Chapter 14

Mike and Pete threw away their half-eaten soft pretzels and stood up. "Don't worry," I assured them. "This really wasn't my idea. You don't have to give me your opinion at all. Really." I could feel my cheeks burning, and I was determined to salvage at least a shred of my dignity.

"Just stand here and pretend to talk to me for a minute," I begged. "That should satisfy her, and then I can go give the dress back. I'm sorry that she put you on the spot like that. It really wasn't necessary. Kendra already pointed out how bad this thing looks on me!"

"Are you kidding?" Mike grabbed my hand and twirled me around. "This dress is great! You should definitely buy it."

"Yeah," Pete said, his eyes wide. "Is Kendra blind or something? How could she possibly say that this dress looks any less than phenomenal on you?"

Mike spun me around and wrapped his arms around my waist. He pulled me close and whispered in my ear, "Laina, you look delectable." His lips brushed my earlobe and I felt myself shiver at the touch.

"Mmmm..." he breathed. "Absolutely delicious."

I was enjoying the attention, but Mike's proximity was starting to make me a little bit nervous. I didn't want to give him any ideas. I placed both of my hands on his chest and pushed him away slightly. "So, the dress looks good, then?" I smiled. I wondered whether it would be rude to tell him to back off when he was in the middle of complimenting me.

Kendra joined us, and Mike loosened his hold on me, sparing me the trouble of trying to squirm out of his grasp. "So, Laina," she asked, "are you ready to hit the outlets? We'd better get going, or we are never going to find a dress that fits you before the stores close!"

Without warning, Pete grabbed my wrist and sat down on the bench, pulling me out of Mike's grasp and across his lap. I shrieked in surprise and then looked at him curiously. He didn't answer my questioning glance, challenging Kendra with an icy stare instead.

"Alaina has decided to stay here," Pete announced.

"Yep!" Mike chimed in. "She's already found a dress that fits just fine."

"Oh, I know it's fine," Kendra replied, "but Laina wants more than just fine. She wants to look good for the Fall Ball. And I am going to help her find the perfect dress."

Pete winked and gave me a little squeeze. "She's already found it. The only way that this dress would look better is if it were in a crumpled heap on my bedroom floor."

I don't know why guys always think that line is so clever, but you would not believe how often I hear it! I've been told that my jeans, my shirts, my dresses, even my band uniform would look really good in a crumpled heap on the floor of someone's bedroom.

I guess that they must think it is some kind of compliment. I think that it's extremely rude and degrading. I hate it! It makes me feel like I'm just an object, a piece of meat. I wanted to slap Pete! I managed to extract myself from his grasp and stormed back into the dressing room to change back into my safe and comfortable t-shirt and jeans. I bought the dress, though. I'm not sure why.

No one ever makes degrading comments like that to Kendra. Or to Andi. But I hear them all of the time. I don't understand it. What makes the guys think that I would enjoy that kind of attention? Because I don't.

Don't get me wrong. It's not that I don't want to be noticed. Just not that way. I mean, I like to imagine that I am pretty. I try to believe that is why guys always tell me that they want to sleep with me. I tell myself that boys are simply too obsessed with sex, that they are too clueless to realize that it's not flattering, that it probably comes up in conversation with everyone, all the time. I tell myself that, but I know that it's not really the truth.

The truth is that for some reason, boys simply don't see me as a real person. When I look in the mirror, I see a girl with hopes and dreams and aspirations. When guys look at me, they just see an object, like I'm some sort of trophy. The sad truth is that they simply don't respect me. And I don't know if they ever will.

Kendra never has that problem. When boys talk to her, they have regular conversations, and they almost never talk about sex. Kendra can talk to boys about politics or philosophy or potato chips. The subject really doesn't matter; the point is that they talk. Of course, I can talk about all of those things too, and I have some great conversations with some of the guys that I spend time with. But sex always finds its way into the conversation somehow.

Even Jarod sometimes takes his teasing to inappropriate extremes. I don't understand it. I'm certain that is the biggest reason that Kendra has a better social life than I do. The boys respect her and see her as a real person, not as an object.

Kendra always has a boyfriend. She says that men are like tissues, because when you're done with one, another always pops up to take its place. She isn't really serious. I think that she heard it on a movie or something and thought that it sounded cool. But for Kendra, it really is true. Right now, she is dating Brandon, and she's happy with him, but Josh has made it perfectly clear that he is waiting for her to be available again so that he can ask her out.

I have never had a boyfriend. Not really. Of course, there was Seth in grade school, but when he moved away in the 4^th grade, that was the end of my romantic life. Except for my long-distance "romance" with Sebastian James in junior high school. I met Sebastian when I was visiting my cousin for spring break in 7^th grade. Sebastian was my cousin Cari's next door neighbor, and we went for a walk together on the first day that I was visiting her.

It was kind of cold, so Sebastian let me wear his jacket, and he held my hand to keep it warm. We saw each other every day, and I really liked him a lot. When I went home again, Sebastian told me that he loved me, and he asked me to be his girlfriend. He even kissed me on the cheek when we said goodbye.

We wrote letters to each other for 3 years, until we just kind of stopped. I still wonder what happened to Sebastian. And sometimes I wonder whether he ever wonders about me. Probably not.

But the boys that I go to school with simply aren't interested in dating a girl like me. Sometimes, we flirt, and of course, I have been propositioned many times. I have even been on a few first dates, but it never develops into anything. The boys that I know simply don't see me as girlfriend material. Sometimes, I wonder if they even really see me as a person.

Comments like the one Pete made at the mall are common. Actually, I have heard that exact pickup line at least 3 times, just this month. I hear it all the time. But that's not the worst of it. I can handle the "subtle" innuendoes like that. I can usually laugh it off and convince myself that it's just a matter of boys being boys. So, even though I hate it, I'm usually not too bothered by it.

But sometimes, the propositions are much more direct and overt. That's when it really hurts. That's when I really wonder who I am and what kind of person other people see when they look at me. I mean, what kinds of signals am I throwing out that would make these guys think that I could ever welcome that kind of attention? That's when I am tempted to give up, when I wonder if the effort is really worth it after all.