When I Say "I love you..."

Chapter 11

Monday started out boring. Damen wasn’t there because he got food poisoning. Piper was sitting at the same table as Breanna, and Whitney and Andy were talking about Prom decorations. I didn’t know that Andy had volunteered as a late helper for the Prom committee. I also started to wonder when Piper had started sitting at another table. It was strange. The day without Damen seemed boring and uneventful. Maybe Piper was just sitting with Carter. She was next to him, but the two of them were across from Breanna. They were all laughing.

Sometimes, though, I would catch Breanna staring at me while talking to Piper when Carter wasn’t looking. What was that about? Was Breanna stealing my best friend too? I didn’t understand why she was obsessed with Damen. You can’t just call dibs on guys! Life doesn’t work that way!Maybe I was getting too worked up about it all though. I mean, Piper has known me forever. She wouldn’t just betray me like that. Would she? Piper was my friend. There wasn’t anything else to it. Maybe I should hang out with her this weekend though. I was going to talk to her after my soccer practice. Whitney was on my soccer team too. Maybe we could all go somewhere together. No, I needed to be with Piper more than those two right now. One thing at a time.

So, I did like I said. I went through all the boring classes. I went through gym class, where it turned out that we just played dodge ball today. Then, it was time to go after my final study-hall. I walked up to Piper at her locker. She was standing with a couple of guys. I noticed that none of them were Carter, but I wasn’t about to judge Piper of all people. I just ignored them. When they saw me coming, they scattered. I tried not to be offended, but I could see them giving me looks. I just did what Piper usually does and pretended not to notice. I just smiled skipping to Piper’s side. She turned toward me. She wasn’t smiling though.

“Hi Adelina.” What? She knew I didn’t like it when people called me that. I gave her a deadpan look.“ Then, I let it go rolling my eyes. Piper...didn’t look like the Piper in knew. In fact, it didn’t look like any Piper at all. She looked at me impatient.

“Piper, what’s wrong? I haven’t seen you in a while.” She brushed by me knocking her boney shoulder into mine. I grabbed her arm. Why would she do something like that. “Piper wait-” I started to say more and she cut me off. Piper looked really mad at me.

“What Addy? What do you want?” Piper was yelling at me now. She was really irritated at something. I let go of her arm, loosening my grip.

“Don’t you want to hang out after school?” I asked her. Why was she acting like this? It had only been a week since the last time we really got to hang out, and now she was so different since then. It felt unfair, like I had limited time with my best friend. What changed?

“No, Addy. I can’t. I have too much stuff to do. You know, not everyone is a smart know-it-all like you are.” She said to me tearing off. I just blinked twice. I was stunned. I didn’t even know what to say to that. Besides, that was totally unfair. Why would she say that? I’ve helped her every time she asked for it. It wasn’t like she needed it though. What had gotten into Piper lately?

I got in my car heading home to get ready for the practice today. The air felt thick and clouds had recently started rolling in. It was humid today. Were we expecting more rain. Usually, we could go a few weeks without rain. I could see flashes a little ways off. I was worried, because if they got too close soccer would be canceled. I kept driving, just waiting for my phone to ring. It hadn’t done so by the time I got home, so I went inside, changed, and put on my cleats and shin guards. I grabbed my ball and sweatshirt, walking out the door.

I got to the fields and I saw that everyone was there. This was our first practice of the year. I looked around to find that more people than I thought I knew were on my team. For instance, the first person I noticed was Breanna. There was also Carter, the boys I saw that were with Piper, Whitney, Andy, myself, Matt, Dan, and Kyle too. There were two boys I recognized that were two grades younger than me. I couldn’t quite remember their names, but I thought that one was named Joe, and the other was named John.