CRUEL SUMMER - Olivia Rodrigo

one

She was the last person I wanted to see that morning. While I walked past her, I felt my eyes follow her even after I was down the hallway.

"Watch where you're going!" A voice snapped at me before I felt my books tumbling out of my hands. My face grew red with a look of undeniable embarrassment plastered across it.

My head snapped at the sound of a familiar laughter. "You had two weeks to prepare for this day," Riley says with a grin on his face. The kind where he thinks he knows everything there is to be told from what he just saw. "I thought you said you were over what happened in middle school, Marisa." His voice trails off, face now buried in his backpack as he searches for last night's homework.

"I am, Riley!" I argue with him even if there is no point in doing so. "I just didn't expect her to look so different, you know?" I look at her again but this time from behind the door of my own locker.

"Trust me I know!" I slam my locker shut and turn to face Riley. "But we're halfway through Sophomore year now. I'm over being jealous of Olivia Rodrigo."

"Are you positive?" Riley questions me, resulting in me giving him a confusing look followed by a nod. "Tell that to your clenched fist." His eyes looking down at my hands before walking swiftly past me.

"I'll see you after class, asshole!" I shook my head and yelled down the hall, receiving a few dirty looks from kids close to me.

I put my headphones in before making my way towards class. My peaceful morning was short lived once I arrived to Chemistry and saw the same girl, I found myself staring at this morning.

I kept my headphones in before sinking down in my assigned seat which someone happened to by next to her. It couldn't be that hard to ignore her.

"Marisa!" A voice flooded through my ears. "Is that you?" I looked over to see Olivia beaming at me with a smile.

"Yeah," 'I weakly smile back before taking my headphones out. "It's me." I quickly put it back in and open up and notebook to seem like I'm busy.

"How are you? How's Riley?" I hear her through my music again. Turns out it actually was harder to ignore her than I thought it would be.

"I'm good," I said, taking both headphones out as I did so. She furrowed her eyebrow and tilted her head waiting for me to answer the next part of her question. "Riley's good, too." I said it more like a question towards her.

"He's gotten kind of cute, right?" Olivia whispers to me almost as if it's something that no one else can know.

"No," I said quickly before shaking my head at her. "He's the same Riley he's always been." I gave her halfway dirty, halfway confused look before putting in my headphones and turning back to the blank notebook I was pretending to be interested in. I hear her muffled voice a couple more times but decide to ignore her.

I thought for a moment. Riley was just the same old Riley from every grade before this one, right? He looked the absolute same. Sure, he'd gotten taller and maybe his hair was nicer now that he didn't cut it short like he used too. He also had a better sense of style and finally got his braces off over the summer, but he was still the same old Riley. Right?

The bell rang and before I knew it, I was the only person left in the classroom besides Olivia who was talking to our teacher, Mr. Yosef, about the upcoming chemistry final. I scrambled to get my things and move to my second period.

"Ms. Carson," I heard our teachers voice as he stopped me just before I got out of the door. "You remember Olivia, right?" He asked me, resulting in a nod from me, followed by a smile from her.

Mr. Yosef smiled at the two of us, "Great," his voice smelled like coffee which I hated. "You can help her study for the chemistry final then?" I began to speak before the warning bell drowned me out. "I knew I could count on you, Marisa." I felt his hand pat my shoulder before shooing the two of us away.

"Listen," Olivia said while I walked in front of her in the hallway. "If you're busy or something I can ask someone else-" I cut her off before stopping at my locker.

"What, am I not good enough to tutor you?" My body tenses up after the questions escapes my mouth. I think about saying sorry, but she beats me to the next chance at speaking.

"No!" She argues with me. "Who said that? I never said that. When did I say that?" Her voice growing louder with every word she spoke.

"When you went all Hollywood on us, Olivia!" I turned around and faced her. I see her face go from confused to angry in less than a second before she swiftly turned around and walked away. A loud, stress filled sigh escaped my mouth

"Smooth, Marisa," Riley peeked at me from the side of his locker door. He was being so quiet I didn't even notice him before. "Real smooth." His locker slammed in the side of my ear before he stared at the side of my head until I finally gave in and looked towards him.

"What, Riley?" I shut my locker and gave him a quick glare; no way was he going to convince me that Olivia was somehow some total saint now. I can see in his eyes that's exactly what he wants to do, too. But there was no way I was going to let Riley convince me that she didn't deserve me snapping at her. 

"Can we please just, grow out of not liking Olivia anymore," His head turning back to me every couple of seconds as he scrambled to push his things into his bookbag. "It's childish and she's changed, Marisa." Riley's tone of voice stung me. He was rarely ever mad at me and when he was, he got over it fast. Something about this time was different though, he wasn't the same old Riley that would be over it by next period. He seemed genuinely mad at me for being rude to Olivia. 

I opened my mouth to defend what I said to her, but he beat me to it. "I don't want to argue about this." He shook his head while he walked away from his locker, naturally I followed him to make sure I could somehow sneak in the last word. 

"I don't want to argue about it, Riley!"  I yelled to his back as he worked through the crowd of people in the hallway that were also making their way to class. "Then why are you following me?" I heard his face calling back to me followed by him throwing his hands up like he just proved his point. Which he did. And I hated that. 

I was never the type to let drama get to me, especially stupid high school drama like this but something about Olivia Rodrigo got to me. I don't know if it was the way she talked perfectly, maybe the way her hair fell perfectly on her face, or it could be she's everything that I'm not. Whenever Olivia and I knew each other, she was the most popular girl in 8th grade and everyone in the school was dying to be friends with her. 

Somehow, she thought that I was cool enough to be graced by her presence but when she left, she didn't bother to talk to me at all, so I went into high school with only one friend, Riley, and right now it seemed like he wasn't really interested in being my friend either. No matter what my problem with Olivia was, I couldn't let her ruin my school year. I refused to let that happen.