Hi! Look, aren't you proud of me, I have another chapter out! YAY!!!! Okay so its been a couple of months but unfortunately I have to priorities my time otherwise I don't get stuff for school done *grumble* and then I get into trouble and I don't think you really want to hear this so just go on and read, okies? <><><*><><><*><><><*><><><*><><><*><><><*><><><*><><><*><><> English had gone well for once in his life and Matt whistled lightly as he shoved books and writing materials into his over flowing locker. Angela had repeatedly made disgusted noises at the state of his locker and he was starting to think about making a change. He shrugged. Later. Angela had been in English only briefly as she had an extended viola lesson through that was second period and he was looking forward to seeing her. He smiled softly to himself and shook his head. She had popped in and out, dropping off a couple of notices, presumably from her teacher, flashed him a quick grin and waved to Charlotte who poked Daniel awake just in time to see the flash of her forest green sued pants as she hurried out the door. Matt found the prospect of going through their usual bantering was more exiting then usua l today. A wave of nervousness swiftly took root in the pit of his stomach and he just as quickly pushed it away. There is never any reason to be nervous about Angela. The tune he was whistling swapped to one of the new orchestra pieces he was growing to like and he started making his way through the hallway to the cafeteria. He swung the blue painted wooden doors open and was surprised to see the amount of people there. He frowned slightly and ploughed on , making his way towards the usual table. Suddenly he caught a flash of chestnut brown hair and deep green material. He grinned widely and followed her in the direction she disappeared. Coming up behind her he grabbed her around the waist and swung her in a circle through the air. She squealed girlishly and wrapped her arms around his neck as soon as her feet touched the ground. "Good day, sunshine" he said happily. The grin fell from his face. The girl in his arms stared up at him with vacant, baby blue eyes. "Wow, what a school!" The distinctly American drawl immediately grated in his ears. "My first day, and I'm already being picked up by hot guys! Pardon the pun." She giggled loudly. Finally stepping back sh e held her hand out to him. "Hi! My names Rachael, I'm new." She looked at him expectantly. He swallowed as a knot of dread settled into his throat. From over the girls shoulder he heard a loud crash and he looked up to where Angela sat, her mouth ajar. Her hand was still in position but her fork was upside-down on the table. Charlotte, next to her, was blinking repeatedly, a look of astonishment on her face and Daniel was slowly turning around, clearly dreading to look at the scene behind him. Suddenly the crowd swept between the table and him and was brought back to the situation by the girl, Rachael, as she cleared her throat. "Do you have a name?" Matt turned to her slowly. His mind was blank. "Err..........Matt." She grinned at him, showing perfectly straight, white teeth. "Well, Matt, are you going to show me around?" she pouted expressively, "It's awful busy." He nodded slowly. "Great!" She grabbed his hand and led him away. The scene greeting them at the table was icy cold. Charlotte and Angela had been engrossed in a whispered conversation across the table and Daniel had been sitting quietly next to Charlotte, nodding or shaking his head every now and then. Mathew took a deep breath and led the way through the crowd to the table. Now each person looked up slowly, his or her eyes immediately drawn to the girl standing behind him. He locked eye contact with Angela; a momentary expression of hurt fleeted across her features before she looked away. "Er....guys? This is...um, Rachael." They looked to him, then to Rachael giving her short smiles. Matt coughed in embarrassment. "She's new here." "And it been the most wonderful day!" She practically hopped with enthusiasm. "You know I'm even new to the country, but you can probably tell." As she chattered she made her way around the table and plonked herself right next to Angela. "I must have to funniest accent to all of you. I know you all certainly sound strange to me." Charlotte went in to a coughing fit, choking on the piece of chicken she had just placed in her mouth, Matts face contorted into a grimace. Sitting down Matt gave Rachael a polite smile and started eating silently, every so often looking up to see if he could catch Angela's gaze. She didn't look up at all. "I'm here on a scholarship, if you were wondering. You all are so lucky. I really had to fight to get into this school. You wouldn't believe whom I was up against to win this scholarship." She turned to Angel. "Do you know that most people consider this to be the best music school in the entire world? It say's quite a bit about my, or should I say our talents in the musical area, don't you think?" Angela opened her mouth to speak then looked to Rachael who was all set to launch into another train of thought, this time facing the onslaught at Charlotte, closed it abruptly and nodded her head at the girl. "So that would mean that I was one of the most talented, should I say best, viola players in the world. Hmmm ...my face just flushes at the thought." Charlotte gave her a flat stare, and then smiled frostily. "I wouldn't say best, you still have the position of primary viola to, ah, strive for." Angela grinned to herself for a second then gave Charlotte a reprimanding stare. No use riling her. At least not yet. Charlotte sighed. The girl was just too darn annoying. "Um, well I'm sure the primary violist isn't too great." Charlotte burst out laughing. Daniel shook his head, grinning at charlotte as she nearly completely lost it. Rachael smiled uncertainly. "What?" Angela pushed her plate away gently. "I have to go." Matt stood alarmed. "Where?" Angela gave him a blank look. "Does it matter?" Matt gave her a confused look, mingled with hurt, and sat again. Angela coughed slightly as she picked up her satchel of manuscripts. "I, er...have to do some practice if I want to keep up standard with the new orchestra pieces." She turned to leave but was interrupted when the American accent again invaded her reeling thoughts. "What do you play? I bet it some dumb instrument like the bassoon. I hate the bassoon." She giggled. Angela faced the table again and flicked some of her dead straight mahogany strands out of her eyes. "I play the viola." The expression on Rachael's face dropped. "Well you certainly look like a bassoon player" Angela openly rolled her eyes and turned to escape through the swinging cafeteria doors. Before the crowd swallowed her she heard one last snippet of the conversation she had previously vacated. The high nasal drawl made her pause midstep. "Gee...well she's a bitch." Angela took a deep breath and quickened her step, all but running the whole way to her dorm and throwing herself onto her bed. <><><*><><><*><><><*><><><*><><><*>< ><><*><><><*><><><*><><> She paced the dorm like a caged tiger . Sunlight billowed in through the open window and splashed itself over Angela and the far wall. Her photos, standing on her clean, organised desk, were lined up immaculately. Evidence of a long session of staring and remembering. Shopping, picnics, swimming, painting, working, studying, laughing. Thousands of happy pictures had danced through her head. She missed her friends terribly. The longing to laugh and talk and just plain be with her closest allies was growing like a cancer. But they had agreed. They would break everything off. Contact especially, so that when they were back together it would be all the more special. Besides, they were noble creatures and to bring one of their own down by preventing her to find people to relate to in her own world would be like taking ones own life, utterly unthinkable. But Angela had sunken into her emotions and all she wanted right now was to remember the times she was happy. In other words, she was dedicating the rest of whatever time she had left of lunch to thinking about her friends. There was Josie, the beauty, with dead straight hair like Angela's own with the exception of hers being so black it practically glowed blue. She would be an actress one day, they all knew for sure, because they had won this decent amount of money in their younger school days and one of the resulting activities was going to a fortune teller and having their futures told. Unfortunately they were only prepared to pay for one of their futures and poor Josie's grandmother had just passed away and the girl had been obsessed about her impending death. The old fortuneteller woman had made some gargling noises for a while and then grabbed Josie's small hand and declared that she would be a world famous actress, either in this life or the next. Josie had screamed blue murder and they all ended up running out of the apartment building like lunatics, but the experience had left a lasting impression. Which is understandable. There was Lindsay, the athlete. She entered into the state squad a couple of years ago and would be trying out for the nationals this year. Originally they'd all been athletics' obsessed when they found out that Brandon O'Donnell was the head of the Ath's squad. All except Nancie. She absolutely refused to physically exert herself, but with a body like hers it is quite possible no one would. Lindsay had been in trouble some time ago over experimenting with mainly smokes. It was more of a desperate ploy for her mother's attention after her father passed away then serious curiosity. They got through it though, together. Nancie, the polar opposite of the shy, dark Josie was pretty much stunningly beautiful. I f only she cared enough about what she looked like. As it is her unbelievably curly hair was usually left out in an unruly tumble down her back and her large baby blue eyes defined only by her God given lashes. She was always the most out going and honest although she had an inept ability to only be able to keep a secret for the maximum duration of ten seconds. She once spilled a secret to her pet parrot, named God, who repeated the whole confession for a year and a half. Nacie's mother was not impressed. The last to be accepted into the mismatched bunch was Matilda. The four, Angela, Lindsay, Josie and Nancie, had met her at a party that was held to welcome Matilda's family to the city. They were twelve years old. Ever since then Matilda and Nancie have been involved in a somewhat intense rivalry. It had something to do with Matilda's overall femininity and grace and Nancies complete disregard for the qualities. Matilda's hair was deep red, like red wine, and almost always contained in a thick braid. Nancie had always envied her that hair, and perhaps saw her as a rival for her place as the group's public face. The speaker if you will, for shy Josie, reserved, proud Angela and rebellious Lindsay. Any chances for building a friendship between them were cut earlier that year when Matilda was accepted into a school, similar to CSM, in France for her voice. Nancie always new she couldn't ever compete with Matildas singing because she wasn't prepared to pour her whole life into it as Matilda was able to. What Nancie needed to do was find something she desperately loved, perhaps that's a reason why Matilda decided to leave. To leave Nancie would free her from the rivalry that she was sinking her spare time and effort into and give her space to find her grounding and perhaps herself again. Angela paused in her tracks and shook herself. What was she doing? She was using her friends to ignore the issue, that's what she was doing. She sighed loudly, frustrated at her lack of self-control. If she was going to be a levelheaded mature person, then she should work through her problems, if not with another to listen then at least herself. She smiled at her photos and took a deep breath. They new that and would tell her too. She turned quickly, whipping her loose hair so that it flicked against her shoulder, as a gentle nock beat a rhythm on the door. She stayed where she was, biting her lip slightly. Was she ready to for a confrontation with Matt, did she even know what she wanted to confront him with? Suddenly, as the rhythm repeated, she relaxed. It wasn't even Matt, the knock was distinctly Charlotte. How strung up was she. She moved over to the door and opened it with a welcoming smile. Charlotte gave a quick, reassuring smile then rolled her eyes, let go of a frustrated smile and stamped her foot. "I can't BELIEVE her!" Angela laughed. Someone obviously needed to vent some frustration also. " I mean she waltzes up to us and is all "look at me, look at me". My God." "Settle Charlotte." Angela took a deep breath. "I don't think she means it." Charlotte strode over to the bed and collapsed onto Angela's doona. "You're just so accepting. She annoys the bajeebers out of me." Angela snorted. "Trust me. I'm not in love with her either." "Yeah, not like you and Matt." Angela's heart nearly evacuated from surprise. "You're joking, right?" "Well maybe not love." Charlotte crinkled her nose. "But there is definitely something going on there." Angela blushed and scratched her head. "Well, it looks like he's not interested." Charlotte crinkled her eyebrows. "Why?" "Um...I think the bell for the end of lunch is going to go really soon." Angela looked at her wristwatch. "Don't be so shy. Look I'll be your surrogate best friend while you can't be with your photo people, okay?" Angela grinned and nodded. "Good, so now I'm your best friend you can't change the subj-" The school bell interrupted her sentence with its trill. Angela laughed outright and raised her eyebrows. Charlotte laughed and shook her head. "So I guess the subject changing thing was valid hey?" "How could it not be?" They laughed and Angela went over to the bed to haul Charlotte up. "Come on, we gotta go to class." <><><*><><><*><><><*><><><*><><><*>< ><><*><><><*><><><*><><*> It's short, so sue me. Actually don't sue me; I'm poor anyway so you wouldn't get much money anyway. *pokes tongue* So there. ...heh heh HEAPS of thanks go to the wonderful goddess. I LOVE YOU!!!! Ehem, not in that way darling....you know what I mean. So yeah, mail her and tell her how great she is, she really deserves it!! And on that note.....MAIL ME! MAIL ME! Ehem....thankyou.