If I were to be asked why I had trust issues, the cause would be clear: Hannah Maybell. From preschool until just her latest betrayal, I had considered Hannah my closest friend. But, Hannah had always made it clear to anyone who was able to put up with her unpredictable behavior that she was superior. In her mind, Hannah was the star and we were her supporting role. Oddly enough, most of the other girls were either scared of her, or grew to hate her. But not me! I was what you could call shy, so I wasn't about to pass up an opportunity to make a friend.
Anyway, flash forward 6 years and me and Hannah were still best friends. We were in fifth grade at Charles Lanburt Prep. Being the confident, gorgeous, charming gal that she was, Hannah had all of the guys in our class wrapped around her little finger. I, however, was an ugly-duckling geek whose closest thing to a romantic experience was sitting next to Hannah's older brother in the car when her mom drove us to school. During our fifth grade year, Hannah had her first boyfriend. His name was Ricki and he was gorgeous. Stupid, but gorgeous. Rickie would be the first in Hannah's long string of short-lived flings.
Anyway, back to me, the ugly-duckling. Although Hannah was considered prettier, I was definitely the brains of our little operation. While Hannah focused on having perfect skin and a flawless look, I focused on having perfect grades and a flawless transcript. Hannah and I were a pretty classic example of the phrase "Opposites attract".
I told Hannah everything, from fears to ideas to crushes. Well not crushes, just a crush. Being the hopeless romantic that I was, I had had a thing for Eli Rutter since the time we'd met in our fifth grade academic decathlon. Me and Eli became friends instantly, most likely due to our shared obsessions with geology and literature. Our first conversation went a little something like this
Eli: "Hey! Be careful with that, it's an amethyst."
Me: "No, it's an amethyst cluster. Big difference."
As you can see, I wasn't exactly a Casanova when it came to first impressions. Despite the fact that our friendship started with me rudely correcting him, me and Eli got really close. I would go over his house after school sometimes to study and collect rocks. Pretty soon, this started to bug Hannah. A lot.
Hannah requested that I stop spending so much time with Eli, which I did. I mean, "Hoes before bros" was an important value to me. I'd later see that it wasn't a value of Hannah's, but I'm getting a head of myself.
