Dares with the Boy Who Doesn't Care

Chapter Thirty-Four(Rose POV)

"I sincerely apologize for my recent behavior. I have sought out for help to get my alcoholism under control. Thus, I have left all of my residents under the control of my son-in-law. Do not worry about last months rent and I told him to give you more time to pay for this one. Once again I am truly sorry."

I read the note for the second time before ultimately decided to throw it away.

I'm sticking to my idea of pretending like the entire drunken-rampage-my-potential-death scenario did not happen.

The rest of the morning proceeds a little bit less than normally. In the transition between first and second period I notice two female students waiting in front of my locker.

One has a short black bob that fits perfectly against her oval face. Her surgically doubled eyelids make her look overly anxious like a rabbit on Redbull and Coke.

Her friend is about an inch shorter and has her tresses pulled into a giant brown bun that sits atop her skull like a second head. She's the first to speak.

"Do you have cancer?" Before I can even fully get within ear shot, she asks.

I stop where I am and take note of the gift wrapped fruit basket the short haired girl is holding. "Why would you think that?"

"It's just the people you have aquatinted yourself with usually don't aquatint themselves with outsiders- especially not of your family and financial background or lack there of." She tries to make everything sound so factual, like it was scientifically proven.

"The only time they've stepped out of their holy inner circle, other than when Cameron is dating someone- which I've figured out is not the case due to the lack of PDA you two have been showing," The other one rambles on and I begin to wonder if I'm going to be able to make it to class on time.

"was with Ella,"

I freeze.

From the information I gathered from Noah, though that was not the initial reason, cancer was ultimately the deciding factor that made the guys stay by her side. They stayed as long as they could, no matter what she did, until her inevitable death. While I was dedicating all of my time into school work they took my best friend and began dedicating all of their time to her.

She dropped me like a sack of potatoes because apparently I wasn't "cool" enough. She preferred hanging around the coolest, most popular kids in school in her last remaining months. I didn't hate her for it, as a matter-of-fact I hated myself. I thought that there was something wrong with me. I was abandoned by my only friend, the only person who was willing to talk to me.

Before I was just the outsider, the poor girl who came from a hole in the wall school yet was able to get higher test scores than all but one of the students here.

I was alone, until I met her.

It started out as us having to work on a group assignment together. Then it slowly progressed into the most unlikely of friendships. Sure I still ended up doing all of the work myself but at least I made a friend out of it. Everything was okay because I knew that I'd always have Ella to look forward to. I'd listen to her stories and she'd listen to mine. One day it just became me listening to her stories.