The War Between Us : Chapter 6

Chapter 6:

Cindy, is it true? The rumors? – O.L.

What rumors?

You know. The one about you pushing two cockroaches down Quinto’s neck and you being expelled for it?

I sigh. Seriously, this was getting out of hand. I’ve been away in the principal’s office for only one hour – and the rumors have already spread far and wide.
And not only that, most of them are outrageously untrue.

Olivie quickly jots down something else on the crumpled piece of paper.

Well? Tell me!

It’s my first French period in this school and I’m not paying the least bit of attention to it.
It’s all somebody else’s fault again, of course.
Like how I was blamed for the frog incident, when it was Mark Wilcox’s fault.
Now, it’s Olivie Lavigne’s fault that I may not be able to keep up with French for the rest of the term.

We shouldn’t be passing notes at all.
We should be listening.

But I reply anyway.

It’s nothing. I’ll tell you the whole story later. I’m just suspended – not expelled or anything ridiculous like that.

Olivie grabs the note – and I’m afraid Mrs. Sanders will look around, but she doesn’t.
Olivie’s sitting beside me, so passing each other notes isn’t hard at all.

She passes me a shocked look as she quickly scribbles down something underneath what I wrote.

She pushes the paper towards me and I read what she has written.

I can’t believe it. You’re probably the first student in the history of all schools to be suspended on the first day itself. OMG - What will your ‘rents say?

I glance at her, hesitantly.
I’m not sure whether I should tell her the truth – or just let it pass.

The truth?
Well, I don’t have parents.
I only have a singular of that word: a parent.
My Mom.

My father left Mom when I was just a baby.
I can’t even remember it, so I don’t really mind much, that I don’t have a father.
But Mom has always taught me to not let my feelings get away with me and cloud my brain.
My Mom’s a Y-chromosome opposer, ever since Dad left her – so, it explains why she always advises me to be in control of myself all the time – and not fall head long into that ‘thing’ people call ‘love’.

She always tells me that boys mean trouble.
And I listen to her. Because, you know – my Mom is always going to be there for me, whenever I need her.
But boys… boys won’t. They’ll just dump you – when they spot some better looking girl or they think you’re a bad kisser or they lose interest in loving you or some other stupid reason like that.

I know all this… because I’ve seen it happening. To many other girls.

I’m glad it won’t ever happen to me, though.
I think I have enough will power in me that I will not fall in ‘love’.
Not until college, anyways.

But- wait- I digress.

As I quickly make up my mind, I scrawl down:

I don’t have a Dad. And, Mom – well, she’d kill me – that’s for sure.

At least she might believe me.

Olivie’s eyes widen and she writes something back to me.

Oh, sorry. Didn’t know.

I smile at her.

It’s okay.

I don’t know why people say sorry, every time I mention the fact that I don’t have a father.
It’s really not their fault.
Why say sorry?

It’s not like Olivie Lavigne could have done anything to stop my Dad from leaving us.
Heck- she wasn’t even born at that time!

I smile again at her – and then a snarling, hiss of a voice spits out behind me.

“Lesbians!”

I twist myself around to look at the foul-mouthed speaker – and knowing my luck, I saw someone I totally don’t want to meet right now.

Candice Quinto.