Their Violence, Your Silence.

I stayed home sick the rest of the week. Anxious about missing so many classes but relieved I didn’t have to face Marley or Caleb for that matter.

I worked ahead in all of my books to make sure I didn’t fall behind. I really couldn’t afford to let my grades slip, I needed to get a scholarship if possible.

But that still gave me more than enough free time on my hands, even though I slept twice as much as I normally did.

Jared felt sorry for me and offered to stay home a day from work to look after me and so did my mom but I told them I was fine on my own. Really I could manage things myself.

So when on Thursday the doorbell rang around four pm I dragged myself to the front door to open it. Expecting it to be Jared who forgot his keys.

Instead it was Cassandra, a big smile plastered to her face. She was bouncing on her toes and her grey eyes we’re twinkling.

‘Winter!’ she yelled excitedly, already stepping past me inside and shrugging out of her coat and shoes. ‘I came to bring you the homework we got this week, and to cheer you up!’

She thrust me a stack of papers : ‘here’s the homework and my notes from all the classes I have as well. Now enough of that let’s get you fixed!’

I couldn’t help but smile at her excitement and I felt warm and grateful, I hadn’t expected her to do this for me.

I quickly placed the papers on the kitchen table and made us drinks while Cassie inspected our miserable television and ancient dvd player.

Suddenly feeling a little ashamed of the state of our house, knowing it was in a crappy neighborhood and that all the furniture was old and sometimes stained. The couch was covered by a large sheet of flowered fabric to cover up the tears and stains underneath.

But Cass sat down on it without pause and smiled up at me as she received the glass of lemonade. ‘You pick what movie we’re gonna watch alright? I brought several. And you must tell me all about that night at the cinema!’

I groaned loudly at that, ‘Cass… how did you know about that?’ She just smiled mysteriously at me and shoved her bag in my lap, ‘Come on, pick one!’

But before I could decide the doorbell rang again. Cassie immediately bounded up and ran to the door, yelling: ‘I’ll get it, you pick!’

I had already twisted around in my seat to see who it was and had to smile widely when I saw Katie framed in the doorway. A confused look on her face as she stared at Cassandra.

‘Who are you? And what are you doing at Winter’s house?’ wow… that sounded rather rude.

Suddenly I realized I hadn’t even told Katie about Cassandra. I quickly jumped up and stumbled to the door.

‘Katie! You came to visit!’ I smiled at my best friend as I threw my arms around her in a hug. Katie quickly returned the hug and then pushed me back to get a closer look at my face.

‘Tssk… You really ought to take better care of yourself girl… How else is that boy ever going to ask you out?’ she smirked as we all stepped inside and Cassie closed the door behind us.

‘I keep trying to tell her that as well… But does she listen?’ Cassandra piped up again bouncing on her toes in excitement.

That broke the ice between them though and Katie introduced herself with a friendly handshake. Cass surprised me by saying: ‘I’m Cassandra but call me Cass, I’m a friend of Winter. Been trying to keep her out of trouble you know… Friend of Caleb too, the guy she has a crush on.’

‘I do not have a crush on him!’ I spluttered indignantly but it was no use, the two girls we’re already deeply engrossed in coming up with scheme’s to make Caleb ask me out.

So I went back to the couch, picked out a movie and then curled up under my blanket to watch it.

They quickly joined me and forced me to tell all about the night at the cinema. I was still utterly confused about that and thought that just maybe they could shed some light on the whole situation.

‘You are so lucky Winnie!’ exclaimed Katie when I was done. It made me choke on my sip of lemonade. ‘Lucky?’

‘Yeah you had two hot guys practically fighting over you!’ said Cass in a ‘duh!’ tone of voice.

‘The most popular guy at your school who was there with his girlfriend and Chris… Come on that guy is hot and he goes to freaking Harvard…’ added Katie.

‘Well she’s not really his girlfriend you know, they just have this deal to pretend to be because they’re both so popular… The idiots,’ Interjected Cass.

Katie stared at her appalled and I spluttered: ‘They weren’t practically fighting over me. Just glaring… And that wasn’t normal behavior for Chris, I’m sure there is some kind of explanation.’

They wouldn’t have any of it of course. Although the way Kate talked about Chris made me wonder if she didn’t have a crush on him.



My brother masked his surprise well when he came home and both Katie and Cass where still there. But I couldn’t help but smirk at him, ‘See I told you I made friends, didn’t believe me did you?’

He laughed and ruffled my hair and only then did I realize he wasn’t alone. Chris was there right behind him standing just at the edge of the pool of light coming from the television.

He lifted his hand to wave at me slowly, ‘Hey there Winter, feeling better?’ A slow smile spread across his face as his eyes darted from me to Katie. ‘Hey Kate, long time no see…
How’ve you been?’

Kate’s face was totally blank as she stared at him and I had to stifle a giggle. Cass gave
Katie a rough shove hissing: ‘Answer him you moron!’

And then Katie stuttered: ‘Yeah.. I…I’ve been… okay?’ At the last moment her sentence turned into a question somehow and a furious blush spread across her cheeks.

I turned my attention back on Chris and was pleased to notice that he was still staring at Katie and that he too seemed a little pink in the face. Did Chris like Katie too? Then what was that in the cinema all about?

As if he read my mind he said: ‘Eh… good to hear, I’ve been good too. Missed home though, missed the people here…’ Then he turned to me and said: ‘Sorry bout my behavior at the cinema Winter. Should have warned you but it was kinda on impulse…’

Still confused I asked: ‘What was?’

‘Well… I thought I’d help you with that boy. Make him a little jealous? Was awful the look on your face when you saw him there with that other girl…’

Oh… Relieve washed over me. He was just pretending so Caleb would get jealous. He didn’t understand that I hadn’t even seen Marley there. That look had been all about actually seeing Caleb…

I could tell Katie was relieved as well, because obviously Chris didn’t like me in any way other than as his little ‘sister.’

The silence that followed was slightly awkward until Cass interrupted it by saying loudly:
‘Well if nobody is going to introduce me…I’m Cassandra, but you can just call me Cass. Winnie and I have a couple of classes together.’

After that we all settled comfortably on the couch and finished watching the movie and I was happy. I didn’t have to worry about Chris anymore, nor about somehow producing a new friend my mother could meet because well obviously I actually had a new friend.

I realized i had more friends then I thought I did, there was Katie and Cassie now but was lucky to count Chris and my own brother Jared as friends too.