Maraschino 🍒 (gxg)

7

Any residual anger Chelsea felt towards Manny melted away by Wednesday. It was better to bite the proverbial bullet and keep Carlie as a friend -- since everyone else wasn't so welcoming -- and Manny a distant acquaintance. She came to terms with Manny's apology and accepted it, much to Carlie's enthusiasm.

"See, I knew you'd come around," she'd said when Chelsea mentioned that she was over the whole situation. Chelsea just rolled her eyes in the other direction.

Now she was sitting in her first period history class, watching her classmates work on their project. The teacher assigned them to groups -- three people to a project -- to work on a study, something about past presidents and how the Declaration of Independence would be written if it was created today. Chelsea wasn't really paying attention; her motive to study her ass off and get out of here relatively unscathed lasted a whole two days before she was bored.

Chelsea was working on her side of the project, barely partaking in talking to her own group, when she heard her name among unintelligible whispers behind her. She paused, listening for a moment, before hearing her name again, along with "new" and "quiet." She just ignored the talking. If she had the ability to block out their conversation, she would.

The whispering ceased, and a second later Chelsea felt another presence in the empty seat next to her. She looked over slowly. There was a girl -- medium length sandy hair with bangs, tanned skin, button-up shirt opened one button too much -- leaning on the desk, her head propped on her fist as she stared at Chelsea.

Chelsea took a subconscious scoot away from the girl. Her staring was creeping her out. "Can I help you?"

"You're the new girl? What's your name?"

This wasn't the first time someone asked her if she was the "new girl."

I guess starting the school year at the end of September wasn't as inconspicuous as I'd hoped.

"Uh, yeah. My name is Chelsea."

The girl smirked. "Cool. I'm Paige." She extended her hand, and Chelsea grabbed it out of politeness. She didn't have any idea why a random student she hadn't even looked at before was introducing herself and being friendly. Despite wanting to not talk to anyone and be alone, she didn't think it through too far.

"So," said Paige, crossing her legs and shifting closer to Chelsea. Her skirt rode up her thigh a bit and Chelsea had to look away before she noticed. "Where are you from?"

"Los Angeles. Mid-City."

"Oh, sweet! I'm from Santa Monica."

Chelsea couldn't help but feel there was an ulterior motive with this girl. In a school for troubled teens, nobody walks up to you and starts having friendly conversation for nothing. Her previous thought of Carlie has been the only sympathetic stranger so far popped in her head again, and she cringed on the inside.

"I'm sorry, but did you need something?" she asked. Might as well get it out of the way.

Paige shrugged, the smirk still on her face. "I just wanted to get to know you a little more. You seem like a cool chick."

Behind them, Chelsea could hear Paige's friends whispering again, but couldn't hear exact words over the other conversations being held in the room. All of a sudden she felt claustrophobic and self-conscious and didn't know what to say.

"Well." Paige said after a while. She reached into the pocket of her skirt and placed a folded piece of paper on the table in front of Chelsea. "I don't want to keep talking and have everyone hear our business. Hit me up sometime." She winked and stood up, her hand traveling around Chelsea's shoulders as she walked back to her group of friends.