Today was the last day of 4th grade. I was…
I don’t know. I feel kinda weird. I don’t know, actually. Whatever. Today’s the last day of school. We’re having our end of year festival- I kinda just randomly said that last chapter, didn’t I? Right, right, I never explained what it was. Well, our end of year festival- let’s just call it the EOYF. Uh, no, let me retry that. Let’s call it the… E… F…The F? No, I’m dumb, let’s just call it the Festival. Yeah, yeah, good. The Festival. Okay, it’s dumb, I agree.
So the… Festival… is a celebration thing on the last day of school where all the students go back to the school and play around and do all sorts of different activities. It’s actually a pretty fun experience, as long as you know how to have fun.
So, yeah, it’s the last day of school. The day already ended so now I was waiting for the adults to set up all of the activities they had planned, and I was sitting by myself (MY CHOICE, I WAS NOT BEING LONELY). I guess I was thinking pretty hard. For previous years, I had always felt incredibly relieved and overjoyed that school was out. But this year, it was different. I feel like I’ve forgot to do something or had yet to do anything at all. And then it hit me.
“What the he- who did that?”
I felt a small bump land on my head and spun around. Cailtyn was standing there, her hand encased in a fist and on top of my head. Putting two things together, I assumed she just clobbered me.
Cool, so she’s here, awesome. Uh, well, I mean, never mind.
“What was that for? You could’ve killed me!”
“You must be insanely weak, then.”
“Shut up, you know I was just joking. So, what’s up? Where’s Anna?”
Please please please please please please
“Oh, she… had some stuff to do…”
YES
“That’s so sad, I was hoping she would come.”
“I know you’re heartbroken, but you’ve gotta hold in your tears, Becky.”
“Yeah, yeah, got it.”
I stood up (after I shook my legs out because standing up quickly after sitting down can like shock you, you know?) and stood right next to her. It felt a little weird. Like I needed to do something. Or maybe it was just cause I stood up too quickly.
“Have you been to the Bounce House thing yet?”
“The Inflatable Obstacle Course?”
“Is that what it’s called?”
“I dunno, but it sounds more right than yours.”
“Shut up.”
“You shut up. I haven’t been to it yet, why?”
“I haven’t either, so… do you wanna race through it?”
So the ‘Inflatable Obstacle Course’ is exactly what it sounds like. It was like the Bouncy House things you know, but make it like a quarter mile long, and then you add a ton of random inflatable objects that are stuck in random places, and then a slide at the very end. But the best part is that there’re two of them right next to each other, which is where the ‘race’ part comes from. This race, now- yeah, it’s fun. When you win, you get a tiny bit of pride. When you lose, you get to challenge them again. All you have to do is just wait in line without wearing your shoes. I don’t know if I mentioned this, but the field our school has is filled with sticker plants. You know, the annoying ones that are sharp and stick to skin or socks? That’s what those are called, right? Burs? Nah, we called them stickers.
“Sure, I think I know who’s gonna win.”
Me.
“I agree.”
We walked towards the huge balloon and got in line. We had to maneuver a bit to make it so we would face against each other (cutting people or pushing people ahead of us.), and then it was our turn to go.
We got in our ready positions (we just stood there) and looked straight forward. I saw my pathway clear as day: I would jump straight through and quickly get up, then gracefully dodge all of the obstacles and climb up the ropes blazing fast and finally, after realizing how far ahead I was of Caitlyn, look out into the world and see all the people and places that were waiting for
I lost.
How? I was athletically superior to her and I knew what I was doing. The last person must have eroded the course with their sweat and it got it slippery. It’s not my fault. If I was on her side, then I would’ve won. No, of course I actually tried. Wait, no, I didn’t try my hardest, I went easy on her. Of course I did.
“Becky, you’re so slow.”
“I- I wasn’t even trying.”
“Sure you weren’t.”
I was… kinda looking a little tired out… so I’m sure she could tell I actually was trying. I would never tell her that. I saw that she was tired as well and asked a question I didn’t think I’d be asking. NOT THAT QUESTION, A DIFFERENT ONE.
“You want popsicles? They’re free I think.”
“Uh, sure?”
We walked over and got some popsicles. I didn’t think she’d agree and was planning on walking up to the woman handing them out and leaving, but a different event happened…
“Wanna have another contest?”
Hey, aren’t I the one that usually initiates contests? What’s Caitlyn doing?
“Sure, what?”
“Who can finish their popsicle first?”
I’m boutta shove the whole thing down my throat
That’s what she said.
“You’re on.”
“3.”
“2.”
“1.”
I won! First victory in… forever… oh… I
“Mmm- oh, god- I win!”
I’m gonna throw up
“You know you don’t win if you puke it back out.”
“Shut up, I still won. Wait, don’t throw away the popsicle stick-”
“What?”
“Don’t throw it away, we’ll be using them to fight each other.”
“Fight… wait, what?”
I held mine up in a sword-like-position. She looked confused for a second, but understood pretty quickly. She got in a sword fighting position like me.
“En garde!”
“Excuse me?”
“I-I said en garde, like, uh, it means get ready- have you never seen a movie?”
“Yeah, but you pronounced it like ‘on - gourd’. That’s not how you pronounce it.”
“I- sorry, French master, I didn’t know?”
“Hey, I’m no French master.”
“Whatever. Just, uh, go?”
We attempted to fight each other with small, wooden sticks, and you can probably guess how that went.
It didn’t work. We just refreshed ourselves with the popsicles and now we’ve tired ourselves out again. And we’re too scared to ask the woman if we can get more popsicles, so we were too tired to do anything else. We sighed at the same time as each other and decided to sit down on the curb.
“Whose idea was it to waste our time?”
“I dunno, wasn’t it yours?”
Yeah, she’s right, it is mine.
“Caitlyn?”
“Becky?”
“Have you ever had a crush on anyone?”
Hmm. Well, it certainly isn’t the weirdest question I’ve asked this school year.
“Uh, yeah, I guess so. Why?”
“Mmmmm no reason, just wondering about what Anna said earlier.”
“Oh, okay.”
“Yup.”
“Mmhmm.”
Ooh. This is awkward. Fun.
“What about who you li-”
“ATTENTION ALL STUDENTS!”
Oh, right, this also happens at the end. Some guy starts screaming.
“We are about to play our movie to end off the Festival. If you’ve brought your towels, please set them down to prepare for the showing. Tonight, we’ll be showing the Trolls movie.”
HAHAHAHAHHAAHAHAHAHAHAAH TROLLS
Ahem, I ‘love’ that movie (nope).
So we sat down on the ground (thankfully Caitlyn brought a lawn towel because I forgot mine) to set ourselves up for the movie, still holding onto our used popsicle sticks from earlier (gross). As I sat next to her, I felt a little bewildered, and I felt like I still wanted to do something, too.
It doesn’t matter. I was sitting next to her. No one’s around to- oh my god Anna isn’t around I just realized
God it’s so annoying how she always ships us together. Just constant shipping, all the time. She and Jaidon, even Karoline would get into it sometimes. What a betrayer. But seriously? Every day? Shipping, non stop, during school, recess, lunch, it doesn’t matter! Every time I see Anna, she’s always talking about ‘how much I like Caitlyn’, or something like that. So, so annoying, stupid, dumb!
They’d make us do some of the dumbest things. Hugs? Seriously? No one, and I mean no one, wanted to do that! What stupid ideas could they come up with next?
I shouldn’t have said that. Their idea of humping- again, so stupid- was even stupider than the hugs thing. What did they even expect us to do? You can’t… hump… someone while standing up, meaning one of us had to get on the ground and- I don’t even want to imagine it, honestly. I hate remembering what Jaidon tried to do.
At least no one remembers the cupcakes. Now every time I see post-it notes, I get flashbacks and PTSD. Okay, maybe it wasn’t that tragic of an experience, but they were making fun of my artwork! You don’t do that to a person, it ruins their… moral, or something!
Okay at least I wasn’t nearly as humiliated as that one time when I was… a… I was a damn dog, for crying out loud. And I wore a collar- god, freaking damn it. They really should have thought more about who they were putting in the gifted program.
God, I need to stop remembering things. Seriously, every time someone says my name, I forget which one is real sometimes. Caitlyn, and especially Anna, call me by my freakish ‘Becky’ nickname. It still makes me want to shrivel and wither away. It’s literally so disgusting. I hate it so, so much. I honestly just hate this entire thing.
Hey, remember that book that the two of them attempted to write? Hated that, too. Absolutely hated that. I tried editing it for them, and still have, cause they’ve continued to try to write about the Elementals for some reason, despite it being a pretty… well, stupid book, but… I gave up trying after they did, too. They stopped pretty much as soon as they met my character, Percy, for some reason.
But the Elementals was such a cool idea, too! Super powers? Moving water? That just sounds so, so cool! I’m not even alone here, the rest of the Friend Group- stupid name, by the way- completely agrees, the fact that we all had super powers was just so, so cool. It’s a shame some people think that it isn’t completely incredibly to see kids jumping in the air, punching each other, slamming their fists on the ground like maniacs- oh, I see why it isn’t completely incredibly now
Speaking of the ground (great transition, right?), that cow thing? The three of them (well, Karoline kinda… didn’t care, so it was really just Anna and Caitlyn) kinda tore up the ground, pulling up the grass a ton. I think they were yelled at one time. Anyway, I didn’t get yelled at, cause I wasn’t doing anything wrong. I never do anything wrong.
Okay, you caught me, I was lying, there was obviously the very few times I was caught dozing off in class or doing questions wrong (there were… maybe a lot more times than I actually wrote to you about… uh, wait, no I take that back), but can we just forget about that? Hey, I know how to do math, right? That means I’m smart, right?
Er, logically smart. People smart, maybe not so much. I bought someone a stuffed animal, and someone I didn’t even like, after all. Or maybe that means I am people smart, like, it’s a forgiving gift for all the things we’ve done to each other? Well, I got the stuffed animal back, so… I guess we never forgave each other for all the things we’ve done to each other. Hmm. Sorry, Anna? Actually, no, you still ship me with Caitlyn, I’m not sorry for any of the things I’ve done to you.
Wait, you were the reason that- hmm. I remember now. You kinda set me up so that I could walk Caitlyn to her car, didn’t you? You’ve planned all the other things- the hugs, the cupcakes, the dog thing- actually, that might not have been you. Well, if you did set me up to walk with Caitlyn… thanks… yeah, no, screw you and all, but if I didn’t start talking to her sooner, than I wouldn’t have been able to do all these things with WHAT THE ACTUAL HELL AM I SAYING WHY AM I SAYING IM HAVING FUN WITH CAITLYN, AND THEN THANKING ANNA? HAVE I GONE ACTUALLY INSANE? WHAT IS WRONG WITH ME? WHAT HAVE I BEEN THINKING?
Is this- no, no, it couldn’t be! NO! NO! I HATE THIS! I HATE EVERYTHING! I HATE YOU! IS- IS THIS-
Is this love?
“Becky, you okay?”
“AH- uh, of course I’m okay.”
She stared at me for a second before quickly looking down. I looked at her, and… not in a creepy way, but just looking at her, it made me realize how… uh… beautiful…
Er, no, I mean, well, I don’t think I’m wrong. Never mind. As I was looking at her, I noticed she was looking kind of troubled.
“Uh…”
She kind of shook herself out of her daze and looked at me after I made a sound.
“What?”
“Nothing, you were just weird right there.”
She rolled her eyes and stared straight ahead. The movie had already started, and it continued playing. The two of us made a couple jokes throughout the movie, some… sexual related (we ranked the hotness of the trolls- it’s the twins, by the way), but we talked throughout it nonetheless. But not… normally talking. You know that word that sounds like awful? Awkward? That’s the word. That’s what I felt.
It felt terrible. Eventually, the two of us completely stopped talking to each other. The movie was almost done, and as I remembered from previous years, as soon as the movie finished, the entire festival finishes, and everyone goes home. Then the… final act was beginning.
Of the movie. You know when they all get put in that pot, and then Justin Timberlake confesses his love for Anna Kendrick? Sorry, ‘Branch’ and ‘Poppy’. Who names their character after plants, anyway?
Anyway, yeah, that happened, and I started thinking.
HAHAHAHA WHAT LOSERS
Okay but for real love confession seems kinda um uh um uh um
Familiar? Wrong word wrong word wrong word
Interesting. That’s the right word. Love confession more like… um… umm…
GOD DAMN IT WHAT THE HELL IS HAPPENING
The (dumb) confession scene ended, and the movie was about over. But… well, no, things weren’t over. The beginning happened.
I heard a small ‘ahem’ to my left, so I looked over to where I heard it from. I was now staring straight into Caitlyn’s eyes, and hers in mine. Hair, eyes, generally, just… what was the word?
Elegant?
Well, coughing isn’t very elegant, is it? Doesn’t matter, what’d she want?
“Hmm?”
“Hey, Becky, guess what?”
“What is it?”
“I’ve actually liked you this whole year.”
What the hell?
She’s joking.
No, really, what the hell? Who says that, even as a joke-
“Oh, real funny joke, Caitlyn. Yeah, yeah, go to hell.”
I thought it was a joke. I must’ve assumed wrong, because her face after that was…
it… broke me.
She had the most broken heart-face I’d ever seen (the first one I’ve
seen- it’s not the goddamn point). I saw it and felt a wave of guilt wash over me. What if… she wasn’t joking around? Wait, what if she was being- oh, no. She had to have been joking. She’s just messing with me as usual. There’s no way, right?
“Hey, what’s with the face? You okay?”
I said, hoping to make the conversation lighter.
It didn’t work.
“I wasn’t- you- you asshole!”
She ran away.
Did I… do something? She’s still joking, right? I don’t get what’s happening. There’s no way she actually meant it. I’ve known her long enough to know that she’s just messing with me.
It. It turns out, she wasn’t lying. She. She was telling the truth.
Oh, no. Did I just… rej- no, no, no.
“Wait. Wait! Caitlyn!”
I screamed her name, expecting her to hear me. There was too many people and I couldn’t see her. It was dark. I pushed through the crowds of people that were trying to sit down and kept calling out her name.
“Caitlyn!”
“Caitlyn!”
Oh, no.
“Caitlyn!”
ns 172.69.58.155da2
and then Add to home screen.