It had already been about a whole month since the entire party experience happened.
In the start it was petrifying. Whenever I passed people who went to the party or at least had heard of my incident (so basically everybody at school) they would start commenting and laughing at me. I learned to deal with it, but at the start I just wanted to punch everyone.
And that was even before they started making up stories. There was this one that said that I actually brought the brownies (which I eventually learned had drugs on them), deliberately ate them and tried to convince Adam to eat them too, before he dragged me to his car and dropped me off at my place while I was actually trying to flirt with him. Which, by the way, is totally the opposite of what happened. Yes, I did eat the brownies but I didn't even know they had drugs on them. And yes, I fainted and Adam had to dragg me to Patty's car. But it was Patty's not Adam's. And Adam was the one who actually tried flirting with me, according to Patty. Yup, even when I'm not sober he tries to get his way. However, it turns out my brain still maintains its own reflexes and involuntary actions with the drugs and whenever he said something cocky or flirty, I would just mumble some sounds in disgust.
Thanks for keeping it together brain, I appreciate you.
And now it's time for another brand new discovery I made in the past three weeks. The person who took the brownies to the party was none other than Ms. Sasha King herself. Why wasn't I expecting this?
When Adam told me that he had found out it was her, I was truly not surprised. Considering her history, it was only a matter of time. And that was probably why she looked at me that way during the party. I don't know. But as I'm not a big drama bitchy cow like her, I simply let it go and continued with my life. Because that's what I do best.
And that was really the best medicine I could have gotten with this situation. After the three weeks some people noticed that I couldn't care less what they thought of me and what they didn't. So, slowly, people started to forget about it. Eventually, after an entire month of paranoia with what I should do so that people will notice me less, I was finally able to take a deep breath and rest.
The Monday after that, I arrived at school and nobody specifically looked at me. Which was a good thing.
The day was going smoothly, no specific problems. Except for the time when Harry decided to start annoying me at Maths with Adam watching. He couldn't just let me be, could he?
He didn't get detention. But he should have. That little brat is annoying as hell! And by that I mean Harry. Adam was just playing cool.
Speaking of Adam, he has actually been kind of nice to me. No more excruciating annoyance from his existence. Actually being tolerable. Which is a good thing. Unless, he's being nice to me so that he can one day ask for something or suddenly start being even more annoying... and I'm probably just starting to play worst case scenario so let's stop that.
But enough with this chit-chat. Let's go back to the story.
It was Monday and I was calmly navigating through the school main hall trying not to get seen or even noticed. And I was succeeding like it was a piece of cake. But then a strange noise that sounded like a broken trumpet came from behind and I was somehow able to hear it besides the noise. I looked behind and didn't see anybody with any instruments. Not even a weird hat from the band. Nothing.
Suddenly, an average tall guy spotted me in the middle of the crowd and started waving at me. "Heyo there, Caroline!" He said smiling at me with his big mouth and an innocent look. "Hi there, Thomas." I replied feeling a little awkard and smiling back at him before starting to walk again.
Whenever I somehow was late to something Patty would either start sending messages as if it was the end of the world, or call me. And if I didn't answer her calls, which happens a lot because I mute my phone, the first option would happen anyway.
While I was walking, Thomas started walking beside me.
"What are you doing?" I asked him once he was right next to me.
"I'm walking with you. What does it look like I'm doing?" He asked me confused. I looked at him confused too.
"Like you're walking with me...?" I said in my incredibly confident nasal voice that is as regular as an owl flying at night. "But the question is why? I don't remember giving you any reason to do so and the socially awkard bean that I am normally pushes people away. So yeah... why?" I asked him.
"Because I want to be friends with the socially awkard bean that you are. And Adam says you're a cool person. And I like cool people." He said sounding as if it was extremely obvious and the world was full of happiness. Well, normally people don't try to be friends with me, or even want to. But Thomas seemed different. So I thought: "Why not?"
But then, a part in my brain clicked and I got a little smirk on my face. "Adam thinks I'm cool?" I asked him curious. If he said yes, this could be good information for future events. So, fingers crossed.
"Yeah. He says that you're funny, even though, according to him, you might get a little violent sometimes, but that when you do, it's funny at the same time." He replied with his hands on his jacket pockets (jocks and those jackets). "Why?" He asked.
"Oh, nothing..." I answered looking back at him. "Just useful information I can use in the future." I said smiling.
But it was was probably a sort of scary smile because the next thing he said to me was "He also said that you were kinda awkard."
I looked at him with a very serious face and responded with a very serious tone. "Yes, Thomas. Yes, I am."
But then, to my surprise, he started smiling brightly again. "That's great! I'm awkard too!" He replied.
Ok, so, one of the best friends from one of the most popular guys at our school, who plays football in the school team, who everybody knows and has tons if friends, considers himself awkard? Am I the only one not getting this right? Because to me it looks like he's just saying stuff to make chit-chat and making up new characteristics to keep on talking to me as if he has nothing else better to do at the moment. And I think that I speak for everyone when I say that that is not a good feeling and a terrible first impression.
"How can you be that 'awkard' if you have such a big amount of friends?" I asked him already knowing the answer. He would probably start stuttering and then start rubbing his hair and then say something stupid. Like all the guys do.
But what I heard next surprised me. "When you have friends you know you can be yourself with them and they won't judge you, right?" He asked me with keeping the smile on his face.
"Yeah..." I was not quite getting where this was going, but I wanted to know. What can I say? Curiosity killed the cat.
"Around my friends I can be myself. Because, when people get to know me at first I might seem something that I'm not. And around my friends, my awkardness is just who I am, and they're all used to it. With strangers, I just don't know how to act." He turned to me smiling brightly.
"That..." I didn't know how to reply to that. He was actually right. The guy who looked stupid and all, was actually saying something pretty clever. I was both shocked, impressed and surprised all at the same time. "That actually makes sense." I said slightly smiling feeling both awkard and... surprised.
"Exactly! That's why I want to be your friend. I just like to be around my friends. So more friends means less awkardness." I looked back at him intrigued. He was nothing like what I thought he would be. I thought that he would most likely be the type of jock who is as dumb as a vanilla ice cream bucket and who just wanted to play football without really realising what he was doing.
Pretty much like Forrest Gump, but less sweet.
But in reality he was just another socially awkard being like me, who just wanted to fit in and survive in high school. The difference was that, I was more of the trying-not-to-get-noticed type, while Thomas was the I-just-wanna-have-friends type.
I was about to respond but a voice came from behind us and it made us both turn around. "Mr. White." An old man was right behind us. He had full white curly hair, a big red nose, a small round pinky face and was both fat and bit tall. So, he did look a bit scary.
"Yes, Mr. McGowan." Thomas said as if it was the 70th time that the teacher had called him that week. Poor guy...
"I hope you don't forget detention like last week. And the week before." He pointed out very seriously. What the heck was the man trying to do? Make the boy feel uncomfortable and guilty. Because if someone tried talking to me like that I sure would feel that way.
"I won't Sir." He told him looking at his feet. Didn't the old gargoyle noticed how bad he was making the boy feel?
He then left and I looked at Thomas. "Hey... umm..." I was not good with people in general. Especially in situations like this one. He was feeling bad and I had no idea of how to comfort him. "Are you ok?"
Seriously, Caroline? Seriously? The boy was extremely sad and embarrassed, and all you could manage to say was 'are you ok'?! Of course he was not ok!
I kept that all to myself and waited for Thomas to reply. Which basically created an awkard silence between us. Crap!
"Yeah, I'm ok." He finally said. Thank god! "I'm used to it, now." He was slightly smiling again. Was that good or bad?
"Really? Used to it?" I asked surprised with his answer. "Yeah. I get detention a lot." He replied smiling the same way. Dude, you're confusing me!
"This might sound weird, but how? You look like the type of guy who doesn't really gets in trouble." I said.
"Well, I told you I was awkard. Sometimes it's because I talk too much, sometimes it's because I wasn't paying attention and there are many times that happen because of blowing my nose." He replied.
"Blowing your nose? You go to detention because of the human need of blowing your nose? How?" I asked ironically. Ok, now he's joking. He must be! Even the worst of all teachers can't be that bad to point when a student needs to blow their nose and they gets send to detention. That's just ridiculous!
"Well, I have tons of allergies especially during the winter and spring. Those are the dark times. So, there are many times when I have to blow my nose during class." He stated out starting to feel a little embarrassed.
"And...?" I said. C'mon dude continue the story!
"And I blow my nose very loudly. Loudly enough for some people to 'not be able to hear the teacher, as some say." He was starting to get really red. Was it really that bad?
"Oh, c'mon. It can't be that bad!" I told him.
"It can. Didn't you hear me blowing my nose just before I came talking to you?" He asked me almost about to laugh with embarrassment.
"Wait... that was you?!" The strange broken trumpet was him blowing his nose? God damn it, it sounded like a broken trumpet!
"Yeah, it was me. I know it sounds weird but I was born this way. Both my dad and my sister have the same problem." He said laughing a little. And I laughed with him.
"That is... undoubtedly interesting. Was that the reason why that old gargoyle gave you detention today?" I asked him.
"Old gargo-... Ahhh! You mean Mr. McGowan! Yeah, he did give detention because I blew my nose in the the middle of his 'extremely important for our future' Geography class." He responded and then we both started laughing our hearts off again.
After a short period of time, we finally reached the caferia and Patty was already there looking at her phone. And to my surprise so were Adam and Ben. What a great best friend Patty is!
I walked to them along with Thomas. The moment I stopped Patty started screaming at me. "Where the hell were you? We've been waiting fir like 15 minutes! I texted you non-stop and you didn't respond to me!"
Remember what I told you about Patty sending me messages if I took too much time? Yup. Getting to see that now, aren't you?
"First of all, calm yourself down for a minute. Second of all, I was talking with Thomas." I replied pointing at the boy. "Are you happy now?" I asked her.
She crossed her arms and glared at me. "Not entirely. But I'm kinda hungry, so I'll let this one pass." She said.
"Well, look who's here." I turned around just to face a smiling Adam. "Are you hungry? Because we've been waiting for you both and I don't think that I can take a single minute without stuffing myself with food." He said holding his tummy.
Wait... were they all gonna have lunch with us? I slightly looked at Patty. I knew this was one of her plans, and I was definitely involved in it (like always).
"Yeah... I'm actually kind of hungry." I said looking away. To my surprise Harry wasn't there. Which was a good thing. At least for now. But the question is why? He always hanged out with his gang. Why wasn't he there right now?
But, since I had no escape to that lunch with the company of Adam, Ben and Thomas, it was a relief knowing that he wouldn't be there.
"Well then let's go!" Ben said starting to walk to the cafeteria and we all followed him. I tried to reach Patty, but she, being the greatest out of all friends, somehow managed to make me stand right next to Adam.
He looked at me with that little annoying smirk of his and started talking. "So, how's my little bug? Having a fun day?" He said sounding like an adult talking to a baby.
I was not putting up with that, so I decided to end it right there. "First of all, if there's anyone here who is a bug, that is you, because you can be as annoying as a fly." I replied with a glare.
"Ouch!" He said with his hand on his heart.
"And second of all..." I smirked at him. "You think I'm cool and funny." And with that I rushed to Patty.
"Wait... what?! Caroline, come back here!" And he, unfortunately, kept on following me.