Friendship Mirrors

Chapter 2 - Young Love

"You are one in a million, 

A four-leaf clover, 

And everytime I look at you, 

My heart flips on over.  Yeah that sounds good."

I played around with a few chords and managed to pull out a pretty bangin' tune. See, I have been playing the guitar since I was seven. That's eight years. And I have to admit - NOT bragging - I am pretty good. I won a music award for best musician in the school's talent show back in East Carrington in London and I am thinking about performing this year. But I can't. Not since I met Ariana yesterday. Ariana can turn goo into stone with just one look. Yep, THAT'S how bad she is. The worst thing is, I've heard she is also amazing on the guitar. She has her own Youtube channel of her singing and playing the guitar and to be honest, she is talented. Like, majorly talented. And she doesn't like competition. 

"Dee! Breakfast's ready honey!"  called Mum from downstairs. 

"Ok! I'll be down in a minute." I put my guitar back into my closet and skipped downstairs, humming the theme song of my favourite show, Such A Perfect Life. As soon as I entered the kitchen, I smelt my favourite; blueberry muffins with a cup of non-fat, decaf coffee with pink marshmallows. 

"Mmmm. It's like you can read my mind!" I smiled and dug in, savouring every bite of the blueberry goodness. I cradled the mug in both hands and leaned over it in the rising steam, blowing softly over the clouded surface. Mum and Dad cuddled up together on the sofa, flicking the remote button every now and then. I finished my coffee with a loud slurp and rubbed my stomach. I glanced at the clock.

"So are you prepared to take on your second day at high school?" asked Dad, kissing the top of my head. 

"Um, yeah it's amazing. Wasn't what I expected it to be. Oops! Gotta rush. Bye Mum. Bye Dad. Love you!" I rushed upstairs to grab my backpack full of books and ran down. Quickly, I put on my new red Converses and hurried out of the door. As I walked out, memories of Velma and Gretchen, my old best friends, came flooding back. All those science fairs, book club meetings and choir flashbacks suddenly appeared in my head.  Now, this is why I was a nerd in primary school. But to make sure I didn't seem like one, I started reading teenage magazines in the summer break and I think I have loosened up the geeky character. I mean, my clothes weren't that bad today: a printed shirt with a with a grey cardigan and leopard print leggings. And my hair was fine too, I had woken up earlier than normal to curl it and combed my fringe to the side. I hurried on, turning on my iPod and playing  all my favourite pop rock songs.

When I walked into Cedarwood Academy for a second day, it was like repeating yesterday all over again. Ariana was sitting by the gates on a bench with her cocky friends, this time all wearing green crop tops and floral skirts. 'Just what I need to start the day... more Ariana drama.' I thought to myself. I tried to look casual and layed back. She slowly walked up to me and rested one hand on my shoulder. I shook it away, but she had a firm grip.

"Listen hun. Every girl has the right to be ugly," she said taking her hand off me and wiping it on a nerdy looking boy passing by. "But you just abused that privilege!" she said, cackling like the witch she was. I walked off, not having a care in the world about what just happened. 

"Hey, if ignorance is bliss, you must be the happiest person alive!" she said out loud, making her whole group howl with laughter. 

'Hey,' I thought walking away, 'she doesn't pay rent to be stuck in my head, so why bother with her?'   I walked into the quad and looked around. There was a basketball court with a basket and balls lined up on the side of the wall. On the other side of the quad were about ten wooden tables and benches. I noticed two of Ariana's gang members sitting at one of the tables, so I hurried away. 

Our first lesson was Maths. Luckily, Ariana was in a set lower than me, so I could pour my heart out with answers. I entered Mr Arnold's classroom, which was covered in multiple tables posters and cartoon algebraic equations, and chose a seat right at the back of the room. I sat down and looked through my fat maths textbook quietly, waiting for Mr Arnold to appear. Suddenly, I saw Ariana's hottie walking into the classroom with a rugby ball in his hand. When he set eyes on me, I gave him a small wave and he came and popped into the seat next to me. He smelt of Chocolate Lynx. So manly. 

"Hi." I smiled. 

"Hey." he replied softly. 

"Soooo, what's your name?" he asked smoothly, after a long awkward silence. 

"Dana. Dana Denzel. Yours?" 

"Oh awesome. Charlie Phoenix." 

"That's nice." 

I smiled like an idiot. 

The next hour was like heaven on earth. Every now and then, I would glance at Charlie and he would give me that sweet smile of his. Whenever we were told to discuss the answer in pairs, he would lean over and talk to me with that angelic voice of his, the smell of his deodorant lingering in the air around us. 

By the end of the period, Charlie told me I was simply amazing at Maths. I chuckled. We walked to the cafeteria together, talking about our previous schools. Charlie used to attend Lexington Academy which was a boys boarding school for gifted and talented students. I was totally impressed by this. While we were queuing up for lunch, Ariana walked over, grabbed Charlie's hand and dragged him away, not even letting him say goodbye to me. But he did give me a cheerful smile, which was good enough. I shuffled forward. Today's menu was baked beans with mashed potatoes, peas, coleslaw and chocolate pudding. Mmmm... I breathed into the surrounding air which ran a cold shiver down my spine. 

Our last period was Foreign Languages. I currently took Spanish because I had been to Spain last year and enjoyed speaking the language. And besides, my other choices were French (boring!) or Chinese, which was way too hard to learn. My mother always used to say 'Nothing is ever too hard unless you try'. But I don't even listen to my own advice, did she really expect me to follow hers? 

Our teacher was a scary-looking, old lady covered in frown lines called Mrs Hewitt, who had flewn in from Spain to teach us Spanish. She was pretty nice, but today was only our first lesson. First impressions are not the last impressions. Or as they say in Spanish, Las primeras impresiones no son en ultimo impresiones.