The List of Things That Have Gone Wrong

Bea kept a list in the back of her maths notebook. Not on purpose, not at first. It had started as a single entry and grown the way disasters tend to, one after another, each one worse than the last.

The list was titled: EVERY TIME I TRY TO TALK TO DANIEL PARK.

Entry one: Tried to say good morning. Said good morning twice because I panicked and forgot I had already said it. He said it back both times. I do not know why.

Entry two: He asked to borrow a pencil. Gave him four pencils for reasons I still do not fully understand.

Entry three: Walked into the door of the science block while looking at him. The door was open. I walked into the frame.

Entry four: He said he liked my bag. I said thank you it is a bag. He said yes I know. I left.

Entry five: Tried to laugh at his joke. Produced a sound that has never come out of my body before and which I can only describe as a honk. Left immediately. Did not look back. Have not made eye contact since.

She added entry five on a Wednesday and sat for a moment looking at it. Five entries. Five attempts. The pencil incident alone should have ended any normal person's interest but here she was, still turning up, still trying, still producing new material for the list.

She was reading the list during lunch when her best friend Chloe leaned over her shoulder and read entries one through five with increasing delight.

"The honk," Chloe said.

"Do not," Bea said.

"You honked."

"I am aware."

"Like a goose."

"Chloe."

"A large, surprised goose."

Bea closed the notebook. "It was a stressful situation and my body made a choice without consulting me."

Chloe sat down across from her, still grinning. She had the particular grin she used for things she found funny that she was also genuinely trying to help with, which was its own specific expression, wider on the left side than the right.

"Okay," Chloe said. "New strategy. We need to get you a normal conversation with him. One where you say normal words in a normal order and nothing honks."

"I have tried," Bea said. "Multiple times. The list is evidence."

"The list is evidence that you are trying too hard," Chloe said. "You are thinking about it so much that by the time you open your mouth your brain has completely overloaded and started producing output at random."

Bea considered this. It was, unfortunately, accurate.

"So what do I do?" she said.

"Stop trying to talk to him," Chloe said.

"That is not helpful."

"I mean stop trying to have a special significant conversation," Chloe said. "Just talk to him like he is a normal person. Like you would talk to me, or to anyone."

"He is not like you or anyone," Bea said.

"He is exactly like anyone," Chloe said. "He is a twelve-year-old boy who likes football and bad jokes and, for reasons I cannot fully explain, that terrible film about the robot dog. He is not a mysterious or complex creature, Bea. He is a person."

Bea looked at her notebook. "Then why does my body keep doing things?" she said.

Chloe patted her hand. "That," she said, "is just having a crush. There is no fix for it. You just have to go through it."