“Teenagers search for unhappiness,” reads my mother from the morning newspaper. My scrambled eggs suddenly become disgusting, unappetizing. “Interesting.”

Fighting back an argumentative statement, I load my dishes into the dishwasher and close the door to my room. It bothers me, these studies they do about us. Is our behavior really that intriguing to them that they have to pick it apart? Reduce us to nothing but a pile of numbers and statistics? You can’t put a number on something that is continually changing. We are not all the same.

Math homework is tedious: parabolas, graphs, functions. With a knock my mum opens the door to my room invasively and hands me the phone.
“It’s Sarah,” she says stiffly, disapproval written on her face and in her eyes. “You’ve got twenty minutes.”
“Hey Sarah.” Her voice is a welcome escape from this rigid house. Incessantly she chatters on about school and her Russian internet crush in Chicago. It’s obvious he’s completely head over heels for her, but I’m still leery even if I’ve never mentioned it.

My phone buzzes “silently” beside my iPod dock drawing my attention. Checking the message, I quickly interrupt her endless stream of information.
“Oh my god, you have to help me. He just texted me!” I cringe slightly when she asks me which “he” I mean. “Jessy!” Obviously. I mean, ever since that concert how could there possibly be anyone else? “He’s been texting me all morning! Help me decide what to say to him.” That’s one thing I love about Sarah; she always knows exactly what to say in response to guys. Me? I’m hopeless! Last time I talked to a guy over facebook without her? Disaster! Let’s not even think about that...
“Do you remember that time I told you about a while ago? When a helicopter landed on my field at school and it was raining and he wiped the rain off my cheeks?” Surprisingly she replies with affirmation. “Well, he said something to me right as the bell for class went, and I think it was important but I couldn’t hear. Should I ask him and see if he remembers? It’s been bothering me.” Of course, she says. I’ll coach you through it.

She helps me decide exactly what to say. I’m pathetic and I know it. How long have I had a crush on him? Years. How often do I talk to him? Practically never. We both know that we’ve had special moments together where the improbable suddenly seems possible but we’ve never actually acted on any of it. So it’s almost unexpected when he replies back that he does indeed remember.

Yeah actually, vaguely. You remember that morning
quite clearly :P

Embarrassed but hopeful, Sarah coaches me through what otherwise would’ve been a most impossible conversation. When I ask him what he said, sadly he responds that he doesn’t remember. My hopes shatter inside. If it had been important, he would remember. At this moment my mum bursts in and takes the phone way, and I lose my conversation coach. I’m stranded, and unsure what to do. Seconds later she comes back into my room ,without knocking, and takes my cellphone. When I try and explain that I’m allowed to have it during the day, she tells me that I’m not allowed to talk to Sarah until after Christmas. Because that totally, somehow, weirdly enough makes sense. Something burns up inside of me and I take my iPod from my pocket and throw it at the floor as hard as I can. Horrified and wiping the tears away that stream down my face, I run for my room and lock myself in my closet.
Now ask me why I, as a teenager, am unhappy.