Chapter 1 What-a-Burger

Chapter 1- what-a-burger

Diana Hoyt shrugged her backpack off and sat down on the swing with a deep sigh. She had no reason to be melancholy, but her mood only worsened as she listened to her best friend, Rachel, chatter on. Most of her friends had already received their early admission letters, and were coasting through their senior year. Not Diana.

Diana dreaded going home and having to disappoint her parents yet again. She had intercepted the letter from TSU, and just as she had predicted she had been put on the waitlist. It wasn't the school she wanted to get into anyways, but there was no way her parents would easily accept an artist into the family. Her mother's opinion was that art was a great hobby but not a successful career. Her father was just as pragmatic as her mother and insisted that she go into something more stable and lucrative… like accounting.

Accounting was not the worst option. Diana was good at math, she was good at most subjects, but she was truly gifted with a brush in her hand. It was her greatest joy to simply tune out the world around her and focus on the feel of the brush or pencil in her hand gliding against the blank page.

Her brilliant plan had been to get early admission to TSU, get into the accounting department, have a studio art minor, and either be a financial advisor or break away from her parents and become an artist. The dream was that her artistic talent would be discovered by some wealthy patron. This would only happen if she went to a well-connected school and TSU was the school of her dreams.

The waitlist was not the end of the world but it did put a slight snag in her plans.

"-and then Kyle kept yelling and I seriously, like, think that he was just trying to get her attention… Diana, you listening?"

"Sorry, yeah that sucks" Diana was definitely not listening. Instead she started to instinctively fill the gaps in the conversation with the short phrases and noises that barely pacified the doe-eyed Rachel.

She was sure that her parents would ask her when she expected to hear from TSU over dinner. Maybe she could put off the inquisition if she just didn't come home till after dinner time. No, that wouldn't work unless there was a really good excuse. Her parents were not chill enough to let her go with no questions asked.

"Did you ask your parents if you could come to Jeremy's for the eclipse party tonight?" Rachel asked as she brushed her light brown side swept bangs out of her eyes, and tried to grasp her straw with her lips without looking. It made her look a little like a fish wearing lip gloss. A very pretty fish.

"Mmhmph-" Right! The eclipse party! It could be avoided for another day! Dinner would be hotdogs and hamburgers surrounded by many other families. Mom and dad would have their social hats on, so they won't ask me anything in public. Thank the eclipse god!

"Chew and swallow first"

Diana shoved some more fries into her mouth and started chewing with her mouth open. Trying to imitate a cow chewing its cud. Maybe she would make the joke about seafood.

"Mmwawm shed –"

"Gross! Stahp it!"

Diana made a big show of swallowing before she finally finished her sentence that she had been trying to tell Rachel.

"Yeah. I'm supposed to meet them there after school. Mom said she's bringing chips."

"Ah yes. The ever important chips. Did Mrs. Schlessinger tell us to read chapter 46 or 47 before our lab this afternoon?"

"Chapter 46 and the lab instructions that follow. It's a pretty easy lab. It only took me an hour... Wait, you've got twenty minutes before lunch break is over. Do you even have your book?"

Rachel pretended to look wounded as she pulled a massive calculus textbook from her overly stuffed backpack.

"I actually came prepared today!"

"That's the wrong book…"

"…"

"Damn it!"

Diana pulled her AP Biology book out of her backpack and handed it to Rachel.

"Just give it back to me at the eclipse party."

"I love you! You're the bestest-estest ever! MWAH"

Blowing fake kisses. It's really only cute when Rachel does that. If Jeremy or Thomas tried to pull of the wink-kiss-pose routine that Rachel had perfected it would just be weird. Rachel looks like one of those American girl dolls all grown up. Beautiful big eyes, straight honey brown hair, and porcelain white skin. She looked really charming doing those cutesy poses.

Diana finished shoving her what-a-burger in her mouth, grabbed her keys, and nodded towards the door.

"Letsh go. *swallow* You can read the chapter in the car. I need to print something out before my history class"

"Ah! Wait! Jeremy asked me to get him a couple potato taquitos since he couldn't leave campus today. Mr. Altman needed help moving paint for the theater club."

Rachel hurried over to the counter as Diana continued to pick up the table. She loaded all of the trash onto the trays and carried them over to the trash. While they waited a few minutes for the taquitos both the girls topped off their sodas and loaded up their backpacks. They talked about Jeremy and his dedication to the theater club, and Diana summarized what would be on the upcoming bio lab as they drove back to campus.

Not once mentioning college or that they would be graduating soon. It was a weird topic that neither of them wanted to breach. Rachel was planning on going out of state. Way out of state. All the way to New York City. Neither of them were really ready to talk about being separated yet.