Dead Jealous

Fake

Sky walked the full kilometre to Cassie's house. It was tiring and made her a little dizzy, but it was worth it. She had to talk to Cassie.

She knocked on the door and stood there awkwardly. She hadn't been there in a long while. The house was plain but sophisticated, with white walls and simple decor. It always seemed to be polished to its bare bones.

She heard footsteps and the door opened to reveal Cassie, her straight blonde hair in a ponytail and fluffy slippers on her feet. Her expression shifted from absent, to angry, to polite.

That was not a good sign.

"Hey," Sky said awkwardly. "Um, how's it going?"

Cassie shifted her feet and looked at her, her mouth a straight line.

"Not bad."

Sky forced her lips into a smile. "That's good. The thing is I, uh, kind of need to talk to you, if that's alright."

Silence ensued for a couple of moments and Sky bit her lip.

Cassie looked down. "Whatever...I guess you can come in."

Sky gratefully smiled but Cassie didn't return it.

They walked into the house and went into the empty lounge room, where Cassie proceeded to lie on the grey couch, jean-covered legs sprawled across its length.

"So, what do you want to know?" Cassie said strangely casually, picking up a bottle of shiny, pale pink nail polish from the coffee table.

Sky licked her lips nervously. "Well, the thing is, I wasn't really sure why you and the others weren't talking to me. Or anything."

"And?"

"What did I do? I don't remember anything..."

Cassie looked at her blankly before shaking the nail polish.

"Look, I get that you lost your memory and blah-blah blah, but it's the intent that we're holding against you," she said almost blasé, picking up a nail file.

"I'm sorry? I don't understand."

Cassie stopped filing her nails then and actually looked right at Sky.

"You. Ditched. Us. For the "cool" group. For your sister's friends."

"I - what?" She had stolen Tara's friends, just as she'd said? Why would she do that?

Cassie opened the nail polish and stroked a coat onto a fingernail.

"I can't...why haven't that talked to me since then? Don't you think, if we'd really become friends..."

"Aha! You hit it right on the nail."

Sky looked at her questionably. "You weren't friends. Not really. If you can't party hard or gossip - which you couldn't while in a coma, and you certainly couldn't now - they aren't interested." Cassy rolled her eyes.

"So, what, I just stood up and left? Went to their group and never came back?" She was disgusted.

"Yeah. And it's obvious you were planning to, way, way before. So quit the dumb act."

Sky gaped at her ex-friend. "I never wanted to stop being friends with you guys! Why would I want to hang with the Fakes?"

Fakes. The name that she and her friends had come up with to describe the plastic popular group.

Cassie actually laughed then.

"Bitch, you were fake."

"I don't remember that!"