the apple of my eye

Chapter 2- apple

"La la la la laaaa" I sing gracefully to the birds awaiting me at my window. "Are you guys listening or what" I giggle, watching them bob their little heads up and down. Sometimes I wish I was a bird so I could just fly away from all my problems into the sky and never come back. Unfortunately that will never happen..

Now you see, the thing about me is, I always seem happy. For as long as I remember  I've been the 'Cheerful glass half full friend' but that's not exactly true. Well I guess it is, my persona isn't entirely false, I am a positive person, it's just.. maybe a hide my true feelings a little too well. If my whole life were a masquerade party, I'd have the best mask.

"You guys understand me though, right?" I whisper to the birds and it seems they sing right back to me. Suddenly my door swings right open, raven queen runs into the room and  flings herself on to her bed. I immediately rush over to her, as she has her arms wrapped around her face and is obviously upset. "Raven what's wrong?" She glances at me and I can see the sadness etched into her eyes.

"Nothing." She says,"forget it."
"No." I say looking into ravens deep brown eyes " My best friend is obviously upset, I'm not just gonna forget it" ravens eyes soften up a bit and this and a ghost of a smile appears at her lips "alright well it's nothing that important - I just failed history of fairytales."
"Oh" I think, is that it? I've known raven for a long time now and she's never given a fuck
About failing lessons before. It has got to be more than that, but I let it go. Whatever it is she clearly doesn't want me to know about it. I shake my head trying to get to the bottom of why that affects my so bad. Oh well.

Little does she know that Apple is upset about not being with her hahaha 😭

"Oh noo ray" "I'm sorry, hopefully you can convince your teacher to change your grade"
"Hopefully," she replies, her eyes glistening with tears. "Although I'm probs gonna need you for that one Apple, I'm not the best at convincing teachers to do things for me."

true, I think, back to one of our earlier days of friendship at ever after high when she tried to convince a teacher to switch seats to sit next to me and ended up with a detention, nice one Raven. "I'll see what I can do" I say smiling, and I place my hand on her soft dark brown and purple hair, gently stroking it. I'm not sure if I imagined it or not but I feel like for a second Ravens breath hitched when I stroked her hair. Yep, probably my imagination.

This sweet moment of our friendship however, is suddenly interrupted by my annoying phone alarm going off like a fire alarm at school.
"Oh goodness" I mutter letting go off ravens hair and rushing to my phone. Only to see the person calling is no other than my mother.

Remember the whole hiding my problems thing I was taking about earlier, well here is the sole reason that I do that. My mother. Although many people say I'm lucky to have my mother being the literal queen of our kingdom, I beg to differ. If she wasn't out doing royal duty's when I was little, she was manipulating me and turning me against my own freinds at home.

I always had to be the best. ME, ME, ME. Well, what good has that got me now. A selfish ego and a love for arguments and competition (although I try my best to hide it) whatever, I think, what can she do to me now that I'm far away in Ever After. Reluctantly I answer the phone whilst rolling my eyes at raven and mouthing "it's my mother" Raven laughs and moths back "oh god"

"Hello mother" I call trying to sound as cheerful as possible. "oh my darling Apple" my mother swoons over me, her voice a fake bittersweet tone. Well, I think, she's not convincing me - I know that truly, her voice is as sharp as ice. "so?" I ask,
"so" she replies, pausing, "I've heard from Headmaster Grim about your grades.."

Oh. "w-what have you heard" I stumble on my words, looking down at my feet. "darling don't act like you don't know"
"No really mother, I have no idea what you are taking about" Mothers voice suddenly cuts into that sharp voice I know all too well. "Apple, Mr Grim informed me that your grades have been slipping rapidly. "I don't know if you are aware of this but I am extremely disappointed."

my heart freezes as I hang on to those lasts words 'I am extremely disappointed' as much as my mother gets on my nerves, the last thing I would ever want to do is disappoint her. I mean, can't she see that I'm trying my hardest?
Yes maybe my grades have slipped a bit in the past pew months but that's mainly because I find myself acctualy enjoying school now that I have friends like Raven and Briar.

Mother breaks my thoughts as she continues now back to her sickly sweet tone "look darling you know I just want the best for you" "and let's be honest, your never going to be queen if you don't get the right grades" I stutter, trying to think of a way to confront her, tell her that I'm trying my best. Yet somehow I stay quiet, tears welling in my eyes and threatening to spill onto my cheeks.

"okay mother, I'll be better I promise" and with that I end the call and flop, hopelessly, on the bed. "Okay, what?" Raven asks shifting her position so she's sitting opposite me. I try to speak but before I can say anything tears fall down my face like a waterfall. This time it's Raven that comforts me - she wraps her arms around me, pulling me in for a big hug. I cry into her shoulder, thankfull for having such an amazing best friend. "It's ok, it's ok" Raven whispers, soothing me. I feel thankful knowing I can tell her anytime I want and she'll listen, she always does.

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A/N - ok so... it's been a hot minute since I posted the last chapter, sorry. I kinda gave up because I thought the last chapter sucked 😭 I feel like this one's better tho and also a bit longer. Lmk if your enjoying this so far or not lmao. byee