This is one story I’ve never told before. Not to anyone. I’ve always been afraid to talk to someone, to open up about it. I was terrified of them thinking less of me after hearing it. Or maybe they’d even walk away and tell all their friends about my deepest, darkest secret. But I don’t think I can hold it in any longer—I’ve got to tell somebody before I explode. So here it goes: this is the story of when I tried to impress a boy I liked by pretending to be “hardcore.”

Awkward phases in life are unavoidable. Most occur within the 6th grade through beginning of high school range of someone’s life. I’m not just talking about a voice change and some zits, though. I’m talking about full-on head-to-toe awkward, where that person literally becomes the walking definition of the word. No one really ever knows when his or her awkward phase is going to strike, and mine hit me like a bolt of lightning during 8th grade.

Flashback to 2009: there I am, sitting in first period English class. Seated right next to me is the man of my dreams. Up to this point in my life, I’ve considered all the boys in my school to be weird and annoying. But not this one—he’s different. He’s… perfect. I just recently broke up with my boyfriend, who I had been dating for a really, really long time (2 weeks). Even though I’m fresh out of this rough relationship (he didn’t even hug me once), my poor little 8th grad heart can’t help but to fall for the cutie in homeroom. As the school years chugs along, I start to learn more and more this boy, who from now on will be referred to as HC for homeroom cutie… not homecoming. Anyways, there I am, stalking every aspect of HC’s life because that’s what I’m good at. Not trying to sound like a certain popular teen novel here, but really I’m a wallflower. I observe other people. I don’t do it so I can spread rumors about them or anything like that. I’m just good at noticing things. So thanks to not only my rocking observation skills, but also through the help of Facebook, and many hours spent scrolling through profiles, I learn all that I need to know about HC. I’m ecstatic to see that he has a great sense of humor and likes a lot of the same things I do. There’s just one tiny issue—he’s into “screamo” music.

When I see it, I’m not sure what to think. I know he wears these weird band shirts all the time with zombies and other dead, bloody things on them, but I’ve never really tried to figure out what kind of music he listens to. I’ve also never heard of ”screamo” music before. The only rock music I know at this point in my life are the Pink Floyd albums my dad used to play when I was little. But hey, I figure if HC, the most perfect human alive, loves whatever “screamo” is, then maybe I will too. And guess what? I hate it. I HATE IT. I try to be open about different types of music and I’m always willing to give a new genre a try. But really, this is some of the crappiest music I’ve ever heard. There’s just a lot of unnecessary screaming and weird shrill guitar chords that make me want to throw whoever thought this type of music was a good idea off a cliff. If I ever want HC to like me though, I have to like this terrible music… or at least pretend to like it. And suddenly, the gears in my head start turning, and not before long, I’ve come up with a brilliant plan to make HC adore me.

The next weekend, my best friend and I head over to Woodfield for our usual shopping trip. I’ve been planning in my head for the past week exactly what I need to buy, and exactly where I’m going to get it from. So I grab my friend and make a beeline straight for my destination—Hot Topic. There, I purchase one t-shirt for a band that I’ve never heard of before. But a certain crush of mine had liked their page on Facebook, so it’s obvious that when he sees me wearing it, he’ll fall madly in love with me. When I wear it to school the next day, HC makes a point in looking at my shirt. He doesn’t say anything, but I know that he sees it. So from then on, my Hot Topic shopping sprees become a weekly thing.

I can’t help but feel like the more shirts I buy, the more HC will love me. Every time I go back, I buy another t-shirt. And then one day, I start to buy other things on top of the shirts. My best friend is dragged along each week, but now she’s starting to like it. We buy clip-in hair extensions one week to show off how rock and roll we really are. Mine is electric blue and hers is red. At this point, I don’t think there’s anyone more hardcore than us at the school, maybe except for HC. For some reason, he still doesn’t say anything about the band t-shirts I’m wearing. But the persona that I’m portraying has become addicting in a way. Even though HC still doesn’t mention my cool shirts, my super cool hair bows, or my rocking hair extension, I keep my hopes up high that he’s just waiting for the perfect time to propose. Eventually I start to get a little less hopeful. There’s no way that he hasn’t noticed my shirts yet. He has to see them. I have literally every class with them. How can he not notice? Maybe he does notice them, but he’s not saying anything. But the only reason he’d do that was if… he didn’t like me.
Sadly, that last sentence was true. But guess what? I got over it. I don’t know what the heck I was thinking that whole time. My brain was obviously under-developed or something, because I was absolutely nuts. How could I even think it was possible to come off as scene when the most-played song on my iPod was “Video Girl” by the Jonas Brothers? It really didn’t help that my best friend was encouraging my behavior the whole time either. At this point I’d like to give a quick shout-out to Mia for aiding and supporting my unhealthy addiction. Honestly, just thinking about all of this makes me shudder. Those were some of the darkest days of my life. But now that I’ve finally told my story, it feels fantastic to have gotten such a burden off my chest.