Free Back To You by Cindy Migeot

finally, FINALLY asked me to dance, a slow dance.  The song was Heaven by Bryan Adams.  He held me close.  I could smell his Polo cologne.  He was sweaty but still smelled so good.  Joel was dancing with Reneigh right next to us.  During the last chorus, Joel sang out as loud as he could and we laughed at him!  I assumed he was in “heaven” because he was dancing with Reneigh.  Pete looked down at me and smiled his award winning smile.  I thought I was in heaven too.
     
    *****
     
    Jack was surprised to see Suzy walk in to his English class the first day of school.  He had decided to give up on her and had been flirting with other girls, even going out with a few, or finding a way to make out with some of them.  But he couldn’t help the way he just froze when she came into view.  It always felt like his throat and his stomach switched places when he was around her.  She wore pink a lot.  That was a good thing.  She looked beautiful in pink.  And she still seemed so different from the other girls.  He never could figure out exactly what that was, but she was like a bright pink crayon in a box full of grey.  Lost your chance on that one, but maybe someday I will get up the nerve to ask her again.  Doubtful.  But maybe.
    They had lunch together.  Well, not TOGETHER, t ogether, but they went to and from lunch with the class.  He sat with a few guys he had known from Holy Cross, but he also hung out with some guys he had just met.  Sometimes he ate lunch with a girl he was interested in, but that never seemed to last very long.  He often wondered why it was that sometimes he would get a chance with a girl, and after one or two dates, or even after a night of kisses and making out, the girl would just pretend he didn’t exist.  Dropped like a hot potato.  Didn’t do much for his self esteem.  He knew he wasn’t ugly, and he was sort of popular because he was on the football team, but still, why didn’t girls want to date him?  It was like a lot of girls wanted everything he was, until they got it.  He admitted he was moody at times.  He was completely and totally in love with music, which almost always came first.  He was sweet and sensitive.  And although he had plenty of friends, he was a bit of a loner.
    Pretty much every day, he was just drawn to look up at Suzy came in class.  And pretty much every lunch period, he always knew where she was sitting, whether he was purposely looking for her or not, he never really knew.  He listened for her laugh because something about that sound made him want to smile.  He even realized one day that he got jealous when he heard other guys talking about her.
    One day at lunch, Jack was caught staring at Suzy by one of his friends, Randy Hunter.  He liked Randy because he was a no bullshit kind of guy.  Sickly, allergic to everything, even a bit nerdy, but down to earth and really cool.
    “She is beautiful, isn’t she?”  Randy asked.
    Jack was startled and even a little embarrassed.  He hadn’t realized he had been staring.  “Yeah.  Something about her is so di fferent.”
    “She’s just as nice as you think she is too.”
    “Haven’t thought about it much.”
    “Hmpf.  Yeah.  Sure.”  Randy laughed at him.
    “How do you know her?” Jack asked.
    “From middle school.  She moved here in seventh grade.”  He sighed.  “She has always been nice to me, but she is way out of my league.”
    “Why do you say that?  Does she think she is better than everyone else?”
    “No, just the opposite, actually.  It’s like she has no idea sometimes that she is so different from every other girl.  Some of the girls hated her because she was the ‘new kid’.  Then she and Reneigh and Donna started hanging out all of the time.  Reneigh was so pop ular.  Suzy just kind of let Reneigh be center stage.  Honestly, I never thought Reneigh was as pretty as Suzy.”
    “Huh.  Doesn’t seem like that has changed much.”
    “Nope.  I