Choices

Chapter 21

"Hey Julie!" I greet immediately I find her after going inside. I collect the brush from my bag and pass it to her.

"Oh you're done. I was kinda skeptical when Noah told me he was borrowing it to braid your hair. For a minute there, I thought he was joking."

"Well... He was damn serious." I pick up the tip of the braid and twirl it a little.

"Wow, it's actually pretty! Do you think he would do mine?"

"No."

She slowly smirks and says "is someone going to be a wittle jealous?"

"Shut up." Yes I was going to be.

"I can see it in your face even if you won't admit it!"

"So? So what if I'll be? You can do your hair yourself." I scoffed.

She laughs "Fine. Fine. I won't ask him. I don't want you to blow up with..."

"Hey guys." Nate interrupts.

Julie slowly stiffens at the voice and swiftly turns around the same time as me.

"Hi" we both mumble. The atmosphere was really awkward. It's never been this awkward between us. Since we became friends, years ago we'd never really had a big fight.

Except you could count the time when Nate ate her cupcakes that her crush got her in 9th grade. She had it bad, was talking about marriage and happily ever afters. He'd gotten her a box of cupcakes for Valentine's day. Julie was giddy, planning to go home and savour them.

But, she had left her bag with me to go to the bathroom. Some girl, Marcy had come to start up a conversation with me and I got distracted. I only realized what was happening when Julie screeched upon her return. I turned to find Nate with his mouth full of cupcakes.

At that point, Julie was inconsolable, claiming that this was a stroke of bad luck and that it meant their future relationship was doomed. Nate explained that he thought Julie's mum made if for us as she always did before and he was really hungry.

She had refused to talk to Nate for almost two weeks, until he got her an apology gift and I convinced her to forgive him. We had squabbles since then, but then every friendship had them. I realized that it was better to hatch things out as friends than pretend nothing was wrong, because after everything gets settled, the friendship gets stronger.

Right now, you could see that Nate was really nervous. He opened his mouth, closed it and opened it again.

"Umm.... Can we talk?"

"No." Julie said moodily and turned around to leave.

"What you did yesterday was not cool Nate." I added and also turned to leave. Once I got home yesterday, I realized that Nate didn't have to be that harsh. He could have explained nicely even though he wasn't ready to tell us what was going on. So I was mad.

He caught my hand "come on guys. I'm really sorry."

He quickly reached into his bag and brought out big cupcakes. He waved it in front of Julie "I brought cupcakes."

Julie tried to maintain her ground but her eyes peeked with interest "chocolate?" Once a foodie, always a foodie.

"Yes." He then directed his look at me "Hannah? Please?"

Ugh. How could I resist that face? "Fine. We'll talk."

Jule's tongue darted out of her mouth, her gaze rapt on the cupcakes "well, I did tell you I'll listen if you brought them."