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Drawing in a deep breath, Anne scanned the cafeteria on her first day of school. She had yet to see her best friend, Robin, at school. Even though they had met up shortly after Anne had returned from North Carolina, they hadn’t compared schedules.
Half of her classmates in her third-period class annoyed her; she would be the first to admit to holding a grudge towards the classmates that teased the artistic students when they were younger – middle school and freshman year – before they had begun to mature.
Although, if she was honest with herself, she disliked them more because of the way they treated Mary. She could barely tolerate the two-facedness of her classmates and Mary’s so-called friends when all they wanted was what the Elliot sisters could give them before they turned around and made fun of them – mostly Mary – as soon as they turned the corner in the hallway.
Suddenly, she saw Robin stand up and wave her arms in the air. “Anne! We’re over here!” she called out.
Turning in their direction, she noticed that ‘we’ included Robin’s boyfriend Nathan and Nathan’s friend Charles Musgraves, and Charles’ girlfriend, - a girl that Anne did not know. His girlfriend turned pink as soon as Anne set her tray down on the table.
“I’m Anne,” she turned and smiled at the girl.
“Emilia,” she weakly smiled back. “I’ve heard so much about you,” she added.
“Robin,” Anne turned to her friend with a teasing grin, “you shouldn’t talk other people’s ears off about me.”
“If I can’t brag about my non-existent drawing skills, I’m going to brag about my best friend’s skills,” Robin acknowledged. “However, I wasn’t the person talking about you,” she added. “That was Charlie.”
Wordlessly, she stared at Robin for a long moment, the friends communicating silently. Why would Charlie be bragging about her?
Either not noticing or intentionally interrupting, Charlie leaned over Emilia and asked Anne how her vacation was.
“It was incredible,” she gushed. Turning to Robin, she told her all about meeting Derek and everything else she had already told Robin. There was more than one way to show her lack of romantic interest.
“Do you have a picture?” Robin asked. She suspected the reason Anne was rambling about stuff they had already discussed shortly after Anne had returned home from North Carolina.
“Of course!” she grinned, taking out her phone and pulling up the album with all of the pictures she and Derek had taken over their six weeks together.
Emilia leaned over Anne’s shoulder as she shared the pictures with Robin. “He’s so cute,” the girl sighed.
The girls focused on the various pictures Anne and Derek had taken – not all of them were of Derek and Anne – while the guys silently communicated. Nathan nudged Charlie before cutting his eyes over at Emilia. He must have spent too much time with his girlfriend because he wondered why Charlie would start dating somebody while crushing on Anne.
“It must suck,” Emilia commented.
“What must suck?” Anne asked, staring at a picture of Derek a beat longer than the others before swiping to the next picture of the boardwalk.
“Breaking up with your summer love.”
“We didn’t break up. Why would we break up?”
Shrugging, Emilia frowned. “I didn’t mean... I...” she stammered. “It’s long distance. Long distance relationships never work.”
“I don’t know why not,” Anne countered. “Phone calls. E-mail. Real letters.”
“But the level of trust you’d have to have that he won’t cheat on you or anything like that.”
Robin narrowed her eyes at what Emilia was saying. “Why would Derek cheat on Anne?”
“Because Anne can’t give him what he needs.”
“Which is?”
“Sex,” the junior blushed. “He’ll just get it somewhere else.”
Anne shook her head at Emilia’s point. “We didn’t have sex anyway,” she commented. “I have to finish school and get into the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and he has to get through Boot Camp. The last thing we need is an unexpected, accidental pregnancy to derail all of our plans.”
“But birth control...”
“Is not completely effective,” Anne interrupted right as her sister, Mary, plopped down at the table with them, wedging her way between Anne and Robin, forcing Robin and Nathan to move down a seat.
“Anne,” she whined. “I have Mrs. Caldwell for English and Mr. Castleman for Computer Science.”
“Why are you taking Computer Science?” Charlie asked, removing his arm from where it had been stationed around Emilia’s shoulders.
Making a face, she answered, “My father thinks that my computer skills need work.”
“She doesn’t know the difference between Word and Excel,” Anne joked, giving Mary a slight nudge.
“Because you are my favorite sister, I’m going to ignore your teasing,” Mary grinning.
“What do you need?” Anne countered.
“Introduce me first,” she commanded.
Rolling her eyes, one of her few non-verbal habits, she held back a sigh and said, “Everybody, this is my sister Mary. She’s a sophomore. Mary, you know Robin and her boyfriend Nathan already. This is Charlie Musgraves...”
“I heard about you,” Mary purred. “Your father owns that furniture store over on the corner of College and State Streets, right?”
“One and the same. I worked there this summer to earn some extra cash. I’ll probably be working on Saturdays now that school has started back.” Glancing at Nathan and Emilia, he leaned back.
“Awesome,” Mary smiled, leaning forward with her hand on her jaw, pretending to be fascinated.
Emilia, still sitting between Charlie and Anne, hissed, “Charlie.”
“Oh. Right. Mary, this is my girlfriend, Emilia.”
None of the girls at the table appreciated the face Mary made with that last introduction.
