Crazy but Sweet, Sweet but Crazy

13: two hypocrites

It was the first time I was anticipating a delivery to my house. Hopefully something worse than a  chopped up Barbie doll.

"Sure, of course. Hey, new earrings, right?"

Scarcely two hours after seeing what she'd put into my locker, to say that to her face with that smile of his- to comment on her earrings. Hoop earrings just like bus handles, perfect for grabbing-

"I don't think so," I said, cramming as much ruefulness as possible into my voice. "I'm not exactly a sports person."

I wasn't sure if I could stomach seeing Reneé's face for longer.

"It's a chill match today, and freshmen are coming over to for a trial session. You can just sit back and spectate," Ester said reassuringly. "I'm sure Elli would-"

"You should, Clare." Reneé, her lab coat draped over her arms, came over to our table with the sickly sweet smile. "There're spectator seats protected from the sun, and they're air-conditioned, too. You don't have to worry about getting tanned."

She wanted to emphasize she'd been in the courts- and I hadn't.

An innocent child compared to the girls at the high school I'd spent my freshman and sophomore years in.

I returned the smile. "Yeah, sounds like it'll be fun. Reneé, do you mind helping us save the best seats? The ones most protected from the sun. You'll know better than me."

Her smile slipped.

"By the way, the chocolate you gave Elli was really nice. From the shop across the hotel that you stayed in. I heard from him you guys went to France for a school trip last year. In a class of...about forty, right?" I added off-handedly, hardly able to keep the grin off my face.

"Yeah, about forty," responded Ester instead, zipping up her pencil case. "Twenty kids from the class next door and the other twenty from ours."

"Everyone," the Chemistry teacher clapped, surveying everyone in the lab with the vague look of dissatisfaction she'd had on since the beginning of class. "We'll be having a debrief on the experiment. Please return to your seats."

Clamping her mouth shut with a pink flush of her ears, Reneé returned to her seat without another word.

"You're very different from Elli." Ester commented quietly, as the teacher started writing on the whiteboard.

"Yeah. The saint and the sinner, right?" I deadpanned. "The prince and the beast."

"I wouldn't phrase it that way, but something along those lines." Her eyes fixed on the writings of the teacher, Ester's mouth curved into an amused smile. "He doesn't exactly express his feelings very openly."

No shit. "Hm."

As soon as the teacher announced class was dismissed, students eagerly emptied the laboratory, heading to the direction of the cafeteria.

"I envy those who can." Ester pursed her lips. "It's courage."

"We're using acrylic paint today. Angela's going to distribute the newspapers- make sure you put at least two pieces on your desk, and you wear the old shirts you brought from home," the art teacher repeated, wincing as if recalling the nightmare of acrylic paint on her former students' desks.

"Please, let's do this properly to make clean up easier afterwards, all right?"

Angela, holding a stack of newspaper under her arm, went around class, offering two pieces to each student.

Finally, she came over to my table, and gently put down two pieces on my desk.

"I saved these just for you," she said softly, removing the bottle of paint on my desk, before putting down two pieces of newspaper and putting down the bottle again.