The Best of Her

Chapter Twenty five

Mavis.

"You wrote this? That's so pretty,"  her ginger curls bounced as she spoke the words. She looked breathtaking, so full of life.

I don't know her, she doesn't know me,  we were two strangers sitting next to each other on the library floor. No one has ever tried speaking to me, I'm always avoided or whispered about. Hearing her compliment my calligraphy felt like I've been acknowledged for the first time since I stepped foot in this wretched high school, without being related to my brothers.

I should have thanked her, should have said something back but I only stared back at her green eyes, dumbfounded. She is just gorgeous. "Are you a freshman?" she asks and I could only nod. She beams at me, white pearls on display. "Young and talented, keep going just like that,"

She must be older, she speaks like she is older. I manage to say, "thanks."

"What's your name? I'm Annabeth, I'm a junior," her voice is so charming, so sweet and tender. "Mavis,"

Another smile, a faster heartbeat from me. "It's nice to meet you, Mavis."

The world is cruel. Human beings are cruel. You learn that the hard way. And when you do learn it, you over come it by adapting, you become the cruel person, the heartless, selfish one.

Meeting her for me was what like a slap to the face, a wake-up call, I was naive enough to believe that she actually liked my calligraphy, that she wanted to be friends, that it could be more than what it was. Thinking about it now, it was kind of dramatic. Trying to use me as a way to get closer to my older brother was a lame move, she thought she was in a movie or something. But it's not that that hurt me more, it was my own brother who was a fool enough to fall for her stupid plan. He didn't see what was right in front of him, he didn't see that I liked her more than a friend, and when I was mean to her and to him because I was jealous, he said I was overdramatic, too harsh, crazy even.

I hated him that year, he was too oblivious, and when he finally caught on it, it was too late.

"You crazy psycho bitch," she snarled, her teeth barring in disgust. "You think yourself funny? Trying to look interesting? trying to make something out of your pathetic life?" her words cut deep enough to feel like I'm bleeding. "Let me remind that you're nothing, nothing without your brothers. You're just a bratty kid who whines and cries when shit doesn't got her way." she takes a threatening step forward, and pushes a finger into my head. "You're just a retarded bitch who ruins the life of  every person who gets close to you, by making their life hell."

Retarded, retarded, retarded.

What a horrible word. I can't even say, it's a slur that ignite a hot angry fire in me. After that, people really started calling me crazy, deranged, unhinged. So I decided to give them a reason to really call me crazy. I didn't let anyone talk down to me, I didn't try to act nice anymore, the event of me breaking a tray on the girl's head was one of many. I was furious at myself for even believing a person had a true interest in me, so I took it out on everyone else.

Which led to the second biggest regret of my life.

I take another hit from the blunt and chuckle at the irony of this situation. Me, sitting alone at a party smoking a joint of weed trying to not think about a boy who wants to show me I'm worth a fight. It is familiar to when I was in sophomore, only then the boy in question tried to play me as a part of a dare to tame the wild girl.

"What do you want?" I saw him, hands in his pockets, easy smile on his lips and a mischievous glint through those dark eyes. "Can't a boy want to hang out with a pretty girl?"