All the days of our lives

The break up

Tina told me about all the times that Jade would come to her and Sandy, with their third friend, Octavia, and would tell them all that they thought I did wrong to her. She would tell them I insulted her and I was a slut that slept around with boys in toilets and came to school commando. At that age!

I was anything beyond dumbfounded and hurt as my tears poured freely down my cheeks while my brain hotly went over her words. Jade kept coming to them each day with a new emotion and a story to tell about what she claimed I did, not minding how many ears were listening. And she would cry so much that they hated me with all their might. It was till the issue at hand came up that they knew the kind of person she was.

Tina claimed that she and Sandra were not her accomplices in the crime, though they were involved, they were not her accomplices. The story was funny and annoying to me. I laughed to seem unbothered but I could not make my laughter void of nervousness and awkwardness. It hit me, really hard.

Sandra was fifteen and the rest of us were fourteen! And all these were coming from fourteen-year-olds. I was surprised and realised that I was probably saner than I thought I was in comparison with a lot of other people. From everything I heard her say Jade said, I could sense nothing other than envy in her words. But why? was the question. Her family was well-off and she had everything she needed, so I did not know why she would envy me and want me down. I did not even steal any guy from her. Even Billy.

Tina told me that the entire issue was her fault, Jade's. The narrative went thus: ''She has been crushing on Fred for quite a while now. And Fred happens to be a very good friend to Sebastian, Sandy's boyfriend, you know that, right? Jade kept asking Sandy to talk to Fred for her and tell him about her feelings so he would know and at least notice her. Sandy did that for her, I knew. And Octavia too. Then one day, Fred asked her to make herself the only available option that he would have to have. I do not know what happened after that till the Principal came to read her torn diary page to the class. I was beyond shocked when she told them, after being questioned, that Sandy, Octavia and I asked her to make him notice her by all means, especially by taking you down because you distract all the guys. She wrote letters of love, personally spread rumours about you to him and his friends as an excuse to talk to him and said a lotta shit about you to us and a whole lot of our other classmates. Sandy kept telling her to be sure of what she was doing but she claimed she knew what she was doing so I did not involve myself till yesterday when I was called upon by the Principal to defend myself as a result of her accusation. I assure you Anto, I am not her accomplice. I admit that I was regrettably stupid to have hated you before but it was due to our immaturity back then. Not that we are so mature now, we just know better by a little percentage. Now, I doubt you did all those things to her and a lot of others that complained. Sometimes, the level of hate our mates secretly harbour for you surprises me but I could not say anything because I am not a saint on that one. You are friends with a whole lot of your haters but eventually, you will know them.-

-My goodness! I just cannot... I can't believe this. Jade... Oh, well, life is full of things like this.- I shrugged with a blank expression, feeling like a knife just went through me. Tina looked at me with sad and surprised eyes but I pretended not to have noticed it.

While I sat and thought, my stupid mind kept giving me reasons why I shouldn't stop crying. I wiped repeatedly and sobbed and hiccuped, and thought I was done crying. But they would start pouring all over again as each word hit me.

I slept around with boys in the bathroom.

I pulled my knees closer to my chest and hugged it tightly as I dipped my head in the tiny space between them. My hand roamed around on the desk beside me, in search of my Kleenex, till I grabbed it. When I pulled the napkin out of it, I remembered that I had once kept something I considered important inside it but could not place a finger on what it was. I raised my head at the thought and brought my legs down. I grabbed the kleenex gently and placed it on my lap to inspect it.