Something To Believe In

CHRISTINE'S POV

I was humming along to a tune in my head when I heard my mom's voice travel up the stairs.
“Christine, honey, we've got company!”
I sprinted down the stairs, eager to see if it was another girl in the neighborhood that I could be friends with. When I reached the last few steps of the staircase, I excitedly jumped off, only to hear a loud crack as I fell off balance. I looked down in disbelief. My right foot was stuck in the floor.
As I heard heavy footsteps approaching, I covered my face in shame.
“Are you okay?” a deep voice asked. I looked up, only to find a boy around the same age as me standing there, chewing on a brownie and staring at me.
I blushed. “Can you.. can you help me up?”
“...Nah, it's okay.” the boy replied, turning around and heading back into the living room.
I scoffed, feeling rejected.
“Christine, dear, where are - -” My mother's voice cut off abruptly as she turned into the foyer.
“My little princess!” my dad's voice boomed as he, too, spotted me knee-deep in the wooden floor.
My parents grabbed me by both my arms and hoisted me up. As they pulled me up, I felt an immense pain in my shin, and I hissed in pain as I yanked myself out of their grasps to check my leg for injuries. There was a long and giant scrape along the length of my entire shin that was beginning to throb badly.
“Oh no, your leg!” my mother exclaimed, dropping to her knees to examine the scrape. “It's alright, at least it's not bleeding.”
Right as my mother's sentence finished, blood started to flood out of the skinned areas of my leg.
“Thanks for jinxing me, mom,” I muttered.
“What's going on in here?” a foreign voice asked. I looked up, only to see the same boy from before accompanied by whom I assumed to be his parents.
“Oh, it's nothing, just a little scrape.” my dad chuckled.
“That doesn't look like just a little scrape...” the boy's father said in a concerned tone.
“ERIC!” the boy's mother shrieked, just in time for me to look up and see the same boy about to collapse onto me.
This is when I would like to say that I got out in time and Eric hit the floor and I escaped, unscathed. Unfortunately, that didn't happen. He collapsed onto me and I fell backwards, banging my head on the floor.
Everything went black.



I awoke to someone shaking my shoulder and excessively repeating my name over and over.
“Christine! Christine! CHRISTINE!” my mom kept nagging.
“That's my name, don't wear it out,” I mumbled, throwing an arm over my eyes.
“Oh, thank God, you're still alive.”
“I'm fine, mom, I just want to rest so can you leave me alone?”
“Okay, honey,” my mom said gently as she left the room, quietly shutting the door.
I let out a satisfied sigh, snuggling my face deeper into my pillow and turning on my side. Suddenly, an odd and familiar smell filled my nostrils and warm gusts of wind blew across my face. I slowly opened my eyes to find a sleeping Eric there, with his mouth wide open and drool collecting on the pillow.
I flinched backwards and my killer instincts kicked in. I slowly kicked the blankets off of my legs, steadied myself on the bed, lifted up my pillow high above my head, ready to strike. With my war/rage face on, I let out a battle cry and whacked Eric straight in the face with my pillow.
Eric let out a freakishly girlish scream as he sat up, hair disheveled and drool dripping from his face. I let out a groan of disgust and whacked him hard across the other side of his face.
The momentum of the pillow-to-the-face knocked him backwards and off the bed. He slumped into a tangle of arms and legs on the floor.
“WHAT THE FUCK WAS THAT FOR?!” he yelled, his voice muffled because his face was pressed against the floor.
“WHY ARE YOU IN MY BED?” I yelled back, picking up the pillow with his drool on it and tossing it next to him on the floor, gagging in disgust.
“I don't know, all I remember is blacking out and then I wake up to you smacking me in the face with a pillow. It stung like a bitch, and it isn't exactly a great way to wake up.” Eric sat up, rubbing his cheeks and groaning.
“Why did you black out in the first place?” I demanded.
“I don't do well around blood,” he admitted.
I could feel my shoulders slumping and my expression softening. This guy wasn't so bad after all.
“I'm sorry,” I apologized. “It's just that I'm not used waking up to a stranger in my bed.”
“It's alright,” he smiled, offering his hand to me. “I'm Eric.”
“I'm Christine,” I smiled back, shaking his hand. “It's nice to meet you.”
He stood up and dusted himself off, saying, “I have to go. It's almost dinnertime. Tell your parents I said thanks for taking care of me, will you?”
I shrugged. “Sure thing.”
As Eric walked towards the door, I remembered something and lifted up my pillow again, striking him square in the face again.
He stumbled backwards in surprise.
“What was THAT for?!” he exclaimed, holding his face with both of his hands.
“For not helping me up when my foot was in the floor,” I stated casually. “Now we're equal. BYEEEE!” I waved with a huge grin on my face.
Eric scoffed. “Bitch,” he muttered as he walked out the door.
Once he shut the door, I sat down on my bed and pondered the day's events. Sure, our meeting was a little weird, but I was hoping that Eric could be my first friend here in this foreign town.
He wasn't the type of friend I would usually make, but I was new here and I didn't have much of a choice. I'll just have to take what I can get.