“Sounds good,” I said, grabbing my book bag. “Ready, Peanut?” I asked.
“I’m going to take her today,” Mom said, smiling at Megan. “But, ummm—Kass, do you plan on wearing that to school?”
“Sure, it’s comfortable,” I said, looking down at my clothes.
“I’m sure it is, but do you think it’s appropriate for school?”
“It’s worked for me the last couple months,” I said defensively.
“I didn’t mean to put you on the defensive, honey. I was just wondering what your friends think of your new casual look.”
“I’m sure if they were still my friends they would hate it,” I said, pushing through the swinging kitchen door before she could say anything else. I felt my cheeks heat up as I threw my bag in the passenger seat and cranked the engine. It embarrassed me to admit I didn’t have any friends anymore, with the exception of Colton. Sometimes, I wished I could rewind time and retract the fateful text I had sent Lacey that night, even if she had shown her true colors afterward. Either way, the whole situation sucked.
Since I didn’t have the usual detour of taking Megan to school, I pulled into the student parking lot twenty minutes earlier than normal.
I scooted the driver’s seat all the way back so I could prop up my feet, deciding to check out Facebook for a few minutes. I scrolled through my messages and clicked on a few I had missed the previous day. Reading the comments made me feel less ostracized. Some of the responses to Lacey’s snarky posts even made me smile. Since we had never dropped each other as Facebook friends, her status updates still crossed my timeline. They were as superficial as usual, like when she complained about the rude clerk at Starbucks who had screwed up her iced caramel latte. I started to click out of the thread when a comment with an avatar of a smirking smiley face caught my eye.
Maybe she was just preoccupied looking at the stick that was up your ass, the unknown smiley face person had posted. The comment had opened a floodgate of replies from Lacey and her supporters, but I couldn’t help giggling as I reread the words. It's funny that she didn't even remove the comment, but you had to know Lacey personally to understand. I think it stroked her gigantic ego even more to see all the replies in her defense. Just like in seventh grade when she adopted a new strut because she thought it would draw attention to her ass.
Still smiling, I scrolled down to an older post where Lacey was trying to drum up likes for a fan page she had started. She offered a virtual kiss to anyone that liked her fan page. Once again, I couldn’t help laughing when I saw the smirking face had struck again.
Not sure where your lips have been, so I feel I should pass on ‘liking’ anything of yours. I was actually starting to like this mysterious person—the Lacey Corps, not so much, judging by the outpouring of support in her defense.
I made my way through several more posts, searching for my new hero and found several more snide remarks. I tried to click on his or her profile, but a message stating that the account was no longer active popped up. Puzzled, I wondered if it was possible he or she had hacked into Facebook.
Slamming car doors pulled me away from my Facebook stalking. I glanced up and was startled to find the student parking lot crowded with cars and students as they piled out of their cars heading for the building. Putting my iPhone in my bag, I opened the car door and followed the herd toward the next eight hours of torture, nine for me, since of course, I had detention.
The morning classes passed in their normal snail's pace as the teachers harped on the end of term finals coming the following week. I dreaded the exams, but the prospect of winter break made me wish they would hurry up and get here.
Instead of heading for my normal hideout in the school library for lunch, I headed to the administrati
on wing for my lunch/meeting with Mrs. Leighton.
“Hey,” a junior I had seen around said as I approached the raised receptionist counter.
“How's it going? I have a meeting with Mrs. Leighton,” I mumbled.
The girl shot me a sympathetic look. No one liked wasting their lunch break in a counselor’s office. She pressed the intercom button on her phone.
“Yes,” Mrs. Leighton’s sunny voice chirped over the line.
“Kassandra, is here to see you Mrs. M.”
It was no surprise that she knew my name. Even without the accident, my cheerleading and extracurricular activities had put me in the limelight for years. It was hard to believe there was a time that I had thrived on the attention and even felt I deserved it.
“Send her back.”
“Okie-dokie.
I shuffled down the brightly lit hallway, pausing outside her door to take a deep breath. Finally, after a moment, I knocked softly, hoping against hope she wouldn’t hear my knock.
“Come in, Kassandra,” she said brightly as I swung the door open.
I entered her bright office that was filled with knickknacks that suited her personality to perfection. There were framed quotes and funny acronyms scattered throughout the room.
“Kassandra, I’m so glad you came to see me today,” she proclaimed, like I had a choice in the matter.
I worked to control my unladylike snort at her comment. “Yeah, well, I really didn’t have much of a choice.”