A Girl Like Me

12. Girls are Confusing...

"Where were you yesterday?" Amy asked me in a hushed voice the next morning at breakfast. We were moving our trays along in the queue, picking up items of food on refrigerated shelves as we went. I grabbed a plastic container with chopped fruit in it and placed it on my tray.

"It's a long story, but you know my ex, Liam?" I began. She nodded in reply, reaching her long fingers out to pick up a natural yoghurt. "We met up at Seapoint and we were hanging out-"

"Ooh la la," she commented, raising her perfect cherry red eyebrows in response.

I rolled my eyes. "It's not like that," I defended myself. "Anyway, to cut a long story short, we fell asleep and woke up in the early hours of the morning. Hence why I'm practically falling asleep here."

Amy giggled. I let her go ahead to pay for her food as I poured a bowl of cereal. I put it down carefully on my tray and followed Amy to the cash register, where a frowning woman stood. She glanced at my tray. "That's five dollars," she said and I handed over the money.

"Thanks," I said, lifting my tray over to the table where Amy was sitting. I smiled to myself when I saw that Ethan and Amy were next to each other, as were Finn and Nikki. I was a bit annoyed that Cole hadn't turned up, he had gone off by himself.

I was halfway through shovelling cereal into my mouth when I noticed a teacher called Mr Walsh stroll into the cafeteria. He seemed to scan the tables very carefully as if he was searching for someone. When his eyes landed directly on me and he began power-walking over, I realised that I was in trouble.

"Uh oh," said Ethan, as if he had read my thoughts. "Someone's in trouble..."

The others followed his gaze and watched as Mr Walsh powered over, slightly breathless and red in the face from his ten second journey. "Miss Evans," he said, gasping for air when he reached me.

"Err yes?" I said. I waited to hear it. I waited for him up send me home to California or expel me or lock me in my room.

"Your Mother is on the phone," he said to my surprise. I breathed a sigh of relief and followed Mr Walsh out to a long corridor where a phone was planted on the cream wall. I picked it up and put it to my ear, twisting the cord around my fingers.

"Hello?" I said.

There was a couple of muffled noises on the other side of the line until I heard my Mom. "Hi honey!" She chirped. "How's your trip? You didn't answer my call last night."

"Hey Mom," I said brightly. It was nice to hear her voice again. "Sorry I was at dinner when you rang. What's up?"

"Oh yes," she said, like she just remembered why she was phoning me. "Grandpa rang yesterday and he has a present for you!"

Grandpa... It had completely slipped my mind that while I was on vacation in Boston that I could visit him. He only lived down the road a bit. "That's awesome!" I said, buzzing with excitement to see him after so long. "I'll go over after we visit an art gallery."

"Sounds like fun," Mom commented. Art galleries and museums were her thing. It was why I hated going on vacation to historical places with her, because I could not just hang by the pool. I had to go see the remains of something and the ruins of something else.

I grunted in reply. "I better go Mom," I said. My food was awaiting me.

"Bye honey! Oh and your Dad says hi," she said.

"Okay, see you soon Mom!" I said and hung up.

As soon as breakfast was over, everyone got ready to leave and we took a bus into the city where the art gallery was. I wasn't expecting much, and it was a good thing that my expectations were low because it was lame.