7 Days of Camp

54

•Rosie's POV•

I was surprised to see Alex walking towards me, but then realized I didn't really want to see him. He was Hunter's best friend, and Hunter...well I didn't want to think about him.

I started to walk away, but Alex called out, "Rosie, wait!"

I took a deep breath, wondering if it was worth it to turn around. Then finally, I faced him. "What?"

"Can I talk to you?"

"Depends. Are you gonna tell me how stupid I am? Or how Hunter likes somebody else?" I replied defensively.

"What? Um. That's not what I was going for. I just wanted to know why you were so upset," he explained. "Your sister-she's on my team-came up to me and told me you were crying the other day. And I just wanted to make sure you were okay."

"Well, I'm not."

"Do you want to talk about it?" he asked gently.

"Not particularly, no."

"Can you at least tell me why you were so upset?"

I heaved a sigh, wondering if I should tell him. He would probably just be mad at me, like everyone else.

Finally, I decided to tell him something different. "I miss my dad."

"Is he overseas or something?"

"Or something."

"Oh." A look of realization crossed his face, and he frowned. "Oh, Rosie, I'm so sorry."

"Yeah. He died two years ago."

"That's...terrible. Wow."

"Yeah. So that's why I stopped coming to camp. We had to move."

"Oh, I was wondering where you went. You never said anything about it to me."

"Because you were always that loser who thought social media was stupid," I teased.

He laughed, lightening the mood. "Oh, right."

"Yeah, it was just...really hard. And no one talked to me. I got bullied a lot, too. So when I found out you and Hunter were here, I got really excited because I thought I might finally have a friend."

"You do. I mean, we are friends," he said sincerely.

"I thought so. But then Kailen-"

"You mean Kaila?"

"Yeah, her. Then she told me Hunter didn't like me. That he liked her. And that I was ruining her life."

"Whoa, really? That doesn't sound like Kaila at all."

"Well, she said it. And just like that, I was broken. All over again."

"Wow... Rosie, I'm so sorry. I'm sure Kaila didn't mean anything by it."

I glared at him. "Of course. You just have to defend her."

"I'm not trying to. I'm just saying, Kaila's a really sweet person. Maybe she was just having a bad day."

"Well, whatever it was, it really hurt my feelings."

"I'm sorry. Do you want me to talk to her?" he offered.

"No, that's okay. I don't want to cause any trouble."

"You sure?"

"I'm sure."

"Okay. Well, I better go. The games are about to start. You coming?"

"Yeah, I guess." So we went.