She'd given the note to him. Crumpled as it was, she'd given it to him. Now she waited, just waited, for a response. He was actually standing before her, reading her little blurb this second. She couldn't wait to see what he had in response, though the anxiety of actually handing over the paper may have killed her before she even knew what he thought about it. She admired him, really. He was a great guy other than this whole "hurr hurr why can't girls be more unique" thing and seemed to get people. That was probably what upset her the most about the whole thing. Harriet had been so sure that he could read people that it shocked her that something she understood so well seemed to have slipped right under his nose.
He sighed in a way that said "Oh Lord, not this again". Harriet straightened up, alert, ready to defend her position on the matter. She wasn't going to back down, not now, when she'd finally gotten something that mattered to her off her chest to someone that she cared about. Usually such subjects stayed locked away in her head for fear of displeasing someone she wanted to stick around. But now? Now she was being more confident because she actually did know a bit about insecurity. ...ha. She was confident about insecurity? Harriet smirked a little. Was she the only one that found that funny?
"Harriet, look," he said, running a hand through his hair, "I get what you're trying to say here, okay? But if it's really that hard...then obviously you're doing something wrong. Just be yourself. That's it." He shrugged. "Changing yourself for people isn't ever going to work. You can't make people love you that way." There was something in the way he said this that made Harriet feel he was referring to her little crush (read: undying love) for him. This kind of made her even more frustrated with him.
"Love--" he started, obviously going for the obvious in case his tone wasn't clear enough. Harriet quickly cut him short.
"Look, guy," she said fiercely, jabbing him in the chest with one finger, "that might be true and all, but have you ever tried being insecure? Like, really, really insecure? Now, I'm not a psychologist and I don't plan on ever being one, but this is what I know: It freaking sucks, okay?"
He looked like he wanted to cut in, but she wouldn't let him.
"Insecurity, in my case, makes you too scared to want to try and be yourself. You're too worried that the people you want to be around won't like the real you, so you hide it. Maybe one or two people get to see what's underneath your makeup, but the rest just see whatever mask you've adopted. For example, I've taken over a nice scene look. Makes it easy, doesn't it? You'll notice a lot of my friends--the ones I hang out with on a regular basis, that is--dress about the same way. It makes it easy so you can fit in right away. And if you don't fit in right away, well...then it's not so easy."
She chewed on her bottom lip a moment and looked at him, feeling tears well up. They weren't tears of weakness or sadness or longing. They were just angry, frustrated tears. He didn't look like he was going to say anything, so she continued on, her fists clenched tightly.
"And...and you get that you should try to be yourself sometimes." She rubbed her eye with the hem of her sleeve, probably smearing her makeup but not especially caring right that moment. "It makes sense to the logical part of your brain. And you want to try it sometimes, too." Harriet turned away from him and leaned back on the lockers next to them, staring at the floor. "But y-you're just so scared that you can't. You're too afraid that you might end up saying or doing something wrong and you'll lose that person forever. So you pretend and pretend, just so you can keep those happy moments. Sometimes you're not even sure who 'you' really is, so pretending is just more comforting."
Suddenly, Harriet clutched the sides of her head tightly, like her head was splitting in half from pain.
"I'm sorry," she mumbled, shaking her head while still holding it, "I'm sorry, I'm sorry..."
She turned and took off down the hall, hands still on her head as if she were trying to keep it stuck together.
And he was still standing there, holding the paper. Harriet could picture it. Now, now she just had to wait. But that was okay. After all of this, she was good at the waiting game. Oh, oh so good at it.
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