The Upside of Unrequited

by Becky Albertalli

I don’t entirely understand how anyone gets a boyfriend. Or a girlfriend. It just seems like the most impossible odds. You have to have a crush on the exact right person at the exact right moment. And they have to like you back. A perfect alignment of feelings and circumstances. It’s almost unfathomable that it happens as often as it does.

Certain nights have this kind of electricity. Certain nights carry you to a different place from where you started.

You would matter. That’s the thing. I get into this weird place sometimes where I worry about that. I’ve never told anyone this—not my moms, not even Cassie—but that’s the thing I’m most afraid of. Not mattering. Existing in a world that doesn’t care who I am. It’s this whole other level of aloneness.

But still. My heart is beating so quickly. I open my mouth to speak again but the words fall away. My entire brain empties in a single whoosh. Like driving through a tunnel in a rainstorm.

Except I’m having trouble paying attention. To be honest, I’m a little bit obsessed with my hand. And his hand. And the space between our hands. I don’t know if I should swing my arm or clasp my hands or let it hang. Every movement feels weirdly deliberate. It’s a little ridiculous. If you turned me into a pie graph, the obsessed-with-hands part would look like Pac-Man.