Broken Hearted

Dylan Hardwick was her best friend and he broke her heart. "I talk louder and laughed harder just to get you to look my way."

Dylan Hardwick.

Indie-rock with his dirty blonde hair, loved his music, played his guitar and broke my heart.

I'd seen him for the first time when I’d heard someone strumming chords softly on a guitar. I turned to find where the music was coming from and found myself looking at a boy about my age - maybe a year or two older.

He smiled slightly as he moved his fingers on the strings, stretching them out over the frets to create the most beautiful and tuneful notes. I sat immersed in the way his shaggy, longish blonde hair fell forward into his brown eyes, the way his foot tapped along slightly to some of the beats; obviously enjoying making the music.

I watched and watched until I realized that he wasn’t concentrating on only his playing but he was now watching me watch him, still playing although slightly more distracted now. Our eyes connected from across the quad.

I felt the heat rise to my cheeks in an instant and quickly looked down, letting a curtain of hair fall in front of my face. I forced myself not to look back over in that direction for the rest of lunchtime, no matter how much my brain was screaming at me to look over.

From that moment forward Dylan Hardwick became that one guy I could never get off my mind, the name I would scribble in the inside of my folders with love hearts, the one guy I most wanted to talk to.

So every day after that I always looked over to his group's spot, just to catch at least one glimpse of him per day.

He was always there.

He sat directly across the quad from my group with his friends. It was the same every single lunchtime and every single interval. It was something I came to look forward to. In the class before I would get excited at the prospect of seeing him again.

After a while I came to the point where glancing over there was just normal, it became a natural thing to me. Get my lunch out of my locker, walk over to my group past his group, sit down and then glance over at him before joining in with whatever conversation my group was having.

Sometimes when I looked over he would return my glance, our eyes would lock for a few seconds and then one of us would look away.

I developed this habit that whenever I knew that he was just over there I would talk just a little bit louder and laugh just a little bit harder and then glance over to check if he’d seen. It was like a reflex. Laugh, glance over, and glance back.

My friends were all begging me to ask him to our year level formal or at least talk to him and get his cell phone number. But me being as nervous as I am found even thinking of going over there nerve-wracking.

Then one day our group emigrated.

For reasons completely unknown to me our group unanimously decided to vacate our current hang out spot in favour of the open part of bench right beside his group.

Jessica told me this was the perfect chance for me to go over and talk to him.

But it wasn’t me who initiated our first conversation.

It was him and it was his fault too.

Have you ever been hit by someone carrying a guitar?

Well I had.

I was walking just slightly behind Dylan; he had his guitar in his hands strumming away like he always was.

It was almost like that guitar was glued to his hands.

Someone called out his name from behind and he swung around to see who had called out and hit me right in the stomach with the head of the guitar.

All the air was knocked out of me as I gasped and bent over double trying to regain my breath.

“Oh my god, I’m so sorry,” he said quickly, bending over beside me to check if I was alright.

“Oww,” I managed to gasp out.

“I really am really sorry, I didn’t see you there and my friend called out to me and I just turned around and then…” he trailed off as my shoulders started to shake slightly with laughter.

“And then…” he said again, this time not so apologetically but trying to hold back the laugh I knew he was trying to hide. But I didn’t care if he laughed, because I, myself, now had to hold onto my stomach not out of the pain from being hit but from laughing so hard.

In minutes we were both laughing harder then I think we’d both ever laughed before.

And that was the beginning of the most amazing friendship ever.

Our groups sort of merged into one and soon it was almost like it had always been that way.

I never thought that my silly little schoolyard crush would develop into anything more then just that. But here Dylan and I were; the best of friends.

All my folders were quickly recovered and hidden so he would never find out that I liked him, all the notes Jess and I had passed in class were stowed away where he would never find so that he could never find out that I had talked about him so much.

Years passed as Dylan and I became closer and closer. I never quite managed to work up the courage in those first few months to actually ask him out, until it no longer really became an option. We spent so much time together; as Jess put it we were inseparable.

And the whole time I was still hiding my true feelings for him.

He was already breaking my heart every time I looked at him; just the thought of him with someone else tore me up.

But that breaking was only just beginning, here started a long list of times he would break my heart, never intentionally but it always pulled that string and made me hurt every time.

One of the worst was when I asked him to go to the formal with me a year after we’d first met, he flat out said ‘no’ and laughed as well, to add insult to injury.

I gaped at him for a few minutes, feeling the tears collecting in my eyes. When he finally realized I was hurt he looked apologetic and told me that someone had already asked him. But it still hurt more then anything, even the time I broke my arm.

And it stayed with me forever.

♥~♥~♥~♥~♥~♥~♥~♥~♥~♥~♥~♥~♥~♥

It was finally our last year of school together; in fact our last week at the same school together. He was leaving for University and I still had one more year left of High School.

We lay out in the field behind his house, talking and reminiscing. His guitar was lying next to him as always, we’d been devising some new lyrics to go along with a tune he had created.

“You know Sammie, I’m going to miss you,” Dylan said randomly in one of our lapses of silence.

“You’d better!” I scoffed slightly, watching as the wispy clouds floated across the pale blue sky. I heard him chuckle beside me.

“You remember how we first met?” he asked with a laugh.

“Of course I do! You severely damaged my chances of having babies after that,” I said trying to suppress a giggle. He burst out laughing.

“I would offer you to damage my chances of having babies, but I value it too much!” he laughed; I snorted and hit him playfully on the arm. A hunk of grass suddenly landed on me, I growled slightly and glared at him pulling the pieces off my top. He sat up on his elbow suddenly and looked down at me seriously.

“Can I tell you a secret?” he asked, looking at me directly with his deep brown eyes. My heart immediately skipped a beat.

“Uh, sure,” I smiled up at him.

“I knew you were walking behind me that day I hit you with my guitar, I wanted to get your attention so I got Craig to call out so I could turn around,” he admitted. I stared at him in shock and then burst out laughing.

“Couldn’t you have found something slightly less painful to get my attention?” I asked. He grinned and shrugged.

“I was only 15, I was stupid when I was 15,” he replied.

“I know!” I nodded. He gestured rudely at me and then lay back down. I just laughed.

“You’re turn!” he declared. I thought about it for a few seconds.

“You know when we sat at opposite sides of the quad?” I asked, he ‘mhmm’-ed. “Well I used to talk as loud as I could, laugh loudly and act silly just to get your attention,” I said. He laughed slightly.

“I never heard any of that �"” he said with a smirk. I grinned back at him. There was a moment of silence.

“Did you ever like me, Dylan?” I asked softly.

“I still do,” he said looking at me weirdly. My eyes widened. “You’re my best friend, Sammie! Of course I like you; you’re like my little sister.” My hopes suddenly plummeted to the ground.

“Oh, yeah I know �" that’s good,” I replied monotonously. We were silent again.

‘Just tell him the truth before you regret it’ my mind told me, whispering over and over again my conscience always got the better of me. Finally I gave in and sat up, looking down at him.

“No that’s not what I meant Dylan,” I said, straight out. He looked at me, confused.

“I didn’t mean if you liked me, I meant do you like me? Because I like you, I love you!” I said it so matter-of-factly that it hardly sounded like it was coming out of my own mouth.

He stared at me for ages and then he did the worst thing ever.

He laughed.

And laughed, and laughed, and laughed.

I sat staring at him in silence as he lay there holding his stomach while he laughed, the pain ebbing into me like someone slowly driving a needle though my heart.

His laughing slowly died down. “Wait are you joking, or not?” he asked, studying my hurt expression.

I stood up quickly, turning my head to hide the tears that were starting to fall and started to walk away. He caught my wrist and pulled me back.

“Wait, Sam, I didn’t mean to be cruel, I just I never…” he started.

“Never liked me, that much is obvious. I don’t want to be hurt anymore, I’m sorry,” I replied, keeping my head down. I pulled my arm out of his and stormed away leaving him standing in the middle of the field.

Even after that I expected a phone call. A text maybe or a letter at the very least but he never made contact.

I never saw him again.

No more Dylan and Sammie.

No more of his indie-rock, no more music all the time and no more listening to him play guitar.

Dylan Hardwick broke my heart.

Reviews

[WriterMe]

This was very good. Very simple, not a complex story yet, it had something about it that allured me. Great work. I hope its not a true story though.

[deeps]

This is a wonderful write here, I like this alot. I thought it was very well written.
I like all the vivid detail and imagery. A wonderful write.

[Keli Renee]

Oh wow. This is amazing. I wasn't too sure about this at first, but after reading the second line my attention was won. Great job. I'm totally putting this in my library.