A Rose as Black as your Heart

(7) A Fight... and right outside my bedroom window too

Chapter 7

Ring... ring... ring...

"Come on, Sav," I muttered, my eyes flitting to my clock. It was 9 'o' clock. School had finished in Canada for at least half an hour. "Pick up the phone..."

Just as I was about to hang up on Savannah, the ringing noise suddenly stopped, and her breathless voice filled trickled down the line. "Hello?"

"Hey Sav, it's me."

"Alexis!" I heard a crackly rustle, which meant she was hugging the phone, a bad habit that she'd never been able to break out of. I played along.

"Savannah, you're squishing me!"

"Oops. Sorry." Savannah stopped hugging the phone. I smiled, a laugh bubbling inside of me.

"How was the first day back?" I asked her, with cheesy bravado. "Lots of fun?"

"Urgh," Savannah groaned. "Don't even mention it. It sucked donkey Kong balls."

Trying to keep that image out of my mind, I felt my heart sink for my best friend. "That bad, huh?"

"That bad," Savannah agreed mournfully. "No one even talked to me. Not that it was a surprise, I mean I saw it in the cards, but still. Do you know that no one's even going to talk to me for the first week?"

Of course, I didn't take much stock in her future telling, but I was sad she thought that. "Poor Savannah."

"Poor Savannah," Sav agreed. "How did Alexis' day go?"

"I thought the know-it-all prophet would have foreseen what an epic fail Alexis' first day was?" I asked in a mystical voice.

I heard Savannah giggle. "The know-it-all prophet was too busy checking the forecast for rain, actually."

"Oh," I laughed. "That explains it."

"Was your day really terrible?"

"Oh, it was okay really." Apart from at the end. "Someone called me short, but I think I 'persuaded' him and the rest of the class that calling me that was a bad idea."

"Poor English kids," Savannah chortled. "Did you make any friends, or where you rude to everyone?"

"Not everyone. Just... a few people. I didn't make any friends, but that's not really a surprise."

Savannah sighed. "Maybe not, but you could've at least tried."

"Hey, I was just pointing them in the right direction. I'll go all friendly on them tomorrow."

Our conversation continued for another hour before my phone beeped. "Oh, hang on Sav, there's another call on the line."

"I better go anyway," Savannah sighed. "Call me tomorrow, yeah?"

"Sure thing." I changed over onto the next call. "Hello?"

"Hello, Alexis."

Oh. It was my mom.

"Um. Hi," I said.

"How're you getting on in England?"

"Um... okay, I guess..."

"Good. Made any friends?"

Did Daniel count as a friend? I liked to think so. "Yeah."

"Ah. That's good." Mom sounded surprised. "Quite unexpected, really, but still..."

"Oh, cut the crap, mom," I snapped, sensing an ulterior motif behind her call. "Why did you call?"

"I wanted to say I'm sorry."