So she's going to live with us?

Chapter 9

Amy

It was Friday afternoon and Amy was praising every god she knew that she made it to the weekend.

School wasn't particularly bad but some of her teachers had started giving the students practice tests for finals already even though they were a couple months away.

"Thank God it's Friday," Alissa sighed as she slumped against the locker next to the one Amy was pulling books out of.

"You can say that again," Amy smiled as she shut her locker door and turned to her friend.

"So, you ready to go?" Alissa asked. Alissa had her blonde hair out and cascading down to her shoulders.

"Yep." Amy answered. She fixed her orange backpack on her shoulder and walked with Alissa out of the building. She almost forgot to text Jude to let him know that Alissa would give her a lift home but she remembered in the nick of time.

The both of them shifted into Alissa's cream Mini Cooper and drove to the Adams' house.

Amy saw Alissa and she noticed how pale and anxious she looked. She was clutching the steering wheel with both hands and sitting straight up staring at the road ahead.

"Are you okay?" Amy asked, beginning to feel worried for her friend.

Alissa blinked and was woken from her unresponsive state. "Yeah, I'm fine I'm just... I haven't been to the Adams' in a while and I'm..."

"Nervous?" Amy supplied.

"Yes you could say that." Alissa nodded.

"Don't worry, Malory said you're always welcome at the house and Charlie says she misses you."

Alissa smiled at that news but didn't remove her view from the road. "It's more Jude I'm worried about."

"Well I haven't had a serious breakup nor have I had a serious boyfriend but you guys seriously need to have a talk or something." Amy said. She still didn't know exactly what happened between Alissa and Jude and she assumed that a little hostility was common after a breakup but the way Alissa talked about him after they broke up, like he was Professor Umbridge, was a bit unnatural. Talking about your ex like he was Voldemort was acceptable but talking about your ex like he was Umbridge displayed immense hatred. The weird thing was, Amy didn't understand how Alissa could hate Jude. He was so kind, sweet, polite. What did Jude do?

"Yeah, like I wanna talk to that jerk," Alissa scoffed "I'll just ignore him or pray I don't run into him."

"This hatred you have for him is unhealthy," Amy said looking out the passenger window so she couldn't see her friend's glare. She could still feel it, though.

"It's perfectly healthy, my 'Jude dartboard' is a great stress relief."

"He must have really broken your heart," Amy said and looked at her friend. That was when she noticed Alissa's strong front crumble a bit. She admired Alissa's ability to hide her true emotions. That was just Alissa's personality. She was strong, independent, caring, but at the moment Amy could see through Alissa's layer of confidence right to her true emotion; hurt.

"It's like my heart is made of iron fragments and he was the magnet pulling them together," Alissa whispered with an impassive expression. "Great," she laughed with mirth absent. "Now I sound like some crappy Disney movie."

"Hey, don't diss Disney!" Amy laughed trying to lighten the moon.

"My apologies, I forgot you had a creepy obsession with those movies." Alissa chuckled letting her shoulders relax and allowing her posture to be less rigid. Amy was glad that her friend was calming down.