Here are my overdramatized thoughts. This is partly fictional and partly autobiographical. You get to decide which things are true about me.

There’s nothing behind my smile. Anybody can smile like this. Its just rows of white teeth lined up between two red lips. Yet I woke up in the morning, feeling like Elizabeth Endara, and plastered it on. Apparently that’s the best thing to wear everyday… a smile. And boys are supposed to like girls who smile all the time. Somehow I always find myself frowning around any boy I do care about. If I smile around him then it might be genuine, and then he might actually see me, and that would be terrifying. These were the thoughts that were running through my head this morning as I took my favorite walk to the education building. It was another perfectly manicured day. The sun was glittering and the sky was the perfect color of blue, the color I wish my eyes were. I walked passed eight flowering Dogwood Trees. The trees seemed especially happy with me this Tuesday morning, and they let the wind shower white flower petals on me as I walked passed. I let the corners of my mouth turn upwards. Mental turmoil or not, this was a happy moment.

One morning two weeks ago, it was so beautiful that I had to stop and soak it in. I put my hands on my hips (the place they seem to naturally go) and just stood there in the middle of the sidewalk. My head was angled upward toward the sun and I had a stupid little grin on my face. I was pretending like the world was perfect. I was as beautiful as I could possibly imagine myself to be. I could eat six pieces of pizza, but still have the body of a Victoria’s Secret model. My boyfriend had finally come out of hiding, and he kissed my mouth and the very ground I walked on. He also looked like Zac Efron and acted like Jesus. Basically we were both perfect. My beautiful world quickly melted away when the person behind me cleared their throat loudly. I opened my eyes and realized that there were more than a few people who now thought I was mentally insane. “I’ll be gone next year anyway you losers,” I thought, and I silently defied them. I hated the comparison of my perfect world to this place I now was. It was cruel really.

As that memory faded I couldn’t help but laugh at myself. When I let my mind wander so many tragic things can occur. Often I think about whether or not anyone is thinking about me, and what they may be thinking about. Just this morning following a frustrating series of events and a complete emotional breakdown, I got in the car to discover an old fortune from a fortune cookie sitting on my seat. I picked it up and it told me that someone was thinking good things about me. I wonder who it was. Maybe it was you. I hope so. I hope you only have good memories of me, though I’m sure that’s not true. I bet you remember some incredibly insensitive, blunt thing that I said. I do that a lot. Sorry. I get in trouble with the things I say. I break hearts that way. I do apologize for the hearts I’ve broken. I remember when my two best friends and I went ice-skating for my tenth birthday. While we were skating, I fell and my bare hands slapped onto the cold ice. That’s what heart break feels like. It burns and stings like tears in your eyes. I feel it.

My walk was coming to an end and I reached for the door handle. I saw my reflection. I saw how ordinary I am. I don’t like being ordinary. Do boys like ordinary girls? Maybe if they smile all the time. Independence is wearing on me, but I wonder if I could ever surrender it. I like having the ability to be alone. There is that song by The Strokes called Alone Together. I think that might work for me as long as you like converse tennis shoes and the color yellow. And you have to promise you’ll buy me cheesecake every once in a while. There goes my mind again. My walk’s end was marked by me tripping over the air that had the nerve to stand in my way. My last thought before becoming absorbed with discussions over critical issues in education? I have got to get out of this town.