layers | john bender

[14] "You're so conceited Claire."

14. ꜰᴏʀʙʙɪᴅᴇɴ ꜰʀɪᴇɴᴅsʜɪᴘs

Everyone stood quiet for the like millionth time today. We all took in everything we said to each other as Claire continued to rub my back. I leaned on her shoulder gently. Brian spoke out about how Allison and him are the only 'better people' here. Allison said she had no friends but if she did, they wouldn't mind having Brian and his friends around. Brian proceeded to tell everyone that he wouldn't act shitty to any of us.
"Your friends wouldn't mind because they look up to us." Claire was right. I mean he was a Sophomore while the rest of us were Juniors. He's friends all looked up to us, they wanted to be 'cool' and/or 'chic.'
Brian laughed at her. "You're so conceited, Claire. You're so conceited. You're so, like, full of yourself, why are you like that?"
Claire teared up again before replying. "I'm not saying that to be conceited! I hate it! I hate having to go along with everything my friends say!"
"Well then why do it? I mean you're your own person Claire. They don't control you." I sat up and looked at Claire while talking. "I don't know, I don't...you don't understand..you don't. You're not friends with the same kind of people that Andy and I are friends with! You know, you just don't understand the pressure that they can put on you!"

Brian let out a small gasp. He was genuinely shocked at her response and I wondered why as she had a fair point. "I don't understand what? You think I don't understand pressure, Claire?" Brian started to cry a bit and I looked at him, quite scared honestly. "Well fuck you! Fuck you!" He hid his face in his arm and continued to tell everyone about why he's here. He told us that one of our teachers, Mr. Ryan, found a gun in his locker. We all looked at him in shock. I was genuinely confused and shocked all at once. Brian with a gun? It didn't make sense.
"Why'd you have a gun in your locker?"
Brian started rambling, none of us understood what it had to do with having a gun. "I tried. You pull the fuckin' trunk on it and the light's s'posed to go on...and it didn't go on, I mean, I-"
"Bri, what was the gun for?"
"Just forget it..."
Andrew spoke for us all when he raised his voice at Brian saying that he's the one who mentioned it.
"I can't have an F, I can't have it and I know my parents can't have it! Even if I aced the rest of the semester, I'm still only a B. And everything's ruined for me!" I shook my head, trying to wipe the grim image that crossed my mind. I placed a hand over my mouth. "Oh, Brian..." Brian bashed a chair over causing me to flinch slightly.
"So I considered my options, you know?"
"No! Killing yourself is not an option!" Claire didn't shout but she certainly wasn't quiet. I was concerned for Brian more than ever. "Well I didn't do it, did I?  No, I don't think so!"
As if it was the most important question ever, Allison seemed curious and asked if it was a hand gun. "No, it was a flare gun, went off in my locker."
Andrew began to laugh. I looked at him as he shook his head but continued to laugh. Brian also looked at him. "It's not funny..." Although, I knew it wasn't funny that Brian was planning his own death, I laughed and so did everyone else including Brian. I didn't feel so bad for laughing when he did.
"Yes it is...fuckin' elephant was destroyed!" Brian spoke out while laughing.

Allison had quieted down which gave her the opportunity to speak up on her experience."You wanna know what I did to get in here? Nothing. I didn't have anything better to do." Our laughters heightened at the idea of Al simply coming just because and not for skipping or something crazy that she normally does. "You're laughing at me."
Andrew shouted out, "No!" and Allison joined our laughter. "Yeah you are!" After our hysterical laughter had calmed down, we sat around for a while. Before Bender decided to speak up.
"You never told us why you're here, Rhiannon." I looked at him, confused. "John, you know why."
"But see, the group doesn't, sweetheart." I sighed and looked at everyone else, who all stared back at me with curious faces.
"I, uh," I rubbed the back of my neck and chuckled nervously. "I flashed our art teacher." I let it all out in a single breath. I expected them to all ask me to repeat what I said as it was barely coherent but they didn't, they understood. Their mouths hung open like if I had cursed them for the rest of their lives.
"You flashed Mr. Lambert?" I nodded at Claire, answering her question, and put my head into my hands, I was embarrassed to say the least. Allison was the first to laugh, asking why in between her laughter. "To my defense, it was John's fault." Bender looked at me, gasping playfully as I pointed at him. "How is that my fault?" He smirked at me, knowing exactly why but wanted me to tell. "He was trying to skip class to pull the alarm and needed a distraction."

Everyone laughed a bit and Brian got up. He walked over to the record player in that room that Andrew was in earlier. He put in a random vinyl and we all decided to dance around the library. Claire, Allison and I all danced on the tables and started laughing, the boys followed after doing their own dance in sync. Allison danced on her own, shaking her head and kind of falling into some cocoon like pose. Bender and I got to the second balcony and started dancing together like Sandy and Danny in Grease.

Through the duration of the song, we danced until we realized that Bender had to go back to the closet before Vernon noticed he was gone. Andrew and Brian gave him a boost back up the ceiling he had fell down from. Once Bender got back up, we all walked over to the railing near our tables. Claire and Brian started talking about the paper we were meant to do and Claire brought up the great point that it was useless to have us all write a paper each. Claire and Andrew implied for him to write for all of us since he is the smartest. Claire then looked at Allison and decided that it was great to give her a personal makeover.

I would've stayed to see the end results of Al's makeover but I excused myself from the gang.
"Where ya going?" Andrew questioned first as Brian looked at me, waiting for me to answer. "I'll be back, I have to do something." They simply nodded and let me go but not before looking out for Vernon first. I thank them and head in the direction of the janitor's closet.