sweetserenity

Boarding School

She followed Derek into the hallway. "Cue the Mission Impossible theme song," she whispered. Making her way to the fire escape, she walked with her back to the walls and constantly checked around herself to make sure the coast was clear. Since Derek ran, he got there a bit before she did. While he was sticking the key in the door, Diana dropped down and did a somersaulte. Standing up, she was now right behind him. "Now cue the Spy Kid's theme song!" She whispered as she dramatically tip toed down the steps once he opened the door.

Boarding School

Diana dived back into the bed as soon as Derek told her to. The bed bounced a little in response. That was fun. The teacher sounded female and Diana couldn't help but wonder if some thirsty boys hit on her. It depended on how old she was, Diana figured. When the teacher walked away, Diana waited a few moments before getting back up again. "Close call," she commented in a whisper. Checking the time on her phone, she saw it was a little past 11 pm. "C'mon, get out of bed before I physically drag you from there," she said softly with a giggle. Quickly, she covered up the giggle with a little cough. She wasn't particularly excited about going out and watching her new friends get drunk, but it was something to do and some motherly instinct in her wanted to make sure none of them did something stupid. Her parents would flip if they knew their daughter was sneaking out. Diana imagined Derek's parents would flip even more if they knew what their son was up to.

She chuckled, imagining their parents having a flip-off.

Boarding School

Diana listened calmly. She wasn't too surprised to hear he came from a big name and a wealthy family, given how Derek had so naturally paid for his friend's meals and looked well kept. His parents so heavily wanting their son to be perfect must have been stressful for him. They wanted him to have the perfect education, perfect girl, perfect everything so he himself could be perfect and live up to the family name.

She felt sympathy for him. Something she was surprised to hear about was his view on relationships and girls. "Oh, so you never actually dated Cadence?" She observed. Given how clingy she was towards him, it was easy for her to assume they were an item. As he admitted he knew she was only using him for money, her heart broke a little both in pity for him and knowing her ex best friend had changed for the worse. "Listen, dude, I'm no 'love expert' but if you don't see a future with Cadence, just drop her once and for all. This isn't a game of House. We're all growing up and we need to decide what's best for ourselves." Diana slid off her bed and slipped on her Nike shoes. Continuing, she added, "If you really want to live your life as a bachelor, that's fine. But I know you'll find somebody perfect for you someday. All you have to do is open your heart to them."

That went deep. Diana grabbed her phone off the charger and slid it into the pocket of her hoodie. Since she was heading out again anyway, she had never bothered changing clothes before slipping into bed.

Boarding School

She sat up after the teacher checked on them. "Yeah, that is pretty creepy," she agreed in a whisper. Her throat was starting to feel a little sore from talking in a lower voice all day. Even now, talking in a whisper, she had to make her voice a tad lower. "After taking the first two years of high school at my local trashy high school, I realized I wasn't growing into the best person I could be. The learning criteria was easy peasy, the people around me were dumb druggies, and none of my friends seemed to give any thought to their future, let alone give any support to my goals. So I looked into private schools away from my town, and the rest is history," Diana explained, looking ahead of her as she explained this. She then turned to Derek. "Are you from this town? Have you been going to private boarding schools your whole life?"

She was realizing that she, too, wanted to learn more about her roommate. So far all she knew was that he's known Harry since childhood, used to be called Derkie, and has some on-and-off thing going on with Cadence. What if we run into Cadence tonight? Diana thought. Is she the type of person to sneak out like Derek is?

Boarding School

Diana laughed as Harry explained the history behind the nickname. What a small world it was; not only was somebody from her childhood in the town, but also from Derek's, too. But perhaps their families lived closer to the school so it wasn't as special for them. She didn't know.

"Aw, lil' Derkie has grown out of his nickname," Diana teased, reaching up to playfully pinch Derek's cheek. She found herself wondering how Derek acted as a child and how it was perhaps different from now. Was he more flamboyant? Rebellious? Or maybe a goody two shoes, like Diana? She smiled and lowered her hand down from his face. Either way, he had definitely been shaped into a lovely & honest young man.

What am I thinking? Snap out of it, Diana! She put both of her hands into the pocket of her hoodie and kept strolling along.

Boarding School

After Derek settled the bill, the boys and Diana walked out. The boys strolled a bit ahead of them as she suddenly drew a ten dollar bill from her pocket and shoved it into Derek's hand. "There. It's yours now. Compensation. No take backs," she said in a soft and serious voice as if they were spies in a movie. She smiled at him and ran off to catch up with the other boys before he could say anything in reply.

As she caught up with the other boys, she laughed and commented, "So you guys call him Derkie?" In reference to them teasing Derek earlier. That was humorous to her for some reason. Must have been the irony of giving such an independent person a baby-like nickname.

Boarding School

Diana blinked twice, surprised by their suddenly serious tone. Even when Cadence stormed out, they were still pretty carefree. "Hey man, don't worry about it," she reassured Derek. "I have better things to do than be a snitch."

Mental high-five for that one! That definitely sounded like something a guy my age would say.

She started eating her food as Baylor tried convincing her to at least tag along. She thought for a bit before replying, "Well.. I guess I could be that one sober friend that keeps all of he- his- tipsy friends in check," Diana replied with a little shrug. It had been a long day already, so she didn't even know how long she'd be able to stay awake. She didn't want to disappoint her new friends.

(Forgot to say this in my last post! I don't really know or care how Derek finds out, as long as it comes up naturally. So he could walk in on her changing, or he could stumble upon her tampon box while looking for something, or unlock her phone and find out from there, etc :) )

Boarding School

That made Diana feel better. If Cadence ran back to him in the past, she'd likely run back to him now. "Drinking..?" She said hesitantly, looking at the other boys then back to Derek. "I don't know. I don't think so." It was in her nature to be a goody-goody. She didn't get into Student Council at her old school for no reason. She never really liked people who snuck out or ditched class to do drugs. To her, it was irresponsible.

But hey, the situation was a bit different now.

She sighed. The waitress swung buy holding a tray filled with their orders. "Ok, a Caesar salad for..." she trailed off as her eyes scanned the table, trying to find Cadence.

"She left, sorry," Diana explained. "So did the other one who ordered the lobster."

The waitress raised an eyebrow but didn't press further about it. She simply handed out the rest of the orders before returning to the back.

Boarding School

Diana had opened her mouth to clarify that the girl in the photo wasn't her cousin- it was just another girl named Diana- but Cadence's terrible mood made Diana reconsider and shut her mouth. She was bummed that her friend left as well when Cadence stormed out. Now she was the only short one again.

Moving on from the topic of, well, herself, Diana took a sip of her coke then joked, "When I ordered coke, I was expecting it to be more powdery than this." A dumb grin was plastered across her face as she said that.

It was odd seeing a childhood friend again while pretending to be a different person. She knew who Cadence was but she didn't know who she was. Diana couldn't help but feel a tad guilty for at least temporarily ruining whatever was going on between Derek and Cadence.

Boarding School

As he called the girl in the picture beautiful, Diana buried her face in her hands to hide a blush. She pretended she was just rubbing her face from sleepiness, though. He essentially just called her beautiful. There's no photos online of me with short hair, so he must be looking at long haired me. That's not a super big difference. Does still think I'm attractive now? Or is he immune to thinking of other guys as attractive? Diana pondered this.

The waitress left after taking everyone's order. She seemed to scurry away because she could sense the tension in the air after Cadence's comment. Diana drew her hands away from her face and looked at her and Derek. She wanted to say something, but she didn't know what to say.

Until something popped into her mind.

There was a few moments of heavy silence until she spoke, "She's not that good looking. Maybe a 5/10, tops."

She had never been so self deprecating before, but this situation called for it. Of course she didn't really think that way about herself, it was just to lift some of the dense air.