The Inselcouth

Chapter 9: The War

*Warning: This chapter gets a little intense*

"Umm. Yeah. You know we used to have swim parties when we were little."

"No. No. No. No. That's not it. You know what I mean. You know that."
I just wanted her to stop. Stop. Stop. Stop. Stop. Stop. Stop. Stop. Stop. I envisioned her stopping as those words ran through my head. "Stop. Stop. Stop. Stop. Stop. Stop it." Chassella yelled at the top off her lungs.

Chassella grabbed her throat and stared at me. She looked horrified and ran off. I feel terrible and pervasive. I just controlled Chassella's vocal cords.

Of course the scream got Mr. Pierre's attention. "Students. Please return to your seats. Continue your projects. The next student up will go to the principal's office."

We all sat down and quieted down. I looked at Chassella and she was holding something shiny. It was her Sun necklace. Her half of our necklace. She threw it in her backpack and stared right into my eyes as she put on her purple sea urchin necklace she got from her dad after her first prank. I knew what this meant. She had done this one other time on one of the worst days of my life.

We were at war.

※

Biology was boring so I won't go into it. But Art was unfortunate, so I bet you will want to here about it.

Last week, Chassella and I chose to work on an art project together. We forgot that this week we don't want to be friends. We were going to make a giant sculpture of our necklaces put together. Yeah. That's not happening anymore.

I tried to convince Ms. Sybill, who is basically a hippie complete with peace signs and rainbow bandanas, to switch us with someone else because "our conflict may ruin the stability and groovy aura of our bodaciously radical art." However, she denied since my use of her "people's language" made me look fairly undignified. Yeah. Oops. My bad.

I was then punished and condemned to work with Chassella . However, someone willing to put up with us would watch us to make sure a few things did not happen. 1) We didn't kill each other. 2)We didn't create a bomb of unorthodox negative chi. And lastly and most importantly. 3) We didn't ruin the art because sculpting clay is too expensive to be wasted at the expense of terrible talent. And you won't believe who that brave soul was. The one, the only(maniac in the world to put up with both of us), Nick Ryan. Yay. 3 cheers for the insanity that will soon come my way. Hip hip hooray.

Nick strolled over like he always does, but something about the way he moved was different this time. He had less swagger and more caution. It was almost as if he thought if he came to close too soon, a land mine would blow up right where he was standing. I walked over to him in order to reassure him, but something else happened. He stopped me and what he said chilled me to the core.

"I have never seen this side of Chassella . It makes me nervous. What do you think will happen?" This was completely unexpected. Nick never got nervous, ever. I have only seen him nervous once before and that was the day his dad was in the hospital because he had been shot in a drive-by shooting at work. Luckily he lived, but he came close to flat-lining several times.

I needed to say something, but I couldn't. Mainly because Chassella swooped in and started talking to us like everything was fine. That was odd. She was up to something again. She hated me, but I didn't want to be at war.

"Ok. Let's start working on our sculpture. Should we keep the same design we had before?" I felt like we needed to get moving.

"No." Chassella said what I was thinking.

"Yes. You are keeping it the same." Nick, please shut up. I pulled him over to the side.

"Are you crazy?"

"Yes. No. I don't know. But if you sculpt the symbol of your friendship together maybe you'll forget about the war."

"You are a genius. I could kiss you." I felt a surge of energy rise, but I contained myself. "But I won't." Then he chuckled and pulled me into a hug. Yay. The clay slowly turned pink.

Stop. Don't do it. I slowly turned it back to grey.

We walked back over. Then Chassella and I started sculpting. Sort of. We came up with measurement and started fighting over who was going to make what.

"Jay, you should sculpt the statue since you are better at it. Then, I will just paint it."

"What! No. I will do the moon half and you will do the sun half. Then we can paint it together." It went on like this for awhile. Finally, Nick got sick of it.

Finally, he burst out,"Ladies! Just each make a half of the sculpture. Make the sculpture evenly and nicely."

Chassella did not like that idea. I didn't know how much and how many reasons why , but I found out real soon. "Of course, Nick. Let's just take Jaydene's side. I mean come on. Why not? You always do. Uggh." She was speaking in a way that made it sound like the words in her mouth tastes like bitter spikes and she couldn't wait to spit them out. But then she started talking again and when she did she sounded disturbingly cool. "Come on Nick. Isn't there a way I could get you on my side?" She walked up real close to him. He stared at me, his eyes begging for help, as her fingers walked up his right arm. Then, she rested her arm on his shoulder, right next to his neck. "I'm sure there is." She murmured in his ear as she rested her head on his shoulder, her voice seductively entrancing. Her arm slipped down his back and she hugged him.

Nick started to hug her back ,with a glimmer in his eye, when he whispered in her ear. "It's not working."

She responded with," How about this?" She put her arms up to his neck to hug him, but slid her hand up to his neck. Then, she...she...she... She pressed her lips onto his and kissed him. His arms hugged her and he kissed her back. He still had a crush on her, so it must have excited him. She shoved him into the corner, still kissing him. Nick tried to move out, but she kissed him, harder. Finally, Nick pushed them both out of the corner, still kissing Chassella , trying to get away. As you can imagine, it was pretty intense and I was already short circuiting.

I backed away, my face red with fury, jealousy, rage, hatred, embarrassment, disappointment, sadness, love, and a bunch of other horrible feelings. I felt myself hit a wall and that is when I blacked out. I felt like I was spinning and I started to dream. Except it was a nightmare. I heard screaming, crying, laughter, giggles, scolding, whimpers, and things crashing into other things. Then, I heard something worst of all. Chasella screaming my name like she was dying.

Jaydene. Jaydene. Jaydene. Jaydene. Jaydene. Jaydene. Jaydene.

I woke up after about the 50th "Jaydene!".

And I wish I hadn't.