She walked down the hallway alone; her arms clutched her books hard to her chest. She could feel their eyes on her back; she felt the fire of their stares wanting to burn her, wanting to hurt her. They were her old friends, the ones she once spent nights with staying up late and gossiping about boys and other girls at their school. But now they gossiped about her and trashed talked her, they didn’t hide it anymore. Half the time they said it to her face.
She rushed into her class and to the desk in the back that she was isolated to, they pushed her back so no one would see her, so she knew that she was invisible. She pulled her ponytail out of her hair and let her curls fall, it was easier to cry this way, and it was easier to not be seen this way. A few seconds later she heard their laughs as they walked into the class and sat down a few rows in front of her. She tried to make herself smaller, but too late they saw her when she looked up just to see.
“What are you looking at?” Chris’s voice rang out, the others turned to stare and laugh.
“Yah Vicky get a life.” May, the girl that replaced her as Chris’s best friend, sneered at her.
They finally sat down and turned their backs to her; she quickly raised her hand and wiped away the tears that managed to escape. She still wasn’t used to the cruel names and the laughs of her old friends turned enemies. The bell rang and the teacher started the class talking about William Shakespeare and the tragic love of Romeo and Juliet. She closed her eyes and thought about her own tragic romance.
He was two years older than her, already out of high school for two years. She had met him at the coffee shop she worked at after school. Her friends never got why she had a job, why she choose to work when her parents would pay for everything. But Vicky didn’t want to be a spoiled rich girl; she wanted her own money that didn’t come out of her daddy’s bank account.
He ordered a large black coffee to go and she was having a rough day, so a simple order made her smile and hurry to get his coffee ready for him. When she came back, he was staring at her in way that made her stomach light on fire. She stumbled over her feet and sent the coffee flying straight into his face. He screamed and so did she, rushing out from behind the counter she tripped again and fell taking the magazine rack down with her.
The other customers and workers didn’t know which way to go, the boy that had hot coffee all over his face or the girl lying under the metal magazine rack. But it was the boy that came over and picked up the metal rack and helped her up.
“The coffee was warm, not hot. So you’re lucky that I wasn’t hurt. But it looks like your arm is bleeding.” She stared at him as he gentle cupped her elbow and showed her the long cut on her arm bleeding red. Without warning she fainted.
When she finally woke up she was in a hospital bed, the coffee boy sitting next to her with the coffee covered t-shirt on. She then realized he had never left her side, she looked around and saw no one else she knew. Not even her parents, she let out a breath and turned back to the boy. His hand was stuck out towards her and a smile was on his face.
“Benny.” She slides her hand into his and smiled as it disappeared into his large hand.
“Vicky.”
From then on she was a goner, and so was he. They spent every waking moment together, but in secret of course. She knew her friends wouldn’t approve of Benny as soon as she found that he was poor. But she fell in love with him any way; they were at the mall when her friends saw them together, kissing on a bench over of a cup of ice cream. The next day Chris said it was him or them, Vicky felt her heart tearing as her phone vibrated in her pocket, she knew it was Benny; she was an hour late for their lunch date.
She turned her back and walked out of Chris’s house, the next day she was a loner with a strange disease that made everyone in the school stay away from her. It was three months later and it still hurt her, but she was with Benny and happier than ever. English was over with the ring of the bell snapping her out of her memories and thoughts. She quickly wrote down her homework assignment and rushed out of the room with her things clutched to her chest once again. She walked out of the class room after Chris and the others.
They ignored for the first time that day and she smiled, she could finally breathe just a little and let her guard down. But it when she got to her locker the red paint made her freeze in the middle of the hall way. Written across her locker in large letters was the word SL*T. Dropping her things, she ran all the way out of the school and away from the laughing faces of her old friends and the rest of the student body.
When she pushed the doors of the school open and saw the face she lived to see every day she flew down the stairs and into his arms. He caught her and hugged her tight, making her feel safe just for the moment, just until tomorrow when she faced her enemies again.