Crybaby

Buried deep

When you finally get over it, when you finally heal, they are still there. And they can barge back in and open new wounds. These will hurt more than before. These will not heal so easily. But you somehow enjoy them, through the stinging, burning, pain.
__________________________
Electra leans in towards the mirror, carefully painting a small black heart on to her pale cheek. She stands back and examines her outfit, waiting for the makeup to dry. She quietly hums to herself as she pulls a white faux fur coat over her pink  dress and grabs her backpack. Some people say she overdresses for school, but she disagrees. They all just underdress.
She steps out of the door and locks it. Her parents are never even home to say goodbye. She sighs and buries her keys in her coat pocket. Her breath turns the chilled air around her misty.
On her walk, she notices something new among the cookie cutter suburban homes and identical grey cars. A boy is riding his bike towards school. He looks about 15, and has slightly wavy, light brown  hair. He is tall and slender. There is this boyish nature about him. He looks her way. She flashes a quick smile before turning away and flipping a section of her curled hair behind her shoulder.
When she arrives at the cold doors of the school, she pops a piece of bubblegum into her mouth.
Some habits never change.
Electra enters the auditorium. It's where all the freshman stay before school.
She is earlier than usual today, which means the busses haven't arrived yet. She spots Troye and makes her way over.
"Hey blue." She says, patting him on the head. He smiles. Blue is a nickname that she started using for Troye during 8th grade for whatever reason.
"Hey. How're you?" He is wearing the same bomber jacket he wears every day. Wild.
"Eh. I'm so done with school already." She says as she takes a seat on his left. The wooden seats have names, dates, drawings, and phrases carved into the backs and handles. No surface is safe in high school.
Electra studies one of the messages.
You and me/always forever
-cult kids of '84
Troye traces his finger over it, seemingly mesmerized.

"I like your coat Electra."
Lana sits down with her while saying this. Electra looks up from the chair.
"Oh thanks Lana. I like your shirt, too."
Lana grins. She has on a white blouse with a scalloped collar and a short tennis skirt.
Lorde comes in, along with Harley, Alessia, and a boy named Jacob who recently started sitting with them on accounts of being friends with Troye. Another girl who really clicked with Crybaby is Yolandi. She is a wild little girl and is dating a senior. She moved here from south Africa.
Almost all of them have earbuds in. The whole little group is very music oriented.

The freshman come in bouts as busses arrive.
Finally Crybaby walks in.
A few heads turn and look at her. 
She just smiles.
"Hi Crybaby!" Alessia grins and waves.
"Hey." Crybaby sits down between Harley and Yolandi.
She slides off her long pink coat to reveal a short green babydoll dress. Her favorite.
Crybaby's eyes have bright colors painted around them with makeup, and her hair is in a bun with a few strands falling out around her ears. It is currently half black and half blonde.
"So there was this new kid I saw. Not sure if he goes here though. He was riding his bike down my street to school. I felt like I recognized him but I couldn't really tell." Electra states once everyone is settled for the next 15 minutes or so.
"Oh. Huh. Will you point him out if you see him?" Lana is scanning the room, clearly intrigued.
Crybaby doesn't even give it a second thought. Maybe she should.
They all chat a little for a few minutes, but nothing important comes up. Everyone is tired, as usual.
Troye, however, has been talking to Jacob the whole morning, and they seem rather enamored with each other.
Harley nudges Crybaby and jerks her head in their direction.
The boys are leaning close and giggling often. Jacob is blushing.
Crybaby lights up. She really, really wants Troye to be happy.
Then the bell rings.
Time for class.

During 3rd period, Crybaby is sitting in the back row, tapping her pencil against the desk in boredom and stares at the clock. Her chin is resting in her hand. She doesn't like being told what to do, when to do it, or being held down by school at all. She glances around the room. The only person who Crybaby is close with in this class is Lorde. Lorde has her eyes out the window, obviously daydreaming. She is somewhere else.
Mark and Ethan snicker at something. The seconds tick by so slowly it hurts.

After two more classes, they are all herded off in to the cafeteria. Electra laughs as she struts past a table of girls and one elbows her friend, staring at Electra very obviously. Electra turns around and looks at the girls, pissed. She blows a bubble with her gum and pops it, before tossing it in the trash. They all seem to have blonde hair and mean eyes. They all blend together. They all fit in.
They all hate Electra.
She has an idea.
With the girls eyes still on her, she runs over to a table of sporty boys across from them, right in their view. She picks out Alex, a certain boyfriend of a certain blonde girl who was talking sh*t about her. She manages to slide in next to him. The girls at the table across are mumbling. They can't hear what Electra is saying to him, but they can see the way she is batting her eyes and biting her lip and flirting with him. "What the hell does she think she is doing? That's my boyfriend. She knows that." Says one of the girls, Kayla.

Electra giggles and leans in
And then kisses him.
And he kisses back.
Kayla is furious. Electra smiles, swings her legs around, winks at Kayla, and walks away.
When she arrives, Crybaby is giggling gleefully.
"Thatwassofunnyohmygod" Crybaby wheezes out through her laughter.
Electra just smiles.

"So do you know if that mystery boy you were telling us about this morning is here?"
"Oh I met him!" Alessia shot her hand up in the air, grinning like a little kid
"What's he like?" Crybaby said, staring off into space. "Well, he seems really sweet and a little shy. His name is
Johnny."

Electra suddenly remember where he is from and wishes she had never brought him up. Troye whips his head around from Jacob. Lana's breath hitches a little.
Only the original four remember Johnny. The boy who left Crybaby when they were young.
Crybaby is snapped out of her daydreaming.
Alessia is confused.
"Did I say something? Do you know Johnny?" She looks around.
"H- he was the boy that I liked when I was little. We were just some kids with crushes. It's not a big deal." Crybaby says dismissively, but with and undertone that no one has heard from her before. Electra, Troye, and Lana share knowing glances. Every word she just said was a lie.

It wasn't just liked.

They weren't just some kids with crushes.

By that age they had been exposed to so much that they weren't even really kids anymore.

It's very unlike Crybaby to hide her emotions.

Crybaby is staring at Johnny from across the lunch room.
Suddenly, he looks back.