Dear Vampire

CHAPTER 4: REPUTATION RUINATION

From then on, she avoided the woman in green. As the head waitress she dishes out responsibilities with the flick of her hand or rearranges them if she wanted to or needed to. And in this situation? Oh, she needed to. With someone else, someone that wasn't her anyway, handling her, her morning pretty much went along without a hassle, and with her handling some of the other customers, the second horde of customers packing the place, she didn't notice and if she did, she was more than thankful for it.

But it would only be later would it occur to her how thankful she should have been to have had that hour of peace.

When she looked at the time, when she made the unconscious decision to check the time because she felt there was something wrong, or at least not right, she just had to close her eyes, hoping, thinking against all the odds that pointed to what was right in front of her, that the clock was wrong, that it had been set back an hour or two or something, however the moment she reopened her eyes, she felt the world was spinning around her as if she were hallucinating. How had the time gone by so fast? She should have been watching the time, she should have been paying attention, why wasn't she taking note of-

Enough, it's not going to change the fact that I'm late.

She rushes to the changing room, swipes her work clothes for her university ones, the ones she had packed in her bag for when the time came to leave for school, but now it is more than obvious that that was long overdue. She grimaced at the realization as she pulled her top on and cussed as she hopped about trying to get her leg into her trousers. She walked out, bag slung over her careless shoulder, looking frazzled, eyes raking everywhere for Fran-they always went to school together-hair mirroring a bird's nest as if she'd slept in a barn, heartbeat beating at a rapid rate, panicked the more she stood there looking her best friend. She asked one of the other waitresses that had deigned to come to work an hour late-she would scold them for that later-were Fran was if that they'd indeed seen her anywhere.

"I think I saw her go to the back," the one she asked said, then paused, scrunched her nose in thoughtful confusion, "or maybe the front? I'm not so sure."

The tramp! How could she leave me, knowing we always go to school together?

It was obvious the waitress was confused. Nevertheless, she thanked the waitress, thinking of what to do to her best friend once she got her hands on her, annoyed and maybe a little bit feeling left behind, twisted around on her feet, walked over, wrenched the door open with all the might she had, burst out of the diner-

-and searched around, hoping she wasn't left behind, especially on the first day back to school-she was never late to school and she didn't want to start now-panicked, about to go back inside when she heard something that sounded like her laughter so whipped round to catch sight of the source of the sound-

Her eyes, a dark shade of brown it almost could be likened to something as black as tar, matched off with her best friend's, crossing her arms above her chest with a serious expression and a grim mouth, bringing the laughter to a halt, levelling her with a hard stare. "You left me," was all she said, fearful that if she said more, there would be words she could not take back.

Fran had caught on to the mood of the situation. "Can I just say it was a joke and that I'm super sorry so you forgive me? I don't like when you're mad at me," She whispered the last part, sounding remorseful. Fran even looked down at the floor instead of at Juniper.

She sighed, anger simmering down and rubbed her forehead, stressed beyond belief. She didn't like seeing her best friend upset. If she really did think about it, was it a big deal? People left places unannounced, even with the people they had come with, some being family member, some being friends.