Once Upon A Time, That Summer
You've all heard this story before. Girl lives in a small town with her crazy family, acts
like she's totally embarrassed by them but secretly isn't, then goes on some kind of wacky
adventure one summer that changes everything. Well, that's me in a nutshell up until the
acting totally embarrassed part.
My name is Jaye Weed, and I'm proud of my crazy family. I mean, when your mom's the only
one on the block who's logged over one hundred hours on Donkey Kong at the gas station
arcade it's hard not to think she's the coolest mom in the world. My dad's a lit geek and I
don't get half the stuff he reads, but it's kinda fun to try. And my brother's a flaky,
fruity artist who's got talent instead of just plain angst like other flaky fruity artists.
As for me? I had my wacky adventure the summer of my fifteenth year, but my family wasn't
in it. Instead, I learned something about myself I never would have without my best friend.
Misty Clark is my other half. We've known each other since the first grade when we got into
a fight over the last yellow crayon in art class, and after the teacher made us shake hands
and make up, we were instant best friends. We practically share a brain, but there always
seemed to be another side to her, a side she kept hidden until that summer.
It was an ordinary day and we were sitting in the woods behind her house, drinking root
beer from the Stewart's down the road and talking about life. But when the conversation
drifted to guys, she suddenly got...weird. Kinda fidgety.
"Jaye...? You and I, we've known each other a long time, right?" she ventured.
"Well, yeah! Remember the yellow crayon?" I laughed, then stopped when I realized she
wasn't laughing with me. "Why? What's going on?"
"Well, I..." She bit her lip and turned away. "It's not important, you'd just be upset if I
told you."
"Misty?" Why would I be mad? Okay, so one time we fought over a guy in the seventh grade,
but that only lasted a week. Unless... "You and Tom, before you broke up with him, did
you-"
"No, of course not!" she cried. "I would've told you if we had."
"Then what's this all about?" I asked, but she put down her soda and hugged her knees to
her chest...something she always did before she was about to cry. Instinctively I put my
arm around her. "Misty?"
"Look, Jaye, what if..." She took a deep breath and swallowed. "What if I told you
I...didn't really like guys that much? At all, even?"
"What are you-" I didn't even have to finish the question before it hit me. "Oh. You mean,
you're..."
"Yeah." She slowly turned to look at me. "Ever since eighth grade, actually. I thought it'd
go away if I kept dating guys, but..."
"Why would I be mad about that?" I asked. "So you're gay, big deal! You're still the same
Misty I've known since first grade!"
"That's not all," she mumbled. "Jaye, I...it's not even just liking girls, it's liking one
girl."
"Oh?" I brush her hair away from her face. "Who is it?"
That's when she kissed me. I know this is gonna sound trite and cliche, but that kiss
honestly and seriously awakened things in me I'd always only suspected were there. I liked
guys, sure, but I remember crushing on some older girls too...I guess I thought it was just
a passing thing, but here I was.
And feeling these things for Misty made sense the more I thought about it. When we pulled
back and looked into each other's eyes, I knew then and there my life would never be the
same again.
My name is Jaye Weed, and that summer I fell in love with my best friend.
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