The Lies We Share ✔

Chapter 2

No pictures with Elise though. 

Laura almost gave up, but after she scrolled a few months back on his timeline, she recognized the blonde next to Todd, Elise.

Laura stared at the post made back in August, the caption read, "I love my girl, she always knows how to lift my spirits" A slew of heart emojis came after that. The picture is of them on a boat wearing swimsuits.

In the photo, the couple looks amazing together. Elise is tan and muscular, as well as well-endowed. Her hair is shiny and straight. Her pink swimsuit is just enough hot and cute, a bit of fancy lace covering her assets as to not be too revealing. 

She appears to be so comfortable with the boy next to her. His eyes stare lazily at the camera, he looks effortlessly posed. With a natural tan and the gentle outline of abs.  They look like models straight out of Vogue. 

Laura was curious, this boy had everything, yet he cared so much what people thought. He had so little compassion and no good reason to be mad at her. Todd didn't make sense.

Laura powered down the laptop once she realized how late it was and how hungry she was. She hadn't eaten since lunch. She got out of bed, her mom still wasn't home, and it was now dark. No empowering light to save her now. 

Then she heard the phone ring, it had only been thirty minutes. She let it go to voicemail.

Laura heard a knock at the door. Of course, the second the phone stopped ringing; her mom came home. Laura went down to the kitchen to help her. 

Her job was to haul the groceries in from the car. Laura opened the door, and her mom came through with two big brown grocery bags which she handed to Laura, who instantly slumped over from the sheer weight of them.

"Here you go, sorry I was gone so long, I had to get the stuff for that Christmas party on Friday." her mom smiled from the reprieve of handing off the groceries. Laura shrugged, to let her know it wasn't a problem. Laura continued to lug the groceries to the house, as her mom continued to put them away.

This Friday would be the day that her parents hosted the neighborhood Christmas party. Luckily this only happened once every three years or so. To relieve her parents, her other neighbors took over alternating every year. 

Identical to the previous years, Laura would end up babysitting for the parents while they drank heavily and prattled the night away. She wouldn't even have any friends at the party either, the only person she hung out with was Casey O'Jenson from down the street. Laura didn't even know her that well, because she was a bit shy. 

Laura could, however, invite Ryan, a boy she sat with at lunch. But to her dismay they weren't good friends either, she had just met him this year. He would probably think that Christmas parties were lame, he seemed to think everything was lame. That's what was cool about Ryan, the "I don't care attitude" he had personified. She knew he did care about one thing though, his music.

Laura would never admit it aloud, but she liked Ryan. Even though within the first week of knowing her he said, "Dating in high school is just stupid like if we started dating that'd be stupid, right?" part of Laura agreed, relationships in high school almost never ended well. Even though what he said wasn't meant to be mean, that didn't make it hurt less. 

Eventually, Laura gave up looking for signs he liked her, he didn't. 

Something Laura did know about Ryan was that he was honest, unlike Todd. Ryan was like her in a way he was tough and ignored the status quo. Laura also sat with a girl named Marie, she was big on not talking. Laura was friendly enough to get her to open up a bit, but boy could that girl avoid conversations. Though Laura felt like she could relate, sometimes she felt like Marie, of course, those days were the quietest.