The Snitch

(v)

Well at least I had a good night's sleep before the next day, right? Wrong. My dreams were plagued by scary occurrences which included Donald Trump in red lace stockings, yeah not a pretty picture. Running my hands through my hair, combs are a luxury I do not have the time to afford, I ran out with a Snickers in my hand. I'd have to get more food at school, Habib would hook me up. He kept a supply of cookies and candy for us. We were both stress eaters. And happiness eaters. And anger eaters. We eat a lot, okay?!

I met him half a block away from school, red and flamingo pink highlights in place. He was wearing skinny black jeans, a dark blue t-shirt and a black leather jacket kept open. He made me feel like a sack of potatoes way too often. I mean, what's the point of having a guy best friend if you can't even be the better dressed one?! He gave my hair a tug and launched into a tirade of school gossip. I know people want me to be like "I don't like gossip, I do not support such a stupid stereotype meant to glorify patriarchy" and shit. But, I take an avid interest in who is dating whom and who came out recently and which teacher got a clapback. What strong woman indulges in gossip? Every one! Get over it!

I met Ramona in English. She was talking to one of the girls I knew the faces of but, never bothered to learn the name. I waved at Ramona and she smiled back. She motioned me to come sit next to her. When the other girl noticed me, she literally fled. Strange. I didn't have that power anymore. I plonked my stuff next to Ramona and sat down. "What did she want?" I asked her. "Word around here is that people are not very happy with me being friendly with you. Apparently, you are the devil reincarnated and I need to keep my distance.", she said. "And what'd you say?" I asked.  "Well", she said with a smirk, " I told them to stick their opinion where the sun don't shine. Not that I trust you very much," She added hastily "It's just that I don't like being told what to do."

I followed her around the rest of the day. That's something I'm good at. I follow Ramona around awkwardly these days. At family parties, I follow my mom around awkwardly. When, I die and go to hell, I'll probably follow Satan around. Awkwardly.

Ramona wasn't exactly invisible, I realized. She had friends, she was pretty, if you took away the expression that suggested she had lemons shoved up her ass. She was also pretty well-informed.  She thought Trudeau was cute and knew Alan Stokes (who btw, favourited my tweet once, so we are basically a couple , at this point.) I was just teaching her to differentiate between the Dolan Twins when I realized she was acting shifty. We were walking to the cafeteria and she looked like she had to tell me something. Then it hit me.

Ramona had her own friends, she had to sit with them. They will definitely not let me sit with them and I couldn't ask her to leave them. I just couldn't. "Look", she started to say, "It's nothing perso-" I cut her off my holding up my hand. Damn, I had always wanted to do that. "I understand." I told her, "Trust me, I actually do. I'll be fine." She nodded her head, gave me an awkward pat on the shoulder and walked to where her friends were sitting, staring at me.

Okay, perfect! I was fucked. Where is the exiled Queen supposed to have lunch? The Girls still had the centre table and would not spare me a glance. I couldn't possibly sit with anybody else. No, it wasn't my pride. I would have happily sat with the Illuminati fan club. Even though, they communicated in a language they made up in 4th grade and nobody else could understand. But, I had been horrible to everyone in this school. I had filled lunchboxes with worms, locked people in with skeletons in the science lab, made sure nobody broke protocol, stuck to their designated position. That the dorks never got smart, the goths never got dates, the unpopulars never got more than twenty likes on their Instagram posts. I wasn't your typical high school bully. I never refused help to anyone, was never unfair but,I just liked the way things were and hated change. Looks like that just came back to bite me in the ass.

So, if I went to any person in this cafeteria and asked to sit with them, there was a very good chance that I would have strawberry-milkshake flavoured hair for the rest of the week. I took a breath and exited the cafeteria. Who needed lunch, anyway?

I was planning on roaming the school halls for the rest of the lunch break, then I decided to go to the school library. It was bound to be empty at this time. We had a librarian but he was probably smoking pot with the janitor. I should have known the cafeteria confusion would occur. I could have discussed this with Mama and Papa but, Rocio stopped me from going to lunch yesterday so I didn't even think about it. For a girl who has a speech ready for when she meets Ryan Reynolds, I can be pretty unprepared at times.

I opened the door to the library and the air conditioner hit my face with a snap. It might actually be cool, a room with no people and a lot of books, mmhmmm! Sign. Me. Up. I entered the library hoping for some alone time for the first time in days.

Except, I wasn't alone.

He was tall. I could see that even when he was curled in the small library desk. It was hard to tell from the distance but, I was pretty sure his eyes were crinkled at the sides. Part Asian, probably. I was pretty sure I had seen him around the school but, he seemed so... detached. Even now, you could see he easily blended into the surroundings. He looked up when I banged the door open, looked startled for a second and went back to his book. "Hey." I said in a voice that broke midway. Damn it, Tyra! You've seen a human being before!

There were about nine desks between us but, the empty room and mahogany walls made my voice seem like a Linkin Park concert (RIP Chester, I'm  dead inside) . He looked up when he heard me, smiled like he had seen something funny and went back to his book. Rude!

"I'm Tyra," I tried again, "You know, Tyra Morgan."  "No", he said, "I don't know." His voice wasn't deep, not effeminate but,not very deep. "That's funny" I smiled.

"No, really," he said, "I don't have a shred of knowledge about who the fuck you are." Ouch.  Had this guy been living in a pineapple under the sea? How could he not know me?! My boycotting is probably a hashtag by now. "Who are you, anyway?" I asked irritably.

"Ray." He answered in a syllable and went back to his book. "Well," I said sitting a few desks away " You sure are a ray of sunshine!" He closed his book with a snap, looked me straight in the eyes and said, "I don't care if you are a girl, if you make jokes like that again, I will  hit you." And started reading again.

Okay then.

***

A/N

Hey-lo,  beautiful! I know I'm late but, Ray deserves a dramatic, time consuming entrance! Do you like him? ! Of course you do!! More coming up real soon! Vote and the comment the crap out of this just because you can!!

Next update sometime tomorrow!!

-Love Tannaz

P.S. This one is for a special bitch who had her birthday a few days ago and would have murdered me if I hadn't updated soon. This one's for you Ramona!