Hypocrite

Next Monday I felt a twinge of anticipation in my stomach. As I ran a brush roughly through my hair I could only think of Linda and Dave will react when they saw me, but as I brushed my teeth I wondered if they would react at all. No, I decided, Linda and Dave are good people or they at least try.

After I was ready I sat wondering what horrors were waiting for me when I glanced at the clock and I let out slightly colored word when I saw that I had about one minute to be five streets away. I quickly slung my bag over my shoulder and I took off. I bounded out the door and got about three streets away when I started to labor to keep up my pace. Almost there! Then I heard that rumbling sound I redoubled my speed and as the bus was closing its doors I appeared by its side gasping. I observed the bus drivers chuckle as I stood gasping for much needed oxygen.

I received many strange looks as I made my way to the back of the bus toward an empty seat and I simply sat in silence the rest of the way to school. To pass the time, seeing as it dragged by at an incredibly slow pace, I hummed my favorite songs as quietly as I could. Needless to say I was still happy to see the school come into sight, if only to escape the amazingly awkward situation. I climbed off the metal contraption and speed off to my locker to punch in my combo and grab the paper weights my teachers felt were necessary for learning.

"Elle!" A perky voice called. I froze. It couldn't be...

"Hey Amber," and only one person wouldn't call me Amber.

"Oh, hi Linda! Hi Dave," I said letting all of my relief leak into my voice simply because I thought that they would ice me out.

"Oh my gosh! I'm so glad I you found you. I was thinking O would have to try to track you down at lunch with all of those hundreds of kids and whew that would have been sooo tough and oh- how was your morning? I love your outfit and-" Linda gushed before she was cut off by Dave.

"Linda, Linda, sweetheart calm down. Let the poor girl speak." Linda beamed at him with love glimmering in her eyes. My stomach lurched when I realized how rare that look is. That aside I smiled up at the two of them.

"I'm on my way to my English, uh where are you two going?" I inquired.

"Oh, we're going to science," Dave spoke on Linda's be-half.

"Ah, well I uh need to go to English 'cause I'm already late as it is so I'll see you at lunch," I spoke hurriedly so as to escape the awkward locker small talk.

"Wait! Science is soo boring and I'm sure English isn't the most fun subject so why don't we skip? Please! It'll be so much more fun with you there!" Linda begged.

"I really shouldn't Linda, sorry," I said as I rose up and shut my locker door with a resounding thud.

"Pretty please," Linda pleaded as persistently as ever.

"Linda, Dave, I would love to but I sort of like the project we're doing right now."

"Oh! I'm sorry to pressure you then," Linda said kindly. “How about we meet later after 3rd so we can find a table."

"Yeah, ok. Meet you guys here," a smile broke on to my face with out my consent.

"Ok. Bye. We should go so we can slip out," Dave said as they started to walk away and Linda gave me a wink before they stepped foot on the other side of the door not a moment too soon. I sighed a little heavily. What was I to do? Accept these slightly rouge friends or make do with half-friends. I knew the answer, but I wasn't sure it was the right one.

I sighed dejectedly as I listened to the hundreds of voices jabbering on about one absurd thing or other. When I reached the classroom I yanked open the door and slid into my seat. Murphy looked up with surprise.

"Hey there!"

"Hi," I said as I smiled slightly.

"So, uh, I guess you'll be sitting with us at lunch," Murphy asked.

"If that's ok with you, yeah,"Murphy gushed a sigh of relive.

"Good 'cause after what Veronica said I -"

"What did Veronica say?" I demanded sharply.

"Uh- nothing too terribly - and by that I mean - it's not like I uhh- I don't know how to say-"

"Murphy! What did she say?" I spoke the words slowly and forcefully.

"Veronica said that maybe you found the two of them and that when you were a kid you sort of stalked Dave for quite a while and-" Murphy struggled to continue and while saying all of that she felt the urge to get it over with as soon as possible as if that might soften the blow.

"I get it," I said a little stunned. "Uh, thanks for telling me. It seems that Veronica went a little rumor crazy." I slumped into my seat dejectedly. Murphy swelled up in her seat as she tried to make me feel a little better.

"You know, most won't believe her and probably don't think that's true. After all what does it matter," She asked.

"I suppose not much but still..." I faded off after the teacher started talking about what we perceived Romeo and Juliet's greatest asset to be in the story. Is it their undying love to each other or was it the fact that they didn't know each other that long so they didn't know all of those weird quirks. Of course I joined in the discussion.

"I'd say the fact that they didn't know the quirks yet because since they didn't well, the mystery was still alive for them. You know, the whole thing about the magic is in the mystery," I argued.

"Point but this epic wouldn't have been an epic with out they thing about how they were so devoted after a few brief moonlit meetings," Angelica piped up. After that I just sat and listened respectfully to all of the other's ideas before the school bell rang and I made a dart for the door as I caught my teacher's parting words.

"Remember to have your Romeo and Juliet copies before we start to study the Wicked script!" I allowed myself a small smile. I loved Wicked.

I tried to prolong fiddling with my locker dial as I waited for Linda and Dave to show up. But when that failed I leafed through my books and then all of the art projects piled atop my locker and to my happy relief they came just after Murphy.

"Hey you two!" a sing songy voice came from behind us. Murphy and I just quite a few feet into the air.

"Linda and Dave...hi. I wasn't expecting you two," Murphy said.

"Oh, well we want to sit with you! It will be such fun!" Linda spoke with such enthusiasm it would be incredibly hard to say no to that, even as Veronica walked past with such a sour expression on her face that it looked as if she had just bitten into a particularly nasty lemon. I simply smiled at the happy couple.

"That's ok with you, right Murphy?" I asked, not wanting to intrude if she didn't want them in her inner circle like I did.

"Yeah, great," she said back a strained smile fighting to remain on her face. I took notice and decided to drag them all into the caf so as to ease some of the tension.

"So, how long have you two been friends?" Dave asked to fill an echoing silence.

"Since school started up again. Elle is in most of my classes," Murphy said with a good amount of frost in her voice.

"Cool! That must make it convenient to keep in touch!" Linda said with probably the exact opposite of Murphy's tone.

"Yeah." I felt like I was in a huge tug of war and I didn't like it, It just made it harder to make the choice of half friends or not.

"Oh-my-gosh!" Linda exclaimed as she checked her phone. "That is just sooo rude!"

"What does it say?" I asked despite myself.

"That wannabe Veronica just sent out a mass text about you saying how you manipulated us!" and Dave and Linda both gained a hard glint in their eyes.

"Well it probably just another trick of hers to get attention and since she hates me it helps so much more," I said, going off cuff for how to explain this so they didn't get too mad because I know that popular people can get mad and ugly real easy when they needed to protect their closest friends, I had seen it happen and I didn't want that to happen over me.

"It's ok Elle, we'll deal with this," Dave said and I shrunk into my seat as Murphy and I shared a nervous glance. Dave and Linda departed to hunt out Veronica as Julianna dropped into the seat next to Murphy.

"What did I miss?"