My night

Tonight’s the night, I thought to myself. Tonight’s the night Elisa’ll be mine, mine at last! I fumbled around in the woods looking for the perfect spot. That night a meteor shower was predicted. It was her thirteenth birthday.
 
When I finally got home after my searching, I checked my appearance in the mirror. Not good enough, I thought. How could I make her mine when one of my brown curls decided to curl the wrong way? How could I make her mine when my awkwardly thin arms hung down lower then they should? How could I make her mine with that BBQ stain on my faded jeans?
 
Now I wasn’t one for gussying up, but tonight was special, so I changed my cloths, cocked up my chest (to make myself look more muscular and hopefully pick up my arms an inch or two. They were oh-so flimsy and long in my opinion.), and even used my mother’s curling iron to get my hair as perfect as possible. I looked at myself in the mirror and smiled. For a thirteen-year-old kid, I thought I looked hot! Or at least good enough to make an impression on Elisa, and a good one at that! (Not like the one back in sixth grade where I tripped on my own foot and spilled my mystery meat all over her blouse. I still feel a little guilty about that.)
 
Oh ya, I’d totally date me, I thought with a laugh. With my nice jacket, Rock Band tee, jeans with rips in the knees, nicely curled hair, and a nice little tie, I thought I looked good. To top it off I brushed my teeth, put on deodorant, and looked at myself one last time. Nothing seemed out of place so I left. The only thing that worried me now was if she would think of me as a hotty, or just plain haughty. With that note I carefully picked up my (hopefully) nicely wrapped gift.
 
As I approached her house for her b-day party I could feel my heart pounding a little harder. I just kept smiling and told myself not to make a baka out of myself. (For those of you who don’t understand Japanese, baka is a word meaning idiot. For example; if I screwed up with Eliza tonight, I would refer to myself as Jason-baka.)
 
One thing crept into my mind, which I had completely forgotten about until this very moment, was my glasses and braces. I’ve heard some girls say that guys with glasses are so cute, others say they make a guy look less attractive. A few say that glasses are nothing but a see-through wall between a guy and girl’s soul. As far as braces go, I’ve heard a lot of girls say they get in the way of… well you know.
 
Thirty feet from fate now, and I was shaking like California in a 6.0! (Please forgive my odd sense of humor, I’m odd like that.) I looked down at my skinny, right hand to see the shinny paper that covered the gift. This box contained my fate for the night, as well as possibly the rest of my eighth grade year.
 
By the time I arrived at Elisa’s house, the sun was setting. I had never been there before and I was shocked to see how nice everything looked. The house was a classy snow-white, two storied, smack-dab-in-the-middle-of-three-acres kind of house. (Where Elisa and I lived was WAY out in the country! In fact I believe it took me a good twenty minutes to walk from my house to hers, and we were neighbors!) The pathway that led to the front door was surrounded by colorful flowers on both sides. Of course there were some light as well along the winding pavement. (How else would I have been able to see all those colorful carnations?)
 
I couldn’t believe my eyes when I saw the door knob and doorbell! They were so golden, and they glistened in the moonlight! I couldn’t believe how wealthy these people must have been for having such a lovely, golden door knob and bell! (A week later I found out that they were nothing but copper items with a golden shine. But that didn’t change the fact that they looked absolutely astonishing!) I remember thinking to myself, can I touch it? I felt that gripping such a lovely craft with my “common class” hands would soil it. In fact I didn’t even bother knocking, so for a good five minutes I gazed at the beautiful knob and bell (sort of like you would expect a Neanderthal to look at fire before stomping it out in fear) before even bothering to knock. If only I had known it was copper, then.
 
Music was blasting from the backyard, though I don’t remember what it was exactly or who it was by. I do remember, however, that it was techno… or is that particular genre of music called “Electronic,” for the sake of being politically correct?
 
Anyway, the music was so loud that I could barely hear Elisa’s mother open the door and say, “Hi there, Carlos! Hear for the party, I assume. You know Eli’s been wondering where you were.” Elisa was concerned for me? My spleen nearly jumped out of… wherever a spleen would be.
 
She led me inside. We walked through the dining room to the backdoor, then she practically pushed me right out. (Through all our hurrying I didn’t have time to really notice much detail. After coming back a second time I took note of the beautiful, and pointy tipped, chandelier right above the front door. Elisa told me that her dad installed the chandelier, and that she would thank him for it later. Ever since then I never walked into her house, but ran as fast as my legs could go.) Elisa’s mother waved a little and shut the door, but not before in Elisa’s direction, of course. I practically skipped toward her, but then I remembered manly-men don’t skip… they hustle.
 
I believe I may have blacked out from the time I set foot in the backyard to me talking to Elisa, because after stepping out door all I really remember is quietly conversing with her while struggling not to spill my punch on my nice t-shirt. (I had a knack for spilling things, just loom at what I did to Elisa in the sixth grade!) Still I puffed out my chest, and I could have sworn one of her friends was trying to hide her giggling. Either my hearing was very good that night, or she was failing miserably.
 
A few details about that night have escaped me, but I can remember the important, as well as a few unimportant, details. I can remember dancing along side Elisa, and then another girl came in between us… then another.
 
Soon Derrick, the only other guy there, was dancing with Elisa. I don’t remember anything about him but one thing, and that was that he had all the muscle I didn’t have. This irked me to no end!
 
Feeling uncomfortable with him dancing along side (the soon to be my) Elisa, I decided to make my move. I smoothly cut in between them and plainly told Elisa, “I need to talk to you.” Oh man, can I remember everything about her from that night! I can remember her curly, chocolate-colored hair, and those big blue eyes. I swear I could have just swum right in them! She had a few freckles here and there dotted across her face as well.
 
She seemed surprised when I grabbed her wrist, but not the least bit uncomfortable. She said “ok,” and followed me out her backyard gate and into the woods. It was so dark that one could barely see his hid right in front of his face. The only reason I knew we were going was the fact that I had lit the way ahead of time with battery-powered lanterns. (My father had hundreds of them lying around in his shed. I was pretty sure he wouldn’t miss them too much.)
 
There it is, I thought as I saw the blanket and basket right by a creek I found earlier. We slowed down and casually strolled to the little picnic area. Instead of battery powered lanterns hanging around in the trees, I set up only one lantern in the middle of the blanket. Unlit candles surrounded us as well as a small section of the river, our blanket, and a couple of trees. After I led Elisa to the blanket I took out a box of matches, lit one, and went around lighting the candles. I made sure to get a few good-smelling candles, but not too many.
 
(Remember when I told you I had been running around in the woods for a while looking for the perfect spot? Well here’s the reason why. You see I wanted to ask Elisa if she wanted to go out with me for a while, but I didn’t want to make a fool of myself and just ask her whenever I felt like it. Can you imagine asking a girl out right after they come out of the bathroom or when they pull their lips away from the school’s water fountain? No, I wanted to give her a reason to go out with me. I wanted to show her I could be a decent man... boy. You wouldn’t believe the trouble I went through! For a month or so I spent hours just watching the news and reading “Astronomy weekly” for a few weeks… or was it “Astrology biweekly? Either way one of those magazines informed me about the meteor shower tonight, which just happened to be her birthday! My gut told me something big was going to happen in the sky, and I’m sure glad I listened and did some research!)
 
I sat back down and looked up into the sky. “Beautiful view, isn’t it?” I said smoothly. Elisa merely giggled a bit as if to say, “Really? That’s your first pick up line?” I looked back at her, a little worried by this, but soon found relief again.
 
She smiled and leaned closer to me. “Oh yes, it surely is.” she replied in an equally smooth tone. I had to admit she knew how to pull me in. “You know I heard there’s a meteor shower tonight,” she informed me while lying back on the blanket. I laid back (but not before moving a little closer to her, of course) and sighed with relaxation.
 
“Surely is,” I repeated. A few moments of silence passed by before we both heard a sound… from the sky. The first meteor flew across the sky. As the number of falling meteors grew, so did my smile. I flipped over toward Elisa only to see her gazing straight at me. Her beautiful blue eyes met my brown ones.
 
“You know, Eli,” I began. (She didn’t like to be called by Elisa, so she asked everyone to call her Eli) “I’ve been well… I’ve just been… well you know.” But did she know? For a moment I’m not even sure if I knew what I was saying! “Well you see I…”
 
Elisa chuckled a bit and kissed my cheek. “I know.” she whispered. I could feel the color fading from my skin. (I’m not sure how much color I had that could escape from my tender flesh to begin with! For some reason I didn’t have to ability to tan, only burn.)
 
She leaned close and rested her head on my shoulder. I was so glad I could wrap my arm around her without having to attempt that lame “Sneaking your arm around the girl,” thing my dad would tell me to do, along with all the cartoons that I’ve ever watched with a guy liking a girl.
 
We both stared at the creek for a while and watched as the mosquitoes danced across the water. We sat there together for some time, though I’m not sure how long. All I can remember is that when we got up the meteor shower was over.
 
We walked back to her house afterward, slowly of course. Her hand rested harmoniously into mine like a missing piece of a puzzle. We talked a little as we went down the trail out of the woods, but not too much was said. We were a new couple, and words would seem to spoil the moment. No we didn’t kiss, no I didn’t read her some heart-felt poem about how I’ve loved her from the first moment I saw her eyes, and I didn’t play her a song on a guitar. (As if I could even play one!) I simply told her I liked her, and hoped she would go out with me. She said yes, nothing to it. Although giving her that bracelet might have helped a bit. (That was the gift. I gave it to Elisa some at one point during the meteor shower.)
 
When we arrived back at the party people were cleaning up and starting to leave. One of Elisa’s friends walked by us and smirked. Our hands were still intertwined for all to see, so that probably explains it. Another came by and did the same… then came Derrick. To my surprise he was smiling.
 
“I told you it would work,” he said to Elisa. Elisa giggled slightly and nodded. (I found out the next day that Elisa had told Derrick she liked me, so he wanted to help her push me into going out with her. Derrick certainly did a fine job, I can tell you that.)
 
After he walked away with a smirk, the last song of the night played. The song was slow and steady. Perfect. This will close the deal for sure, I thought. I gently grabbed my girl and danced with her. She blushed slightly… as did I. She leaned her head against my shoulder. I was right, I thought with a smile. This has definitely been my night.