Life With You. [Wattys2017]

~ Four ~

Keep it together. That's what I told myself as I exited the restroom with Frankie following; and all eyes were on me. Keep it together. Frankie tugged on my shirt and pulled me in her direction.

"Don't mind them. They have no idea about what reality is. If they knew - they would run; flee the country or something along the lines of that. Who cares what other people think? You have your whole life to care - but now it doesn't matter. You are beautiful and if Jake was lying just to see how miserable you look - well you will still be beautiful. Do you understand me?" Questions Frankie as we walk to Psych together.

She's right. Frankie always knows what to say. Maybe Jake isn't a complete and total douche. Who knows? I should just embrace the fact that I do not want to fall in love at a young age; because that is just highly unlikely at sixteen; and I don't want my heart broken yet. One day - just not right now.

Laughing I say, "Of course Lady Francesca."

"Hey - don't call me that."

"You shouldn't mind what others say about you. Learned that from my best friend."

"Ha-ha. You're funny."

"I know, but guess what? I've stopped crying haven't I? You made me laugh about the truest thing and that is because you are my best friend."

"Oh go on. I think you were going to say that I am the best thing to ever stumble into your life and that without me; you'd be completely lost. Oh and that I am always right and that no one should ever cross me, because I will go all ninja on them."

"That's my line - but yeah. I was totally going to say that." I say before glancing at my phone and noticing we were about t-minus one minute away from the first bell ringing; and 2 minutes away from the tardy bell to ring. "We have to go."

We dashed away leaving whatever happened earlier with Jake and I in the past - or so I was led to believe.

Entering the room, all eyes were glued on me. Just me. Not Frankie or the outfits we were wearing - but me. The girl with the honey blonde hair that came down half pass my shoulders; who had the blue eyes with the yellow halo around them. Me. All eyes were on me and only me; which made me nervous; with the weeble-wobble in the legs.

"Girls. Nice of you to join us. Please take a seat. Ms. MacMurrough, could you please come with me into the planning room? I need to speak to you on urgent matters." said Mr. Ferdinand as he gestures his hand to the door and ushers me out.

Oh god. What could the urgent matter be? Was it my sisters? Was it my family? Did someone die? My eyes were starting to swell up with tears and become jet red; and they were bulging out, because how was I supposed to react when someone tells me something urgent.

"Ms. Amelia. I am afraid that your partner will not be at school this whole week and some of next week. The thing that concerns me is that is absence was sort of uhm, irregular and out of the blue. He was here for homeroom, but soon therefore after he was checked out. Since this was a big grade and you two were working on it together - I will allow you to do the project yourself; and he will have to do the makeup project. Anyways a question I had was, do you know why he would vanish like that?"

The news has traveled fast, like lightning speed, and now I had to be the barer of bad news.

"Uh well I guess maybe it has to do with an argument he had with a peer earlier today; that sent her running out of homeroom crying right into a bathroom; but then again causation is not correlation. I can't say that an feud between two people is the reason for him leaving. That's just not logical to assume without all the facts. I will finish the project by myself. Can I go sit down now? These books are kind of heavy and this bag is killing my shoulders."

My words startled him and then he smiled. "Of course. Yes. Very well. My bad."

I then slipped away and re-entered the room. "What was that all about?" whispers Frankie with a quizzical look scribbled on her face as she leans into my desk.

As I place my books down on the desk, I shrug with, "Well it was very puzzling. Someone has disappeared from school. Won't be back till like next Friday; days after my project, that I am now doing on my own now."

"Are you sure?"

"Absolutely."

"About you?"

"Causation is not correlation. Hard to tell."

"Are you sure it's him?"

"Jake. It was Jake. It is always Jake. My partner who abandoned me to do this project. My luck is surely not getting any better."

"Oh."

"Yeah."