Message In A Bottle

Feb 6

A few days had passed, yet people continued to discuss the possibility of Danielle crushing on Fred. The rumours were everywhere, because it was high school and high schoolers were notorious for being nosy and judgemental. Danielle, who had been subjected to rumours ever since she set foot in her middle school, pretended not to care. But there was no denying she was upset.

"I cannot believe people are still talking about Fred. Like, literally nobody has moved on from middle school," Danielle furiously ranted to Bree as they hung out in Danielle's room during the weekend (Bree liked going to Danielle's because Bree had less privacy back home due to her sisters). "I hate this. I hate everyone. I'm going to murder people."

"Amen," Bree said, not even knowing if she was being ironic or unironic.

Danielle buried her face with her hands. "A-and the worst thing is that they're right!" she shrieked. "I-I'm the one who still has a dumb crush on him! After all these years! And now everyone knows! This is just like middle school but not as bad because my skin's thicker now!"

"But they're being so cruel and wrong! They're dumbing you down to some tropey villain who's 'stealing' Fred away." Bree rolled her eyes as she made the air quotes. "Like hating on you, Fred's friend, will give them better chances of being together with him."

Danielle wrinkled her nose. "Eh. I don't think they want to get with Freddie because literally everybody knows about his feelings for Alex and just— just expect them to get together. It's more like— they don't like me. Because I'm supposedly selfish and immature and emotional and whatever. And they don't like that Fred Hayford, most popular guy in our year, is hanging out with me."

Bree huffed. "Typical jealousy. They're trying to make it like they're superior and somehow better. Like come on, we're all just stressed teenagers trying to survive."

Danielle groaned and flopped on her bed. "Ughhhh. This is just so aggravating. But I can't do anything too insane because then it'll be my problem too." Danielle then thought of something, and turned. "Bree, you're not going to do something insane on my behalf, right?"

Bree nonchalantly shrugged. "Hmm? What makes you think of that?"

"I dunno, just seems like something you would do."

Bree sighed. "Well, we'll see how it goes..."

-

When Monday came, the high school continued to watch the fiery drama with great interest. The principal character was of course Danielle Rowland, her cheeks as red as her hair, who was furious yet not very intimidating. Then there was Fred, who was trying so hard to get everybody to shut up, but everything he did just intensified the fire because people made fun of him defending Danielle. And of course there was Bree, the murder mystery novel writer; scathing, deathly calm, and unafraid. Unlike Danielle, people were actually scared of Bree, so Bree used that to defend Danielle.

But in the backstage, another character was lurking and plotting.

People remembered Fred. People remembered Bree. People also remembered the Bailey twins since they were all in the same friend group.

In the chaos, people forgot about Eugene.

Now, Eugene was usually not an impulsive person. He was good at keeping his emotions under lock and key. He claimed he could regulate his emotions, but what he really was doing was ignoring them until he couldn't anymore.

People knew Eugene as the guarded, studious kid who was on the basketball team despite his height. Eugene's classmates thought of him as polite with a hidden sarcastic edge. Eugene could be aloof and snippy, but he never really was angry. He seemed too... calm and collected for that.