[onhold] Through All Seasons

16│Winter: 'I'm sour candy, so sweet, then I get a little angry, yeah.'

Where was I again? Ah, right. 

Stupid, stupid River. That's my new mantra. 

I was so stupid. 

How could I believe for one second that anyone was genuinely nice to me? I knew that Collin was a double-edged sword, but this...

Well, I guess I'm glad I found out sooner than later. 

While I rode back, tears stung in my eyes. No, no, no, never cry because of assholes, I told myself. They weren't worth a single tear. But they streamed down my face anyway. 

Even though I hated all footballers all by now, Collin managed to hurt me the most. I would never ever admit that out loud, but even though he acted like a jerk most of the time, a little spark of hope glimpsed inside me, telling me, he'd be keen on me. Tonight this spark sparked the last time. 

He passed me with his shiny, expensive black Mercedes. Fuck you, Collin. Fuck you. 

The pity tears turned to anger tears. Whenever he talks to me, I will ignore him coldhearted. Only on stage during drama class, I will eventually face him, but then I'm Lily and he's James.  

I arrived home and threw myself onto my bed. Some part of me still couldn't believe this evening actually happened. Mason, obviously, wanted to hit on me but was too shy or proud or whatever to ask me in person, so Collin arranged everything. But why? The big why. There were too many. Why did he lie to me? Why did he have to arrange the "date"? And most importantly, why did he get me out of this in the end? I didn't believe I would ever get the answers to any of those questions. And that was probably for the better. 

Move on, River. Assholes are everywhere. 

The weekend passed, gladly, without further events. I had enough of them. By the time Monday arrived, I cooled off a little. The betrayal didn't hurt as much as it did on Friday evening. Unfortunately, on Monday we had drama class and my stomach did Olympic twists when I thought about it. I wanted nothing more than to never see Collins gorgeous face again. I didn't care about Mason though. 

In history class, I passed him without a look and sat on the opposite side of the classroom. I was lucky that our project was over. Working now with Tyler and Collin would be an absolute horror scenario. 

I managed to not even glance at him once. Small successes like this kept me going. 

When lunch break arrived, I bought a small snack from the vending machine and sat down in the halls, furthest away from the cafeteria. I wasn't hungry at all. Sadness and anger usually blocked the entrance of my stomach. But it will be a long day and I didn't want to hurt my body. 

I was back at a lonely, invisible River. But I liked this version more than the one trying to make friends or giving people chances and being hurt so much. 

The next classes went by quite quickly and the feared drama class was next. I also hated Collin for making me afraid of drama class. It had always been my hiding spot, the light at this school. Now it's drowning in fear, hatred, and anger. Just because of one guy. 

No River, don't let him take this away from you. This was your territory, he was a stranger there. Take control, I told myself over and over again.

I entered the auditorium and walked confidently towards the first row. Collin wasn't here yet. 

"Hey Kyle, how are things going?" I asked him while I took the seat next to him. 

"Oh, you know, the usual stuff," he grinned. 

"Sure," I answered, not knowing how to respond to this kind of reply.