London's Guard Is Falling Down

𝐒𝐎𝐑𝐑𝐘 𝐍𝐎𝐓 𝐒𝐎𝐑𝐑𝐘

[𝐏𝐀𝐑𝐈𝐒]

"𝐌𝐘 𝐏𝐎𝐎𝐑 𝐁𝐀𝐁𝐘. 𝐏𝐀𝐑𝐈𝐒, 𝐈'𝐌 𝐒𝐎 𝐒𝐎𝐑𝐑𝐘 𝐓𝐇𝐀𝐓
happened to you."

  "Mommy, drive slower," I whined. Mom's fast driving made me feel like throwing up again.

  "When we get home I'll make you some soup. I told Dad, and he said he'll buy some saltines from Quickcheck on the way home."

  "'Kay." I felt terrible, inside and out.

  When I would feel guilty (which was a rare feeling) I'd just throw up. That was part of how I would show my remorse. I felt guilty for what I did to London, hence the throw-up by the auditorium.

  I could just apologize, but my childish side thought that that'd be weak of me. I planned to try to apologize to London when he came home after school, though.

  Up until he came home I stayed in my bed, on my phone. I heard when he came in, my mom was out when he did, running a quick errand.

  "London," I called when I heard his footsteps on the stairs. I then heard a sigh followed by footsteps coming toward my room. He appeared at my door with a tired look on his face, paper in one hand.

  "I got your homework," he announced walking toward my bed and setting it there. He then sat on the edge of my bed.

  He stared me dead in the eye. I knew I had to
make this quick.

  "At the end of the day, my comment in biology was a joke. I didn't mean for Ms. Noreen to search your bag or anything like that. And by the way, I got in trouble, too, so I guess we're even."

  He chuckled once and raised his eyebrows. "Even? You think we're even?"

  "Yeah." I nodded once dramatically.

  "Uh-huh, okay, Paris." He stood up me headed for the door.

  "Wait, you're not going to accept my apology?"

  "What apology? You didn't apologize."

  "Well, can you at least pretend that I did because I have a really hard time saying I'm sorry?"

  He scoffed and stalked out of my room. I heard his door shut.

  All of sudden, my guilt went away, and I immediately was angry with myself for ever feeling guilty for what I did to him. At least I knew not to make that mistake again.

[𝐋𝐎𝐍𝐃𝐎𝐍]

𝐏𝐀𝐑𝐈𝐒 𝐖𝐀𝐒 𝐒𝐓𝐔𝐂𝐊-𝐔𝐏 𝐀𝐍𝐃 𝐂𝐎𝐍𝐂𝐄𝐈𝐓𝐄𝐃 𝐀𝐍𝐃 𝐈
was tired of her. It's really hard to ignore someone you're living with. It was especially hard to ignore Paris even though she began to pretend I wasn't there in an adversarial way.

  I was fine with her ignoring me, but she didn't have to be so passive-aggressive with it.

  I made a friend at school, her name was Kristen. She invited me to sit with her at lunch during my third week of school.

  We sat in the corner of the cafeteria, at the end of a long rectangular table.

  "So why are you staying with the Havens?" Kristen asked.

  "It's personal," I told her.

  "Oh, my bad then," she muttered.

I turned my attention to the cafeteria entrance, Sean walked in, looking around. I waved for him to come over when he spotted me.

"You invited Sean to come sit with us?" Kristen questioned with her eyebrows raised.

  "Mm-hm, why?"

  She looked away and cleared her throat. "No reason."

  Sean came and sat down next to Kristen.

  "I see you made a friend, proud of ya, buddy," he said and dapped me up. He looked at Kristen who was ignoring him and then back at me, mouthing 'What's her name?'

  Sean told me he's always kind of been in a clique so he's never really gotten a chance to know students who were "socially irrelevant " (his words).

  I don't think Sean meant for his comment to sound insensitive, but that's how it came off to me.

  "Sean, this is Kristen. Kristen, this is Sean," I introduced.

  Kristen finally looked up at me. "I know who he is,"  she hissed. I put my hands up in mock surrender at the sudden fierceness from her.

  Sean kept snapping his fingers, closing his eyes.

  "Oh shoot, I forgot, we went to the same middle school. Yeah, I know her." That made Kristen roll her eyes. "You look so different now. You have a septum piercing, half your hair's green. Damn." He gazed at her and shook his head slowly. "You still short as hell, though."

  I laughed, Kristen was irritated.

  After school, I waited in the parking lot for Paris. My last class of the day was AP Literature, which was on the third floor. I knew Paris' last class was Spanish, which was on the first floor. That pissed me off because I didn't like waiting for her when she was close to the school's exit door.

  School ended at two-thirty. Unless she was dying, having a heart attack, or was surprised with her regular monthly girl troubles; there was no reason why it should've taken Paris a long time to come out of the building.

  Paris finally came out with Darion, whose arm was around her shoulder. The two weren't walking fast enough and I wanted to go home, so that irritated me even more.

  When she was finally close to me that I didn't have to yell, I told her, "Paris, it shouldn't take you that long to come out of the building. School ended a half-hour ago. It's really pissing me off that I have to wait for you."

  Paris frowned and furrowed her eyebrows. "So what do you want me to do, London?" she snapped and crossed her arms stubbornly.

  "I'd appreciate it if you'd stop lallygagging in the hallways and just come out of school on time."

  "Okay, well then I'm sorry I socialize with people before I leave. Okay? I'm sorry I have friends to talk to and you don't?" Her voice was elevated.

  "It's really not that serious," Darion chimed in. His yet again insignificant comment was aimed toward me. "You're way out of line."

  "I wasn't talking to you," I retorted.

  "Okay, but I made a comment anyways," he countered.

  "Yes, and it was insignificant." I looked back at Paris who was frustrated

  "Are you ready to go?" she asked.

  "I've been ready since two-thirty. Are you ready?"

  "Yeah, I'm ready."

  "Okay then," I concluded.