

  “I mean it. I actually like you. Despite the fact that you’re self-righteous and frustrating, and you’ve been following me around for a year, which is pretty creepy—”

  “Please don’t flatter me, you’re making me blush,” he said in a monotone voice.

  “The thing is the whole ‘liking someone’ thing?—that’s never happened to me before. I’ve never wanted to be with someone. I’ve always been perfectly fine on my own, and then I met you and it was just . . . different.” I realized I was ranting, which was something I always did, but it usually happened in my head so those around me didn’t have to be subjected to it. Then again, that was David. He always made me say the strangest things—the kind of things that really belong in your head, that you always think but never say. Being around David was like taking some sort of honesty pill.

  “I’m going to finish up with Nate and Karen and then I’m done. Those were your terms after all, weren’t they?” I smiled at him, actually excited by this thrilling new prospect.

  “They were,” he agreed, still sounding a bit apprehensive of my motives. “Are you sure this is what you want? I mean, I don’t want you to be unhappy, and I realize I’ve been making you pretty miserable this week.” He looked down guiltily, though I could see a hint of a smile on his face. He didn’t really feel all that bad.

  Without bothering to vocally tell him that this was indeed what I wanted, I lifted his chin and leaned over and kissed him. It was a long, wonderful, blissful kiss that felt like it might just keep going until the bell rang, and when he finally pulled away, my arms had, yet again, encircled his neck somehow, which proved to be slightly uncomfortable since we were sitting down. It was odd how I had no idea what was going on when I kissed him. Instead, I just sort of lived for that moment. I was also beginning to notice that now that I’d kissed him once, I was becoming a bit of an addict. Under any other circumstances I’d never take the initiative and kiss a boy, even if we’d kissed before. I suppose that was all part of the new Amelia.

  David brought his hand to my cheek and gave me one more small kiss before leaning his back against the wall once again. “I’ll take that as a yes,” he said breathlessly. He closed his eyes and smiled. “It’s weird though.” I raised an eyebrow at these words, not quite sure what to make of them.

  “What’s weird?” Surely he didn’t mean my kissing. I really had to stop worrying about that. It’s like I’d said before—it’s a pretty basic thing. How bad could I be?

  “Just the way all of this came about. I mean, I set out to destroy you, and then became a bit infatuated with you. You set out to ruin my fake relationship, and then you started to like me. We have to have the most screwed-up relationship in the history of all screwed-up high school relationships.” He laughed quietly, his eyes still closed. I followed his example and leaned my head back against the wall, closing my eyes.

  It was like a release from the craziness of the past week, just to sit there with David in silence, thinking about how we got to this point. I felt such a mix of emotions that it was almost difficult to catalogue them into separate categories just then. I was happy that I was actually going to make a connection with someone other than myself, I was scared out of my mind at the prospect of change and the unknown, and I was really wanting to kiss David again. Now that I had that option open on a consistent basis, I’d have to learn to keep my emotions under control. Except, now that he was my boyfriend, I should be able to kiss him whenever I wanted to. Or at least . . . I thought he was my boyfriend. I guess we hadn’t actually had that talk.

  “So . . . do we need a DTR or are we pretty much past that?” I asked, opening my eyes to look at him. He turned his head in my direction so he could take in my expression.

  “Is DTR some relationship acronym that only breakup artists know about?” I quickly remembered that not everyone spoke the same language as I did for my line of work: DTR, POI, CF.

  “It means Define the Relationship. It’s that horribly awkward talk couples have when they aren’t sure if they’re a couple of not . . . it’s basically a way to force someone into telling you if you’re their girlfriend or boyfriend.” I blushed slightly, never thinking I would stoop so low as to have a DTR. Those kinds of talks were for sappy high school students who actually thought their relationship would last through the whole week. It was slightly embarrassing that I had joined the ranks of the love struck, but there it was. The truth is sometimes painful to accept.

  “Ah,” he said mysteriously, a grin creeping onto his face. Sometimes David’s lack of normal human responses was so frustrating.

  “Well, glad we cleared that up,” I said sarcastically. I was doing it again. I was desperate for him to tell me what we were. I actually cared if we had an official title of couple or not. The new me was so pathetic, and yet I loved it. He kept his grin in place and entwined his fingers with mine, giving my hand a little squeeze.

  “I definitely think we’re past that talk. I stalked you for a year and you hated me for trying to ruin your life . . . I’d say that makes us a couple, wouldn’t you?” I laughed and nodded in agreement. “So, just one more job, right?” he asked. Oddly enough, the fact that this was kind of a possessive thing to say didn’t bother me at all. It struck me as sweet. Oh yeah, I was disgustingly infatuated with him. It was odd how easy it was to confuse love and hate. Yesterday I wanted to blast him off the face of the earth and today I just wanted to be close to him and breathe i
n his intoxicating scent.

  “One more. Nate and Karen,” I confirmed. “I don’t think it’ll be that hard except that they seem to actually like each other . . . which doesn’t make much sense.” David looked at me with confusion lining his features but said nothing, apparently not wanting to get involved in the line of work he found so distasteful.

  The bell rang then, signaling the end of break, and the two of us stood. I looked around awkwardly for a moment, wondering what I was supposed to say to my new boyfriend. The whole fact that I was even wondering such a thing was a bit embarrassing, but I’d just have to live with my newfound sense of reality. Before I could decide what would be best, David slid his arms artfully around my waist, giving me chills all over. He pulled me close to him, his hands on the small of my back, and gave me one long, deep kiss. When he broke away I sighed, reminding me forcefully of some pitiable character in a romance novel. He smiled at this and said, “See you at lunch,” before walking back through the quad to his class. And there I stood, left with a stupid grin on my face and obviously blushing cheeks.

  ☼☼☼

  My ASL class was actually interesting enough to keep my attention, though my mind was trying its hardest to be distracted. We learned the various signs for different food items and I decided I’d have to show David the sign for shrimp after class because it was just so comical. That thought made me smile. Having someone to share things with and someone to look forward to seeing was a first for me. It made me feel like I actually had a purpose or a reason for being here.

  When class was over, I was the first one out the door, startling a few of my classmates as I pushed past them to get to my little spot by the library. When I got there, the wall was empty, which puzzled me for a moment, making me wonder if I had imagined the whole scene at break. I quickly realized, however, that it was, in fact, lunch, and David was probably getting food, which was something I had forgotten to do in my excitement. I slid down the wall and sat impatiently, scanning the passing students for David’s bright green eyes. He was there only two minutes later, carrying two long, skinny items wrapped in foil. I refrained from jumping up and running over to him and decided to maintain at least a little dignity. He slid down next to me on the ground, and we both sat in silence for a moment.

  “So . . . I’m not still a job or anything, am I?” he asked suddenly, catching me entirely off guard.

  “I don’t think I understand the question,” I said honestly. Well . . . semi-honestly.

  “Well, I just realized that all of this elation and ‘Oh, I’m so happy to be in a relationship with this boy that I hate’ stuff could really just be me falling into one of your expertly laid traps. I mean . . . you really, really don’t like me. Remember?” He said all of this with the same infuriating smirk that he always wore.

  “Well . . . if you were a job, I couldn’t very well tell you now, could I?” I countered, trying to sound sly and unpredictable. It didn’t work. “I’m starting to think that hating someone and really liking them are incredibly similar.”

  “So what you’re telling me is that you feel like you probably like me . . . but at any moment you could realize you just want to push me down a flight of stairs? That sounds about like every healthy relationship I’ve ever seen,” he said with a shrug, and I couldn’t really tell if he was joking or not. It was a lot harder to read David than it was to read all the other boys I had broken up with over the years.

  Looking at our current relationship, I had to admit that this was the scariest way possible to jump into having a normal life. I wanted so badly to believe that David and I had just gotten lucky to be that one-in-a-million exception to the short-lived, high school relationship rule. The worry that this was a superficial connection permeated my mind, but I pushed it back to pull out and examine at some other time.

  “I brought you a lettuce wrap,” he said, placing one of the foil items in my hand. “I know you like them . . . which makes me sound like a stalker.”

  “If the shoe fits,” I answered with a shrug. We ate in silence for a moment and I let my gaze roam to the library entrance where Nate and Karen were talking right outside the door. I made a mental note to talk to Karen after school so that I could get the job done tomorrow. David followed my gaze to the conversing couple and raised an eyebrow.

  “Is that them?” he asked casually, though I knew he was a bit uncomfortable with work talk. He’d just have to get over that for the next two days. It wasn’t like I was a stripper or something; my work wasn’t that difficult to talk about.

  “Yeah.” I continued looking at them. Karen seemed upset by something. Her face was flushed and her hand continually went up to her cheeks as if she were wiping away tears I couldn’t see from this distance. Nate put his arm around her and kissed her forehead, quietly comforting his girlfriend. He didn’t look around him to see who was watching this ordeal; he simply focused all of his attention on her. He really did care for her.

  “Do you see that?” I asked after a moment of silence. “Do you see how he’s not worried about if comforting a girl is scoring him brownie points with the other girls in the school or making him any less cool to the boys? He just doesn’t care about that kind of stuff.” I was thinking out loud again, but I thought maybe David could help me figure this mystery out. “They actually like each other,” I said incredulously.

  “That has been known to happen sometimes,” David replied with a laugh. I was sure he thought I was some sort of hardened, unlovable freak show after my notorious career. And yet he still wanted me. So maybe he was right—it has been known to happen.

  “I can see that,” I said, turning to him with a smile before returning to concentrate on the last job in my extensive career. “It’s just . . . people who actually like each other are so infrequent. I never see them in my line of work. Why would two people who like each other want to break up?” None of it made sense.

  “Maybe you should ask her.” David suggested with such obviousness that I couldn’t believe I hadn’t thought about that before. I didn’t say anything to this suggestion but nodded in agreement, trying to figure out exactly how I could approach the subject without seeming nosey.

  “That’s enough work for one lunch period,” I said finally, returning my gaze to David. My boyfriend.

  “So I was thinking that maybe we could try our first date over again. Now that you don’t have to think of a good lie for every question I ask you.” He was smirking but the mention of that night made me shake my head.

  “You’re horrible! You knew the whole time I was lying to you, didn’t you?” I asked, though I was pretty sure I knew the answer.

  “Why do you think I was so interested in your past? I wanted to see how good you were at thinking on your feet. I must say, now that you’re looking for a new job, you should seriously consider acting.” I shook my head at him, amazed that I had been the butt of his own personal joke without my knowledge.

  “I think a second first date is definitely in order,” I answered with a playful glare.

  “How about Friday at about five?”

  “Well, we both know my schedule is pretty free now,” I said just as the bell rang. I wasn’t sure how the time had flown by so quickly when I could have sworn that we had just sat down for lunch. We stood again and I threw our trash into the nearby can.

  “Friday it is then,” he answered, before repeating the scene at break and pulling me into him. I could smell what I was sure had to be some sort of cologne, and I put my arms around his neck, resting one hand on his soft blond hair. He placed his forehead lightly against mine and smiled. “I’m glad we got that cleared up,” he whispered before kissing me once more. I was definitely an addict. Even though the occurrence was becoming more and more frequent, kissing David never ceased to make me feel dizzy. I knew there had to be some sort of social no-no about kissing in the middle of a crowded high school where everyone could see you, but I truly didn’t care. David didn’t seem to either, since our kisses were
becoming longer and more involved every time they happened. When he pulled away to go to his last class, a thought struck me, and I grabbed his hand to stop him.

  “Why did you take me out so late on our first date?” I asked, genuinely puzzled and curious. A grin crept across his face, making my heart skip a beat.

  “I was pretty sure I would chicken out, and I just wanted to give you plenty of time to bail so I wouldn’t have to,” he said simply, and then he released my hand to go to class.

  I shook my head with a smile, watching him go. At least I wasn’t the only one who was out of my element.

  ☼☼☼

  Trying to pay any attention to my math class was simply out of the question. Not only did I not understand a word of what my teacher was saying, but I was too focused on my upcoming date and the little talk I needed to have with Karen to concentrate on anything else. I tapped my pencil on my desk absentmindedly, playing the confrontation out in my head. Okay, so maybe confrontation wasn’t the right word to use. It really wouldn’t be too difficult; I simply had to ask why she wanted to break up with Nate when they seemed to be so completely attached at the hip. She didn’t even seem to be faking her affection as some of my more kind clients would do to their soon-to-be ex-boyfriends. I went over the situation in my mind until it seemed like an abstract concept, and finally the bell rang.