More Random Writing

I'm assuming you've all heard that one of the Project Blook writers has been offered a publishing contract. If not, WOW. Isn't that GREAT?! I know that she/he's not exactly reading or going to read this, but I just want to wish her a very happy, sincere CONGRATULATIONS! I'm sure she's rejoicing right now. :DD Anyway, on to my writing, I'm going to keep on posting random writing pieces that I've done a way back into last year because I don't have time to SERIOUSLY write, though I'm planning to over the weekend, so please, just bear with me for Never Been Loved and Viewer, Walker, Whisperer right now. Thank you!

I kept up with my steady pace as I walked to school. Squelch, squelch, squelch. The sound of my favourite pair of wellingtons’ rubber soles making contact with the stony wet pavement repeated itself over and over.
I sighed and clutched the straps of my canvas haversack while continuing the pattern. This was simply another average day during which I would go to school and back, then preferably grab a bite to eat with one of my friends at Groove, before heading down to one of the local clubs for fun.
So normal, so repetitive. Frankly speaking, I hadn’t actually expected much more.
Yes, I admit, I’m one of those girls that read countless of books on magical heroines and wished that I could possibly be in the shoes of one of them. Day after day, I’d raise my hopes as I watched the sun rise from behind the puffy white clouds. Morning after morning, I’d willed myself the positivity that after all this waiting, that today would be the day I could be one of them.
But not anymore. My dreams had been dashed with the constant daily rejection. It made me want to cry when I finally woke up from my daydreams and realised that I would never be the person I’d always wanted to be. That I would just have to live a perfectly normal life, like any other human.
Nothing could go differently. No unexpected twists and turns. But of course, I didn’t actually give all this away. To anyone else, I was simply an extremely cool and popular girl at my school. That I was void of any other emotions besides just being a somebody in this place. That I was already the best I could be. That I could be nothing else but this body carrying out its daily routines, without its soul present.
But on the inside, it was a raging battle. A battle between hope and normality. Of course people would usually choose hope and live out their dreams just like who they wanted to be. They were the lucky ones. But I wasn’t so lucky.
So far, the scale was tipping towards normality instead. I exhaled sharply when I came face to face with a grey dullish-looking building.
My school.
I put on my hard mask, sucked in a deep breath and entered through the double doors. They creaked, obviously not oiled at the hinges. I pushed my way through the throng of closely packed bodies and headed for the black door which led to the lab.
Apparently, I had arrived just on time. The crowd of students in hippie outfits jostling past each other to get to their classes on time gave enough proof. I rushed into the lab room and settled into my seat. Next thing I knew, a girl wearing all black and dark make-up appeared next to me.
“Hey Amber,” I greeted while taking out all my stuff and placing them neatly on the black-top table. She didn’t seem to hear me though. She just kept walking, zoned out, to her seat two tables behind me.
My eyebrows knitted together into a frown, but Mr. Jones walked in just then, so I simply shook it off. She was probably just tired, since I’ve heard that she goes to bed only three hours before school started.
Today was just like any other day. Mr. Jones started droning on and on about some silly frog dissection that we would be doing the very next day, much to my utter disgust. I mean, why would people even want to dissect live frogs? Unless they were seriously that sadistic, obviously.
But at least I’d gotten away with no assignments to complete-which was pretty much a first since Mr. Jones loved dishing away what he calls ‘pleasant presents’. I hadn’t actually paid much attention (since when did I pay attention anyway?) and instead, spent the hour and a half doodling on the cover of my biology textbook.
Meanwhile, I sat there thinking of colours to use for my pointless cartoons when I suddenly came across the colour black, which instantaneously led me to ever-burning curiosity of mine.
I liked to ask questions. A lot.
So I’d always pondered about one of my friends-Amber, that is-who was in fact, a goth. I didn’t even know why she’d decided to be a goth. I mean, isn’t a girl dressed up in a cool shirt, jeans and sneakers good enough for her?
Plus all the dark make-up and once, I’d even visited her house and I’d ended up with spooky nightmares when I fell asleep. I didn’t get why she’d done up her place like that! Yeah, her parents might have allowed her to since they hardly cared what she did anyway, but still, that wasn’t a good enough reason for me. Who in the right mind-exclusive of Amber, of course-would actually paint everything in the house black, get furniture that screams ‘creepy’ and leave loads of freaky ‘I’m-watching-you’ ornaments lying around?
That’s just insane, more so because she was named after a happy colour! Amber! Think about that. It’s illogical! I broke out of my daylight reverie as soon as I heard the distant calling of my name.
“Lucy!” Snapping out of it, immediately blinked my eyes-the recipe for returning your soul back to Earth-and saw a group of familiar-looking girls staring down at me.
“What?” The girl in front-Miranda-put her hands on her hip and flipped her strawberry blonde hair back behind her shoulders.
“You were just staring into black space, Lucy. I can’t believe you!” I blinked again, then quickly ran through the day’s schedule in my mind. Let’s see, get to biology, skip double English classes with the girls, sneak out of- wait, skip double English classes?
“Oh, right, my bad. Let’s get going,” I apologized-my voice was layered with guilty implications-while grabbing my leather handbag. The nine of us strode down the hallway, our heels scraping the unpolished floor.
I didn’t actually want to skip double English. It was just that, I’d agreed on impulse yesterday. I hadn’t meant it. I didn’t think twice, that was all. But there is no such thing as making a mistake in the social scene. It’s either you’re in or you’re out. One little error could propel you to the fiery, cursed pit of Hades.
Well, I must say I am pretty popular. But I never knew what was going to happen tomorrow, right? So of course, it was only proper for me to prepare myself and do everything it takes to stay put in my current position, or even better yet, to climb even higher up the social ladder.
After all, I had begun to lose hope in the whole magic thing and my heroine dream had mostly faded away. What else could I lose in this life? The only available thing left is to try and splash different colours into my otherwise dull world by being popular. Try.
So I’d succumbed to the vulnerability of hanging out with the most popular people of each social circle. The Goths, the cheerleaders (which I was going with, in this case), the jocks and possibly even the nerds. That was the least I could do.
“So, where will we be crashing?” I asked nonchalantly, acting as if skipping school was typical. I was, in actual fact, so used to all this pretence already that I didn’t even had to try to keep up with it. It just came naturally. Like breathing.
It was second nature to me, really. All I had to do was to hide my feelings, put on an excellent poker face and do a completely believable voiceover. Easier said than done.
But all those times of hard work and I guess what you could call practice paid off, honing my skills such that I was now a fake. But everybody would be able to pull off such an impressive feat, if you’d been given the ten-year opportunity of learning like I had.
“Oh, we’ll be going to Crackle and Boom,” Natasha answered.
Highly expected. Crackle and Boom was one of the pubs in town with the highest criminal activity, though only people in on this secret would know. I couldn’t understand how I had actually thought our destination was Groove. Groove was too much of a goody club for youngsters.
Now, Crackle and Boom was the real thing. Unspoken words told me that there would be a substantial amount of booze, drugs and definitely smoking involved. I sighed internally.
Great.
I hadn’t always been a big fan of such stuff, just that I had to keep up my image, of course. So instead of turning around and heading back to school like a true heroine would, I nodded and plastered on an ‘I-know-what-we’re-going-to-do-and-I-love-it’ smile.
We were walking up as a huge group consisting of ten chicks, if I do say so myself, and I was fairly sure the pub owner wouldn’t at all mind letting us in, even though we were under the age limit by approximately three years.
Besides, wearing these heels make us look taller for our age, and we got the advantage there, especially since Miranda-the representation of a school slut-with us. I saw her furiously whispering to the owner, who kept staring down at her chest the whole time, and just as we were about to clink in with our heels, I vaguely saw a distressed Amber peeking from around the corner.
Her face was half hidden behind her thick curtain of chocolate brown curls, but I could still see her expression clearly. Those lips, the corners of her mouth pulled down in a distasteful, grim frown. Those eyebrows, pushed so closely together that they almost formed a line across her crinkled forehead. Those cheeks, flushing crimson with what possibly looked like the consequences of a sprint. Those eyes...
I didn’t even know how to describe them. They looked so void, so empty of any other emotions other than that which screamed help all over. Her face crumpled in pain, so much so that she didn’t even look like the confident Amber that I knew so well.
Even her ‘I-don’t-care-what-you-think-cos’-you-don’t-matter’ attitude wasn’t even there anymore. It was just her, plain, old, vulnerable Amber. The Amber that I had grown to love so much before. The Amber that had once been my very best friend, before she transformed into some weird, freaky goth girl. The Amber that I knew I must help no matter what.
She saw me shuffle into the pub and quickly left before Michelle could spot her when she realised that I had been staring at her for too long.
“What is it?” Michelle demanded crudely. I gave one last sweeping glance at the traces of Amber, before turning back to face her.
“Oh, nothing. Just the scruffy old neighbourhood cat. He doesn’t ever seem to stop looking so ugly, does he?” I faked a scornful voice. I knew that this was the perfect remedy to keep Michelle from probing into my business since she always launched into how she hated cats after any remark about any one of them. I blinked and as I walked into the pub, I made a firm decision to go meet with Amber later on. Whatever trouble was going on with her was definitely going to be my trouble too.
I stepped into the pub, faking a lopsided grin and swung my hips flirtatiously, as if they were made of rubber. I thought that’s what we were supposed to do, anyway, so I did.
As soon as I had entered the pub, I gazed at everything in undeniable awe, and probably even gasped silently. The setting wasn’t at all like I had expected.
Instead of boring old silver tables where you’d usually settle down with your drinks like at Groove, almost the entire pub was taken up by a really cool dance floor. The glass tiles repeatedly changed colours from hot pink to lime green and hordes of people were out there dancing wildly as if there was no tomorrow.
Flashlights beamed fluorescent light from above and coupled with the possibly hyperactive dancers, the party atmosphere was most definitely euphoric.

--Random Writing