i don't wanna be that girl

Upon receiving the piece of paper, Marley gazed down at the scribbled numbers and tried to ignore the feeling of her heart leaping out of her chest. She simply nodded and slid the paper into the same pocket containing the baseball card. “I expect weekly updates,” she joked. She had never been that great of an actress, so trying to contain her obvious excitement and nervousness was proving to be difficult. She bit down on her lower lip and steadied her breathing, forcing herself to look up and pretend to pay attention to their professor’s opening lecture. She knew it was useless to let herself crush on a straight girl, but she couldn’t help it. There was something about Brooke that drew Marley in closer, and she was helpless to the feeling.

Eventually, Ms. Robinson gave them an assignment and retreated back to her desk. Marley turned to look at Brooke’s notebook, head tilting for a moment as she thought of an answer to her question. “Is there any place you really like going to? Last semester, I painted a landscape of my favorite park.” She grabbed a pencil and started sketching on a blank piece of paper. Within moments, she was drawing the outline of a park that had trees and benches littered throughout. “Something like this.”

Brooke leaned back in her chair and thought about Marley’s question. There were a lot of places she liked going to. She was always outside, whether it was for a game, practice, or even a hike. That’s what made the choice of what to draw so hard. Maybe she could draw her high school softball field? No, that was too obvious. She was brought out of her thought process when Marley spoke up again, showing off her rough sketch. “Oh my god, Marley. That’s brilliant!”

“I appreciate it.” Marley’s interest was once again piqued by mention of a dog, and she sat up a little straighter in excitement. “I’d love to meet her! It’s been ages since I got to spend quality time with a dog.” An animal lover at heart, Marley always swore she’d get her own dog someday, but it was yet to happen.

She giggled at Brooke’s pantomiming, and upon realizing that the other girl was not going to reclaim her baseball card any time soon, slid the card into the front sleeve of her binder. “I’ve never actually seen any kind of sports game in person before, but I’ll go if it means I get to see Nellie.” Marley playfully nudged at Brooke’s side with a big smile. “Kidding. I’d love to see you play. Just let me know a time and place.” It felt like flirting, but there was no way it was. Marley tried to shake the idea away. Brooke was just being friendly, friendlier than most people, but there was no ulterior motive or anything. Nope. Just friends being friends.

“No dogs, no sports. We’ll have to change that.” She wrote her number on the corner of a piece of paper and handed it to Marley. “There. Now you can text me and I’ll let you know when the next game is. I can also send you my progress in the world of art. Before you know it, I’ll be drawing the most realistic dinosaur you’ve ever seen.”

God, she’s beautiful. Marley was absolutely flustered when Brooke praised her drawing, her own cheeks reddening in response. “Well, I still appreciate your messed up dino nugget.” She perked up at the mention of a dog, subconsciously scooting her chair closer to Brooke’s. “Nellie is such a cute name! I always wanted a dog when I was a kid, but my mom only let me have a pet goldfish.” She frowned a little at the memory, though she knew it would have been difficult for them to afford a dog. “Nellie’s a really lucky dog having you as an owner.”

Marley wordlessly watched as Brooke took her hand and placed a card inside her palm. She swore that the skin Brooke touched felt like it was on fire as soon as she broke contact. “I.. I don’t even know what to say. I definitely don’t deserve this.” She held the card up to her face to observe it for a moment, then shook her head. “I can’t take your good luck card away! What will you do for good luck now?” She laughed a little and tried to hand it back to Brooke. “I’ve thought about it before, but I don’t know. Maybe I’ll minor in it.”

“I’m so sorry your childhood was dog-less. I wouldn’t wish that on anyone, not even my worst enemy.” Brooke’s stomach did a little flip when she noticed Marley had moved closer to her. It had been awhile since she had made a new friend, that was obviously why she was feeling like this. Plus, nerves from starting a new semester. “If you ever want to meet Nellie, she loves new people. She always knows she’ll get pets and treats from them.” She tucked a piece of hair behind her ear. “And I’m the lucky one. She’s got me through a lot in life.”

The more they became acquainted with each other, the more Marley realized that the girl sitting beside her was unlike anyone she’d ever met. She never hung around with any athletes; all of her friends were outsiders just like her, and athletes tended to be the most persistent of her bullies. Brooke, however, seemed different from the rest of them. She wasn’t trying to put on any kind of persona. Their conversation was genuine, and Marley was interested to learn more about the girl. “You should go for it,” she said suddenly, eyes meeting Brooke’s as she spoke. “For the MLB, I mean. If that’s what you’re passionate about, you shouldn’t give up on it.” It surprised her how genuine she sounded, but she meant it.

Marley stifled a laugh until receiving the dinosaur drawing. In a way, she found it sort of endearing. “It’s a.. decent first attempt! It just takes practice. A lot of practice.” She flipped through the drawings in her binder once again, settling on one of a dog that she’d drawn years ago. She signed the drawing, just as Brooke had, and slid it across the table to her. “If I get one of yours, you get one of mine. It’s only fair.” And with that, she replaced the spot her dog drawing had once held in her binder with Brooke’s dinosaur one. “I hope the class isn’t too bad for you. Ms. Robinson is really nice, and I’ll try my best to be a helpful tablemate.” She offered a weak smile.

She could feel a blush starting to creep up the back of her neck and to her face. Everyone had told her to come up with a smaller dream, that the MLB would never have women on any of their teams. It was nice to hear someone say she could go after her dream. Brooke hadn’t heard that since... She smiled back at Marley, giving her a little nod as a thank you.

Marley was a little caught off guard by Brooke’s response to her. She knew that most people at their college knew her as “the gay kid,” and she received her fair share of weird treatment from people as a result of it, but Brooke seemed almost as nervous as she was for some reason. Marley couldn’t help but fear that it was because of her status around school.

 “Uh, yeah, mostly art.” She laughed a little and turned to dig a binder and pen out of her bag. “No, but, uh, I just really like art. If I wasn’t a math major, I would probably be an art major.” She opened her binder to reveal page after page of sketches until she found a blank page. She wasn’t trying to show off her work by any means; if anything, she found it pretty embarrassing because she didn’t think of herself as a particularly good artist to begin with. Once she had everything prepared for class to begin, she turned to look at Brooke again and asked, “What about you? Are you interested in art?”

Brooke leaned towards Marley when she started flipping through her sketchbook. From the glimpses she got of the pages, she could have been fooled into believing Marley was an art major. She looked back up at the other girl when she asked about her being interested in art. “Oh, I mean, I appreciate art. I’ve seen a lot of fanart on Twitter, that’s pretty cool. And, you know, Picasso, Van Gogh, Frida... They’re great. As for this class...”

Para • First Encounter

@msbrookeweston​

After the events of the previous year, Marley wasn’t exactly thrilled about the new semester starting. After being outed, she became pretty reclusive, mostly spending time hiding away with her small group of friends and avoiding eye contact with most people she passed on campus. Thankfully, the bullying seemed to have subsided a lot over the summer. People still looked at her and whispered to each other, but she was doing a better job of shaking it off and moving on. She got through her first course of the day without much conflict, only a few weird stares that she tried to ignore. Of all her classes, she was most excited for her art class, which was starting in… less than five minutes. She practically ran her way across the campus and towards the art building, where she saw others filing into a classroom that must be hers. She stood at the doorway for a moment to catch her breath before walking in, gaze cast down, not wanting to draw any attention to herself. 

Ms. Robinson was easily her favorite professor at the college, so Marley always went out of her way to take her classes. When the taunting was at its worst last year, Ms. Robinson took Marley under her wing and, being a lesbian herself, gave Marley advice on how to deal with the homophobia and survive college. Marley entered the classroom and saw that most seats were filled aside from a table in the far corner, which had an open seat next to a girl she didn’t really recognize. She took a seat there, dropping her bag on the floor to her side before turning to look at the girl sitting next to her. It was then that she noticed just how pretty she was. “Hi.” Her voice was still a little breathy from running. “I’m Marley.”

This was absolutely ridiculous. If her teammates knew that their captain was in this silly art class, Brooke would never hear the end of it. It wasn’t her fault that she forgot that her advisor told her to pick up more electives. It also wasn’t her fault that by the time Susan reminded her of said electives, the only class left with openings was something about “exploring artistic mediums.” Despite her many protests, there simply wasn’t anything her advisor could do. She was stuck with art. She even tried coming to class early to talk with Ms. Robinson about getting her transferred out. Give it a try. Maybe you’ll find out something new about yourself. It was no use.

Marley: It couldn't hurt. I'm sorry you have to deal with that right now.

Marley: Okay, I'll come straight home as soon as they release me. Have you tried singing to her? Or playing a video of me?

Marley: But the divorce..

Brody: A stupid idea. I was drunk and pissed off when I signed them.

Marley: Babe, are you sure?

Marley: What?

Marley: I'm so sorry.

Brody: Stop.