Love Left Unrequited

Chapter 3

Chapter 3

"Octavia!" a girly voice squealed at me the moment I stepped over the threshold.

Her arms, thin as twigs, wrapped around me, and I stood numbly. I could already picture the perfect smile on her face. I didn't reciprocate the happiness.

"Octavia, be kinder to your sister! Can't you see how happy she is to see you?" my mother scolded from the entryway.

"But I'm ecstatic," I droned in a monotone voice.

My mom just rolled her eyes. "How was school?" she asked when I had been released from my sister's grip.

"Brilliant," I answered.

"Simone, tell your sister that story about the sleeping student and the professor," my mother instructed, and she happily agreed.

"Oh, so listen to this, sis. Here I was in class, with at least 500 other students around me, and the professor is educating us about the importance of Dostoyevsky to our lives today, and he suddenly notices that a student is actually asleep in the front row!"

"How thrilling," I said, but she wasn't even fazed by the comment.

"Tell her what the professor did," Mom told her.

"When he saw that, he took a ruler and a bottle of cold water and poured it on the kid's head while rapping the desk with the ruler."

"Shouldn't they get fired for that?" I asked.

"He's on tenure. They can't fire him."

I didn't say anything. "Doesn't your sister make you want to go to Vanderbilt, too?" Mom asked me, a cheery smile on her face.

"Oh, yeah," I said sarcastically.

I popped a grape in my mouth and headed for the fridge. My sister, with her big brown eyes and hair that was long, red and beautiful, was the definition of perfect. She had finished her undergraduate degree, and now she was working on graduate school. I was just a wallflower, and still had another year and a half before I even started college. Most people forgot that the Glass family more than one daughter.

My sister had got all of the lucky genes, beautiful, smart, and charismatic. I just got genes. Well, I did get my sister's jeans, if that counted.

"Honey, don't eat anything. We're having dinner in an hour," Mom hollered at me.

If Simone ate right now, you wouldn't mind, I thought, but kept my mouth shut. I trudged up the stairs to my room. I collapsed on my bed once I was there.

I pulled my blue backpack onto my bed and spilled out its contents. I pulled out a book for school, and started to read, even though my thoughts kept floating back to Computer Science with the gorgeous boy, Vance. It almost wasn't fair, how good looking he was. I could picture him vividly in my mind, as if he was standing in front of me. I shook myself free of the thoughts of him, however.

Before I could realize it, an hour had been taken away from me while I read. I jumped up when I heard my mother's voice from downstairs.

"Why are you back, Simone? I thought school started back up for you this week," I asked as I came into the dining room.

"Actually, it's next week. You should know that I spent Christmas with Clyde's family in New York."

How could I forget? It was the best Christmas I've had in a long time.

"I just assumed you weren't visiting us this year."

"I love you all too much," she voiced sweetly.