You're My Nicotine

"What's wrong?" Joshi asked October as the two of them entered St. Michael High the next morning, noticing her sour expression, "Your plan worked!"

"Ethan," she replied miserably, "I keep seeing his face when he tried to kiss me... I didn't mean to lead him on."

"That is kind of a cringe fest," he agreed, "What are you going to do?"

"I don't know," she sighed and groaned, "If only Frank would have called me, none of this would have happened!"

Everything seemed to be getting worse, October realised, as she found Ethan at lunch and wanted to talk to him.

"Hey, Ethan," she called as she paced down the stairs to follow him. When they got to the bottom and he hadn't turned round, she frowned. "Is everything okay?"

"I hope your 'elastic band' theory worked," he said simply, still not looking at her.

Realisation crossed October's face as she walked beside him. "What?" she exhaled.

"Hazel told Ben you only went out with me to make Frank jealous."

"Oh Jesus," she whispered to herself, shutting her eyes in shame.

"You're a heartless user," Ethan said, anger building in his eyes, "What you did... that's just shit." He finally looked at her, but it was more of a glare.

"Ethan," October panicked, "I'm really sorry, I-"

"I really thought you liked me," he cut her off and shook his head at her in disgust, "But all this time you were trying to get to my cousin."

"Ethan," she whispered, pleading desperately, but he didn't want to know and raced off in another direction, leaving her in the school hall, hating herself.

During Gym after lunch, Joshi began warming up with the rest of the boys in his class, and watched from the soccer court outside as Hazel tried to speak to October in the basketball court next to him.

"I told you I'm sorry," Hazel offered, girls moving all around in the basketball game.

"I'm going to be known as the biggest bitch in history because of you and your big mouth," October replied angrily.

"I didnt mean to tell Ben! I was just saying how much you really liked Frank and it just came out..."

"Ethan thinks I'm a heartless user, he's gonna tell everyone and Frank will hate me forever." She caught the ball that was thrown at her, and jogged a few steps before passing it on and turning back to Hazel. "If you weren't so loved up with cabage boy, you would have thought about that before opening your fat trap."

"Oh just stop being so jealous, October," Hazel said.

She recieved the ball again and passed it on. "Jealous?" she mused, "Of what? Of Ben?" She snickered lightly, "He's not even good enough for you, Hazel."

The black haired girl's jaw dropped and Joshi found this as a que to run over, not caring about soccer, and attempting to stop the fight that he was sure would break out any second.

"Do you seriously want to spend the rest of your life picking out cabages?" October questionned as the whistle blew after a goal had been scored, "At least Frank has bigger goals."

"Well at least Ben loves me, Frank's not even bothered about speaking to you!" Hazel shot back and caught the ball, chucking it onto another girl of her team.

"Well he would have if you hadn't put your big foot in it!" she fired in return.

"Hey, girls, come on!" Joshi cut in, stopping in between the two, "We can all be civil about this."

"Civil?" October repeated, "Right, she's being real civil when she went behind my back yet again."

"Hey, if I hadn't last time you could have ended up dead!" Hazel pointed out.

"Oh, boo-fucking-hoo! Save the tragic play, drama queen."

"Hazel's right, October," Joshi spoke up as Hazel exhaled a breath in disbelief, "You may not have been here if it wasn't for her... If it wasn't for both of us."

"Oh yeah, 'cause you were behind it aswell, Josh, weren't you," October said, "I bet you were in this, too, I bet you both hoped Ethan would find out."

"You're talking such bullshit!" Hazel cried.

"Oh really? You never wanted me to get Frank, Hazel, did you? You wanted to be the one with the oh-so-great boyfriend."

"No, its all your own fault, October. You scared Frank away with all your scheming and pretending... And you said Hollywood was fake..."

October glared at her bitterly. "Don't think I'm gonna be talking to you after this," she told her.

"Good!" Hazel retorted, "Maybe it'll open up your pretty green eyes and show you that you're not living in a fantasy world." She watched as October's eyes flared lividly, and carried on, "Frank and you can never happen, it's just a dream. Deal with it and grow the fuck up."

Before she knew it, October had lunged at Hazel, tackling her to the ground. Joshi tried his best to pull her off, and achieved his goal, but as Hazel got back to her feet, October kicked her straight in the shin.

"Ow!" screamed Hazel, falling down into a crouch position with her hand over her throbbing leg.

"October Armstrong," spat the Gym teacher, "Principal's office NOW!"

October looked up at the teacher, realising that she and the rest of the girls had surrounded them, and they were all staring at her, wide-eyed. She glanced down at Hazel on the ground and Hazel merely looked back, more shot daggers at her. October just scowled and walked off the court.

As her punishment, the principal made October clean garbage around the entire school grounds instead of being in last period. To make things worse, it was absolutely pouring down with rain, and only made her curse the skies because it chose to open up on what was supposed to be a Summer's day.

So there October was, having now reached the lawn at the front of the school, standing on the grass with a black trash bag and 'pokey' stick to pick up the garbage, wearing a green rain mack the principal had given her.

The last few students were walking into the school building for last period and October spotted Joshi helping Hazel limp into the side entrance. She clenched her teeth and stuck the 'pokey' stick into a Pepsi can harshly, putting it into the black bag.

"You've really pissed off a lot of people..."

October turned at Frank's voice to see him standing there in front of her, on the front lawn of the school, soaked, with drops of water falling from the top of his hood down onto his face.

After days of not speaking, he chose to come to the school?

"Ethan's pretty cut up," he said, "He's my cousin, October."

"I didn't mean to use him," she replied truthfully, thunder sounding in the distance, and then she frowned, "You never called me when you said you would."

Frank looked away and then back at her. "I had to think really badly, I know..." he spoke, "But I wasn't sure I wanted to start something I didn't know could carry on... I didn't want to hurt anybody's feelings."

October fiddled with the stick and asked, "So, you were thinking that maybe we could be together... and then you were gonna call me?"

"Yeah," he nodded simply.

Her lips broke into a small smile, thinking that maybe she had just achieved what she had hoped.

"And then I saw you with Ethan at the show..." he continued, "I can't say I was chuffed."

October's eyes fell down to her feet, the smile still playing across her lips, her plan had worked. Frank watched her for a moment, before speaking again.

"But it's different now," he told her, shattering her hopes and causing her to frown up at him. "Why did you tell Hazel that Ben wasn't good enough for her?"

Her mouth opened and closed like a goldfish. "I didnt mean that... W-we were just fighting-"

"Does that mean Ethan isn't good enough for you either?" Frank questionned, "As we're related, does that mean I'm not good enough for you?"

"No!" October cried, shaking her head, "Of course not-"

"Because I thought you were different than that, October... but you're not."

The rain started to ease up a little, but still dulled the mood. The sky was full of thick white/grey cloud. There wasn't a bird in sight, just water... and lots of it.

"You're just a kid," Frank announced, "You only think about yourself."

His words hit October like a truck, and her heart smashed to pieces as she watched him walk away from her.