"This is what she had become."
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Cleopatra Banks' last week in the small town of New Chelsea is nothing like she would have imagined it, but nothing could have prepared her for the stinging betrayal she's faced with and suddenly the prospect of...
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"Cleo honey, uhh...I'm going to be super busy today and your dad's gone out of town for just a few days so none of us will really be able to pick you up from school today," mom says. She sounds unusually nervous.
I look up from my barely eaten breakfast and meet her gaze but she looks away and quickly focuses on wiping milk from Ruby's cheek.
I shift uncomfortably in my seat. I understand why she's behaving this way. In fact I'm even surprised she's decided to speak in full sentences when talking to me. Except for "Come eat," and "let's go," she hasn't really said much to me since Monday.
"So uh...the school provides a bus but it doesn't really come this side so I have a bus ticket for you. You just need to wait outside at this little bus stop, you're not new to busses and it's just a little walk from school and it's completely safe so you're safe," she tells me, patting the top of her head with an open palm.
I don't reply figuring that she's not done yet.
"But if you don't want to use the bus, Suzan said Ethan wouldn't mind bringing you home since he lives right next door but that's completely up to you. No pressure," she raises her hands in surrender, getting up from her chair and hurriedly making her way out of the dining room.
My lips pull upwards, not enough to cause me to smile but enough to remind me that mom will never stop being mom.
"Oh and we're going to the salon tomorrow...if you want to that is. Completely optional of course!" she pipes in behind a wall a second later right before scampering off again.
That right there people, is how my mother offers an olive branch.
Wait.
I avert my gaze from my extremely boring and unappetizing breakfast and towards the larger than life clock on the wall that's equipped with some type of digital calendar and all that good stuff.
It's Friday today.
I seriously don't remember yesterday happening.
I went from torturing myself reading through as many Facebook statuses and comments as I could, scrolling through Max's timeline wondering why Shanice was good enough for him and I wasn't, to Nigel's timeline wondering if he ever felt the same way about me.
Judging by the way he had his lips pressed against Lacey's while she made his dark green and white soccer jersey look sexy I doubt he has anything to worry about when it comes to inadequacy. And why would he when a girl who looks like Lacey had her hands all over him, smiling lovingly at him.
Why won't anyone look at me like that?
I continued in this fashion, going back and forth between Nigel and Max's timelines comparing myself to these near perfect looking goddess like beings that were now their girlfriends, stuffing hidden stashes of chocolate down my throat until sunrise.
