{Completed}
When we got hurt as children, we went running to our parents, they would scold us and treat the wound until it was cured.
As we became older, we realized that the wounds we showed our parents were the ones that healed quickly because so...
I hated that I had to live by the whole week anticipating the stupid party. I could leave the house or whatever and leave them to their business, that was what I planned until my mother came into the room this morning to give me a dress to wear.
"I don't want to wear this Ma, don't you think it's kind of tight?" I stared disapprovingly at the way the cloth hugged my body in the mirror. I didn't like it, at all.
"I would have let you wear this but Jade plans on wearing hers and you know how she gets when it comes to wearing the same clothes," my mother tried not to offend me and to satisfy both of us at the same time.
What she didn't know was I didn't want anything to do with this party. I wanted to tell her, I really wanted to. My anxiety about their reaction just didn't let me.
"Can't I just leave the house and go somewhere else, Mother?" I asked her.
She looked up at me with a playful scoff, "where do you possibly hope to go? Besides it's your party what do you mean leave the house?"
I would have told her to let me go to my grandmother's which was five hours away but I knew that would raise more questions and I wasn't ready to let it out.
"Just wear it, it's one night, have fun June and send me pictures," she smiled as she started to walk out of the room to leave for her flight. "Lots of them."
I sighed and swallowed the lump in my throat knowing that there was no escape to this. I looked at the yellow gown again before walking out to see off our parents off as they left for their anniversary.
••••••••
As dusk fell, Jade's friends came by first. You would know from their endless chatter about how she looked in each shoes she wore to match the gown she planned to wear. I looked at my own gown as I sat in front of the mirror.
If I wanted to annoy the life out of Jade, I'd wear the same gown that she planned to wear. But I wasn't that kind of person, maybe she was right. I tried so hard to always be different. I wasn't sure if it was a good thing or a bad thing.
A knock came on my door and I thought about who it could possibly be. As I let out the instruction to come in, I stared at the mirror to see Jace's face as he entered into my room already dressed up for the party.
Thousands of thoughts wandered through my mind as I wondered why Jace was in my room instead of playing video games with his friends in his room or the other things he did to get by life.
"What are you doing here?" I asked him.
"I can't stop thinking about what Jade said. It's not true right? That you didn't get accepted into the university?" He asked me.
I looked up to him, searching for any trace of deliberate mockery in his eyes. But there weren't any and that was odd.
"Why do you care?" I asked him.
Jace didn't care about me, not in a bad way. If I had chicken pox, he wouldn't be bothered the slightest, as long as I didn't die. That was the kind of person he was, he didn't care but he still cared.
"I mean, why didn't you get accepted? You passed the SATs," he asked me, discarding my question as to whether he cared or not.
The question he asked was a question I hadn't asked for myself. I was so bothered about what everyone would say and think that I didn't bother to see why I didn't get accepted or ask the university to reconsider their decision.
Instinctively, I grabbed the phone and opened the mail again and I knew Jace's gaze were fixated on me as he anticipated my response.
"I didn't meet the standard academic threshold," I blurted as I read out from the mail. That was absurd, what is that supposed to mean?
"I know someone in college, I'll ask. I think you can write to them and ask them for a reconsideration." He told me.
I shook my head and looked back at the mail wondering how this never crossed my mind. As I looked back to still see Jace, there this warm feeling in my gut and I knew I was kind of pleased with him caring about it.
"Thank you," I said to him with a small smile and he nodded yeah as he walked out of the room.
Jace wasn't as blunt as Jade was, I knew that he didn't relate to me as well as he did with Jade, but I just knew that he didn't totally disregard my existence and this evening was proof of that.
Maybe he was the good side of the bad egg.
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