Iciness brewed like iced tea in her heart, chilling winds blowing fast and feelings of despair singing taunting words. She felt nothing. It was numb and frostbitten, because in the cold world of love, she had forgotten to bring mittens. She wanted to be sad. She wanted to be angry. But there was nothing. And there never would be.
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Linette shivered against the harsh winds of the bitter cold winter afternoon. Her parents just HAD to settle in the Catskills. Her thin jean jacket was nothing against the incoming snowstorm, and she quickened her pace as she marched up the mountain that was Theodore Street. A thousand pounds of textbooks and lost, apple-stained papers threatened to break her shoulders, along with its best friend, gravity. Her pocket vibrated, nearly knocking her off balance, and she ignored it out of frustration. Forwards upon forwards filled up 99% of her cheap Verizon phone, almost all of them about love. “Send this to 10 people and the love of your life will ask you out,” or “if you don’t send this you will never find true love,” was among the most common. All of them different, but they had one thing in common. Each was deleted.
Boys were the new fad, and Linette hated it. Everyone had a boyfriend now since they were in high school, and it seemed if you were single or didn’t fancy anyone, then you had a problem. Well didn’t that just fit right in with her? Linette, the problem child. Of course, her perfect older sister Chelle had a boyfriend. Who wouldn’t want to date that beautiful girl with straight A’s, a promising future, and an eye for creativity? But the real question was who would want to date Linette? The shy girl with a procrastination problem, no idea what she wanted to accomplish, and an addiction to the computer. No one. Although she liked to tell people she was happy being single, that she was independent and didn’t need some silly boy to make her feel complete, who was she kidding? Linette desperately wanted a boyfriend. Too bad I won’t get one till I’m 90, she thought.
Trudging through the unlocked backdoor, Linette threw down her backpack in its usual corner, causing a deafening roar to echo throughout the house. She hated walking home. She also hated not having a boyfriend. Unfortunately, neither of those would be changing anytime soon. Calling out, “Hello?” she walked into the den and pushed the desktop’s power button with her toe. 3:00 p.m., and already she was on the computer. The sad part was, the only time she would get up from that spot in the next 8 hours would be to get food, or go to the bathroom. Such a pathetic life. Such a pathetic girl.
She sulked, ate fatty foods, complained to her friends, and did just about everything other than homework. Don’t misunderstand, however, Linette wasn’t fat. No, she weighed under 90 pounds, in fact. But she wasn’t anorexic either, as her mother liked to think. Well actually, she was sure other people thought it too. She knew her family talked about her. She tried not to let it bother her. It did.
The thing was, on the outside, strangers saw just an average, Dakota Fanning look-alike, petite girl. She wasn’t an idiot, either. Lin hadn’t missed one marking period without being on the honor roll (until now, of course).But no one knew what went on inside her head. No one knew the conflicts she faced, like her father who only visited one day a week just because he was obliged to, or the loneliness she felt as she sat at the lunch table, her real friends laughing together at another school, as she was talked to only out of pity. Her social life was rapidly declining. She dreamed of something huge happening to her one day. She wanted to be a hero, like the main character of a fiction book who saved the day, and got drooled over by every perfect boy. But who was she kidding, that would never happen.