Shadowteer

Chapter 32

Manon sighed and adjusted her purple headphones before raising the volume of the music she was listening to. She walked through the school hall quietly. She didn't talk to anyone or say hi or grin. She felt like showing her depression for once. She remembered how her mother had taken her up to the attic and showed her a coloured photo of the same man she had seen on the screen during the interview, but younger. He was holding a small child that seemed to be half asleep in his arms, her tiny fingers wrapped around his thumb. The smile on his face was huge. It was beautiful. The man was her father. The little child... Was her.

Her mother hated him for leaving them to fight for a country that wasn't even their own and so she packed away anything and everything he owned and pretended like he didn't exist. Manon was crushed. She watched every single video her mother had, the man groaning when she spat food on his face, and that bright smile when she said her first word (Dada) and when she took her first steps. She listened to him sing for her when she fell after a few steps with tears welling up in her eyes. Her first reaction was to slap her mother but she walked into her room instead, shut the door and cried.

Things were bad. Really bad. Pictures were going around the internet. Pictures of her and Riley from years before. She watched a twenty-minute long interview between Riley and no other than Alex where he claimed that he still loved her, that the pictures were recent and that wanted a second chance to be with her. He had never loved her to begin with! It was all a sham, one of the many mistakes she had made in her preteen years was falling for Mr Bad boy Riley Kovacevich and now it was coming back to bite her. Those pictures were from two or three years before and the difference in her face and height were clear but people were taking it as a huge deal.

Chralex fans came to her Instagram pages to post all sorts of hate on her pictures till she actually had to disable comments. Even then, they still found ways to bully her and make fun of her. Ralex and Ranon were the newest ships in the contest for the last couple standing and people were drinking it in. Alex's ratings were up, both of them were getting more followers, they were using her and Chris to become famous. She was right, Alex was exactly like her mother and that only made Manon detest her more for her complete lack of moral. She and Riley would make a great, gag-worthy power couple.

She tapped Chris. He turned around and frowned when he noticed how sad she looked. At least she wasn't hiding it. "Hey, dude. How's life? Yeah, okay, that's great man. Anyway, I've been meaning to ask you something."

"Is it related to your birthday maybe?"

"You remember?"

"December twelfth. Of course, I remember. Gah, it's so hot! My hoodie is killing me!"

"Well take it off then-"

"No way! My bare chest is under this thing. Ain't nobody wanna see that." I know a couple of girls who wouldn't mind, number one; Manon Chamack.

"You can come take it off at my place then-"

"Do you realise the implications of inviting a guy into your house to take off his clothes?" He waited until it sunk in and chuckled when her eyes widened to U.F.O. size.

"Oh... um... what I meant was... the gang is throwing me a little pool party thing for my B-day and its supposed to be a surprise but I guessed so yeah... you can come if you want to." She bit back a blush and he sighed.

"Not like I have anything better to do- oh wait." She rose an eyebrow and folded her arms.

"Look, I'm not gonna beg you. Hurry up and choose so I can leave."

"Woah, are you still mad at me? Whatever I said, I was drunk and-" she waved him off with a flick of her wrist and tapped her foot impatiently. "Uh... will your mom be there?"