12th July

Hey there.

It's already been twelve days, huh? Feels like a blink of an eye. Can't believe it, twelve days. What an accomplishment!

Tuesday, Tuesday, Tuesday…

See you next Tuesday. If you know, you know.

Anyways, why don't we start off with a short story? I got a bunch of stories I randomly think up throughout the day.

So there were two guys. One guy was large and looked scary. The other was normal and generically handsome. The first guy, though scary, had a kind heart and loved animals and plants while the second guy was kinda a playboy and an asshole to boot. Both guys came from upper-middle-class families, so they weren't doing too badly.

So one fine day, the big guy was tending to a garden when a girl walked by. She was a normal girl, not a supermodel kind of pretty by any means. The girl had been there to view the flowers in the garden. She approached him and started chatting, though the big guy was kinda awkward. She didn't feel threatened by his looks and was willing to have a conversation with him.

Right there, at the end of that conversation, the big guy was absolutely smitten with her.

On another fine day, the handsome guy was relaxing by the beach. He had gone with a bunch of friends. While the other guys and girls were off enjoying themselves by the beach, the handsome guy was left alone. With his transparent asshole-ness, not many of his friends liked hanging out with him.

So a girl approached him. She was a complete stranger.

The handsome guy kinda expected it, he thought she was approaching him to hit on him. However, she just sat down and started chatting about random stuff. For example, why he was sitting alone, what sand tastes like and his favourite types of rocks. He was good at chatting a fun person to talk with, and by the end of the conversation, he was absolutely smitten.

As you could probably guess, that was the same girl both the big guy and the handsome guy fell for.

You see, both of them lacked something in their lives. Not many people showed compassion towards them. The big guy cause he was treated like a freak and scared people, the handsome guy cause he was kind of a dick.

For the first time, the big guy didn't feel like a creep, and the handsome guy didn't act like an ass.

They found out about each other from the girl when they talked more. Oh boy did they not like each other.

They started comparing everything, who had what better, who was better suited. They attacked each other's weaknesses and quarrelled at every moment they got. They started changing. The big guy thought that he wasn't good-looking enough to be with the girl, so he started investing his time in fashion and other shenanigans. The handsome guy thought that maybe he needed to be more down-to-earth, and started picking up time-consuming hobbies.

Leaving the poor girl without a person to talk to.

That girl had been going around town trying to speak with as many people as she could, but she found herself abandoning that mission when she met those two. She was ill and was set to die in a few years, so she just wanted to chat.

But they disappeared over her.

They didn't listen to her when she asked them to stop. She knew it was unhealthy for them to keep going.

So she pressed a gun against her temple.

Storytime's over, now let's get onto my day, shall we?

Today we have an extraordinary schedule! I gotta head to school, go to my club and then meet Mr Popular at that cafe.

I don't think y'all know what Club I'm in, do you? Make a guess, I dare you.

I woke up on the floor, again. I really gotta stop doing that. It has to be bad for my back or something. I crawled up my bed with the grace of a ballerina if that ballerina lost both her legs.

But hey, got up, didn't I?

I wonder what it is about the number twelve. It's kinda easy to count, but also kinda hard when it gets too big. I like that it's the multiple of 3 and 4, and that's about it. Is that weird? Or are you weird?

Anyways, the routine's out of the way. I got tons to do today, gotta get to that real quick.

"Hey yo Westerberg," I hummed softly to myself.

I don't know, the tune just randomly popped into my head.

"Morning!" I greeted.

My Mom was relaxing more than yesterday. Dad was at the dining table, as he always is. What is it about people drinking coffee? Fable was not awake yet.

"Could you help knock on Fable's door?" My Mom requested. "He hasn't woken up yet."

"Sure thing," I nodded before kicking Fable's door.

"You awake?" I asked him, knocking on it.

There was no reply for a hot second before I heard a tired grumble, "Yeah."

"Are you awake?" I asked again, slightly louder.

Now, at this point, Fable was obviously too sick of my bullshit to actually give a reply, either that or he went back to sleep. So I did the only logical thing I thought of doing.

"ARE YOU AWAKE?" I shouted.

The door flung open, Fable looking mighty pissed in the morning. I laughed, walking away. He grumbled more, "Why the heck are you shouting this early in the morning?"

"Cause I felt like it."

My Mom told Fable, "Hurry up or you'll be late for school."

"Alright, alright," He sighed.

He did his stuff while I was having breakfast. Just a peanut butter sandwich, nothing too fancy. When Fable sat down at the dining table, his hair was still damp. He let out a long yawn before making his own sandwich.

"What's got you so tired this morning?" I asked.

"Homework," He replied.

My Mom snickered, dad scoffed and I just chuckled in his face. "Nah, seriously, what did you do last night?"

"Well, I couldn't be playing games cause Mom unplugged the computer," He complained. "What else would I be doing?"

"Couldn't you just like, plug it back in?"

"That's what I did, yeah," He admitted.

"Wait, computers work just by plugging them in?" My Mom asked. "I thought you had to go through all the reprogramming and stuff."

"That's not how they work," Fable told her.

"So you weren't doing homework," I nodded. "Up playing games again? How do you even repeatedly do the same time over and over again?"

"I didn't wake up today to be interrogated about games, okay?" Fable told everyone.

Dad finally spoke up. "Yeah, but one more missing homework phone call from your teachers and we might take that computer."

"No, we wouldn't," My Mom cut in.

"Really?" Fable asked, turning around.

"Yeah, yeah, we wouldn't take that computer out of your room," She elaborated. "I mean, that magic tower of a device you have was quite expensive, so I would rather it be in use, you know?"

"Geez, that's cool," He let out a small smile.

"We'll kick you out of the house instead," She continued. "You can have the computer, use it as a heater or something."

Fable rolled his eyes. "Y'all not going to let me live down the whole disowning me thing."

I laughed and headed toward the door, saying, "Well, I gotta get going now. See y'all later tonight, if I even see y'all."

"Get to school safe," My Mom said to me.

"How do I get to school unsafe?" I joked.

And I'm off!

School's gonna be a mess, especially if what I said yesterday were to stay in other people's memories. Might not have been the best of ideas, but it was the most humorous.

Can you blame me?

I was on the bus.

I was chilling, doing what normal people do on buses and just stood there. I did have a smile on my face, so that was different from the rest of the world. Minding my own business and someone decided to talk to me.

"Hey, you're that weirdo from that time," A dude called out.

I turned around. The guy had pulled his headphones down to speak to me. I told him, "Calling someone you barely know a weirdo is kinda weird, ain't it?"

"Oh right, sorry about that," He apologised. "I recognised you because of the-"

He gestured to his own head. "Hair."

I can't possibly be the only person in town that has green hair.

I shrugged, telling him, "Well, I am a very notable person after all."

He scoffed before asking me more questions. "Why do you smile all the time? I mean, it's a bus ride, people don't typically smile."

"I can do what I want man," I replied. "I'll smile if I want to."

"You're weird."

"No, you're weird."

He smiled before continuing the conversation. "You go to… Vahchi, right? I got a friend there who says it's pretty shit."

"Whaaaaat?" I asked sarcastically. "No, it couldn't possibly be that bad."

"He says that there's a group constantly following one dude," The guy commented. "And a lot of bullying."

"Isn't there bullying in every school? What's the difference?"

"True, but not as bad as Vahchi."

"Sure, sure."

There was a moment of silence before I asked the real question. "Have we met before? Cause I don't know why you're acting so familiar with me."

"We spoke briefly," He answered. "Very briefly."

Huh, don't remember too well.

"My name's Brandon?" He added on.

"Nope, no clue," I told him bluntly. "But how has your day been so far?"

"My day literally started."

"Wow, same."

At that point, I was trying to hold back my laughter. He just gave me the 'are you serious?' look. Hey, I think it's a decent joke. Don't judge me.

The bus came to a stop.

"If you're gonna talk to people in public, let me give you some advice, m'kay?" I said to him. "Don't call people weirdos, don't talk like you're old pals, and maybe give me a warning beforehand."

"Noted."

Fast forward a little.

Usually, when entering school, I meet no resistance from any teachers. The secret to getting away with bad attire is to simply enter the school earlier than the teachers can set up their posts there. I mean, the security guards sure as hell aren't gonna stop me from entering school.

Now, I was rather unlucky.

Mr Dohl thought it would be good if he waited near the entrance ten minutes early.

He's my homeroom teacher and all, and we're quite friendly, but holy hell is he a sucker for the rules. I cleared my throat when he noticed me, a look of disappointment instantly flashing across his face.

"I can explain," I started.

"Why is your hair not black?" He demanded.

"Um… Freedom? Go America?" I shrugged.

"We aren't in the US," He stated bluntly.

"That's a bummer."

I sighed before telling him, "I'll dye my hair back eventually, okay? Something gotta happen before I do that."

"But you won't tell me what it is."

"Great! You're finally getting how this works!" I clasped my hands together. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I got somewhere to be."

When I tried to walk past him, he blocked my path by standing in front of me. I tilted my head slightly, asking, "Is there a problem?"

"You keep saying something has to be done but won't say what it is," He started. "Depending on what that thing is, I could help out. I know you're not a bad student, so I am willing to listen to you."

"What's the point?"

"Pardon?"

I laughed and elaborated. "I mean, what's the point of me telling you, right? There's a problem, and I could very easily ask it to be fixed, but that would be pointless. I'll tell y'all, and y'all would be like 'Oh, happy now?'. I mean, from my perspective, this 'thing' I'm waiting to be done, is basically the school's job that they're not doing, so who am I to go around telling the school what to do?"

"It's called constructive feedback, you could be helping the school."

"Sure, I'll list off a couple of things wrong with this school," I started listing with my fingers. "The cafeteria has few healthy options, the bathrooms are a disaster, our school has the highest suicide rate of any school in the country and we are second in depression rate. Hell, the only reason we aren't first for depression is that some of them committed suicide."

Mr Dohl bit his bottom lip before sighing. "Okay, I understand what you're getting at. Do you want a change in the welfare sector?"

"Who knows? That's your job, innit?" I asked.

"How about this? Dye your hair black, and we'll do our best to solve…" He gestured randomly in the air. "Whatever you want to be solved."

Something's odd.

"Something's odd," I stated, staring Mr Dohl straight in the eyes.

He was a portly, short man, so he was not intimidating in the slightest.

"You seem awfully nice and patient to me," I continued. "Normally you wouldn't tolerate the hair, but something's going on. You aren't being particularly mad about me breaking the school rules so much either."

"What's going on, teach?"

He clenched his teeth and glanced off to the side before sighing. "Nothing's up, what are you talking about? I know that being aggressive will get me nowhere, so I'm being calmer with the way I treat students."

There was a moment of silence before I shrugged. "Sure, whatever."

I chuckled as I walked past Mr Dohl, telling him, "I don't think a teacher with that belief will actually tell a student that."

Whatever happens, happens.

"I'll be headed to class now," I turned around to say to him. "If you need me for anything, you can find me there, okay?"

Before any kind of reply was given, I was well on my way.

Regarding the fiasco that happened yesterday, not much actually changed. It seems like Candace managed to shut everyone up quite effectively, maybe with the use of violence and threats. Classic Candace, classic.

But I can tell. The looks in their eyes, it was still lingering in their minds.

"Morning!" I greeted them when I entered.

Okay, a random idea just popped into my head, and it'll be great! It'll involve Candace. Can't believe I hadn't thought of this before.

"Good morning," Someone responded.

I clapped my hands loudly, startling everyone who was either sleeping or doing their own stuff. I pointed at the guy and said loudly, "Thank you!"

Snapping my fingers, I tried to remember his name. "Right… you are…"

I leaned towards the girl who was near where I was standing. I whispered, "Psst, what's his name again?"

"Who?" The girl asked, leaning away.

I had gotten straight up to her face, so I understand why she wanted to lean away. I pointed to the guy, saying, "That guy."

"Oh, uh… Jonathan," She told me.

"Great, thanks a bunch," I told her.

She was staring at me quite a bit, so I smirked, asking her, "You're looking at me quite intensely… so, wanna make out?"

Her face flushed red.

I laughed loudly and stood straight up, facing the guy. "Right, Jonathan, right?"

"Yeah?"

"Thank you!" I thanked him.

I walked back to my seat, which was once again vandalised. I just swapped it with another desk, again. I said to the class as I swapped the table. "You know, coming back yesterday, this whole table graffiti thing was probably the best 'welcome back' I've ever received."

At this rate, all the tables will be vandalised.

When I was done, a girl showed up near the door, looking at me. She was short, cute and looked very huggable when grumpy. I winked at her, but Jonathan walked into my line of sight to meet with that girl.

What lessons do I even have today?

Whatever.

Candace walked in soon after, shooting me a glare. She was followed by her group, most of them glaring at me… except one.

Heh.

"What you looking at?" Candace demanded when she noticed me looking at her.

I was going to make a possibly offensive joke about her lower half, but I decided to go with another reply instead. "Love you too!"

She raged, her friends gathering around her to try and calm her down. I laughed to myself. Eventually, the lessons began.

I am really enjoying this restraining order. After so long, I get some distance from Candace. But honestly, the timing couldn't be worse. I would love to get closer to Candace now after I've made all these jokes.

During the break, I went up to one of Candace's friends.

She aggressively turned towards me, shoving me back and asking, "Want's your problem?"

"It's not about my problem now," I laughed, brushing the shove aside. "I just wanted to tell Candace something, but I just can't get close to her."

"Fuck off," She said, turning around.

"Mr Popular himself will be at a cafe this evening," I said to her, getting her attention.

She turned around.

"I know that Candace has a thing for that guy, and maybe you too," I added.

"Candace would kill me if I liked him," She told me. "So no, I don't have a thing for him."

"Right, so pass along this private message from me to Candace, okay?" I continued. "Mr Popular will be at the cafe down the fifth avenue, he'll be there."

"How do you know this?" She asked.

"I have my sources," I shrugged. "Besides, I think the Candace-Otto pairing would be hilarious to see happen."

She scoffed and walked away.

I played around with my fingers a little before turning away as well. I just can't wait for the future to reveal itself.

That break was rather normal, I got some food and ate, then went back to class. Really though, they need more healthy options in the school cafeteria.

Anyways, after school, here comes the thing! By thing, I mean Club activities.

Now, I know many of you have already guessed that I'm in the Drama Club cause I introduce myself as an actress, yes, yes, it's very obvious. I mean, anyone would have seen it from a mile away, even if they were blind.

But nope~

My school's weird, haven't you figured that out? We don't even have a Drama Club in this school, that's how bad it is. So instead, I joined the obvious next best option for a person such as myself.

Baking Club.

Spoiler Alert, I'm not the best at baking. I just follow the instructions. Hell, I don't even do any cooking at home.

With that reveal out of the way, I gotta make my way over to that Club of mine.

How many weeks has it been?

"I'm back!" I announced when I walked in.

The President of the Baking Club did a small jump when she saw me. She was very startled, I can tell cause she dropped her phone onto the table. She scrambled to pick it up before asking, "What happened?"

"What? Something on my face?" I joked, walking in.

"So you were that green-haired girl that started that whole thing," She came to a realisation. "I always wondered who it was."

"Surprise?" I asked, raising an eyebrow.

Club activity is underway, and we're baking cupcakes.

We were paired up at each work table. My work partner was… different. He had black hair, a petite frame and a rather tall build. His hair was long and tied into a short ponytail. As we started working, I said to him, "Don't remember seeing you around here."

"Oh, I just recently joined," He replied. "I'm a first-year and just transferred over from tennis."

"Oh, that's nice," I nodded. "What's your name?"

"Ted."

"Is that short for something?"

"Ted."

"So Ted is short for Ted," I repeated. "That's nice."

"What's your name?"

"---," I told him.

"Is that short for something?"

"---."

He cracked a smile before laughing lightly. He then faced me and asked, "Wait, you're the girl that kissed the other girl, right?"

Oh~

"How did you know about that?" I asked him.

"My older sister heard about it and told me," He said shyly.

I shrugged and continued with whatever I was doing. The reason I'm not going into detail is that I actually have no idea what I'm doing, I'm just kinda going with the flow.

"Are you actually gay?" He asked me.

"Why?" I responded, facing him.

"Well, I mean, don't people bully you and stuff if you reveal it?" He started. "I-I uh… I've heard about it from others."

Wait a minute.

"I guess?" I shrugged. "But my situation is kinda different."

"How so?"

"It's complicated."

There was some awkward silence before I decided to break that silence with a bombshell of a question. "So, Ted, are you being bullied right now?"

"A little?" He shrugged, looking down at whatever he was doing. "It's mostly just name-calling, but I've been hit a few times."

"Why?"

His eyes widened. "Oh, uh… Cause I'm skinny?"

He let out an awkward laugh. "You know how guys are, right? They wanna be big and strong, huh? I just look like a twig."

"Bullying's rough, aye?" I continued the conversation with him.

"Yeah," He let out a sigh.

We chatted a little more afterwards. Something about the coolest different eye colour combinations. My personal favourite is red and blue. Like, one eye is red and the other eye is blue. Ted thought that having purple and yellow was cool.

What a weirdo, huh?

So, I went ahead and made some pretty regular cupcakes. Ted looked like he was struggling, so I just had to ask him, "Why did you join the Baking Club anyway? Problems with the Tennis Club?"

"Something like that," He answered. "Besides, thought that I might want to learn a new skill or something."

"That's great," I said as I waited for the cupcakes to bake. "Learning a new skill is always great."

"Then why did you join the Baking Club?" Ted returned the question.

"I threw a dart at a wall, and it landed on the Baking Club," I told him. "Not completely true, but I did just kinda randomly pick my club. This school doesn't have a Drama Club, so that's a downer."

"You're into acting?"

"You could say that."

Cupcakes were done, they tasted pretty normal. Ted's did taste a little too sweet, but that was a beginner's mistake thing, I guess.

So, let's skip right ahead to the end of club where I just waved everyone off. Ted went his own way, probably to meet up with his friends. I went ahead to the bus stop by myself, and several other students also gathered at the bus stop with me. It's been a while since I've gone to the Baking Club.

I went home and no one was home, as expected.

I had absolutely no idea where Fable was. My parents were at work, and I needed to leave soon.

Evening, at a cafe, with Mr Popular himself.

I threw on a shirt, followed by a hoodie. I wore a pair of long pants, of course. Now, back to the main objective.

So Mr Popular asked me out, probably to talk about something.

But for a single reason, I needed to be there early, or at least, earlier than a certain someone.

I got there. The cafe didn't have too many people around, which was given on a weekday early evening. I went up to the counter and ordered a slice of pecan pie for no reason other than to try it out. However, after deciding that only eating a pie for dinner wasn't ideal, I went ahead and bought myself a plate of ravioli.

Not long after I settled down and started my meal, Otto arrived. He was wearing pretty fashionable clothes. A nice jacket, good quality stuff. I just sat there with a hoodie and absolutely no fucks were given.

"Yello," I greeted.

He raised an eyebrow at the pronunciation of my greeting. He glanced over at the table I had reserved for us. Otto snapped his fingers and then pointed at the seat across from me. "I'll be right back."

"Sure," I shrugged.

I had chosen a seat where I faced the window. Otto would be sat with his back facing the window if he sits across from me.

Eventually, Otto returned with his food.

He got green pasta. He noticed that I was looking, so he explained himself, "It's the vegetarian pasta."

"They made it green?" I asked before glancing back. "Maybe I'll get that next time."

Otto shrugged.

"So, why did you call me all the way out here?" I asked him, pointing my fork at him.

He let out a long sigh. "I need help."

"With…?"

"The fangirls," He admitted softly.

"Wow, never thought you would want to get rid of people just like that," I joked around. "So what? You want me to kill them or something?"

"No," He shook his head. "I saw you talking to the fangirls, and you brought up some valid points. I can't possibly sustain a stable romantic relationship if all of them are still doing whatever they're doing."

"Makes sense."

"Is there a way for me to just… I don't know, have them not follow me anymore?"

I tapped my fork on my plate. "Well, you could always just tell them to stop following you. That might work. Oh, or you could just stop being a pimp."

"I am not a pimp," He insisted.

I gave him a look. "Really?"

He cleared his throat. "Well, maybe I acted like one, but I'm a changed man. I don't need this superficial attention from these girls anymore."

"Go to LA, you probably wouldn't even stand out," I joked with him.

"Yeah, no."

I laughed before setting down my fork. "Why the sudden change though? Weren't you all high and mighty about being hot and shit to those fangirls of yours?"

"Yeah," He sighed. "Looking back, I kinda regret that now."

He glanced around before telling me in a softer voice. "I think I discovered what love is."

"Ew," I said to him.

"No, I'm serious," He explained to me. "I don't know what came over me, and all of a sudden, I don't need attention from anyone except her. I'm afraid I can't do anything if these fangirls follow me everywhere."

"Okay, quick question, who's this girl we're talking about?"

His face became slightly redder. There was a pause before he replied, "President of the Chess Club."

"Wow, didn't expect that," I raised an eyebrow. "That's my classmate."

"She is?"

"No."

He gave me a look before questioning, "Right, are you willing to help me or not?"

"Out of everyone you could have asked, you come to me," I chided. "What do I look like to you? A mercenary?"

I glanced behind him.

Hi~

Otto noticed my glance and turned around too. I laughed and apologised, "Sorry, I saw something moving, so I looked over."

Damn, she knows how to disappear quick.

"I don't mind helping you out," I told him. "But I probably wouldn't be able to make a difference."

"You're the only person I can talk to normally," He stated.

"Dang, you are lonely."

"Am not."

We ate for a couple of minutes, just silence and no talking between us. I then asked him, "Why the Chess Club girl?"

"Have you met her before?" Otto asked.

"Nope."

"I'm not telling," He finalised.

"Whatcha gonna do about Candace?" I asked him.

Otto flinched when he heard her name. "Oh right… Candace might be the worse of the lot. I don't want her to go ballistic."

"Would you like Candace gone?"

"Gone?"

"Yeah, gone."

He rubbed his chin before replying loosely. "Yeah, that would be nice."

"Well, lucky for you, I have an absolutely perfect plan to send her out of your life," I grinned. "But I'm not telling you, and I'm not telling anyone else. Hell, I don't even know it completely. But trust me, I'm trying to get her to stop."

"That's great, thanks a ton," He thanked me.

"Also, stop talking to me in school," I added.

"You sat near where I normally sit," He countered,

"That is some bullshit."

He chuckled before shooting back at me, "At least I don't try to start a slugfest with a bunch of fangirls."

"It wasn't going to be a slugfest," I defended myself. "It was going to be a battle royale between those girls which would likely end with one person taking the right to date you. I thought it would be hilarious if they did that just for you to reject them."

He shook his head, smiling.

"If you weren't such a pimp, more people might actually like you," I commented.

"If you weren't such a weirdo, more people might actually like you," He countered.

Tick, tick.

"I'm home," I announced when I got home.

Fable wasn't in the living room, probably off to play some games. My Mom was nowhere to be seen, so maybe she still hasn't returned from home yet? Dad… not that important, let's move on.

It's surprisingly early, still.

I would rather not have to speak to my Mom about dyeing my hair, so I think I'll just chill in my room until tomorrow. Hell, I got some homework to do, I can't really spend too much time chatting with people nowadays.

Let's just end it here for today, okay?