One Green Eye, One Red One

10 Things that really annoy me about my brother

1.       He is such a snitch,

2.       He locks himself in the bathroom and sits in the middle of the floor just so I can’t get in

3.       He has the most annoying friends

4.       He has the worst dress sense

5.       He is a pig when he eats

6.       He is rude

7.       He is insensitive,

8.       He’s a jerk

9.       He steals stuff from me

And the most annoying thing about Max:

10.   He holds grudges

Sleep is just amazing. 

Drifting off in a dream, snuggling under covers, feeling toasty warm and having your worries temporarily melt away… It’s just perfect.

“Melanie!”

You know what isn’t amazing?  Being woken up from a perfect sleep.

“Melanie!  Have you not woken up yet?!”

Urgh, mum’s voice is getting closer, any minute she’s gonna knock on my door and actually force me out of bed, but you know what?  Five more minutes won’t hurt anybody.

 “It’s 7:40!”

Wait.  What?!  How did this happen?  I have an alarm that goes off multiple times every morning, I should have heard it!  Is she sure it’s 7:40?  Shoot.  Where has my alarm clock gone?  It was on my bedside table last night and now it’s not.  In fact, looking around my room, it’s not in here at all. 

Well, right now I have more important things to worry about than my clock being missing.  It’s 20 to 8 and I’m usually at school by 10 to.  That’s not happening today.  Let’s see… Takes my mum 20 minutes to drive there, and if you take into account the traffic, that’s a 30 minute drive.  If I leave in 20 minutes I can still get to school on time.  Problem solved, just need to run to the bathroom and be as quick as I can.

19 minutes

It’s locked.  The bathroom door is locked.  And I now have 18 minutes to leave the house.

“Max!  I’m really late, how long are you gonna be?”

“Dunno, as long as I need, to be honest.”

Why is he being so smug?  Urgh, I do not have time for this, I have 17 minutes to get to school.

“Well, what are you doing in there?” Silence.  All I can hear is the hallway clock ticking.  “Max, seriously.  What are you doing in there?”

“Sitting on the bathroom floor, washed and dressed.  I’ll be here ‘til 8:30.”

Is he serious?  Does he want me to kill him this morning?  I have 16 minutes.  16 flipping minutes to be out of the house, washed and dressed, and I’m standing outside of the bathroom in my pyjamas because my brother wants to be funny.

“Max.  I’m giving you 10 seconds to be out of the bathroom.”

“Or what?”

“Or…. MUM!!!”  I hate to pull the mum card, I’m not a snitch.  To be honest, I haven’t even yelled loud enough for her to actually hear me, but it’s enough to get Max to unlock the door and exit the bathroom with a scowl on his face.  Point: me.

15 minutes.

Time for a quick rush inside the bathroom.  Teeth, mouthwash, exfoliate and rinse done in 5 minutes, which is pretty good for me. 

10 minutes.

Quickly �" bedroom, uniform, hair, bag (pre-packed from last night �" thank goodness).  1 minute. 

A Dash down the stairs, out the door and into the car where mum and Max are waiting.  That’s right.  I don’t know how, but I just managed to get ready in 15 minutes.

***

Ok, I’m finally at school and its 8:26, 4 minutes until registration.  The classroom’s packed, yet Macy, Brooke, Becki, Alison, Megan (Urgh), or Kelly (Even more urgh), are nowhere to be seen, and I’ve scanned the classroom like 3 times now.  Oh well, might as well dump my bag on my desk and go and join Natasha and Valerie for a chat (They’re really nice and funny and would probably be super popular if they didn’t refuse to follow trends.)

So, Becki Allison and Megan have entered, along with Ms Baldon, so now everyone’s back in their seats.  There is still no sign of Kelly, Macy or Brooke, so I’m sitting on our row of 4 by myself, looking like a loner.  Perfect. 

“Melanie?”

“Here.”

Great, now everyone’s staring, and silently judging, wondering why my friends have ditched me because I’m sitting alone.  I just need to make myself look busy, fiddle around in my bag or something, anything to make me look less sad, lonely and pathetic. 

 “Ok, so Brooke, Macy and Kelly’s bags are here, but they are not, Melanie, did they tell you where they were going?”

Seriously.  Why did Ms Baldon have to go and make the situation awkward?  I can actually feel everyone’s eyes boring into my soul.  I have to play this right, be casual, and make it sound like I’m fine with sitting by myself.  I’m fine that my friends are probably having fun somewhere without me, all because of my stupid alarm clock.  I am 100%, totally, completely fine.  I will be fine, just need to plaster my face with a fake smile and speak.

“Um, I dunno, I was late this morning!  I’ve just come in!”

Perfect.  Now all I need to do is carry on my signature ‘act confused to hide the shame’ look until everyone stops staring. 

That took like 10 seconds.  Am I seriously that boring?  Everyone lost interest in 10 seconds.  I am slightly offended.  And still alone.  What is this?  And what is my first lesson this morning?  I’m pretty sure it’s history… Or PE… Or English… Or Maths… I don’t know, something educational.  I really should check my planner.  And, if I check it, there’s the bonus that I’ll look busy and un-aware of the fact that I may as well be in solitary confinement.  5 more minutes ‘til the end of form, come on, I can be strong for another 5 minutes.  Seriously, where are these 3?  There bags are on their desks but they’re M.I.A.

4 more minutes…

“Girls, you’re late.” Ms Baldon’s staring at the door.

Oh my gosh.  It’s them.  Kelly, Macy and Brooke.  They’re strolling in the classroom giggling and apologising, sitting down in their seats, filling the row, completely oblivious to the fact that they abandoned me this form time and are rubbing their fun in my face.

 “Where were you?”

Ok, that sounded way too angry.  Not that they’ve noticed I’m angry, I mean I don’t think that Brooke’s even noticed I spoke and Kelly… Well, she doesn’t care.

“We went for a walk around outside and lost track of time” Macy’s whispered back,

“Oh, hi Melanie!  Didn’t even notice you there!” Brooke’s added gleefully, “Are you ok?”

No.  I’m slightly annoyed because whenever Macy, Kelly and I go for walks around the fields in the mornings, we always make sure to keep checking the classroom for Brooke!  Do I not mean anything to them?!?  Not as much as Brooke does, obviously.  Urgh.  I could rant and cause drama, or I could act ok and let this slide.  I choose option number 2.

 “I’m fine.”

Good.  That actually sounded believable.  Just need to wipe the moody look off of my face.

***

Ok, so now I’m pretty sure that I really am not thought of as part of the group.  This morning didn’t get much better after registration.

After the end of registration bell rang, I had trampolining with Kelly (Macy and Brooke chose to take tennis instead).  It was easy to forget about the morning incident because Megan, Becki and Allison take trampolining too and there are only two big trampolines, so when you are not one of the 2 people jumping, you’re standing around spotting people (Or in our case, standing around chatting while pretending to spot).

Becki, Allison and I did the usual: stood around, had a good conversation about Sam and Lewis, laughed at Allison when it was her turn to jump (She’s super scared of jumping on a trampoline), and stared in awe at Becki (She is amazing at trampolining). 

However, as soon as trampolining was finished we went into the changing rooms and got changed and I went to go see if Brooke and Macy had finished changing but they weren’t by their sports lockers and their bags weren’t outside of their lockers so I left the changing rooms.

Our sports department is separate from the rest of the building so you have to walk down this path that leads to a side entrance to the main building.  As I was walking down the path, guess what I saw?  A few metres in front of me was Brooke, Macy and Kelly all linking arms as they strolled down the path laughing. 

That was the moment that I was abducted and overtaken by the green eyed monster.

Now I’m sitting in English, waiting for our teacher to show up, while ignoring whatever conversation is happening between my “friends” and ranting in my head.

I’ve never liked Kelly, but now, I hate to say it, but I’m downright jealous of her. 

She has ignored Brooke and Macy for almost a month, she looked at them like they were dirt at Chelsea’s party, and she is constantly blowing them off for better offers, yet they are still putty in her hands.  I, on the other hand, am nothing but nice to them, am always the person there to talk to, lend them money, listen to every little petty problem that they have and yet, as soon as Kelly shows up, I am completely invisible.  I honestly don’t understand how that makes sense at all.

I am on rage mode.

It also didn’t help that when I first got to English, Kelly and Brooke were in their usual 2 seated desk and when I  went over, sat in my normal seat next to Macy and asked what we were talking about, they all went silent, and Kelly mumbled a quick

“Nothing don’t worry,”

Before Macy turned towards are and went,

“Well anyway I’m so sorry Kelly!  I really wish I could!”

Yup.  That’s right.  I am being left out of conversations now too.  May as well not be here at this rate. 

Finally our English teacher, Mrs Dawson’s come in, asking for our homework.  I know that this makes me sound like a complete geek, but I’m actually looking forward to handing in my essay �" I spent time on it and it’s 5 pages long, well structured and if I do say so myself, the best piece of English homework that I have ever written. 

Just need to get it out of my… It’s not there.  It’s not in my English folder.  No.  No.  No.  It has to be there.  Ok, I just need to stay calm.  It was there when I packed it last night, it probably just fell out in my bag.  I just need to have a rummage through my school bag, I’ll find it lying at the bottom and I’ll laugh about how silly I was for panicking.

Except it’s not there.  And Mrs Dawson is making her way around the classroom quickly.  Where is it?  Where is it?  Where is it?  Where is it?  It’s not there.  It’s actually not there.  All that I have lying in the bottom of my school bag is a tin of lip balm, hand sanitizer and… Wait… There’s a random piece of paper at the bottom of my bag, and it has writing on it.

Let’s see you try to tease me when you’re in detention for forgetting your English homework!  From Max

He didn’t.  No way.  Is he serious?  He actually took my English homework.  And left a note?  I hate him.  So flipping much. 

“Melanie!  Homework?” Mrs Dawson holding out he hand.

Ok.  I can do this.  I have seen many people talk their way out of detention, I can do this.  I just have to be charming, and sweet and believable.

“Well, my printer at home was out of ink and I was going to print it out in the school one this morning, but it just wouldn’t print!”

She doesn’t believe me.  I can see it in her eyes.  She’s giving me a really confused look.  She knows I was lying.  Great, I’m going to get detention, and she’s gonna think that I’m a liar. 

“Well, you never hand in your homework late so I will give you the benefit of the doubt.  We have a lesson last period tomorrow, if it is not in by then, I will have to give you detention”

I did it!  I pulled off a successful lie, and it worked!

Urgh, I swear �" that’s the one good thing that’s happened today.  The rest of the day has pretty much sucked, waking up late just ruined my whole day. 

I hate alarm clocks. 

I hate English essays. 

I hate my brother.

I hate Kelly.

At this moment I even think I hate Brooke and Macy.

Great.  I’ve been abducted by the green eyed monster of jealousy and the red eyed monster of anger.  How is that even possible?

Looks like I’m sporting one green eye and one red one.

Urgh.  Those 2 colours really clash.