Since When Do Things Not Go My Way?

The next call I had to make made me want to be sick. My worst nightmare was that Ian would never understand what was going on and would break up with me. When I called him to explain everything though he was surprisingly understanding of it all. The only thing he was upset about was that I had ignored all his texts. A few weeks went by and I didn't tell anyone else. I couldn't; it would destroy me. We were starting to plan everything for moving into my grandparents house. I was going through stuff, trying to figure out what to take and what to leave. Most of my furniture was staying and some of my clothes. My grandparent's house was an average, middle-class sized, mini-mansion sort of house. They had a lot of money, but they were both retired and spent it on world-wide trips after they had moved out of their old house. As we were driving out of my neighborhood for the last time in who knows how long, I said goodbye to all of the beautifully landscaped houses and the people in them.

.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*

The next morning I was back in school. I kept expecting someone to come up to me from behind and start to make fun of me for being poor, but no one ever did. I was standing at my locker with my friends, when Duncan came down the hall.

"You know it's a shame he's so poor and shy," said Steph,"He's really hot. He could be so popular. Maybe even more popular than you Abbie."

You should know some things about Steph. Number one: Her real name wasn't Steph. It wasn't even Stephanie. It was Agnus. Number two: Her "naturally beautiful red hair" as she called it wasn't natural in the least bit. She was blonde. And number three: I hate her. So why do I hang out with her, you ask? Have you ever heard the expression 'keep your friends close, but keep your enemies closer'? Yes? Well, that's why. She would have no problem stabbing me in the back. In fact, she's tried a few times and could have succeeded if she wasn't so bad at it. She never really had anything on me that was enough to destroy me. But anyway back to Duncan.

He may have been shy, but he most definitely was not poor. I know this because he lives in my neighborhood. Actually he lives three houses down. Sometimes when I went out for a walk or something, we'd actually meet up and talk for a while. He was an altogether nice guy. That's why I couldn't stand when someone would make fun of him.

I began to walk down to my first class without even bothering to say goodbye to my friends, who I was slightly disgusted with at the moment, and then Duncan caught up to me.

"Hey, um, I know we never talk in school," he started, "but I saw you moving out and was wondering what was up. I didn't see a for sale sign..." he said trailing off.

"Oh, well, we're not exactly moving..." He stared at me expectantly, but I wasn't sure whether to tell him or not. We weren't really friends...or were we? We definitely weren't enemies. And for some reason I felt like I could trust him just as much as I trusted Marissa. I told him everything, beginning to end.

"Wow, are you okay?" he asked. It was strange: as understanding as Ian had seemed to be , that was one thing he never asked.

"I'm as okay as I can be I guess."

"I hope everything gets resolved soon. I'm gonna miss our walks."

I laughed, "Yeah. Me too. The minute I get back that's what were gonna do."

This time, it was his turn to laugh," I'll hold you to that."

Just as he said this the warning bell rang.

"I'll see you around," he said.

"Yeah, see you around."

By this time my friends had noticed that I was gone and who I had been talking to.

The first thing out of Steph's mouth was an insult. "What were you talking to that loser for?"

"Um nothing. He just had a question about our math homework."

"Oh good. You know, cause you wouldn't want to ruin your rep by being friends with that."

But Duncan always made me happy when I talked to him. And if being friends with him was going to 'ruin my rep' as Steph said...then maybe I didn't care about my rep too much after all.