Chapter Eight

I wasn’t seeing anymore of Travis than I usually did; in fact I was starting to get the feeling that he was avoiding me, especially as February drew nearer and nearer.
“Ugh,” Elizabeth said on the 6th. “Valentine’s Day is going to be such a pain in the ***. I never get any cards, and all day it’s like, ‘Lizzie, how many did u get? I got thirteen. Boys like me better than you,’ it’s freaking annoying!”
“Well, not to burst your bubble Liz,” Cleyra said, laughing. “But if you don’t send any cards, you’re probably not going to get any cards.”
“I’ll thank you not to insult my intelligence,” Elizabeth snarled. “Of course I send cards! I buy hundreds and send them to everyone at school!”
“I think you just have bad luck, Lizzie,” Ayden said from her chair.
“Or maybe it’s because you play too many pranks,” Brendan added. “I think I would hate you if you didn’t happen to be one of my best friends.”
Everyone laughed as Liz scowled.
“Don’t feel bad Lizzie,” Sapphire said. “You’ll see; we’ll make sure you get some cards this year.”
Aqua groaned.
“I don’t want to buy any cards this year. It takes way too long to pick them out and even longer to sort them by friend!”
“Don’t be a bitch, Aqua,” Cleyra warned. “You’re going to send cards this year, whether you like it or not.”
“Don’t tell me what to do, Clair,” Aqua said angrily. “I hate it when you act like you’re my mother.”
“Then don’t act like a spoiled brat!”
“Clair, Aqua, calm down!” Damian said loudly.
“No!” Aqua shouted first. “I’m tired of listening to everything you say, Clair!”
“I’m tired of listening to you whine like a child and putting up with you copying everything I do!”
“I am not a child! You are such a bitch you know that?”
“The only one acting bitchy here is you.”
Aqua and Cleyra both stomped out of the room angrily, going in different directions once they reached the hall.
“That didn’t sound good…” I said, breaking the silence.
“Nah, don’t worry about it,” Brendan answered. “They always fight those two. But they always make up in the end.”
“Trust me, this is nothing,” Ayden added. “Last time they fought they broke every chair in the history classroom.”
“I bet you ten bucks they’ll be friends again by dinner, Brendan,” Damian said.
Brendan snorted.
“They’ll never make up by then. I’ll add another ten that they’ll make up by lunch tomorrow.”
“This still doesn’t fix my Valentine card problem,” muttered Liz under her breath.
“I bet thirty that Clair will push Aqua into the fountain!” Ayden said loudly.
“No way,” Brendan said. “I’ll take on that bet.”
I shook my head. I had the strangest friends in the whole school.
The rest of the day passed quite normally. By dinner, Aqua and Clair refused to sit together and so sat on opposite sides. I sat alone. If I sat with Clair, Aqua would hate me, and if I sat with Aqua, Claire would hurt me pretty badly. Halfway through my dinner I looked around and caught Travis’s eye, who was farther along the table. He looked down again pointedly and I wondered if he had been staring at me as his face turned pink. I looked away and saw Marella and her friends glaring at me from Cleyra’s side of the table. I was suddenly glad Clair and Aqua were fighting.
I had to finish a report before going to bed, so I headed down to the library, which was for the most part empty. I set my laptop up and began to type. Halfway through, the librarian said the library was closed and shooed me out. I made my way to our hangout, where I was pretty sure I would get some quiet.
The classroom was indeed empty, and even though I turned the lights on, I still felt cold, as if all the warmth in the place had gone after everyone went to bed. I gave an involuntary shudder and continued on my work. I hardly realized the time until I looked up and saw the clock read half past midnight. It was against the rules to stay up longer than ten o’clock, and if a teacher caught me, I’d surely be given detention. I quickly slipped my laptop and books into my bag and began to walk briskly down the corridor towards the stairs.
I was nearly to my dormitory when I looked out a window and saw someone on the grounds. I stopped dead, and leaned forward to see more clearly out the window. A tall figure was walking across the lawn toward one of the trees. I watched them carefully, but then they went into the shadows and I couldn’t see anything anymore. After a few moments, I shrugged and opened the door to my dormitory.

The next day, it seemed that Brendan would win the bet as Aqua and Clair were being slightly politer to each other. Everyone seemed to be waiting to see if he really did win, because apparently he and Damian had struck a new bet; if Clair and Aqua made up by lunch, Damian would have to wear a girl’s bathing suit and walk around all weekend in it, and if Brendan lost, he would have to do the same.
“Looks like you’ll be stuck wearing a bikini, Damian,” Brendan gloated as we all took our seats in the unused classroom during morning break. Cleyra was late, and Aqua was at the library.
“At least if I do, I’ll actually look good in it,” Damian said, striking a pose. All the girls laughed.
“So now you’re a cross dresser?”
Damian scowled and sat down.
“Yeah, I’m going to win this bet,” Brendan said, yawning.
“There’s still three hours left before lunch,” Damian growled. “There is a chance they won’t make up before then.”
“Yeah, but it’s most likely they will,” Elizabeth said.
“Since when do you take Brendan’s side?”
“Since he gave me twenty dollars to be on his side.”
“BRENDAN!!!!!!”
“Oh like you wouldn’t,” Brendan said as he rolled his eyes.

“Aqua, I want to tell you something.”
Everyone was standing outside on the grounds watching Clair and Aqua near the fountain.
“I’m sorry,” Cleyra said
Everyone gasped, although not altogether surprised.
“Sorry I’m about to do this!” She roughly grabbed Aqua from the shoulders and pushed her into the fountain with a loud splash.
“Ha! That’s thirty dollars, Brendan!” I heard Ayden shout.
“Aquamarine!” someone yelled.
“You little-,” Aqua said as she grabbed onto Cleyra’s pants and they tumbled into the water, clawing and pulling at each other’s hair with such ferocity that we could barely tell them apart.
“WHAT’S GOING ON HERE?”
Cleyra and Aqua immediately stopped moving, and were pulled apart by none other than the headmistress herself.
“How dare you fight on school grounds?” She said loudly and angrily. “You will both be given detention, and if I hear so much as a sound from either of you, I will suspend you both!”
Cleyra waited until the headmistress was far enough away before glaring at Aqua.
“I hate you,” she hissed.
“You be quiet, it’s your fault we’re in this stupid mess.”
“This is what I think of you,” Cleyra said as she did a rude hand gesture at Aquamarine.
“Oh, whatever,” she said as she rolled her eyes.
Behind me I could hear Damian laughing.
“You lose Brendan.”

The weekend was not very pleasant for several reasons. The first was that the disturbing image of Brendan in a bikini left a very disturbing image in our minds. The second was that Cleyra and Aqua seemed unlikely to ever speak to each other again. The third was that Marella was now taunting me worse than ever, and finally that Travis seemed to be avoiding me at all costs. All in all, I had had better days.
Monday came with the prospect of Valentines Day. All morning, girls gathered in groups in the halls whenever boys passed, and it was impossible to walk along a single corridor without finding couples embracing each other fiercely. Candy was given out by the teachers, and just as predicted, Elizabeth barely got any valentines.
“I knew this would happen,” she said sulkily.
“Don’t be so depressed!” Sapphire said.
“You know it’s true that nobody loves me,” she sighed.
“Don’t be ridiculous. There’s bound to be someone other than us who sent you a valentine card,” Ayden said soothingly.
“Yeah, the day’s not over yet!” I said. “Cheer up Liz!”
“Ugh, Valentine’s Day is the most boring holiday…”
“It’s not that bad, it’s kind of contagious,” Brendan said, counting the many cards and lollipops in his bag.
“HA, whatever.”
“You always get depressed this time of year, Lizzie,” Ayden said. “How about we pull a prank on someone?”
“No thank you.”
Everyone gasped.
“No pranks?” Damian said amazed.
“You are Elizabeth, right?” Cleyra asked cautiously. “You aren’t one of Marella’s spies infiltrating our hangout?”
“No, don’t ask stupid questions like that,” Liz answered sourly.
“Man, don’t take your bad mood out on us,” Aqua said. She was sitting in a corner as far away from Cleyra as possible.
“Oh shut up, like you don’t do that all the time,” Clair answered hotly.
Aqua ignored her.
“C’mon,” I said encouragingly. “Don’t you want some lunch, at least?”
“No, can’t you guys leave me alone?”
“Ok, fine. But don’t come whining to us later, Liz,” Ayden said as she stomped from the room angrily.
Everyone except me followed suit, and after a quick glance at Elizabeth, I went after them.

Lunch was quite delicious; the cooks had made more of an effort and had ended up cooking way better than before. Cleyra and I sat together while Aqua sat farther along the table with a girl named Lucia and her friends.
“It’s my birthday today,” Cleyra said casually.
I dropped my fork in surprise.
“What? Why didn’t you tell us?”
She shrugged.
“It’s Valentine’s Day; don’t you think that’s ironic?”
I looked her up and down, in her slacks and rocker shoes and short hair. Oh yeah. It was definitely ironic.
“But why didn’t you say something?”
“You think I like being born on the most loving day of the year? I hate it.”
I laughed.
“It’s not funny,” she said in such a menacing voice that I immediately stopped laughing.
“Oh, well, then, um, happy birthday…”
She scowled.

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