"Can I tell you something?" Conrad asked.
I only nodded.
"You're the strongest person I know."
To this day, I still think he lied to me. I should be the least strongest person he knows. How did he consider me strong when I could list dozens of peop...
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I REMAINED WITH TWO tightenedfists. I knew for a while that I was holding in a lot of anger, but I didn't realize how angry I was with how everything turned out. I have always loved being right, so I never thought that I would ever wish I was wrong about something this much. I hate how divided we have all become. It feels like a knife keeps stabbing me in the chest over and over again until one day I just can't live with it anymore. I think that today might just be that day.
Belly decided she wanted to sit across from me for lunch. I could feel as the anticipation grew in her stomach, waiting for me to look up at her and say something. Little did she know that I wasn't going to be the first to break the stillness and uncomfortable silence between us. Our relationship changed because of her, so I was going to wait for her to change it back, no matter how long it was going to take her to own up to it.
As much as I missed my best friend and my practically little sister, I needed to do this because then she'd think doing these things are okay. I will not tolerate that. Not ever. I know my worth and I won't let someone treat me like that.
I had finished my food a while ago, but everyone still sat at the table talking about things. It was impossible for me to finally converse with them because I had no idea what they were talking about since I had zoned out a long time ago.
One thing that did catch my attention was Steven saying, "Yo, this is dope. I'm going viral on TikTok."
"Is that a good thing," John asked, who always seemed clueless about new slang or trends going around.
"What, millions of people around the world watching my speech in a loop? Yes, Dad, that is a very good thing." Steven continued to look down at his phone, smirking like he was the coolest guy in the world. "I gotta forward this to Con and Jere, man."
I turned to look at Belly and she had done the same, it didn't take long for me to look away. There seemed to be an awkward silence after Steven mentioned them.
It was cut short by our waiter, who was coming by to give us our check. "It's actually meant to be all of us together," Laurel said to the waiter.
"Nope, I told him to do this for us. Steven is on our tab."
"But, Alva—"
"No buts. I know me and Beck already had a present waiting for him, but I wanted to do this too." She looked at Eduardo for a second before saying, "We wanted to do this."
Laurel pretended to be mad for a few seconds before letting out a small smile. "Thank you."
The waiter was still standing there, waiting to see if it was okay for him to leave. "Anything else?"
