The Soul of Me (Part 11) (standard:romance, 0 words) [11/11] show all parts
Author: Maya	Added: Jun 09 2001	Views/Reads: 2520/1809	Part vote: 0.00 (0 votes)
Heidi and Aaron have a talk.

Click here to read the first 75 lines of the story

crying again. “Yep, that’s me. Heidi the loser.” 

“You are not a loser.” Aaron walked over to me and tried to hold me
again. 

“No!” I shouted as a pulled away from his embrace. “I don’t want your
pity. It’s over. I won’t do it again. I made a mistake. I’m dealing 
with it. I don’t need your help. I have all the help I need. Besides, 
it doesn’t concern you anyway. Just stay out of it.” 

“If it doesn’t concern me, why did you mention me in your note?” 

“I...I...” I was trying to come up with a plausible explanation. “I
don’t know. I just did.” That wasn’t very plausible, but I couldn’t 
think of another reason, except the truth. I had already let go of too 
much of myself. I didn’t want to lose anymore. 

Aaron came up to me and put his hands on my shoulders. I didn’t pull
away. “I won’t say anything to anyone about this. Please believe me.” I 
did. In my heart I never thought otherwise. “You’ll tell me if I can 
help, even if you just need to talk?” I nodded. 

I took a deep breath. “I’m sorry. I know you wouldn’t spread rumors.
It’s just that I have a hard enough time in school without something 
like this going around. I was just scared. I didn’t mean to yell at 
you.” 

“It’s okay. If you can’t yell at your friends, who can you tell at.” He
surprised me with another hug. A brief friendly hug. 

“You consider us friends?” I asked when he let me go. 

He looked puzzled. “Well, yeah. Don’t you?” 

“We aren’t exactly in the same clique. I just thought you were a nice
guy for being nice to me.” 

“I am a nice guy,” he giggled at his joke, “but I don’t choose my
friends based on cliques.” Then he got a strange look on his face. “I 
used to. I’m ashamed to admit this. It’s sort of part of what we were 
talking about last night. Let’s sit down.” I took my place on the edge 
of my bed. Aaron sat in my chair facing me. “Remember when I said I 
wished I had cared less about what other people thought about me.” I 
nodded. “I used to think that appearances were everything. I know now 
that I was wrong. Who I hang out with and what I look like is not what 
makes me Aaron. It certainly doesn’t make me any better or any worse 
than the next person.” 

“I agree.” 

“You agree with me?” 

“Of course I do. I just wish other people understood that.” 

“I don’t think you understand it.” 

“What?” 

“I don’t think you understand it.” 

“How can you say that. Wait. I know how you can say it. You’re one of
the ‘beautiful’ people. You have no idea what it’s like to be looked 
down on and treated differently.” 

“You don’t think I’m treated differently for the way I look? Ha! You
just made my point. You said I’m one of the ‘beautiful’ people. Doesn’t 
that say that appearances do matter to you. What about yourself. If you 
consider yourself not one of the ‘beautiful’ people (I hate that term 
by the way.) then how people perceive you also matters to you.” I 
looked at him, stunned. He was confusing me, but somewhere in all that 
confusion he was making a valid point. “You were surprised when I 
talked about us as friends. You talked about us being in different 
cliques. That says to me that you judge people based on who they hang 
around with, too.” 

I started to protest. “It’s not the same. Maybe you are treated
differently for who you are. You’re treated better for it. People like 
me are treated badly.” 

“I won’t deny that, but it still amounts to the same thing. Who you hang
out with and what you look like is not what makes you Heidi, and it 
certainly doesn’t make you any better or any worse than the next 
person. Do you see my point?” 

“Yeah, I guess I do. I never really thought about it that way.” 

“Well, I have. I’ve thought about it a lot lately. I really like you,
Heidi. I don’t see any reason we can’t hang out and talk and stuff 
without either of us worrying about what anyone says or thinks. Do 
you?” 

Thoughts were running around my mind. ‘He likes me. This angel likes me.
He didn’t say he loves me, but he likes me.’ I needed those words in 
order to give myself permission to be his friend – to admit to someone 
other than Jody that I liked him, too. I was so happy. Aaron was my 
friend. We were friends. It was mutual. I hadn’t had a friendship on a 
mutual basis since I met Jody. 

“Heidi?” 

“What? Oh, I mean, no. I don’t see any reason why we can’t be friends.”
I took a deep breath. “I really like you, too.” There. I said it. It 
wasn’t the truth, but it was close enough for now. 

“Good. That settles it then. No more avoiding me, right?” 

“Right. Now that the cat’s out of the bag about my...you know, I don’t
really have any reason to avoid you.” 

“Are you sure you won’t tell me what happened Tuesday? Maybe I can
help.” 

“It’s okay. I have to learn to deal with Ky...uh...things on my own.” I
tried to catch myself before I mentioned Kyle’s name, but Aaron knew. 
His beautiful face hardened before my eyes. 

He jumped up from the chair and started pacing. “Kyle. It was Kyle
wasn’t it? I knew it! He said something to you didn’t he?” 

“No. I mean, it’s okay.” I’d never, in all the time I’ve known Aaron,
seen him so agitated. It was frightening. 

“It’s not okay. What did he say? No, never mind. It doesn’t matter what
he said. It only matters that he hurt you. He pushed you so far to the 
edge that...” He stopped pacing and turned to look at me. “I’m so sorry 
Heidi.” 

“It’s okay. I’m getting over it. I was just having a bad day. Kyle just
helped make it a little worse. It’s not really his fault.” 

“Not his fault?” Aaron repeated incredulously. “How can you say that?” 

“Kyle’s a jerk. We both know that. Most of the school knows that. He’s
not one of my favorite people,” that was putting it mildly, “but he 
didn’t make me do anything. I made my own choices. Now I’ve got to 
learn to deal with things on my own. I’ve got to learn how to deal with 
the pain I feel when other people can’t see me for who I really am. 
I’ve got help now. I’ll be okay.” 

“You’ve got me, too.” Aaron seemed to calm down – almost. “If he every
says anything to you or does anything to you again, I want to know 
about it, okay.” 

“Aaron...” I started to protest. 

“I mean it. No-one treats any of my friends like that, okay.” 

“Okay.” What else could I say. 

“Okay.” He stepped in front of me and held out his hand. “It’s getting
late. I’ve got to get home.” I took his hand and stood up. “Come on. 
You can at least walk me to my car.” 

I followed him down the stairs, out of the house, and to his car.
Turning to me, he said, “I’m really glad we talked today. I know it was 
awkward, but I feel much better knowing we’re both on the same page.” I 
didn’t necessarily think we were on the same page. He liked me. I was 
still in love with him, but at least we were both reading from the same 
book. 

“I’m glad we talked, too.” I said. “You really are a nice guy.” I took a
chance and reached out to hug him. He hugged me in return. It felt 
wonderful. 

“Well, I try.” He said in a cocky sort of voice. Then we both laughed.
He got into his car and started the engine. “Hey!” He said as he 
started backing down my drive. “Would you talk to Jody. She’s been 
hounding Clark about what we’re all doing for the prom. You two figure 
it out. We’ll do whatever you guys want.” He waved goodbye as he 
started down my street. 

I was stunned. I was still standing there looking down the street when
my mother drove up. “Honey,” she said quite concerned after everything 
that had happened that week. “What’s wrong?” 

I looked at her and smiled brighter than I had in years. “Nothing mom.
Absolutely nothing.” I took her arm and walked with her into the house. 
“Oh, by the way,” I said slowly. “I’ve got a date for the prom.” My 
mother stopped, and turned me toward her. I nodded. We both squealed 
and started jumping up and down. Anyone that walked in right then would 
have thought we were both crazy. 

******************************* 

Part 12 coming soon.  Please Rate.  Thanks for reading.


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