My pointy elbows jab at shoulders as we all push down the hallway. Oily, sticky skin brushes my arms and I wish they would all leave, or give me a couple feet of space. Trying to get into a less crowded area, I walk faster, my head down and my fiery curls bouncing in my face.  My eyes dart from the ground to the blank space in front of me and then back down to the ground, careful not to meet anyones gaze. They were all looking at me. They judge my knobby knees that didn't straighten all the way and my transition glasses that I have had since grade school. I want to scream at them all to leave me alone but instead I hunch over even more and push my way to class.
How dare they judge me. They don’t even know me. I am like a rotten banana that no one wants to touch, even just to throw away. They don’t know that I have 23 board games collected in my room and no friends to play them with. They don’t know that I sit on my neighborhood slide for hours to avoid having to tell my mom that I wasn’t invited to a boy’s birthday party whose mom is in her book club. I try to be nice to people, but they don’t give me a chance. All I need is a chance.
As I turn the last corner to Mr. Burns room I glance at the locker that I know so well. On days when I don’t want to sit through class any longer I have stared at this locker and memorized its cracks and chips. Its damaged lock and the horrible words written on it soothe me somehow because I know what it feels like to be someone that everyone hates. The little sticky note on the top, though, is what gives me hope to come to school every day. Scribbles in sharp black ink spell out “future construction.” The dirty, foul locker will one day shine with the rest of the glossy green lockers. Someday, it will belong.
Just as the bell is about to ring I slump into class and sit in the back desk on the right. Mr. Burns starts mumbling about American wars and I pull out my drawing book. It opens to the page where I have been working on an eyeball with spiders erupting from it. I’ll never be able to get the shading right. My art skills suck.
“Phineas,” someone annoyedly whispers to me. She looks away and mumbles about how stupid I am. Her comment jabs me in the gut, but I am used to it. When I look up, I see Mr. Burns in front of my table.
“Glad to know everyone is respecting me in this class,” he sneers. His yellow teeth and greasy porous face lines up with mine.
“Can you repeat what I just said to the class, Phineas?” His hot breath blows into my face. My fists clench and I can feel my face get hot, but I don’t respond. Just his face alone makes me mad enough to punch a wall.
“What an idiot,” A skinny, porcelain girl whispers to her friend. Trying to get him to leave with mind power or something, I squeeze my eyes shut, but it doesn’t work. Mr. Burns stays close to my face, persistent, like he feeds off  my embarrassment.
“I dont know,” I finally say slowly, pronouncing each word. He reaches out and slams my book closed, which makes my blood boil.
“As I was saying before I was rudely interrupted,” he says as he briskly turns and walks away, his hands folded behind his back. “today I will be assigning partners for our end of the year project.” It was almost audible how loud I groaned in my head . This day was already going crappy enough. Now I have to put up with some kid who will complain the whole time about how annoying and gross I am.  Mr. Burns started calling off the names of people working together. His words started to run together but I made sure not to zone out so I wouldn’t be picked on again. Then I hear my name.
“Phineas and Jonathan.” Giggles and a “sucks for you” come from behind me and pretend I didn’t hear it. Then Jonathan pulls his chair forward and sits at the seat next to mine. His sandy blonde hair was short on the sides and long on the top, a style that I had always wanted but would never be able to pull off. He was tall with broad shoulders and a thick, muscular neck. I didn’t know him personally, but had always wanted to. As homecoming king and captain of the basketball team, he never had problems finding a spot to sit at lunch or not getting invited to the biggest party of the year. If I was friends with him, all of my problems would go away. He opens his mouth and I prepare for the verbal abuse about to come.
“Do you know anything about the Spanish war? because I am totally lost.” He cracks a smile and his white teeth flash at me. I was confused. Maybe he was just trying to amuse his friends by being deceiving. I slouch and don’t respond. After a while he speaks again.
“Well. . . if were going to get a good grade we should probably get to know each other. Phineas, right? I’m Jonathan.” He sticks his hand out. I stare at it for a couple seconds. Could he be serious? Was he really trying to be nice.. to me? I take it apprehensively and he smiles again.
“So. . . I guess we better get cracking.”
As the hour creeps by, I keep my guard up, but he never shook his kind, positive attitude. After a while I start to relax and respond to his questions. His easy going behavior was hypnotizing, and soon I start to believe he is actually being nice. I have never had anyone besides my mom be this kind to me. It feels good to have a real, truthful conversation with someone. By the end of class it feels like I have been warmed from the inside. Happiness bubbles up inside me in a way that I haven’t felt since I was a toddler. This must be what belonging feels like. Then the bell shrieks and everyone starts to head toward the door.
“I’ll see you tomorrow,” he says to me as his long strides glide him down the hallway. He gets farther and farther away from me and I start to settle with the feeling of only having a friend for 50 minutes out of the day. But then I start to think that this isn’t fair. I want the feeling of being liked. I want to be able to tell the truth to my mom when I say I am going to a friend’s house. A fire starts deep inside me that I can only explain as a drive. I start to jog down the hallway until I see his seaweed green Hollister shirt.
“Jonathan!” My nasally voice cracks as loud as it will muster. His head turns but the kids around him make it hard for me to get his attention.
“Hey Jonathan!” I call again, this time stronger, with more force. He sees me and slows down a little for me to catch up. The kids around him sneer when they see me and although they don’t say anything, I know they want me to leave them alone.
“Oh, hey Phineas.” he calls. He seems confused. “Do you have a question about the report?”
“No actually I… I was wondering if..” My voice started to shake, but I continue. I have never wanted anything more. “if you wanted to maybe come over tonight.”
“To work on the project? I don’t know… we have a lot of time to work on it.”
“No, not to work on the project. To maybe…” I swallowed hard “ To hang out? I have some super fun board games we could play. My mom could make us snacks.” I stared into his face trying to find an answer.
Then his lips started to push together. They start to face upward but he is fighting them. His friends don’t try to fight it, though. I hear snickers and giggles burst from the crowd that has formed around him. Then I hear a snort that comes from his mouth. He starts laughing hard like I just cracked some joke. A hollow pit forms from the bottom of my stomach and stretches to my lungs. It makes it hard for me to breathe.
“Is this a joke?” Jonathan says in between his fits of laughter. “No, Phineus. We aren’t friends. We never will be friends,” he spits out, looking around at all his friends. Then he looks back at me and shrugs. “Sorry.”
Red hot anger floods through me as I process his words. He isn’t my friend. He was just faking it so I would help him. He doesn’t care about me; why would he? My hands twitch harder than they ever have and a stinging feeling sweeps through my nose. I am about to cry in front of the most popular kids in school. The kids who already think I am a freak. The kids who think it’s funny to ruin someone's life. I push a snorting kid out of my way and take a sprinting dash the opposite direction. The tears fly off my face as I turn a corner, any corner, to get out of the mass of people.
Then I see the locker again. The locker that is me. Stopping dead in my tracks, I start to shake. The sticky note on the top that used to be my hope is now the difference between us. This locker will one day be just like all of the other ones; I will always be the kid who sits alone outside eating my tuna sandwich for lunch. With all of the force I can muster up, I slam my fist into its rusty surface.  It buckles and a shallow crater forms in the center. I slide down the locker and put my face in my hands. Tears flow down my cheeks and blood drips down my fist as I try to think of a reason why I am still breathing.