Searching for Love, Found Wealth

A smile came to my face when I saw my mom’s driver at the parking lot. He was going to take me back home.

Back to my sweet bed, away from today’s awkwardness. Waiting for tomorrow’s freshness. I stopped to buy some anime comic books for Sheena.

I recognized the anime character Naruto that she had drawn and thought I could buy them in paperback but I couldn’t find any.

Mom wasn’t back when I got home. She never came home till I slept.

I guess I had gotten for myself the ideal “teenage parent who wasn’t always around” to take care of their kids.

But I understood this time. She was trying to revive an almost dead company.

I had a quick shower, made my self some omelet and began typing down my day to Charles.

He had told me to write it daily so he’ll know how my day went. We were like pen pals now. Writing letters cos we’re apart. He did add that his contract at Corn Fest will be over in a month.

I spent my day either doodling or surfing the internet. Basically nothing fun to do. I began hearing for the next day.

I couldn’t stand coming home to an empty house. I jumped from my bed downstairs to where the driver stayed. Did I add that he’s also like a babysitter as he stayed around to watch me.

I honestly have no problem as I didn’t have plans of going out but…

“Hello, sir. I’d really like you to be coming to pick me up an hour later than you used to. I’m trying to make friends at school and you come early” I said while smiling, trying to pull my most polite face.

He gave a simple nod. And that was it.

I hopped back to bed and let boredom drive me to sleep.

The next day was less enthusiastic to me as my days were pulling off weirdly but I managed to get out of bed.

I was in my senior year. Meaning I needed to buckle up and study. As my mom had always wished, I could even graduate school with an award or title in my name.

At school, I worked hard on finding out awards and titles that have not been collected.

Some like “Face of the year”, “Prom Queen”, “Prom King”, “Top Student”, “Nicest Student”, “Science Geek”, “Inventors”, “Best Artist”, “Best Sportsmanship”, “Most Popular girl” and “Most Popular boy”.

Basically, awards and titles that I doubt I could attain. Judging from current statistics.

If I could get a grasp on anyone, it would be “Top Student” and “Nicest Student”.

The girl who informed me about the awards seemed to have been a senior here before as she told to apply my name to show on the board before the application closed.

That was another problem. I was a new student, applying would be cheeky as I hadn’t made any friends. I’d stay below till the competition was over.

She showed me some old students of the “Science Geek” they all wore glasses except two. Like even nerds had a special award.

Well, I’ll lose there as I don’t get the hang of chemistry and isn’t a science student.

I asked for the charts of “Nicest Students” and even got more discouraged. They were mainly girls with pretty, cute and innocent faces.

Some of them had other nicknames to spice up their prizes like “Best Cheerleader of the year”, “Most Innocent face”, “Best Dancer” and one even had “Top Student”.Upstodatee from Novel(D)ra/m/a.O(r)g

She looked familiar but I couldn’t place where I’ve seen her. Her name then struck a bell.

She was the pretty model working with Charles. The one that mentored Samantha. She had attended our school?

My mouth was open in awe. She was a natural beauty then. And very pure in looks.

I couldn’t beat that. Not with my always moody and frowning look. And my hair can’t even stay in a ponytail for long so I couldn’t ever look cute.

She must have been a goddess amongst among classmates.

I gasped and reluctantly returned the charts, promising the lady to try to apply my name as soon as possible.

She was nice and believed I could win. I didn’t though. I just wanted an award to make my mom proud and maybe get a good university but I shouldn’t kill myself for one when I can’t get them.

As I walked out of the lady’s office, someone bumped into me and I nearly crashed back into the lady’s room. I looked up to Clara Adams with an irritated face.

“Won’t you apologize Cara? I’ve told you to stop coming here? Didn’t I?” the lady yelled at her. Cara looked down at me with no expression.

Surprisingly, she stretched her hand for me to get up with. I took it and thanked her, not really sure why she was acting nice.

As I walked away, I then knew why she was acting nice. She too was competing for “Nicest Student”.

Like what in the world! She was obviously putting a show.

And she had come to enquire on who had dropped her at second.

The student was Jennifer. My seatmate. She too was contesting for Nicest Student.

All those reduced my confidence.

“Like Jennifer is a bully. A nice bully. How can she be the Nicest Student?” Cara queried.

“Look at a kettle calling a pot black. You’re a bigger bully than Jennifer can ever be” the lady responded calmly.

I nodded at my new revelations.

Jenifer and Cara must have some problems. Jennifer was beautiful and appeared nice.

Cara same, though appeared wicked and there’s no faking there. Still people loved them for their looks.

Jennifer had an innocent aura. It would be easy to tag her Nicest Student even if she just helped you tie a lace.

But wasn’t Cara supposed to be competing for Prom Queen, Most Popular girl and Face of the Year? They were more suitable for her popular status.

Since I couldn’t decide which status I would be fighting for, I quietly went back to my class. No teacher was in again. I just stood at the door, disappointed and irritated.