I. The first day she arrived at Sanctus, she was young, and shy. Well, shy really wasn't the word.. more closed off, to herself. She didn't want to be hurt again. She promised. And so, as her first year at Sanctus continued, she packed it all inside her, as she had been taught to. When a group of girls, all tall and beautiful, came up to her and invited her to join them for lunch, she wasn't sure what to do. But, not knowing any better, she did.
She knew she was a certifiable bitch around the school by her second year. She would walk through the halls with her 'friends,' long legged, always dressed to impress. She surrounded herself with people she knew she didn't have to get close to. People who cared more about doing your hair in the morning, or who's cuter in their class, than how you slept, or what your family was like. It was the day she made someone cry, that she knew she had to stop. The day her, and her 'friends' walked up to a short girl, with glasses, a lisp, and a tail, and called her a freak. She had joined in with the mocking, getting so caught up in it, and being so used to it, that she didn't realize something was wrong until the rest walked off, giggling, after shoving the girl into a locker, that she made herself stay, dry the young girls' eyes and promise her a better time, on her life.
As time went on, she slowly broke away from that group. She stopped responding when they texted her, stopped sitting with them at lunch, even if it meant sitting in the bathroom stall alone trying to balance her lunch on her thighs as she ate in the cramped space. She decided that, at the beginning of her third year, she would try to get back to a place where she could feel good about being at Sanctus, feeling like she deserved to be at a place that accepted who she was, and who everyone was.
So, by the time everyone came back for the beginning of third year, Ade had fallen back into touch with her best friend from her very first year at Sanctus, Aziza. She came back, too, with a new faith in herself, and affirmations to ease herself through what she knew could be a hard time. But she knew, as long as she had people she could trust and depend on by her side, she would get through this and become the person she wanted to be.
II. Even after deciding against being friends with the 'Cool Girls,' Adelina didn't like making friends. She didn't want to make friends. Who needed friends when she had a journal? She could write everything she was feeling, without having to say the words. Sometimes she would journal her nightmares; of her being teased to the breaking point, her father finding her and beating her in front of the whole school. Sometimes she would toss and turn at night, not even having the strength to journal it.
Ms. Priya took over for her old teacher halfway through the second year. On the day they met, Addie decided she looked too much like her mom for her liking, and decided to stay away.. or at least tried. What she didn't know is that Priya is basically Cupid. She was a matchmaker, but she could also feel what others were feeling, if it was strong enough. One day, she caught Ade crying in the girls room during lunch, being wracked by panic, and calmed her with reassurance that no thing or person was going to harm her.
She made her first real friend, though, when she bumped into Sam in the hallway, causing him to drop his books all over the ground. It was her "reinventing herself" phase. She didn't say a word out of place, and she would only smile when she looked at people, trying to stay under the radar. So, falling face first onto the ground along with the sound of books pounding down around her was not the best way to do it. When he offered to buy her some coffee, along with a study session, she decided not to say no, and she realized.. maybe it wasn't so bad to have friends.
III. It was a bright, shining day at Sanctus as her third year began. Her friend had dragged her through the courtyard because she insisted on Adelina meeting someone. When they finally got to where they were going, Ade realized she was staring at what had once been the young, scrawny boy she had known, and the first thing she noticed was his fiery red hair, and how she felt an attraction to him. Maybe it had always been there, but all she could do was stand there in shock as the now incredibly attractive boy greeted her.
Once getting ahold of her own nerves, she put on her own nonchalant expression and went along with the day, only getting by due to her best friend, Aziza, nudging her every time she caught her staring at Quinn.
Quinn and Az were the only ones who believed she could redeem herself after what she had done in the past year, after closing herself off 'to protect herself.' She had come back to school with freshly made cupcakes in hand for her two friends in hopes of winning them back, because the truth was that she had missed them. And now that she had regained their trust, she intended to keep it for as long as possible.
Still, they went on as normal, sitting together at lunch, laughing and talking, Az's blonde ponytail bobbing every time she laughed, Quinn constantly cracking jokes to attempt to break the girls' firm demeanors', just to prove to them he was as funny as he thought. And when they had finished, they all walked to their last class together before they had to split up again, and made plans to attend Quinn's lacrosse game that night, to cheer him on in the stands.
Az and Ade grabbed each other when they were told to partner up, as that was what usually happened anyway, and, though they paid attention, they mostly talked in hushed whispers about the boy sitting at the table only some odd feet away from them, exchanging theories on exactly what could have happened, eventually getting to the point of simply trying to make each other laugh without getting caught.
It was later that night, after he had scored the winning goal for the team, and Ade shot up from her seat to cheer for him as loud as she could that it happened. Their eyes met, if only for a second, and Ade smiled at him, a smile she saved only for the ones she loved most, bright and genuine, that they felt a spark that shot through both of them, which later caused an awkward exchange through them when Az and Ade went to bid him goodbye, ending in a tense hug and a quiet goodbye exchanged, and later pulled questioning from the other girl.
IV. Their first kiss wasn't dramatic, or something pulled from a sappy romance movie. It was two friends, sitting together and watching a movie, enjoying each others' presence, smiling and laughing. It was also two friends trying to sit and watch a movie together while dancing around the attraction they both felt. Not to say that it wasn't a sweet moment, as all first kisses with people in love are, but it was right for the two of them. Ade made the first move, she usually had to, as she was the less awkward of the two, though still awkward in her own right.
Sure, it wasn't a long embrace in the rain, or pure lust and passion, but it was theirs. It was two best friends, sitting together, laughing together, and just being with each other when she leaned in. It started slow, cautious, and eventually the two of them started beaming until they were practically forced to pull away, only to gaze at each other like it was their last moment, and all they wanted to see was each other. There had always been a connection between the two of them, and they always felt it. They would always look at each other just a moment too long, their hugs would last longer than that of someone who's 'just a friend'. And though they swore up and down that they were just close, they both knew they felt it. At least, Ade did.
So, from that day forward, though neither had said anything, everyone knew that it had finally happened. Mostly because every time they looked at each other in passing, they blushed. After having enough of the strange looks the two were getting, Ade stopped Quinn in the middle of the courtyard on her way to class and kissed him, in front of everyone, so that the murmuring around them would finally stop. And, just maybe, she liked letting people know she had finally caught the man of her dreams.
