To be honest, I never really wanted her to begin with.

She was beautiful, blonde, brainless. An easy lay. Almost effortless, really. All it took was a flash of blue eyes, the heat of hands against her waist, and a few mumbled deceptions for her to spread her legs for me.

And she felt good. Curves in all the right places: a round, supple ass, a set of perky breasts, a flat expanse of stomach, tanned legs that went on for miles. Long blonde hair that brushed against my chest as she leaned over me, grunting and panting, her moans soft and whiny. She was a mewling kitten below me as we moved together in a dusty corner of the boys' locker, sweat sticking our bodies together, our fingers tangled in the space between back and ass, eyes closed and somewhere else.

She was good at this, almost too good. She mewled at all the right times, panted with the consistency of a porn whore, and knew exactly where to touch, exactly what to say. It felt rehearsed, like she spent her evenings in her bedroom with her hand trailing against her naked body, whispering a script over and over until it became engraved in everything she did. I think, at one time, she might have been a virgin. Maybe then, she was nervous and shy and trembling, maybe then, she didn't know what to scream to fill in the awkward silence of sweaty bodies slamming together in unison.

When I asked her if she wanted to go somewhere with a bed before she willingly gave herself up to me, she shook her head coyly and said that she'd rather do it quick and easy. She didn't want a bed, roses, candlelight, or even a declaration of some kind of broken emotion. "You know this doesn't mean anything, right?" she whispered as she unclasped her front of her lacy blue bra and revealed herself to my hungry gaze as though she hadn't done this a million times before, with a million different boys wearing a million different faces. She looked up at me with virgin eyes as she trailed her fingers down my back and brushed her lips against my cheek, whispering, "It's just a game, Troy."

I knew all about this game. I'd been playing it my whole life.

That's why, when I pushed into her wetness for the last time and heard her whisper someone else's name into my neck, I didn't even flinch. I just rolled over, palmed her breast slowly and asked her how she lived with herself, you know, being such a slut.

She laughed at me and leaned forward, her legs open, her juices glistening on the inside of her creamy white thighs. "You didn't seem to mind when you were inside me, screaming my name." She was such a horny little bitch. And she wasn't even tight. She stuck her index finger into her mouth and sucked, the slow, tantalizing motion of her tongue pulling something deep within my gut as I fought the urge to break her nose with my fist.

Instead, I pulled her closer to me, blocking out her stupid laughter as I gripped her perfect ass cheeks and pushed into her for a second round.

change of view

"Oooooh…you love him! You wanna marry him! You wanna buy babies with him!"

"Shut up, stupid! Why are you so stupid?" Eight-year-old Gabriella sent her most menacing version of a scowl Kelsi's way as she trudged her way to school, hiking her pink backpack further up her tiny frame. It was raining today, and she'd decided to wear her new yellow raincoat, the one with a Beauty and the Beast sticker stuck on the back. Her purple rain boots made a delicious "schmuck schmuck" sound as she lifted them from the mud, and her carefully braided pigtails were already frizzing. Her large brown eyes sparkled with annoyance as she heard Kelsi's laughter behind her.

"Gabby and Mark… sitting in a tree…"

"I'm so gonna punch you in the face, Kelsi."

"K-I-S-S…"

"Seriously. I'm going to kick you in the butt."

"I-N-G!"

Kelsi squealed as Gabriella suddenly pinned her to the nearest tree, her fingers dangerously close to Kelsi's giggling face.

"You know what I'm going to do? I'm going to pull out your eyeballs."

"Ew, Gabby! Gross."

"Well, you were the one who opened up your big ugly mouth about Mark. And you don't even sing good. Yup, I think you deserve to be blind for the rest of your life."

"Gab-by! I'm sorry..." Kelsi whined, stamping her foot in a pile of damp and moldy autumn leaves. "It's just, the way you make moony eyes at him, it's so funny!"

"I do not make moony eyes at him!"

"Sure you do. And whenever he talks to you, your face turns into a big fat tomato, and your voice goes all high and weird-like."

"Shut up, dumbo!"

"It's truuuuuuuuuuue."

"No it's not, fatso!"

"You know I'm right. Gabby has a cru-ush! Gabby has a cru-ush!"

"Shut. Up!"

"Do you think he's cute?"

A pause.

"Gabby?"

"He's alright. You know – if you're into that."

"What's 'that'?"

"You know, brown eyes, yellow hair, big smile. That' that'."

"So, are you into 'that'?" Kelsi pushed her face closer to Gabby's, her breath coming out in short pants as she struggled to understand what was wrong with her best friend. "Cuz, you know he has cooties, right?"

"No he doesn't. He… touched my hand once, when he asked for answers for his homework. And it didn't feel weird… it felt… nice."

Kelsi let out an exasperated sigh as she slid down the truck of the tree and settled her bum on the crinkly leaves that blanketed the wet ground. Gabriella soon followed her, and they sat side by side, backs against the ripply bark of the tree.

"So, do you love him?"

Another pause.

"Yeah, basically."

Kelsi patted Gabriella's mittened hand with her own.

"You know, if you ever get cooties, we can never be friends again, right?"

"Yeah, I know."

"Good. So do you still like him?"

Gabriella blinked her brown eyes, once, twice. She brushed her hair away from her cheeks and studied the butterflies on her rain boots.

"Not so much… I like you better."

"Good." Kelsi turned and threw herself into Gabriella's arms, falling facefirst into the crumpled leaves surrounding them. Gabriella laughed and hit Kelsi's scrawny little butt with her plastic Cinderella lunch box.

"Ow!"

"I told you I'd kick your butt."

Kelsi pulled the leaves and twigs out of her hair and glanced at Gabriella with serious green eyes.

"We're best buds forever, okay?"

"Okay, Kelsi."

Gabriella wiped the sleep from her eyes and stared at the glaring red numerals on her beside clock: 1 o'clock in the morning. She smiled nostalgically for a moment, letting the cleanness of her childhood settle into her bones for a moment before she closed her eyes once more and drifted off to sleep, her fingers curled at her sides in an almost prayer. Before the last flicker of consciousness emptied from her mind, she realized that her dream reminded her of Troy somehow, and she wandered into her deep, dreamless sleep wondering why.

A/N: Yay! Thank you alllllll for reviewing – you guys are awesome. Your suggestions and comments are really important to me, and everytime I read a new one, my whole face lights up. Since this is my first story, your reviews are really helping me. Thanks so much, guys – and keep them rollin' in:)