Lovesessed (6 page)

“
A love potion,” I
breathed. My eyes opened widened, and I think that my mouth
actually dropped open.

“
Love boils down to
chemistry anyway, because what makes people fall in love is a
cocktail of chemicals and hormones.”

“
I know that teenagers are
very hormonal.”

“
That’s when it’s starts.
When you’re attracted to someone the chemical phenylethylamine or
PEA, also called
the ‘love molecule’
is
released in the body.
C
hocolate is known to have very high
levels of this chemical, that’s why people become addicted to or
even fall in love with chocolate.
This
chemical speeds up the connections in the nervous system making you
excited or hyperactive. It also triggers the secretion of dopamine,
which gives a feeling of elation and euphoria. It is the
norepinepherine that is released in the system that makes a person
feel extremely high. Together, the three chemicals produce the ‘in
love’ feeling.
It is, as they say,
chemistry,”
she explained like she was
giving a Chemistry lecture.

I stared at her in shock for what
seemed like minutes.

“
I can make a love potion
that stimulates these chemicals in Chase. Cupid’s arrows are
supposedly dipped in love potion, so that’s why when he strikes two
people they fall in love. So, call me Cupid.” She smiled
triumphantly.

I felt like I had just been struck by
an arrow dipped in energy, and started babbling a mile a minute. “I
love Chemistry! Now I know why you adore it so much. You are a
genius! You should be cloned! In fact, you could probably clone
yourself because you’re such a genius! I guess that’s why they say
that when it comes to love, chemistry is important. This is
brilliant! Then Chase will be my boyfriend, and then we will get
engaged, and then married. I know that our children will be
adorable, just like him. I want one boy and one girl. It would be
better if the boy was older, because I always wanted an older
brother so that I could date his friends…”

Liz put her hands on my shoulders.
“Phoebe, calm down.”

#

It was definitely fate. We
had just started reading
A Midsummer
Night’s Dream
by Shakespeare in English.
I’d already read it before because I loved Shakespeare. I could
actually understand most of it, unlike the others in my class who
needed a constant translator. English had always been my favorite
subject. It was the one subject that I excelled at, probably
because they say that you are good at something you enjoy. In the
play
A Midsummer Night’s
Dream
, the mischievous Puck produces
a
magical juice from a flower
called “
love-in-idleness
,”
which when applied to a person's eyelids while sleeping, makes them
fall in love with the first living thing they see when they wake
up.
Puck uses the love potion on Titania,
queen of the fairies, who falls in love with Bottom, despite the
fact that his head has been turned into a donkey’s head. It’s a
comedy of errors as everyone falls in love with the wrong
people
.

I
was meeting Liz after school to make
the love potion. Well, she’d make it, and I’d watch. I didn’t know
if it would work, but it couldn’t hurt, right?

#

In the Chemistry lab, Liz
looked professional with her goggles and white coat as she
explained the details to me. “The book from the library says that
the potion is called ‘Cupid’s Love Potion.’”

“
Oh my word, that is so
corny,” I exclaimed.

“
It’s called that because
it has to be drunk on Valentine’s Day, which is perfect because it
falls this week,” Liz said mixing a concoction of colored
liquids.

“
Liz,
it’s weird. Lately, I keep recreating movie scenes, like in Biology
with the frog scene from
ET
. Now this feels like we’re in
that movie
Love Potion No.
9
.”

“
I’ve never seen it,” she
said busy with a measuring cup.

“
It’s about a nerdy
science guy…” I stopped as she shot me an offended look. “I mean an
extremely intelligent science guy, who produces a love potion that
affects a person’s vocal cords and makes anyone of the opposite sex
fall in love with them while they speak.”

“
Well, there are different
types of love potions. Like in that movie, they used a potion to
make people fall in love with the drinker. Our potion is to make
the drinker fall in love with someone. Speaking of which, we don’t
want Chase to fall in love with just anyone, like the first person
they see. So we need something of yours that contains your
DNA.”

“
That could be funny
though,” I said continuing. “Like when Titania falls in love with a
guy who has a donkey’s head. Love is blind they say.”

“
That’s true. Smell is one
of the key elements of attraction. Often, when a person is drawn to
someone who doesn’t fit their normal dating profile, it could be an
unconscious scent drawing her to him or vice versa. The chemical
reaction that occurs referred to as ‘chemistry,’ often makes a
person fall in love with someone who is completely wrong for them.
This ‘clicking’ draws someone to a person who is opposite to them,
or who fulfills a need from their childhood. You know the saying
‘opposites attract.’”

“
Like when people run off
and elope with guys their parents wouldn’t approve of.”

“
Yes,
the chemicals I told you about that are produced when you are
attracted to someone,
Phenylethylamine, dopamine, and
norepinepherine
, are like natural drugs,
making your heart race, your palms sweat, and your knees weak. When
people are infatuated, social obligations, other relationships, and
even sense and sensibility, all fly out the window. ‘Crazy in love’
isn’t just a song.”

“
I love that Beyoncé
song.” I started dancing around and singing the song.

“
Phoebes, can you turn the
page please? My hands are full,” she said holding a test tube in
each hand.

“
Sure,” I said turning the
page. “I didn’t know all of this. I’ve learnt a lot today. Liz, if
the chemicals make people fall in love, then what happens when they
aren’t passionately in love anymore, but are comfortable, and want
to build a future together?”

“
We become tolerant to the
chemicals, and it’s a good thing. I mean, that passionate love
where people stay up talking all night, and have extreme amounts of
energy, cannot be sustained. Relationships break-up if the people
are desperate to feel that infatuation feeling again, or move into
a new, deeper phase of love.”

“
The honeymoon is over,” I
giggled.

“
Most people believe that
you can’t have love without chemistry, and so when they feel that
chemistry, they conclude that it must be love.”

“
Hmm, but if it’s all
based on physical stuff, then what about personality,
compatibility, and values? Those are the things that last when the
honeymoon phase is over.”

“
Those things usually only
become important after the infatuation phase. That’s why they say
that you shouldn’t discount a person just because you don’t feel a
burning attraction for them, because that fades after a while, and
what you are left with is more important. The things that you need
to sustain a relationship over years, or a lifetime.”

“
All of this new
information is making me doubt everything I thought I knew about
love.”

“
I know!” she exclaimed,
looking like she should have a light bulb above her head. “We’ll
use a lock of your hair, because that contains DNA. Hand me those
scissors over there.”

I touched my hair
defensively. “Chase won’t want me if I’m bald,” I said
dramatically. I had a thing about cutting my hair. Once, I went for
a trim and the hairdresser must have been out to get me, because
she cut my hair into a bob. I’d been trying to grow my hair long
like Rachel’s for years, but it grows so slowly, and psycho
hairdressers don’t help.

“
Don’t be silly, we just
need an inch from a piece of your hair. You don’t want Chase to
fall in love with Amber do you?”

“
I’ll get the scissors,” I
said quickly. Liz cut off only an inch as promised, and it
dissolved in the liquid straight away. “But how are we going to get
Chase to drink the love potion? It’s not like he goes to our
school, and we can slip it in his coke at lunch. But that would be
handy.” I grinned.

“
Good question,” she said.
“But I’ve already thought of that part. We’ll inject the potion
into a box of chocolates and send it to Chase as a Valentine’s
gift,” she said pulling out a red, heart-shaped box of chocolates
from her backpack and beaming about her “genius” idea.

“
You have got to be
kidding,” I said in shock. “What celebrity even opens gifts and
mail from fans, let alone eats the gifts?”

“
The love potion will
attract Chase to the chocolates. He will be drawn to open the gift.
He will smell the sweet, deliciousness of the love potion and will
be unable to resist trying just one chocolate. What is sweeter than
a box of love potion chocolates on Valentine’s Day?”

“
Ok, James Bond, what
about this one. How will he know how to find me?” This should stump
her.

“
Like when you send any
package, we’ll include your name and return address. After he’s
consumed the love potion, he’ll be instantly drawn to you, and will
come find you. A man in love, will climb mountains, and swim oceans
to be with the woman he loves.”

“
But still, I seriously
doubt that anyone would be dumb enough to eat a random box of
chocolates. If it was me, I would be too scared that the chocolates
were laced with arsenic from an obsessed fan,” I said shuddering.
Liz raised her eyebrows. “I know what you’re thinking Liz. But
we’ve been over this. I’m not obsessed, I’m in love, and I don’t
want to hurt him, I want to love him. How could love
hurt?”

*****

6. Valentine’s
Day

The next day, the day
before Valentine’s Day, I noticed that the whole school had gone
crazy. Red balloons and streamers covered the halls. People had
been giving each other heart shaped invitations to the Valentine’s
Day dance.

“
Liz, there’s a pink heart
in my locker. I wonder who it’s from.”

“
Phoebe,
sometimes I wonder where
you’re
from, Mars
perhaps?”

“
No, men are from Mars and
women are from Venus,” I corrected, referring to the famous
relationship book.

“
How could I forget,” she
slapped her forehead.

“
It’s from Ben,” I said
reading the note.

“
Duh!” she practically
shouted.

“
It’s an invitation to the
dance. It says:

Dear Phoebe,

Roses are red

Violets are blue

I’d love to go to the
dance

With you,

Love Ben”

“
That’s so sweet, and he
used ‘L-O-V-E,’” Liz said, reading over my shoulder.

“
Well he’s definitely no
poet, but it’s the thought that counts. I think that he was just
trying to cheer me up over the whole Chase thing.”

“
Maybe he really wants to
go with you.”

“
We’re going as a group,
remember, the three musketeers.”

“
Well, I’m actually going
with Nathan.”

“
Why didn’t you tell me?”
I demanded.

“
I’m telling you now. But
we can all go as a group if you’d rather do that.”

“
Yes please, a group is
definitely better.”

#

Every year, the
Valentine’s king and queen were chosen at the
dance. I knew that Amber would definitely be nominated for queen,
and probably win. She would take Chase to the dance in a heartbeat
if she could, but Eugene Sherman would take her in a heartbeat if
he could. However, that would never happen in a million years.
Well, maybe in his dreams. Eugene Sherman was a sweet, yet dorky
guy who would probably be decent looking if he actually had
something resembling a hair style, and didn’t wear his pants so
high. Poor Eugene, he’s had a massive crush on Amber since the
third grade. However, she can’t stand him, and avoids him like the
plague. She said that she wouldn’t touch him, if he was the last
man on earth. But if he really were the last man on earth, she
couldn’t be so picky, because the survival of our species would be
up to her. I heard that Eugene had snuck a heart invitation in
Amber’s locker, and she tore it up in front of him. The poor boy
must have been heartbroken. What an ice queen.

Amber overhead me talking
to Liz about him one day, and then walked up to me, and told me in
front of everyone that I was crazy to think that someone like him
would ever look twice at me. She said that I was pathetic and sad.
When she said such hurtful things to my face, I felt the tears
burning my eyes as they welled up to reveal my pain. I quickly ran
into the ladies room so that she wouldn’t see me cry. Liz followed
me and said that Amber was a sad person who had to make other
people feel bad in order to make herself look and feel
better.