Well, this is a story about a girl. A girl who isn't afraid to share her dreams, her worries and her opinions with the world around her. I guess that this story is about me. Critique please.
Path of the Lilly
One girl. One boy. One school. One path. Two sides.
A war is brewing and Lillian is stuck right in the middle of it all. Choosing a path may sound easy, but when it’s between love and friendship, nothing is as simple as it seems.
“Becky.” I whispered, and I glanced down from the pier to the blue of the sea, crashing against the pier. “We have to make a pact. If Jack asks me out, you’ll have to respect that.”
The ginger hair girl looked back at me, she wasn’t smiling but something in her eyes told me that she did think it was funny.
“And if he asks me out, you’ll have to respect that too.” She replied. Then, grinning, she added “But for now, he’s fair game.”
I couldn’t help but grin back. I stuck out my hand and we shook, looking out to the sea once more and letting out a long sigh.
Becky was my best friend. She has long ginger hair and a smile that always makes my day. I couldn’t say that we don’t fight, but it usually that sorts its self out.
You might think that it was the time that we found out that we both had a crush on Jack when the real problems started. No. It was when we found out that Jack had a crush on both of us.
Lil:
Hey Jack, how are ya?
Jack:
Gd thnx. U?
Lil:
Pretty good thanks. Um, I need to ask you a question.
Jack:
Go ahed.
Lil:
Who do you fancy...? Just wondering, as ya do.
Jack:
Um. Bex and you. A bit.
Lil:
Ah, cool.
Jack:
Soz mate, i betta be goin. Mums calling.
-Jack has exited the conversation-
Yes. That was when the real problems started.
It was the summer holidays, hot, steamy days of hanging by the pool in our bikinis, or spending time on msn with Becks and the rest of the lot. I’ve never really been a popular girl, but I suppose that it was in the summer holidays when I started get noticed more.
The term before, my main friends were a slut called Millie and her boy friend Henry, a great friend of mine. Millie’s left now, and all I can say is good riddance, a two timing, backstabbing friend stealer.
Along with Henry, there was Gabriel, Alexei, Weymouth (George, Weymouth is his surname, but that’s we call him by his last name) and Sam. Now these boys may be as kind and funny as anything, but they aren’t exactly easy on the eye. I hung out with them most of the time trying to ignore the other girls who certainly weren’t my friends. Our little geeky group were called The Bofs. That means that we were the unpopular people, pretty much rejected from the Cool Gang. I suppose you could have called me the lucky one, since I wasn’t as hated as the others were, but I wouldn’t go as far as being called ‘liked’.
It was the day of Kit’s party. I knew the Jack would be there. I also knew that it would be the day that he chose between me and Becky. But I didn’t realise that I was going to regret that day for a very long time...
I had already had a fight with Becky, we were arguing because she wanted to wear near to the same thing as this girl from the Cool Gang called Jess. Becky wasn’t in the Cool Gang or in The Bofs. I guess she was an Inbetweener, but she would have to choose one of the groups sooner rather than later.
It was alright when I got to Kit’s house though. Well, almost. His house is in the middle of nowhere, and as I walked with Becky to the middle of the wood where they all were I realised that if something bad happened there was no escape. I saw Jack and the rest of the boys on ‘the ropes’; huge nets suspended high off the ground and tied to trees. For a while, me and Becky just stood there, my dirty blonde hair blew over my eyes in the wind and I laughed awkwardly. I looked up at Kit, Jack, Andy (also called Jack, but we call him Andy) Bradley and George, trying to smile. Becky was already trying to scramble up to the nets but she was failing miserably until I gave her a leg up. That’s when Georgie arrived.
Georgie has no friends, I’m not even joking. She’s just very strange. There are rumours that she may be a lesbian, but no one is entirely sure. According to Becky she is, and I do trust her.
Tried as I might, I couldn’t get up onto the ropes, but I was quite glad that I didn’t in the end. Kit was jumping hard up and down trying to make the others fall off, when I heard a crack.
One of the ropes had snapped and Jack went crashing to the ground.
My heart pounded through my chest and it was all I could do not to run to him. I held myself back and heard the horrible laughter of the cruel boys. Jack was alright, but very shaken and rose steadily to his feet. It wasn’t long before the other girls arrived, Iona, Jess and Tash. All looking stunning, as usual. I flashed them a quick, confident smile and we all went back to the house together. The woods were dark, but dry and my pumps didn’t suffer too much, since they were already dirty from walking in the sea with them on my holiday with Becky. We were nearing the edge of the wood and into a large field that seemed to stretch for miles on end to the left and right, making me feel really small in the world. I felt happier when we got to the front of the house. The garden was full of bits of old skate board ramps which we all had to step over, making me feel uneasy because I thought I was going to trip over them and make myself look like a complete fool.
I looked around as Kit’s Mum showed us the tents.
“This is the boy’s tent” She said firmly, pointing to one of the two big white tents “and this is the girl’s tent.” She pointed to the other one, about 2 meters from the first. Kit just looked at us and rolled his eyes, while we went and got our bags to put in the tents.
As we came back from the house we found that Kit’s Mum had gone and all the pegs from our tent had been pulled out.
“You’re kidding me.” Tasha breathed, narrowing her eyes at Andy and Brad who were laughing. The others were nowhere to be seen.
I sighed and looked to Iona who looked fed up. We stood and watched as the tent started to collapse and just chucked our bags into it. We then got changed into our bikinis, ready for a swim in the lake.
The only thing was that as soon as we got to the lake, all the boys were getting out. I let out a long sigh. It looked freezing. Tash and Iona leapt in happily and Jess soon followed leaving me and Becky to dangle our feet in the black, ice cold water.
“It’s freezing.” I turned to Becky and shivered, trying to hug myself warm.
“Yeah, it is. Those girls must be mad.” I nodded in silent agreement and stood up.
“I’m bored now. Let’s just leave them to throw pond weed at each other.” Becky laughed. We grabbed our stuff and headed back to our tents in search for the boys.
We found them in a huge tent in the middle of the wood, music blaring. They had tubes of fluero pink and yellow hair dye and were squirting it at each other. I tried to avoid it but Andy got me on the shoulder.
“Geez Andy, what’s your problem?” I glared at him, grabbed the tube from him and squirted him back. The screams were satisfying. The girls had still not come back from swimming so the rest of us headed back to our tents to have a bounce on the trampolines outside.
There were two of them, close together so you could bounce from one to the other. I looked around for Jack and saw him bouncing with Becky. Scowling unconsciously, I hauled myself up and started bouncing with both of them. To my disgust, he completely ignored me as Becky ‘accidently’ fell into him.
“What a joke.” I hissed angrily, leaping onto the other trampoline to let Jack get up by himself. I shot a quick smile at Kit, who smiled back. Kit’s not bad actually; he’s funny and quite fit with hazel eyes and a friendly face.
“Too scared to get wet then?” he said with a grin. I laughed and nodded.
“Yes Meow (my nickname for him). You could even say that I’m a bit of a scaredy-cat”
I laughed at my own joke and he gave me a playful punch.
“You know how I hate being called Meow.” He said, pretending to be angry. He said a few other things as well, but I wasn’t listening; I was concentrating on Becky. I knew that it was fair game, we had agreed that last month, shook on it even! We had made the pact of two best friends, I couldn’t exactly get cross with her could I. But something bad was brewing in my heart that made me want to push her off the trampoline and laugh as her pale, fragile body crumpled as it hit the ground. Not that it would have of course, Becky’s as nimble as a cat when it comes to things like falling.
“Lills...” I heard Kit say and snapped out of my hopeless devil dream. “Are you alright? You suddenly looked... Weird.”
“I’m fine.” I replied quickly, then called to Becky.
“Hey Becky, I think the others are coming back!”
“Oh really?” she replied, looking over to the field to check. “Oh yeah!” But turned back to her precious Jack and gave him a stupid little high five.
I met the girls in the field and asked them how the water was.
“It was great!” they replied, laughing with each other (or was it at me?). I followed them back to the house and we all went to get changed back into our clothes again.
Saying that it was a nightmare would be an understatement. For a start, the doors didn’t lock. And since I was ‘dryer’ than everyone else, I had to guard the door from the boys and get changed last. It was while I was guarding Iona when trouble arose in the form of Kit’s 7 year old brother. He was charging around the house in nothing but his dressing gown. If that wasn’t bad enough, he was armed with a gun that shot hard, foam pellets.
“TAKE COVER. FIRE IN THE HOLE. I’M COMING TO GET YOU!”
He cried, pointing the gun at me. I couldn’t help but scream, knowing how much those pellets hurt when they hit you in the face.
“Lils... Lils! What’s the matter!” a voice cried from inside the bathroom, as Ben (Kit’s brother) charged at me. I fled, down the stairs, up them, through Kit’s parents room and back to the bathroom door again.
“Lilly! LILLIAN! ARE YOU BACK YET YOU BIRCH TREE!” the angry cries of Iona through the door.
“Yeah. I'm back.” I replied, looking around in case of a surprise attack from the small boy and digging my short fingernails into my palm.
