Younger - Ruel Van Dijk

Eight

*Ruel

Monday - 3:06 pm

"Ruel, you coming?"

I prise my eyes from the school's main door to find my friends motioning for me to join them.

"Uh, yeah." I looked back once more, looking to see if the person had appeared. They hadn't, so I sighed and ran to catch up with the boys.

"Who are you looking for?"

"Oh, no one is particular." I lie, knowing fully well who I'm trying to find.

Unfortunately, no one's seen her for the past five weeks.

*one week later*

Friday - 6:39

"Jared said this would be a small gathering." I say, standing out the front of the house.

"It is."

"There's gotta be at least forty people in there."

"Nah, you know Jared. It probably just looks bigger than it is."

The cars along the road and the noise inside tell me otherwise, but I shrug it off and decide I'll just have a word with Jared later.

We walk in and head to the garden, knowing that we'd find Jared back there, hopefully with a few other friends.

And like we expected, he was standing on the patio, talking to some girl I didn't recognised.

"Hey man." Flynn, the person I'd arrived with, stepped forward to greet Jared. They did their high five thing before I greeted him.

I noticed that the girl was looking kinda nervous. She was pretty, but she obviously had loads of makeup on to try and hide the bags under her eyes. If anything, they just stood out more. She was also incredibly pale and thin (in an unnatural way), and had uncomfortably hollow cheeks. She looked sick, and not in a good way.

Jared noticed me staring, and decided he would introduce me to her.

"Oh Ruel, this is Ella."

That's when it hit me. I concentrated on smaller features like her eyebrows and nose. I couldn't believe it. After all this time...

"Ellie?"

~

I saw you just the other night

I didn't even recognize you

Find it kind of strange, I guess that people change

But I didn't expect you to

~