Addicted

Chapter 18

It was just me. She rolled her eyes.

 "Why do you dress like that? You're really pretty but those clothes are not."

I stared into her face, trying to see if she were being mean, but there was just an honest curiosity as she stared back. "Because I have no choice." I replied, looking down at my tray in embarrassment. "The foster family that I stay with picks out my clothes. This is what they get."

"Have you told them that you don't like it or you want to pick out your own?"

 I shook my head.  "No, but they're pretty strict about what I wear."

 I smirked thinking about what would happen if I wore what I actually wanted to wear.

I was already reduced to bring my little black eyeliner pencil to school and putting it on in the girls bathroom before class. I was more drawn into the whole emo faze more than anything.

 I looked at what Kat was wearing. A fitted black t-shirt with the word SHORE in yellow, and DUDES in pink, black jeans with a white studded belt, and basic black Vans. Nice.

 I looked down at my own button up yellow flowered shirt, hanging over a knee length jean skirt, with the flat, round toed dress shoes and cringed. No wonder people picked on me. Seriously.

"You know," I looked back up to meet Kat's gaze as she started speaking again. "I've got some extra clothes that we were going to donate to the GoodWill if you want them. It's stuff that I can't wear anymore, but you look a little smaller than me. If might fit you fine. Wanna come over after school and check it out?"

My mouth fell open a little. Was this going to be a trap? Should I turn her down now, so that I'm not even open to the possibility of getting hurt? I hadn't been invited to anyone's house since that sleep over. Having been bounced from school to school, home to home...didn't leave much time to actually learn to trust people.

 "I would have to ask..." I murmured out, hanging my head.

 Even if I kind of did want to go to her house, I wasn't sure that my foster parents would let me.

"I'll get my parents to call your parents, if you want."

I shook my head. "They aren't my parents." I said, my voice going hard again on instinct.

 It didn't even faze her. "Sorry. I'll still get them to call. They're pretty good at talking other parents into stuff." This girl didn't stop.

 I couldn't help but admire that about her though. "Okay." I nodded. "Okay, that sounds good. Th-thank you." I stuttered out.

That wasn't a word that I was used to saying anymore. She smiled and leaned over to pat my hand.

 "I didn't need a thank you but did it kill you to say it?"

 I met her gaze and saw the laughter behind her eyes, the grin lifting her lips. I couldn't help but smile back.

 "Almost," I replied, smartly.

 I lifted my milk carton to take a sip, when someone rammed into the back of my shoulder, causing the milk to splash all over my face and down my shirt. I grabbed a napkin, and turned, ready to cuss out whoever had done it.

It was fucking Josh Graham, the school douche that thought he was better than everyone else. I hadn't even been here that long and he had already made me a target.

"Oops, sorry. Guess I didn't see you. Though I don't see how I missed you in those ugly ass clothes." Him and his little buddies started laughing.

 I stood up, the top of my head barely coming to his chin, but I didn't care. Opening my mouth, I was prepared to get suspended again.

 Before I could say anything, Kat jumped in front of me and shoved him as hard as she could. He was a big guy so he didn't go far, but he stumbled back a couple of feet, his friends making sure that he didn't fall.

"Bitch!" He yelled at her.

 She looked like a fierce kitten, standing there ready for battle. She shoved her finger into his chest, poking hard, emphasizing every word that she spoke.

 "You will leave her alone, do you hear me? Does it make you happy to try and make others feel like shit just because your life sucks so bad? Huh? Well, I got news for you. You better be glad that I jumped in front of her, because she will fuck your whole world up. I'm just warning you. Now you and your little buddies can pack up your little dicks and go away." She made a shooing motion with her hands and smiled sweetly at them.

Who in the hell was this chick? Wow. I was actually speechless.

 I mimicked the shooing motion with her as they walked away, glancing back at us.

 "Ugly fucking bitches." I heard one of them mutter. Kat heard too.

 "Ugly fucking pricks!" She screamed back at them.

 Damn. Yep.

There was a teacher making his way over to us. I had just gotten back after being suspended for two days. They were going to kick me out again if this kept up.

"Can you ladies come with me please?" We gathered our trays and dumped them, following him to the office. "Can you tell me why you were yelling obscenities in the lunch room?"

I opened my mouth to tell him about the guys but Kat jumped in again. "She didn't do it. I did. A couple of guys were being jerks so I told them off. If you are going to discipline me, then I think they should be disciplined too."

She stood back and crossed her arms over her chest, staring the teacher down. Okay, bad ass. I was really starting to like this girl.

 "The boys didn't scream it across the lunchroom." The teacher replied, looking from me to her.

 "No, but they said some really hateful things to us. Are we not expected to retaliate? I don't think it's fair that we should get into trouble for standing up for ourselves. This is why bullying is a problem." I watched her rant to this teacher and knew that Katrina Stuart would be my friend for life.