Young Writers Society

I looked down at the photo album. It had been the first thing I packed when I left home but since then, it had been left in a box under my bed. When was the last time I looked at it? The book was stylish, soft, black leather with the words Remember Me written in gold lettering across the front. Lizzie had made it for me; it was one of those things that she was really good at. I had carefully selected and arranged the photos myself. It was a project that we’d started together, making one each, in year ten and by the end of high school the whole of our group had one.

I picked up the album and sat it in my lap, gently lifting back the cover. Pictures and drawings and weird comments scribbled in almost illegible handwriting covered the thick, creamy white pages. The first picture was one of the whole group and each of us had written comments about the others. As I reread the comments now, I chuckled, letting the fond memories flow over me. I remembered the photo being taken; it was from the first time we were all in Jimmy’s house together.

After finding out that Cassandra lived next door, Faith’s outbursts increased in frequency. She would shout things at Cassandra and make jokes and every time she did I could see Jimmy getting more and more annoyed. One day he snapped, and we saw for the first time what he really thought about Cassandra.

Michael had stolen Cassandra’s bag from her while one of his friends distracted her and, after making her chase him around, he’d thrown it onto the school roof. Unfortunately, he’d neglected to zip it up first so the entire contents of her bag had emptied onto the roof. Now, she was staring up at it helplessly while Michael and his friends laughed uncontrollably.

“That’s brilliant,” Faith said. She was, naturally, in hysterics.

“It’s not that funny, Faith,” Lizzie said awkwardly.

“What are you talking about? It’s hilar-“

“It’s not funny at all,” Jimmy snapped.

I was about to say something, to back him up or calm him down, when he stormed off towards the roof where Cassandra’s belongings lay. He strode past her and she watched silently as he hoisted himself up and skilfully scaled the wall. Once he was on the roof, a rather sizable crowd had started to gather. He scooped up the bag and began to shove Cassandra’s belongings back into it. The whole time, Cassandra just watched him, barely reacting at all. When he’d gathered all her things together in her bag, he jumped down off the building, landing clumsily. He thrust the bag into her arms and turned to Michael.

“Next time you do something like that, I’ll kick the shit out of you,” he hissed at him.

Michael pretended to be scared and his mates all laughed and mocked Jimmy. Jimmy started to walk back to the rest of us when she finally spoke.

“James Golding, champion of the down trodden,” she said so quietly I almost didn’t hear it. Jimmy turned to look at her and they locked gazes. “Since when do you care what happens to me?” She walked slowly closer to him, holding his gaze like a lioness stalking her prey. “I thought you’d made it clear that you didn’t care what I did anymore.”

Then she held him in her hands, able to drop him at any moment if she wanted to. When he didn’t answer, she did, breaking off eye contact and walking away. For a moment, Jimmy was completely motionless, not even retorting the mockery from Michael and his lackeys. Then he turned back to us and wondered over distantly.

“What was that about?” Faith shouted at him, embarrassed by the fact that he’d made a fool of her by helping Cassandra. “And what the hell was her problem? You help her and she acts like a bitch as always.”

“Shut up, Faith!” Jimmy yelled. “I’ve had enough of you talking about stuff you don’t understand. Just cause you’re jealous of the fact that she’s prettier, smarter and more likable than you doesn’t mean you can say the things you do.”

He stormed off, walking too quickly for me to catch up to him. The next couple of weeks were icy at best. Faith wanted nothing to do with any of us and Lizzie followed her out of the group – she was angry with Jimmy for how he’d spoken to Faith. Naturally, I stuck by Jimmy despite that meaning that I couldn’t talk to Lizzie. I’d never really liked Faith and I found myself liking Cassandra more the more I spoke to and noticed her. She wasn’t mean, just defensive. She wasn’t rude, just shy. She wasn’t a snob, just didn’t have the patience to deal with people that she didn’t like. There was nothing particularly dislikeable about Cassandra – she was just not that easy to understand. Sam and Gia were sort of caught in the middle but they both hated Faith – they just didn’t like losing Lizzie over it. It wasn’t until February when things began to fix themselves.

The four of us, Sam, Gia, Jimmy and I had gathered at Jimmy’s house, like usual, and we were trying to cheer Jimmy up, who hadn’t been his usual upbeat self since that fight. The knock at his bedroom door stopped us mid conversation and Jimmy called out for whoever it was to come in. When the door opened, Lizzie was stood behind it. She looked at us all sheepishly and shuffled form foot to foot, unsure of how to start whatever it was she’d come to say.

“What do you want?” Jimmy asked after a few minutes of waiting for her to speak.

She flinched and Gia thumped him on the arm. “God Jimmy,” she said angrily. “Enough already.”

“Urm, actually,” Lizzie began, casting her eyes down to the floor. “I wanted to apologise. I kept treating you guys badly and ignoring the fact that you guys were upset by Faith. I knew that she was being horrible with the things she said but I wanted to believe that she was still the Faith I used to know. I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be,” Gia said, jumping up to embrace her. “We understand.”

“Sorry for being a dick,” Jimmy mumbled as he stood up to usher her in.

Then, I turned instinctively to the window and, sure enough, there Cassandra was, sitting on that swing.

“Jimmy,” I said gently. “I think you need to talk to Cassandra.”

He followed my gaze out of the window and nodded. “Yeah,” he said. “I think I do.”

We watched him leave the room then all hurried to the window to see what happened. He appeared in the front garden and, as he closed the gap between them, Cassandra looked up, confusion on her face. He spoke first. Then she burst out laughing. Then he got angry, snatched her book from her and stormed back to the house. She caught up to him quickly and suddenly they were running around the garden. We could hear Jimmy laughing from where we were stood.

“I don’t think he understands the concept of apologising,” I said, prompting giggles.

At this point, Jimmy led a furious Cassandra inside and, when we heard the commotion they were making, we decided it was time to join them. We found them in the lounge, where Jimmy had placed Cassandra’s book on a shelf that was too high for her to reach and she was wrestling with a chair in her attempts to retrieve it.

“Hi, Cassandra,” I said cheerfully.

“Oh bugger off MacDowell,” she threw back at me.

I shrunk back and I could hear Jimmy laughing from the kitchen.

“In our defence,” Lizzie tried, “he was meant to be apologising.”

“James?” Cassandra scoffed, hopping down off her chair after finally reaching her book. “James doesn’t apologise. Ever.”

Lizzie chuckled awkwardly and looked to me for support. Jimmy emerged from the kitchen, holding a bowel of popcorn and a jug filled with squash. Placing them on the coffee table in the middle of the two sofas, he turned his attention to Cassandra again.

“Stop trying to leave,” he demanded. She scowled at him and started making her way towards the door. Jimmy stopped her, standing between her the exit. “Hey, Sammy, can you go get Field of Dreams? We’re gonna watch a film.”

Sam disappeared upstairs as instructed.

“Good for you,” Cassandra sneered.

“You’re watching it too,” he said.

“I’ve seen enough of that film.”

“Oh, yeah. Five times in one summer once. Good times.”

“Different times.”

She turned and headed towards the door, only for Jimmy slam his down on it from behind her so that it wouldn’t open.

“Stop trying to leave,” he snapped, patience dwindling.

“For Christ sake, Cassandra. Jimmy’s trying to make things right,” Lizzie said frustratedly.

“What’s it to you?” Cassandra yelled back at her.

I an arm around Lizzie and guided her back towards the lounge to suggest that we perhaps shouldn’t get involved.

“I just want us to go back, Cass,” Jimmy said helplessly.

“To when?” Cassandra asked, laughing. “Before you started ignoring me, or before you started bullying me?”

Silence fell over the house. Was that true? Had Jimmy bullied Cassandra? Jimmy wouldn’t do that. But then why would she say it.

Jimmy wandered into the lounge dejectedly and sunk onto the sofa, his head in his hands. I sat down beside him and placed a comforting hand on his shoulder. In the hallway, I could hear Cassandra yelling as she spoke to Gia, who remained calm as she told Cassandra that she understood. Lizzie remained on the other side of the room to me and Jimmy, sulking about having been shouted at by Cassandra, and Sammy appeared in the doorway, standing there awkwardly, holding the DVD. Waving for him to enter the room, I sat forward to look at Jimmy’s face.

“Maybe if you tell us what happened we can help,” I suggested.

Jimmy looked up at me curiously, before casting his eyes down, shame on his face that said it all. My heart sank. I’d looked up to Jimmy so much but, now, he seemed like less than half the guy I’d thought he was.

“Cass and I were really good friends until she started acting weirdly in year six,” he explained in a low voice. “I thought she was sick of me so I said some nasty stuff and she returned the favour. It should’ve stopped at that but I just kept ripping into her. The kids in our class thought it was hilarious so I just kept doing it. I only stopped when I found out that Cass’s behaviour was because of her parents’ divorce. Then I just ignored her.”

I sighed and screwed up my face to hide my disappointment. I’d been expecting him to say something like that but it still hurt to hear him admit it. Gia stomped into the room in a way that told us not to ask what had happened with Cassandra and took the film from Sam. Kneeling in front of the DVD player, she set it up and grabbed the remote, watching the doorway until Cassandra followed her through. Plonking herself into one of the spots on the three seat sofa, she calmed down and took a handful of popcorn.

“Well?” she said. “Are we gonna watch this movie, or not?”

We hesitated, unsure of what was going through Cassandra’s mind, and turned to Gia for instruction. She smiled and took a seat on the two seat sofa, waiting for the rest of us to follow her lead. Obediently, we all sat down, Sam taking the other spot on the two seat sofa and Lizzie and I squashing onto one side of the three seat sofa, next to Jimmy. Gia pressed play and I tried to concentrate on the movie, but couldn’t keep my eyes off of Cassandra and Jimmy. She seemed so out of place, curled up in a ball on the sofa, so obviously trying to keep her distance from him, flinching away very time he reached forward to get a handful of popcorn. Slowly, she relaxed though and unfurled herself, actually allowing her knee to touch Jimmy’s. Finally, when the movie reached its most moving moment, he started sniffling and hamming up his acting and she couldn’t help but get caught up in his act and put her arm around his shoulders. By the end of the film, she was laughing happily with him, as if the fight and everything that came with it had never happened.

After that, the group was complete. The six of us ate lunch together, met up outside of school and became the envy of everyone else in our year group, not because we were any different from them but simply because we always had each other. People still said things about Cassandra and sometimes to her, but Jimmy would quickly scare off most of the guys who bothered her. Some of them even bothered to speak to her now and their opinions of her changed drastically. The girl that everyone thought was a snooty, spoilt brat turned out to be a foul mouthed, sarcastic but lovable girl with an infectious laugh. She wasn’t what people thought and they were finally starting to realise that.

AN here! Ok so any feedback I can get on this chapter would be greatly appreciated, especially concerning the final scene with Jimmy and Cassandra. I've had a lot of problems with that part and have lost count of the number of times that I have written. Could you let me know if you think this sounds like how they might act/speak/react? Thank you! ^-^