Even the Losers

Lyrics by Tom Petty, re-imagined by michchick

 

Well, it was nearly summer; we sat on your roof.
Yeah, we smoked cigarettes and we stared at the moon.
And I’d show you stars you never could see.
Baby, it couldn’t have been that easy to forget about me.

   

Will hadn’t expected much when he arrived in the hick town of Meryton. It was true he’d heard the rumors that there were an exceptionally high percentage of pretty girls in the town, but, as usual, Will had other, much more serious things on his mind when he’d arrived in town. Initially, he hadn’t even found Lizzy attractive. By comparison to her older sister Jane, Lizzy was really nothing at all. Yet once Will had begun to spend time with the second Bennet sister, he found himself to be rather infatuated.  

 The night Will realized his infatuation was possibly something more happened one night after a simple dinner gathering. Lizzy had all she could take of her obnoxious younger sisters and ridiculously overbearing mother and escaped through an upstairs dormer window to sit on the roof and have a smoke in peace. Will had been concerned by her disappearance and sought her out. He climbed out the window and joined her, much to her unhidden dismay.

Will couldn’t believe his great fortune. He had finally found an opportunity to be alone with her, and in a romantic setting to boot! The moon appeared full, but when Lizzy mentioned it, Will corrected her, explaining that it was, in actuality, a waning gibbous moon. Will took her apparent interest in the heavens as an opening and then began to point out the varying constellations, explaining the mythologies behind them. This began a pattern for the summer. When everyone would get together and Lizzy needed to get away from it all, Will did his best to keep her company.

When Will thought back to those early days when he first knew Lizzy, he still didn’t understand how she’d come to feel the way she did. She had to like him, if even a little.

Baby, time meant nothing, anything seemed real.
Yeah, you could kiss like fire and you made me feel-
Like every word you said was meant to be.
No, it couldn’t have been that easy to forget about me.

Will still thought often of those days. Somehow he’s missed something that he couldn’t seem to comprehend. He reviewed their conversations in his mind and felt certain, even now, that Lizzy had indeed been flirting with him! She had listened to him earnestly and whenever she spoke with him, it had been in such a teasing way that could leave no room for misinterpretation. Yet he had done just that!

True, when he kissed her that afternoon when he confessed his feelings for her, Lizzy slapped him; but the fire in her eyes, the passion that he’d incited in her held such promise for the future! Time was all that Will needed; time for her to see that she was mistaken. He tried to be angry with her for her refusal of his affection, but all he had to do was think about the beauty of her hazel eyes and he was lost again.

Will was positive that if anyone could change her fury into fervor, it was him.

  Baby, even the losers get lucky sometimes.
Even the losers keep a little bit of pride.
They get lucky sometimes.
 
Will knew he wouldn’t beg for another chance with her. She had called him, right to his face, a loser! Generally he was of a disposition to remain unaffected by harsh criticisms, but a man had to keep some of his pride! He had already put himself out there, made himself vulnerable, and he was not in a hurry to do it again. For the moment, he would just bide his time until he could figure something else out.

  Perhaps she would realize her great mistake and come crawling back to him, begging for forgiveness. Even losers get lucky sometimes!

Two cars parked on the overpass.
Rocks hit the water like broken glass.
I should have known right then it was too good to last.
God, it’s such a drag when you’re livin’ in the past.

Will had waited for her on the bridge’s footpath. He knew she walked five miles every day and her path always brought her the same way and so he skipped stones to while away the time until she arrived.

Lizzy nearly turned the other way when she saw him lying in wait for her, but realized it would be rude and even he didn’t warrant such harsh treatment. Lizzy met Will and listened as he briefly made his case one last time. He was less arrogant the second time around, but she was still unmoved. Her feelings and wishes remained unchanged and Will knew it was time to cut his loses once and for all.

Once he realized he ought to live in the present instead of his idealized past, it didn’t take long for Will to shake off his melancholy and get over Lizzy. In fact, it was only a matter of days before he believed himself to be in love all over again.

Yes, in the end Will Collins found happiness with Lizzy’s best friend Charlotte.

After all, even the losers get lucky sometimes!

The End!

 

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Even the Losers by Jennifer Hickling aka michchick is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.