Nadine's Point of View
To love is to risk not being loved in return. To hope is to risk pain.
To try is to risk failure, but risk must be taken, because the
greatest hazard in life is to risk nothing.
-Unknown
I was swirling my French fries to certain death within a mound of barbeque sauce, when Meghan sat down beside me. You're probably thinking "So what?" but in my town, when Meghan Fairfield sits down beside you, it doesn't mean anything good. Because, you see, Meghan Fairfield is my little town's resident matchmaker.
Basically, she goes after all the singles in the area—whether they are twelve or eighty-nine—and pairs them off, and makes them date each other. She is, in an essence, Cupid. And if you do a lot of research on our Cupid boy, you'll realize that even the upper-class gods feared him. He had the ability to destroy a god or human with just one arrow from his quiver—and I hear that he had excellent aim.
Now, if gods feared Aphrodite's son, what do you think the students of Rose Water Creek feel for Meghan? Believe me here—it's beyond fear.
Which explains why I immediately froze when she sat down, swallowed a fry whole, and began choking for air. If my best friend Angie Kim had been there, she would have probably saved me from choking to death while distracting the Matchmaker with her own love story. Yeah, she and Luke were one of the results of Meghan's matchmaking, obviously one of her better pairings.
Unfortunately, Angie wasn't there. Darn it.
"Aren't you busy trying to pair off Ria and Milo?" I asked the second I managed to work the fry down, and fill my lungs with air.
Yeah, I know that it wasn't the most tactful thing to ask, in fact, it was rather rude, but I was trying to advert her attention from me, and back to where it should be; on her best friend and our schools' Mr. Popular. Last time I checked, that was what she was what she was working on. And I bet the whole school is with me on this one—but after hearing that, I had breathed a sigh of relief.
Because, besides Ria, I'm the only other one that she hasn't been able to really pair off for more than a date. About ninety percent of the school's population has had a boyfriend or girlfriend hand picked by the Matchmaker, now whether they've lasted for longer than a month or two is another thing.
However, I have never had a boyfriend that the Matchmaker has picked out for me, mostly because I have been avoiding her for most of my life. By 'conveniently' never being home, and never standing still at school. (Because you know what they say about a moving target being harder to catch, yes, I'm learning from deer's past mistakes. So sue me, somebody needs to learn from them.)
Figures that she would catch me when I was sitting down for lunch.
A bright smile filled her face, "Nope, at the moment, I'm all yours—besides, they don't need my help at this exact moment, Kale's with them."
Kale Daniels, Meghan's boyfriend, and Cupid's little sidekick—he's a really great person, don't get me wrong, and he is his own person, he's just madly in love with her, and apparently feels the same way about matchmaking as she does. That or he finds nothing wrong with tormenting the rest of us.
And you can't even hate him for it, because he is the model boyfriend and this all around great guy. It absolutely drives me up a wall, because Meghan's the same way. She may swoop down with no warning, and make your life chaotic in the process, but she's this wonderful person who thinks she's doing something great.
She's scary.
"Oh." I murmured, and glanced around the cafeteria, trying to see if I could pinpoint someone willing to come save me. Alas, there was no savior waiting in the ranks, heck, they were probably avoiding my eye contact to save their own hinds. Nobody wants Meghan's full attention on them.
She tucked her dark auburn hair behind an ear, and grinned. "I found you a boyfriend."
Hmm…? I must be dreaming, or hallucinating, because I think I heard her say that she found me a boyfriend. Which couldn't be right, there was no way that she would have said that…right?
I blinked slowly, "Beg pardon?"
She grinned broader, if that's even possible. "I said that I found you a boyfriend, since the two of you are perfect for each other, I didn't think there was a reason for you two to go through the whole dating thing."
Yup, I must be losing my hearing, that's it. People don't go around arranging others with boyfriends, it's just not done. I mean, once upon a time there were things as arranged marriages, but that was a long time ago. And even then, it was generally the fathers' doing the arranging, not teenage girls.
So, I slowly blinked once more, and then took a deep breath and calmly asked once more, "Beg pardon?"
Her eyes sparkled, "I found you the perfect boyfriend, he's tall, dark, and handsome—the whole prince charming package."
Oh Lord, she's serious. She found me a boyfriend. She found me a boyfriend that is apparently 'Prince Charming'—I always hated prince charming in all those Disney movies. He always seemed a little to quick to fall in love, and he always fell for the lovely princess is disguise. I would have respected the guy more if he fell in love with a lowly chambermaid. One that was quirky and had a good soul, not the looks of Aphrodite with birds singing along with her. That was always creepy, like in Sleeping Beauty, how did that guy know all the words to that sound, the moment he heard her singing? Heck, how did she manage to break out in rhyme at the drop of a hat?
Yeah, even as a little second grader, I was already questioning Disney. Don't even get me started on Aladdin. Superficial horn-dog, that's what he was….even the stupid bimbo beauty pageant girls managed to wish for world peace…
Right, back to the point.
I cleared my throat and managed to ask a really intelligent question, "What?"
By now, I think even she was realizing that she was repeating herself about a thousand times. "I found you your Prince Charming."
Eck, does she have to throw that word around? "Are you pulling my leg?"
"I knew you'd be excited!"
Try devastated. "Why would a prince charming want to date me?" I cried, suddenly not hungry. I closed my eyes, and took several deep breaths before opening them again. "I meant, who would this guy be?" I managed to choke out, tying to figure out who was a big enough idiot to agree to date me. That, or who was pathetic enough to consent to being my boyfriend without even meeting me. I hate him already. For it is because of him that she set her sights on me. (Read that as: he is going to have to die.) Of course nothing prepared me for the next thing that she said. What could have in all actuality? Who in the world would have guessed that the name she said next would be his?
"Thatcher Wood." She replied, and I felt my stomach drop.
"W-who?" I asked in a scraggily voice.
She looked like the Cheshire cat from Alice in Wonderland by now, "Thatcher Wood."
A/N: Hehehe…yes, I know that this is a classic ending that I used for The Matchmaker's Best Friend, but I couldn't help it. Now, before you ask; no, this is not the sequel to The Matchmaker's Best Friend—believe me here, I am not done with that story, it's just that this one had been floating around in my head for awhile, and I couldn't think of how to start it. Then the idea of starting it off with Meghan came to mind, and well, this came out.
So, in recap, this is NOT a sequel to my other story that has Meghan and Kale in it and you don't need to read that one before reading this. Although, you might want to, so that you'd understand some of the stuff that's going on, but you don't have to. (But if you want too…..)
Now, I promise to go work on more chapters for this story and my other two. That is…if anyone is reading this…which I guess I assumed, but now that I think about it, that was a little presumptuous of me….Is anyone reading this? Or have you all given up on me as a writer? I'd understand, I'm horrible at updating, and writing summaries….Sorry, please review—if you're actually reading this, that is.