° two °

969 40 34
                                        

Somehow, today was going horribly, and I was pretty sure it was only going to get worse.  At least, that was almost always how I felt.  For the past couple of years, school had been terrible, and it would be no different if it continued that way.  To start the day off, my first period was awful.  We had a substitute that thought they owned the place, and that never went over well when the trouble students started speaking up.  There was no doubt in my mind that our teacher was going to be pissed when they came in tomorrow, but I guess that was an issue for tomorrow and not one I had to directly worry about.  Second period had sucked, along with my third and fourth as well.  To top it all off, though, there was no pizza left by C lunch.  I had no idea how the cafeteria could miscalculate so poorly, but there was basically nothing I could do.  At this point, I wanted to just fall over and die, which was extremely dramatic, but I simply could not wait for this day to end.  It was an absolutely terrible Monday, and I simply prayed the going to book club would turn the whole thing around somehow. 

"Nicole.  Nicole!" 

Just when I thought it couldn't get worse.  Just when I hoped we would continue to coast on an average horrible day, the dial was cranked up to the highest possible number.  The one and only Harry Styles was shouting my name halfway across the cafeteria, his eyes focused on me.  The dark-haired boy was approaching quickly, my friends glancing in my direction, and raising their eyebrows.  They knew Harry was good friends with my brother, hell they had been there when Harry was over.  Then again, the whole school basically knew I had a tie to Harry considering him and my brother were always hanging out.  While the rest of the school thought he was cool, though, I only ever talked about how rude he was to me, so this was certainly a turn of events—and not in a good way either.

"Nicole, let me sit with you," he stated once he was finally close enough to speak to me without yelling.  "They fucked my schedule up, and now I have C lunch instead of B with Ethan." 

I stared at him.  How was that my problem? It wasn't like I was the one sitting in the office trying to make sure that Harry and my brother would be separated.  If anything, a part of me was almost amused at the fact that he wanted to sit with my brother so badly.  The two had been inseparable for years, and it was always crazy to me.  After all, I felt like I had never gotten that close with any of my friends now, yet here were Harry and Ethan over a decade later still best buds to the point that having separate lunches was basically the end of the world. 

"I'm sorry, why would you want to sit with Juniors?" I asked him.  "You always complain to Ethan about Seniors who sit with Juniors being dumb."

"Jesus Christ, I'm not happy about it either.  Do I look like I am happy to even be asking you this question? For God's sake, I'm asking if I can sit with you, and I don't like you at all so I'm just—" 

"Is that pizza?" 

Harry shut his mouth, glancing down at his tray.  He raised an eyebrow after thinking about what I had asked him, nodding slowly.  My friends were all quiet, watching as I thought over my decision, though I was pretty sure they already knew what I was going to do.  After all, it was my only reasonable choice at this point.  Especially since I had just been complaining about the food situation to them no less than a minute prior to Harry calling my name.

"You can sit if I can eat your pizza." 

He stared at me.  I could tell by the look on his face that my words were not what he had wanted to hear.  If anything, it was the exact opposite.  I was certain that it was probably the last thing he would have thought I was going to ask, and quite frankly the last thing he would want to fork over at lunch.  However, this was the only option in this situation.  There were no other options, and I knew I had all of the power here. 

Desolate - h.s. ✓Where stories live. Discover now