Best Friends Forever?

Chapter 9: Closer Than Ever

Shortly after that weekend, on Monday, my dad passed away. The school day had been good except for a fight with Madeline, and then when my mom, siblings, and I got home, my dad had passed. I would rather not say what happened, but we didn't know what to do and eventually the police and ambulance showed up.

Lots of people were coming to the house, and I didn't want anyone to bother me. I was tired of everyone touching me and only wanted to stay on the porch and talk to my friends online. Madeline, despite our fight, had showed up, and so had Anabelle. Brienna, our other siblings, and I ended up having to stay the night at one of my real friends' house, so Anabelle and Madeline came with. Marina and Marybeth showed up at the friend's house soon after.

The wifi wasn't always on, so I wasn't sure I wanted to stay there instead of going to school the next day. I decided to go to school despite what had happened because I had to be online to talk to Monica, and if I couldn't talk to Monica, my best friend and big sister, I would go nuts.

Monica told me she didn't care if she got in trouble for being on her laptop during class, because I was more important, and she was ready to talk about everything. She was glad Madeline was there to comfort me and sit by me no matter what, and when we left school, we went to where a family friend had taken my mom the night before, which was my grandparents' house.

Even though my grandma had passed away, and my grandpa had gotten an apartment, no one had bought their house yet. That's where we planned on staying for about a week (which was as long as the neighbor said we could get away with it).

Monica was really worried because I hadn't eaten and I was too upset to eat. But she said, "You Have Got To Eat Something Melinda !!" She made me eat and then tell her exactly what I had eaten. I sent her a picture of me eating, too.

We ended up staying at my grandparents' house with a bunch of my imaginary friends for a lot longer than a week. It turned out, our family friend (the same one who had taken my mom to my grandparents' house) had been redoing our house but had actually been stealing from us and messing the house up. It was the same day one of my real friends was staying the night there with us and my mom didn't want me to tell her because it would scare her.

But I did tell Monica. I couldn't not tell her. I told her how scared I was of that woman, and she was so supportive. She was happy I had my imaginary friends with me to help me feel better. Monica also told me about the drama that had gone on during dance practice for the next competition. Her dance teacher was upset that she wouldn't tell her why she was in a bad mood (which had been because Mrs. Dolly was taking Lynn's side when Lynn wasn't getting along with the rest of us. It was on Twitter and everything!) and Mrs. Madison had gone home.

We were also going to this waterpark a lot of us had been to last summer called Nashville Shores, and Monica always seemed so interested to hear about our time.

We RPed a lot during the summer. We would try to do it every Friday, and our settings changed every time to keep it interesting. Monica was also excited for me because I was going to see my best friend Sheri, who was the manager at Red Lobster. I made sure to send Monica pictures of us.

I couldn't wait to tell her about my trip to Missouri.