invisible string

year 12

"Move over." Meredith said as she plopped her food down across from Derek.

"What do you want, Freshman?" Mark asked.

"I'm eating lunch with Derek." She announced.

"We're seniors, freshman don't eat with seniors." Mark said. Derek couldn't help but laugh at Mark. This was not going to go well for him. Fighting with Meredith never did.

"Hmm. Well, this freshman eats with that senior." She said pointing towards Derek. Derek smiled back at her. He really loved having Meredith at school with him. Over the past month or so, they had spent all of their time together. Between classes, they would walk together, during lunch, much to Mark's chagrin, they always ate together, and after school they always studied together.

"That's against the rules." Mark said. Mark should really just give it up, and honestly, if he did somehow convince Meredith to leave, Derek would just leave with her.

"What rules?" She asked. This was a trap for Mark, and everyone knew it. It was classic in a Meredith argument. She would ask a basic question that everyone knew the answer to. Mark would explain the rules then Meredith would inform him the reasons why the rules moot.

"The rules of the cafeteria." Mark explained. Derek grinned at the smirk that was growing on Meredith's face. She had just won the argument.

"Oh, can I see these rules?" Meredith asked sweetly. The sweet always came before the insults.

"No, they aren't written down, everyone just knows them." Mark said.

"Well, you don't even follow rules that are written down. It's written down that seventeen year-olds shouldn't drink, yet every weekend you get drunk and whore around." She said. He really wished he could bring Meredith to college.

"Fine." Mark sighed. "Eat here."

"Cause I really needed your permission." Meredith sneered. Derek had always liked Meredith. Since she was a little kid, they had gotten along, but Meredith as a teenager was something else. She was always cute, but now she was cute in the way that teenage girls were cute. And she was snarky and fearless. She got perfect grades without even trying.

A lot of the kids at the school thought Meredith and Derek were dating, but they weren't. They were just close as ever. It's not that he didn't want to date her, she was cute and smart and funny, and basically everything he looked for in a girl, but it couldn't work out. He was a senior and she was a freshman, within a year, he would most likely be on the opposite side of the country. She was only fourteen and he was seventeen. Not to mention that Meredith was somewhat cool and Derek definitely was not. Meredith could do significantly better than him.

Derek had dated a bit in high school, but it wasn't really working out. He wasn't the best looking and he really didn't have a good reputation. He was known for being a quiet, weird looking dork. And the girls who wanted to date him were always kinda weird. He knew he probably shouldn't date someone who he didn't like but he was a seventeen year-old boy. All he wanted was girls. So he would date a girl for a while, then, when he was no longer interested, which never took all that long, he would introduce her to Meredith. Meredith had a knack for making girls break up with him. He had no idea what she did, but every single time he introduced a girl to Meredith, within a few days, the girl would dump him. The first time with Cindy, it was clear what Meredith had said to make her leave, but Meredith now had much more sophisticated ways of getting rid of his girlfriends. He couldn't even tell anymore. They would talk and then there would be some tension that came out of nowhere, and the next thing he knew, he was dumped.

He was a little worried about when he finally would find a girl he actually liked, but that was a ways off. Anyways, hopefully if he met a girl that he actually liked, Meredith would like her too and not chase her away. Though, it might be some time before he could actually meet a girl he liked. The dating thing had just about dropped off when he started his senior year. He wasn't sure if it was the fact that he had already dated all the girls who were willing to date him or if it was Meredith preemptively chasing away all the girls. He didn't really mind either way, he had Meredith and that's all he really needed.