Short Story / Build Me Up, Buttercup (Analysis)
I cannot even begin to explain my hatred for Matthew Atkinson during my elementary/middle school years. He was a know-it-all loser who just loved to make fun of me. He was big and goofy, and I never really gave him a second thought unless my friends and I were making fun of him by the monkey bars during recess. Don’t get me wrong, I wasn’t exactly the most popular girl in the cafeteria, but he was just… well, revolting. Funny, how things change. I’m sure if my fifth grade self saw me falling in love with him now, she’d scoff and call me a geek behind my back.
In eighth grade I broke up with my first “real” boyfriend Randy. After that I started to have crushes on every guy that even said one word to me. I had about seven other guys on my mind the day I decided to ask Matt out. I have no idea what had been going through my mind other than that he was nice to me during gym class. Of course, he said no. But it wasn’t the end of the world for me; there were still six others who had the same potential.
I can see why he had said no. Middle school was a time when I was trying to find “myself.” I thought black clothes; lots of jewelry and skulls was the real “me.” Matt was afraid of me, as many others were. After eighth grade I started dressing normally again, I still refused to be like everyone else, but at least now my friend’s parents wouldn’t be afraid to let their kids hang out with me.
High school came and many kids didn’t end up going to Danvers High from the Dunn. The Building isn’t the most beautiful thing in the world (to say the least) and parents were afraid of the accreditation problem the school was going through at the time. My parents tried to get me to go to a different school, but I thought my friends were more important and ultimately, went to good ol’ DHS.
Matt, on the other hand, went to North Shore Tech, where he played football and began to learn about different trades. He turned into an all around good kid, after he decided to quit the drugs he did with his friends through middle school. He really turned his life around very early in his High School career, which is good because what happened next never would have happened if he hadn’t.
I remember it was the end of February vacation in freshman year. My best friend Sam was on the computer as I was in the next room watching Texas Chainsaw Massacre by myself.
“Hey you have a new friend request.” Sam said. I jumped from the couch to see who it could be. Hoping it was that cute new kid in my History class. I have to say when I saw who it was, I was extremely disappointed.
“Matt Atkinson? I forgot he was even alive.” His picture showed him and best friends Justin and Connor making faces to the camera.
“Loser. Should I add him for you?”
“What the hell. He probably won’t say anything anyways. Now I’m up to 200 friends!” I walked back into the other room and forgot about my new MySpace Buddy in seconds.
A day later, I was getting ready to leave to go on a New York trip with some girl scouts when I noticed I had a new comment on my MySpace. It was Matt.
(this is the best to my memory because you had your myspace deleted a couple summers ago, which deleted our first comments.)
New Comment from Matthew Atkinson:
Hey. I haven’t talked to you in a while! How’s everything?
I rolled my eyes. Why the heck is he talking to me? I decided to be polite and say something back. We’d probably talk for about four comments and never speak again anyway.
Hey same old stuff here. How are you? You went to that other school right?
I turned off my computer and left for NYC for a few days, and never thought of him or the comment once.
When I got back there was yet another comment waiting for me from Matt. I decided to give him my screen name in my reply mainly because I didn’t know what my friends would think. But another part of me figured that if he really wanted to talk to me, he shouldn’t have to wait for me to comment him back on MySpace. After I commented him back, I went to my grandmother’s house. I kept thinking about whether or not he would I.M me, as well as what I would say if he did.
Later that night, he IMed me. We talked for a really long time, about ourselves and what we had been doing since middle school. We never knew a lot about each other because we both hated each other our whole lives. It was very easy to talk to him. However, I didn’t see us ever being together as a couple yet. It was just Matt after all.
Soon, we were talking all the time on AIM. We cracked jokes and definitely flirted. It was fun, but I still didn’t like him like “that.” I still saw him as the loser from middle school, just now I was talking to him.
BUT, when he told me he was going for a run with his friends, I couldn’t help but stare out the window until I saw him go by…
One night, he asked me for my cell number. I gave it to him and soon enough got a text message. “Wierdo,” it said. I laughed. We continued talking online for a long time. I said goodnight to him rather early that night, because I wanted to watch my favorite show before I went to sleep.
He text messaged me around ten just before I turned off the TV to go to bed.
“Hey”
“Hi? Lol”
“I knew you weren’t asleep. :P”
“Lol. Well I’m going to bed now, creep. Good night.”
“Lol. Night.”
That night, I started to get feelings for Matt. But, I never admitted it, to myself or anyone else.
One day, I was sitting at home when Matt texted me asking me if he could come over. I said yes. We had to sit outside because my parents weren’t home. When I finally saw him, I couldn’t help but stare at him. He was wearing a navy blue NIKE shirt and khaki shorts. Those eyes, piercing and blue, I couldn’t help but get lost in them.
We talked for a while. I remember Matt saying I was pretty (in a roundabout way) while we were talking on the front steps. I remember thinking about him saying that for days. I still wouldn’t admit that I was starting to like him
But my friends noticed. Sam kept telling me that I did. Kasey would laugh when I told her it was Matt I was texted all day during school. Sam was going through my text messages one day at lunch, and saw one that he had sent me the night before.
“The best part of the day was when I was with you.” She read it out loud. “He definitely likes you.”
I denied it. And everyone rolled their eyes. They all knew.
We had a ritual every night. We would talk all night until we had to go to sleep. I remember him saying that he liked the” little night thing” we had going on. He was starting to be very confusing. Sometimes, I knew that he liked me. Others, I wasn’t so sure. I was starting to be more and more true to myself. I started telling people that I liked him. I loved to talk about him, almost as much as I loved to talk to him.
It was easy to talk to Matt. We had so much in common, and neither of us was afraid to say anything. We talked about other guys/girls with each other. And even though it made me a little jealous, I just liked talking to him as much as he liked talking to me.
April Vacation came around, and I went on a trip to Myrtle Beach with my family. By this time, I had openly liked Matt for some time, and him me. While I was there, he repeatedly told me that he missed me and that he wished he was there. By this point, I knew he liked me. I was just waiting to see which one of us would make that first move.
A few weeks later, on the night of May 7th, 2006 it finally happened.
He hadn’t talked to me all day, so when I was ready to get into bed, I figured I’d say hi. We talked for a long time about other girls/guys. It was starting to worry me that he was always talking about “other girls.” I tried to forget it and remember that there was no way in hell this boy didn’t like me…right?
As we were talking, he casually mentioned that he wanted a girlfriend.
“I really need a gf. Got any ideas?”
At this point, my heart was beating so fast, I was sure it would race right out of my chest. I stared at the reply screen on my cell phone and thought, “what do I do?” I decided to be daring. What the hell? If he doesn’t like me, he doesn’t like me. I’ll move on…eventually.
“Hi Matt, my name is Danielle, nice to meet you.”
From only a few miles away, I didn’t know that our phones weren’t working properly, and that it took him a while to get it. In my bed, I stared at my phone and shook like a leaf.
Ten excruciating minutes later, I received this.
“Hello? Did you send something?”
I cursed our phone, and found myself face to face with yet another reply screen of certain doom. Again, a wave of “what-ifs” crashed over me. I fought them back and, with shaking, sweaty palms re-sent the message.
“Hi Matt, my name is Danielle, nice to meet you.”
From only a few miles away, I didn’t know that I had just blown his mind.
After that, there were many confused and scrambled messages as our phones continued to misbehave. But in the end, he finally asked me the question that I had wanted to be asked since February.
“Will you go out with me?”
And I finally got to give the answer that I had wanted so long to give.
“Yes.”
It was 11:45 pm on Sunday May Seventh, two thousand and six.
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It was well written. However I dont think it captivates. I suppose not all stories will be full of twist and turns but a sticky opening sentence to keep the reader glued would be nice.
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It was cute definitely a 21st century love story via IM and cell phone. The usual teen angst with technology. I think it would appeal to kids of this generation. Good job. No glaring errors either.
You have a good start here. The pieces are all there to have a really entertaining young adult short story, yet you seem to waver between diary entry and storytelling. You have to do more showing and less telling. For example, when you let the reader know that Matt said Danielle was pretty in a roundabout way, take us there. Show us roundabout and let us feel the embarrassment/tension that the characters did.
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