Life, Love & A Little Coffee

Chapter Forty-Two: Showdown

"Well, aren't you a little sexy pants this morning," Britt sang out as she skipped to Ada's side in the hallway.

Ada double-checked the shade of her yellow dress, then looked at Britt's blouse. Her eyes traveled downward at Britt's red pants, then looked at her own short-sleeved red cardigan. "We seriously look like we color coordinated today." They even both had tan cowboy boots on, Ada's most expensive purchase on her shopping spree. "We look crazy."

"Crazy awesome," Britt replied with a smile. "Speaking of crazy, since it's the weekend of graduation, I don't have to go to my grandma's."

"Also speaking of crazy and grandma's, mine found out about a certain guy this morning." Ada didn't dare use his name, not for anything having to do with a relationship.

"Something tells me she didn't take it well."

"I think she's gonna go old school southern and put a bounty on his head. Should make my surprise graduation party interesting."

"Our surprise party," Britt corrected to Ada's surprise. "Since you insist on taking all the fun out of it. With us both being social rejects now, our parents combined our parties. Bigger numbers to make us seem less pathetic, I guess."

Ada's numbers would have been crappy either way. She was always a social reject and only appeared popular because of Britt. If the rumor never existed, Ada knew how her party would have gone. Britt would have shown up about halfway through, bringing her posse with her. They would've stayed for about a half an hour until her former other best friend, Rayna, complained about being bored and talked Britt into leaving early to go to a party where they could drink.

Rayna was the only one of Britt's friends that legit hated Ada. She never showed it in front of Britt, but made it clear throughout the last few years that Ada would always been an outsider and unwelcome in their group. She'd made plenty of jabs about Ada's weight freshman year and when sophomore year came and she'd lost a little weight, Rayna kicked the comments into top gear.

Although Ada was always fine with her hidden 'reject' status, it was hard not to feel bad for Britt. "Do you miss your friends?"

"You're my friend," Britt responded before she turned to stand in front of Ada. "If those other people were my friends, they wouldn't have turned on either of us. So if that's who they are, hell no I don't miss them."

Ada took a heavy breath before nodding. The next breath she took caught in her throat when she spotted who was on her way toward them, a forced smile painted on her perfect face and a yearbook held against her chest.

"Fuck me," Ada muttered.

"Huh?" Britt turned around to see Rayna just ahead. As soon as they locked eyes, Britt straightened her posture and crossed her arms, placing a subtle sneer on her face. "What the hell does that twat want?"

"Probably wants to look like less of a bitch so she can go out on a high note," Ada guessed.

"Hey, guys! I'm so happy I ran into you." Rayna held out her yearbook with one hand and flipped her black hair with the other. "I was hoping you'd both sign my yearbook. I feel so shitty with how things ended with all of us and want to make up now that school's over."

It was complete bullshit.

Since Tom's lecture on Monday, people had been talking. More than that, they'd been apologizing to those they'd hurt over the years and others were confronting their bullies head-on. Tom created something remarkable out of what he said on Monday. It actually made Ada's final week feel like it did before.

Ada grabbed a pen from her book bag and took the yearbook from Rayna's grasp with a smile. She flipped toward the end, noticing she didn't have as many messages, around half of what Ada had collected throughout the week. Her smile became genuine seeing that, albeit in a twisted, self-satisfying way.