The Georgia Rule

Chapter Nine

While it's no secret that a certain member of our student body has been the centre of attention for quite some time, it seems as though said student has taken it upon herself to thrust herself into the limelight once more. Maybe it's because she craves the attention, or maybe her life has been particularly drab since the ever so unfortunate events of last Friday, but I'm getting ahead of myself.

Introducing our self-proclaimed 'queen bee.' With high heels constantly clicking down the hall, some say that she basically begs for heads to turn her way. Is it even a surprise that she's currently single and moping, while her boyfriend, sorry, ex-boyfriend is having the time of his life?

"Your name doesn't even flow well," I blurted, desperate to distract myself from the angry words swirling around my mind.

"Excuse me?"

"Finn Radford?" I crinkled my nose, "Why insist to be called something that sounds so... abrupt?" I finished, still unsure about my choice of words. "Finnegan Radford- now that seems to have at least some sort of order," I rambled, "Why don't you like your name?"

"If you're looking for some sort of sob story regarding my name, then boy do I have a surprise for you," he drawled sarcastically. He studied the curiosity displayed on my face before rolling his eyes. "It's too much of a mouthful and I'd rather it be shorter," he added unenthusiastically, so I decided not to reply.

My fingers absentmindedly trailed the rim of my coffee mug while I rapidly blew the remaining steam away. Despite my attempts, the coffee was still too hot to drink. I glanced around the interior of the café, partially annoyed by the dim lighting. My eyes had already been through a triad of agonising tests and I was in no mood to deal with them being on a constant strain.

Sources say that Georgia has been shunned by most of her usual crew. She's sitting alone in classes and almost never seen at lunch.

"Why did you take me here?" One minute we were in Mr Radford's office and the next, I was following him to a random café, far enough that it would not raise unnecessary suspicion at school.

"Isn't it obvious?" he asked dumbfounded, "C'mon you were going to start with the waterworks and I had to distract you."

I was too busy trying to cover up the fact that I sniffled all the way over here to notice that for once, his sentence structure did not seem to come from a person over the age of thirty.

"So since Mr Professional himself is making me skip school, does that mean I won't get in trouble with dad?" I asked sweetly while batting my eyelashes mockingly. His lips tilted slightly as if he were remembering a secret joke.

"Technically-" he glanced at his watch, yet another thing that made him seem like a grandpa, "-it's around lunch and you didn't miss any classes to begin with."

I huffed in exasperation as he swiftly ended my futile attempt at a conversation by taking a large bite of his otherwise untouched sandwich. I quickly snapped a picture of my Christmas-themed coffee mug that seemed to be a few holidays too early and saved it to edit later for my Instagram.

Regrettably, I took a large swig of said coffee to prove my annoyance, forgetting to check the temperature. The liquid scorched the sensitive tip of my tongue and burned its way down my throat.

Grabbing the complimentary glass of water, I plucked the straw out and carelessly stuck my tongue in the cool liquid, welcoming the relief that came almost immediately. I let out an involuntary sigh of relief and opened my eyes that had somehow closed on its own accord.