𝐒𝐓𝐈𝐍𝐆 𝐅𝐈𝐑𝐒𝐓 | 𝘮𝘢𝘳𝘤𝘶𝘴 𝘣𝘢𝘬𝘦𝘳

𝐂𝐇𝐀𝐏𝐓𝐄𝐑 𝟏𝟗 | 𝐑𝐄𝐌𝐄𝐌𝐁𝐄𝐑 𝐋𝐎𝐔𝐈𝐒?

y/ns pov

Abby walked up to our table, conversation dying midway. She held chips in her hand from the cafeteria. Everyone looked at her, me giving her a small smile. She gave me one back, fiddling with the bag.

"Oh my God. Look who it is. Avoid eye contact, or she'll think we want her to sit with us."

"Oh my God. That's, like, so embarrassing."

"Ooh, gross. She's so disgusting. Oh God. She's coming over."

Abby smiled, sitting next to me. The conversation started again, Abby sharing her food with the rest of us.

"Maxie, Maxie, Mo-Maxie, Banana fans fo faxie, me, my, Mo-Maxie. Maxie." Brodie sat on the lunch table, posing for Max. Norah created space for Jordan, giving up her seat to plop down on his lap. "Beirut partner on Saturday. What was our team name again?" "Glitter Magic." "Hmm."

Max and Brodie did their handshake, grunting between
hand hits. "What? Who? What?"

They laughed, "Why are we like this?" "I don't know."

——————————————

Despite it being Ginny's birthday, a usually happy time of year, it was silent. The only sounds were the crunching of bacon, fruit and waffles. I wanted to say something but I had no one to talk to.

"You guys love breakfast for dinner."

"I'm not hungry." Austin mumbled. "Me either."

"I am." I took a big bite out of my third waffle, this one had chocolate sauce over it, in contrast to the honey I drizzled on the earlier ones.

"How was the big birthday in school? Anybody do anything fun?" Mom attempted to converse to Ginny.

She sighed, "Not really." "Really? Not even Hunter?"

Ah, so this was Mom's way of seeing if Ginny would tell her, meaning Mom already knew every little detail.

Ginny froze, the clinking of her plate and fork suddenly halting. Mom bit her waffle crunching loudly, "Mom! You know I hate it when you chew loudly."

Austin shot up, storming away. Mom and I looked a each other, startled. "He's nervous for school tomorrow." She reasoned. "It's his first day back since the incident."

"By incident, do you mean when he violently stabbed another student?"

"Stop acting like he's a villain. You're making him feel worse." I reached over to his plate taking his fruit, if I didn't take it, he would still give it to me. It was a thing we did, I take his fruit and he gets half of my bacon.

"Are you excited for tomorrow? Big birthday surprise." Mom tried to change the subject before we argued again.

Ginny sighed, "You know what? Why, Mom? Why can't you have a single real conversation? You act like nothing happened. You know what I want for my birthday? I want you to treat me like an adult." She was about to walk away but I stopped her.

"I'm tired of you. Ginny, you claim you want to be treated like an adult but when things don't go your way, you cry or throw a temper tantrum. You come for Mom, day after day, and she just sits there and takes it, so why are you so surprised when she doesn't tell you anything? If this is how you act when you don't know the truth, just imagine how you would act if you ever found out." I stood up taking my plate to my room, no matter how angry she made me, I wasn't going to leave my food. After closing my door, a slam echoed from Ginny's room.