The Pretend Boyfriend

Chapter 1

As I walked home, I was still fuming from the incident with Brooke. It was always Brooke. I don't see why she has to always pick on me. Her and the Mini-Brookes. We used to be best friends, that has to count for something, right?

"But now you have a much awesomer, prettier, and fun best friend!" Lee chirped beside me, and I realized I had spoken my thoughts aloud.

"Oh?" I asked, grinning at her. "I don't know who you are talking about." She punched me in the shoulder lightly.

"Don't be a bitch, Evie." She said, mock glaring at me. "But in all seriousness, you shouldn't let her get to you so much. You've got to learn to just ignore the whore. Hey, that rhymed!"

I giggled at her joke. "It's kind of hard to ignore her when she pours coffee on your shirt," I grimaced, looking down at my shirt. Once a light pink, now it had dark coffee stains from where Brooke had 'accidentally' tripped and spilled her coffee all over it this morning. Thankfully, Lee was wearing a sweater today and had let me borrow it to hide my now hideous shirt.

"Well, yeah that was kind of a bitch move today, but in general you should just ignore her. She isn't worth it." Lee replied.

I'm sure we could have talked about how much we hated Brooke for much longer, but we had to split ways as Lee turned down her block.

"Bye!" I hollered after her, continuing down Maple Street. My house was at the very end, where a little creek caused the street to stop. I loved my house; it was perfect. It wasn't super large, but it was big enough for our family of four, and small enough to be cozy.

When the white paneling and red shutters of the house came into view, I broke into a run, excited to see my golden retriever waiting expectantly on the front lawn.

"Hey Buddy!" I called once I got close enough. Yeah I know, real original name right? He wagged his tail in response as I bent down to hug him. Buddy was the best dog. Everyone says that their own dog is the best, but Buddy really does beat all other dogs. He was a constant companion; we had gotten him when I was two and have had him for fourteen years.

"Want a... cookie?" I asked, his ears perking up in recognition. Frantically wagging his tail, he ran to the front door. "Alright, let's go get you a cookie."

After giving my dog the promised cookie, I ran upstairs to my room, grabbing my laptop and flopping down on my bed, ready to get started on my homework. English essays are the worst. Especially with Mr. Healy as the teacher.

Man, was he horrible. If you turned in a paper that has the wrong date, not the right font, or any other miniscule mistake, you were already down a whole letter grade. Not to mention he couldn't stand it if you messed up punctuation. I don't know what it was with this guy, but if you mix up a colon and a semicolon, you're a goner. I was proud to say I was one of the only three people who had an A in his class.

I guess that makes me a nerd. But I'm fine with that. I wasn't one of those, 'glasses, braces, and zero friends' type of nerd, because I had a pretty decent amount of friends, metal-free mouth, and 20-20 vision.

I sighed in frustration after starting and deleting the first sentence of the essay at least five times. I was just too distracted. The Brooke thing earlier had really ticked me off. And it wasn't like this was the first time something had happened. Ever since our fallout in eighth grade, she has been nothing but hostile and bitchy towards me. I think the worst 'incident' was probably when I had been showering after track, and she had added green dye to the conditioner. My honey-blonde hair was green for a week before the color faded enough to get it re-dyed. Gritting my teeth at the thought, I close the laptop and lie back on the fluffy pillows.