Easton goes to an all-boys school, and we go to the school’s opposite. There are both called Foxwood, and are at the same time, but here’s the thing: we all have strict schedules so the only places boys and girls would mix was before school and after school. That’s really clever, right? Wrong. It’s way too easy to ask to go to the bathroom and then spend a couple minutes with your hubby.
But Foxwood isn’t the case. The case was that Easton, Emmaline, and I all go to Foxwood School for Extremely Gifted Children. And that is how this whole thing started, because without Foxwood, my family would have no record whatsoever. Without Foxwood, we wouldn’t have had to meet her.
Every school has one. I mean, it’s true. Look around; find the Satan Worshipper of a preppy bitch that is always making a deal out of everything she does. Wow, have you found her yet? No? Well, here, she has another name besides Spawn of Satan. It’s…Queen Bee. And at Foxwood, we had one – and trust me, she was a pain on the ass. She had long blond hair, and clear blue eyes, and flawless skin complexion. Her name was Chloe, Chloe Solomon. And I hated her.
At first, she was nice enough. Everybody seemed to like her. I did too, I admit. She always gave money to people who didn’t have any, and one time, she helped me score an A on my math homework, the only subject that I’m a little sore in. Chloe had these two, equally annoying friends, named Jessi and Lessi. They formed the trifecta from Hell: the popular clique.
Oh God, when I just said that, it even sounded stupid. Foxwood is for nerds – and we have preppy bitches like Chloe that pretend to be cool. They aren’t. They really aren’t.
Anyway, the day I started wanting to punch her, or at least scratch that smirk off her face, was a couple days before she met my whole family. “Come on, donate for the Winter Ball!” She exclaimed, waving some bright blue flyer in my best friend, Chelsea Small’s, face. “Or else we won’t have one, and somebody won’t have their first kiss.”
I gritted my teeth while Chloe aimed that remark at Chelsea. But, my best friend coolly replied, “I’m saving it for somebody special, Chloe. Unlike you, who has way too many first kisses to spare.” With that, she turned on her heel and headed to lunch. Score one for Chelsea! I thought, heading after her.
Okay, that wasn’t the big incident. The big incident was ten minutes later, while Chloe Solomon was still feeling butt-hurt that Chelsea made her look like an idiot in front of most of the school. I was getting lunch, since I didn’t want to come home that day and be bored, watching TV while eating a sandwich. So I was looking for another bowl of chocolate pudding when Chloe slid up next to me.
“Hello there, Delilah,” She said, her eyes scanning the food. “What are you looking for?” Now believe me, that wasn’t anything insulting and I didn’t have anything against Chloe. Actually, I was contemplating whether or not to make Chelsea apologize. That wasn’t how a lady talks to somebody, and these weren’t an eye for an eye days anymore.
“Eh, just another chocolate pudding for Chelsea…if I don’t bring one to her, she’ll eat mine.” My best friend had an appetite of a dinosaur. I wondered if she ever tried to eat less than four people’s amount of food.
Chloe made a face, but I didn’t really catch it. Now, here’s a piece of advice to all of you looking at this, or hearing me say it out loud: don’t mention Chelsea Small’s name to Chloe Solomon when the former just dissed her. “Oh, here, she can have this,” Chloe said, taking her pudding and thwacking it right on my white blouse.
Okay, that was uncalled for.
Brown goo slid down my shirt, making my skin crawl as the cafeteria laughed. I eyed Chloe, with that stupid smirk of hers, and wanted so badly to claw it off. I took my own chocolate pudding (Oh, how I wished I took a bite of it first), and plummeted it right into stupid Chloe Solomon’s face. If that didn’t wipe that filthy smirk off, it covered it just as well.
Chloe made some sort of muffled noise, since the pudding was seeping into her mouth and nose. I laughed along with the cafeteria, before deciding one more plate of food was enough to cover my vengeance. I grabbed for the corn, which was just sitting there on my plate (I wasn’t even going to eat it anyway), and smashed that down her shirt. At least corn will cover off, anyway.
A hand landed on my shoulder. When I looked up, it was Headmistress Anne. Oh God, how I was in for it. Nobody was stricter than Headmistress. She wore her hair in this really tight bun, and made sure that everybody was scared of her. And trust me, we all were scared. I wished that she didn’t see this, mostly because if she heard about it, she would always be less mean. Well, that’s what I heard, anyway.
“Hartford, Solomon, into my office,” She growled. I scampered away just as she said that, planning to try to block out all the yelling that I knew would go on for the next hour. I could feel Chloe planning my death behind me, and closed my eyes. There had to be something up with that girl. First, she is so nice, and then, she throws pudding down my shirt. Is she bipolar?
At Headmistress’s office was Emmaline. She was a year younger than I was, so she had a class going on right then. And unfortunately, it was Office Aid. “Hey sis, hey Chloe,” She said, looking up at our outraged faces. Okay, only Chloe was outraged. I must have looked like a poor puppy dog.
“Emmaline, call Dad,” I told her, before going into the office. Emmaline looked confused, but she picked up her cell phone from off the desk anyway. But I knew what I was doing. Throughout our childhood, Easton always had little mishaps. He would accidently let our dog, Sadie, around the house when she was strictly outside only, or lose the keys to the house and sit outside until Emmaline and I came home.
And Mom was always more angry about it than Dad. See, Mom is some sort of perfectionist-freak. Everything she wanted for us, it had to be perfect. And sometimes, that was great. We got cool clothes, cool parties, and cool parents. But then, she was very authoritarian about everything else. Like when we got into trouble, Dad would just forgive and forget. Mom could barely even forgive.
So I had Emmaline call Dad and tell him I was in the office, while I was sitting around, waiting for Headmistress Anne to come in and scream at me until I confessed that I feel sorry that I did that to Chloe (I don’t). Chloe sat beside me, stiff, before she turned her head slowly and stared. “I hate you,” She told me calmly.
I didn’t know what to say, so I said the first thing that popped into my mind. “Cool.” Eh, that was the worst thing a girl could say, wasn’t it? I mean, ‘cool’ is something you say when you hear a good song from a friend, or when somebody asks you how the weather is outside. I think I may have pushed the lines of idiocy.
We didn’t say anything after that, even though I felt like laughing until I died. I mean, this was the first bad thing I ever done at Foxwood, and it was just retaliation? And if I died, well, I could blame Chloe. Chelsea would lie and say I was allergic to chocolate pudding (Oh, the horror).
Headmistress came in, and slowly sat down in front of the big wooden table. She stared at us with those eyes that I could swear are red, before speaking. “What you ladies have done is disgraceful to Foxwood. Would your parents let you get away with such nonsense?” Um, I think I remember a food fight. Oh yeah, last night, I won against Emmaline and Dad.
While Headmistress rambled on in her scream-y voice, I droned off for a bit. I stared at her hair, which looked a lot like eels to me. Thick, coil ropes that could choke a person if it wanted to. Like Medusa, just a little more modern.
A knock sounded on the door, and when I looked up, it was Dad. He looked confused to why I was being yelled at by Headmistress, since this was a first-time thing, but he got the whole thing understood pretty quickly. And while I was sitting down, staring off at the wall, I felt his hand on my shoulder. That was a good sign.
“I do not accept punishment at this school, but I will need Delilah – and Chloe – to attend the Back to School Night that is in a few days. We need more leaders for the children that are planning to attend Foxwood. Actually, we need two more. Mr. Hartford, if you wish, you can take Delilah home. As for you Chloe, you need to get back to class.”
I looked at Headmistress with angry eyes. Come on. Back to School Night? That wasn’t even about the current members of Foxwood; it was about the little kiddies and new kids for next year, or quarter! I never went, and neither did my siblings. Who really cared about the whole ordeal anyway?
Dad decided on taking me home instead of having me mope around the school and worry Emmaline, so he signed me out as soon as the doors to Headmistress’s office were closed. “Don’t worry Delilah, Easton and I will come and help,” Emmaline told me, writing down the time that I was signed out at school. “And if it makes you feel better, we are serving slushies!”
Good. Another thing for me to throw in Chloe’s face.
Dad saw that wasn’t helping and said goodbye to Emmaline quickly, bringing me out of the building. “I can’t believe this.” He shook his head. “Out of all the kids, it was you.” I looked at him, questions in my eyes. “I thought Easton would be the first to bring trouble to the family. After all, you were always the good one, Del.”
I snorted. “Good enough that I just kind of punched Chloe in the face with my pudding, and some corn?” I challenged.
Dad thought about it. “No, but just good enough.” He fussed with my hair before opening the car door for me. “How about we don’t tell your mother about this,” Dad told me, putting on the blinker to turn out of school. I knew where we were going instantly. There was a little hole-in-the-wall all teenagers seemed to want to go to, called Forte’s. And, of course, whenever Dad wanted us to hide something from Mom, we went there.
And that is how I came to hate Chloe Solomon, I thought, looking back through the day about how snotty she was to Chelsea. God, she deserved that pudding, that corn, those food products that are now staining her face and shirt. It was almost like it was God’s hand throwing them, begging me to do that to her. But only because I don’t think Satan would do that to his own child.
At Forte’s, we ordered peanut butter chocolate malted milkshakes, a total mouthful to say. But really, it was a tasty mouthful. They had a reputation for being cheap and greasy, something any teenager, including Foxwood’s finest, absolutely adores. I sat at the booth across from my dad, looking at all the students from Foxwood who were with their friends; books splayed everywhere, studying erratically for upcoming tests.
“So how did this Courtney girl mess with you?” Dad asked between sips of his Cola.
“Her name’s Chloe and she threw pudding in my face,” I told her, reliving the anger and the satisfaction of throwing it back. She deserved all the carbs she got.
Dad didn’t look too pleased with me. “I thought we taught you that being a mean person won’t solve anything,” He scolded. I rolled my eyes. That was my dad’s way of saying that what I did was wrong, but she probably deserved the vanilla pudding. After all, that would stain more on her black shirt than anything. Or maybe I could steal a car and run her over with it.
…
When I got home, Emmaline and Easton were already there. They both saw how I wasn’t ready to talk about Chloe yet, and back off, making their own little sandwiches and going off to watch TV. Mom walked in from the laundry room, smiling at me. “Ah, there’s Delilah. I thought you died or something.”
Or something, I thought.
“Hey honey, how was work?” Mom asked Dad, planting a kiss on his cheek while I slid onto the kitchen counter and watched her putter around the kitchen. God, I felt like an outsider. I mean, everybody was perfect. Easton and Emmaline were laughing to some weird sitcom, Dad was making a sandwich, and Mom was humming. I just got in a fight at school and now was hiding it from my own mother. When did I become such a badass?
Easton walked in, and seeing me, he grinned, maybe he thought that I was, I don’t know, over my anger. “Hey, there’s my little sister!” He laughed. I glowered at him. Didn’t Easton know he had two little sisters? One was me, and one was standing in the kitchen doorway, quiet as a mouse. “How was school, you little badass?”
“Easton Alexander!” Mom gasped. “You do not use that language with your sister, do you understand me?” Easton nodded, pretending to be ashamed, while Mom turned around and started on cleaning a dish again, annoyed. My brother looked up and winked at me, punching my shoulder before walking off.
So the Foxwood boys heard about it. Great. I’ll never get a date.
“So, honey, Back to School Night is in a few days, and Emmaline is the office aid and needs to help out. Why don’t we all go?” Dad asked Mom, avoiding eye contact with us three kids. Easton, Emmaline, and I looked at each other. Cool, we’re all lying to Mom now. What else is next, we cut our hair and write depressing, heart-wrenched poetry?
Mom looked up, a smile back on her face. “Why, Peter, it sounds wonderful. I bet all of Easton and Delilah’s friends will be there to keep them company, too.” Wrong. Unless I wanted to make friends with the new kid, which I didn’t, then I have no idea what I was going to do. I refuse to be that bored during after-school hours.
“Actually, Mom, Delilah’s friend Chloe is going to be working there.” That was Easton, and then I punched him when our parents weren’t looking. He rubbed his gut, his face twisted in pain. Serves him right, that abominable traitor.
“Oh, I haven’t met Chloe. Is she a nice girl?” Mom asked.
Okay, I admit, I couldn’t help but start laughing. And neither could Easton or Emmaline. Even Dad started to chuckle. Now, to anybody being a Peeping Tom and looking outside our kitchen window, we looked like one big happy family, laughing with Mom while she looked slightly confused, but was still smiling.
But we were all actually just laughing because Chloe Solomon is not a nice girl. And you want more proof of that? Okay, how about this: I am on her shit list. And by shit list, I mean hit list.
especially the food fight part. This needs another chapter. Unless you already made one. I didn't see anything wrong with it so no nitpicks. I'm not good at that kind of stuff anyway. So keep doing what you're doing and happy writing 
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