Author's Note:

I'm getting the house to myself the next two weekends (I think), which is perfect time for down time and, hopefully, some writing time. I'm so socially exhausted from this past weekend (mostly just this last Friday), so I'm ready for a couple weekends in, ha ha.

As always, thank you so much for all your support and kind words! :)

Sweet Pea
a My Candy Love (© ChinoMiko) fanfiction

Chapter Twenty-Four
prelude

Opening Song: "Honey Come Home" - the Head and the Heart

do you remember every block

every minute of every walk we used to take

we were young, so many years ago

and I think of all this time

that we've wasted with all our fighting

Every time I think about the conversation between me and Ken, I feel like I'm getting slapped in the face. I'd thought that if I found out what was going on, if I finally got him to tell him why he stopped talking to me, that everything would be okay. Sure enough, everything is not okay, and part of me feels like it'd be better if I were still in the dark. Ignorance is bliss, I guess. (Of course, nothing before this was bliss at all, and now instead of being sad and depressive and angry and confused, I'm just sad and depressive and angry and knowledgeable.)

I don't know who sent those text messages or how they were sent from my number, but I know for a fact that I never sent them. I know I haven't always been the greatest friend to Ken, but never, in my entire life, have I ever thought those words. Ken has always been my best friend, has always been so special to me — just thinking about those words makes me nauseous.

At first, it's the words that make me angry. Why would they send that to him? Who, in possession of a human heart and a human conscience and a human soul, would send something that awful to him? They must have known how self-conscious and sensitive he is. They must have known how hard that would it, and how badly he would take it. No one should ever have to listen or see or hear something so awful being said about them, true or not. Least of all Ken — sweet Ken, my best friend, the nicest boy in the entire world who greeted me with homemade chocolate chip cookies every day.

But then I realize I'm not just angry at the dick who sent him those awful things — I'm also angry at Ken.

How could he believe I would send him those things? How could he actually believe that it was me? And it's not just that. He didn't call me or text me or anything to ask about it. He just… assumed that I'd sent it, and decided that was it, and completely cut me out of his life. We knew each other, were friends for so long, and he didn't even think about asking? Like, I get that initial shock and even his anger. If I'd gotten something like that from him, I'd have been seething. And crying. And probably screaming. But I would have called him and asked what the hell that was about. I know Ken is (was?) shy, but obviously not shy enough to come up with these stupid revenge plots and make me feel like absolute shit.

Look, I know I'm not the greatest person. I know that I'm nosey, and I have absolutely no sense of time or punctuality, and I could probably bring my sassiness down a level. I know that I talk a lot to a lot of people, and I know that I could have been a better friend to Ken while he was here. We didn't spend a lot of time together when we first got here and that was entirely my fault, but like… I was making friends and I don't think I should be penalized for that? And even then, even before Sweet Amoris, Ken was my best friend. Did I think too much of our friendship? I honestly that that we'd be friends forever, that we'd be able to handle anything.

How can I be friends with someone who doesn't trust me? Who doesn't believe in me? Who doesn't believe in us? Even if I had sent those things, Ken didn't fight. He just laid town and took it — like he always does. Ken never stood up for himself, so really, how could I expect him to stand up for us?

Part of me always thought that Ken put more into our friendship than I did. Sometimes I thought he was more invested, because he was too shy to meet other people and often I was his only friend. But I never questioned that I love Ken, honestly and truly love Ken. He was so much more than a friend to me; he was my rock, my constant, the only person I always had by my side. I thought he thought the same of me.

I was wrong. Nothing is forever — not even Ken and Aome.

It isn't long until Rosalya and Alexy approach me with their concern (the very next day, right before the morning bell rings, in fact). "You didn't respond to my texts all night," Alexy says. He hands me a large white chocolate mocha from the bakery, which tells me that I look miserable. "Which made me think that you might have fallen asleep early, except one, you didn't show up to the assembly, and two The Bachelorette was playing last night, and there's no way you slept through that."

I roll my eyes at him, though I do take the drink. Depressed or not, I'll never turn down a white chocolate mocha. "For your information, unfortunately, I did miss it, but it's not because I fell asleep." Actually, I end up just laying on my bed and glaring at the ceiling until I finally passed out from all the internal rage, but neither he nor Rosalya need to know that. "Also, I doubt I missed anything at the assembly."

"You didn't," Rosalya says, "but that's not the point. The point is that you told us to save you a seat, so we did. Where did you go?"

I bite down on my lower lip, looking between the two of them as casually as I can. The last thing I want to do right now is have a conversation about my Asshole Former Best Friend in the hallway before classes start, especially because I know the two of them will freak out. "I got a stomachache, and I wanted to grab something before work," I say.

"Don't you carry painkillers with you?"

"Aunt Lonnie's very anti-non-natural medicines," I say, and it isn't untrue. If you open our medicine cabinet at home, all you'll see are herbs and rubs and wraps. I don't know useful they actually are, but the smell from most of them knock me out just as well as benadryl does.

Sure enough, neither of them look convinced by my argument. "You're hiding something from us," Alexy says.

There's no point in lying. Alexy and Rosalya are good enough at figuring me out individually; I can't even imagine what they'd be like together. "Yes," I say, and I try to ignore the incredibly smug looks on their faces, "but I'll tell you guys later. I don't really wanna talk about it right now."

They both look a little reluctant, but they don't have much time to argue because the bell rings (sweet Jesus, hallelujah, praise the Lord). "Alright," Rosalya says, "we'll hold you to that."

I wiggle my fingers at them before sliding away, desperate to get out from underneath their Ultra Perceptive Aome Eyes. I know it's important to talk to your friends, especially when you're having a hard time, and especially when you're really sad and angry. I know it's bad to keep everything bottled up and that just makes everything a hundred times worse, but I'm still coming to terms with it. I kinda just wanna… soak in it before I seek a second opinion? Okay, that sounds masochistic, but I swear there's logic behind it.

"Hey, hey, hey." Castiel grabs me by me sleeve, tugging me towards the lockers. "I haven't seen you in a while. You hiding from me?"

I blink. Honestly, I kind of forgot about Cas with all of this Ken stuff happening. (Holy shit, that sounds awful.) "You're the one who missed the first day of classes," I say, raising an eyebrow. "I should be asking you that."

I'm only mildly disgusted by the way my stomach flops when he grins. "Some stuff came up, but luckily for you, I'm back."

I roll my eyes. "Oh yes, I am just so blessed. We're gonna be late for class."

"Is your New Year's resolution to actually show up on time this semester?"

"If that were the case, then I've already failed," I say, deadpan. "I was late yesterday because I spent most of the morning falling on my ass." I was smart enough to take Aunt Lonnie up on her offer this morning, which means I avoided adding more bruises to my backside. "However, my New Year's resolution is actually to decrease my number of detentions by half. Which I guess means that we can't be friends anymore."

Castiel snorts. "Trying to get rid of me now?"

"If only I were so lucky."

Castiel "tch"s loudly as he tussles my hair. "Watch your sass." I wear down his glower with my grin (Mission Accomplished!), until he grabs my backpack and yanks me along into the classroom. "You're a damn handful, you know that?"

"So I've been told."

Art has always been one of my favorite subjects, save for those couple of weeks during the fall when she made us paint a bowl of fruit over and over again. I'm super pumped because our first assignment for this semester is a self-portrait, which is perfect for a narcissist like me.

"I think I'm gonna use oil paints," I say as I grab a canvas. "I know Mrs. Leo wants me to 'try something different,' but I don't really like water colors and this is supposed to be about me, right?"

"That makes sense," Violette says, though something tells me it doesn't actually and she's just saying that. "By the way…" I look over at her, and she fidgets uncomfortably, dropping one of her brushes. "I heard from Iris that, um…" The way her eyes keep shifting left to right tells me that she's terrified of setting off, which kinda hurts, but I know my outbursts aren't the tamest. "Well, I heard that Ken's back from military school."

Just hearing his name makes my heart beat uncomfortably. "Yeah, he is." All of a sudden, it's hard to focus on the paint or the canvas or even Violette, who I can tell feels really bad. "Um, yeah. Yeah, he is." I just said that.

"He looks different. Have you talked to him?"

Yeah, he basically just told me that I'm an awful friend and that he's never trusted me and that our friendship is just as flimsy as the stale potato chip in the back of Aunt Lonnie's cupboard. "Yeah, a little bit," I say. I'm trying to really hard to sound blasé about it, which is kinda hard considering all of the rage being sheltered in this body. "Haven't had much time to, yanno? Getting back into school and… stuff. Yanno."

The smile on her face tells me she's trying really hard not to laugh, though I wouldn't blame her; the word vomit is getting out of control. "Are you okay, Aome?"

No, I am definitely not okay. My Ex-Best Friend is a total ass, I still have no idea what my relationship with Castiel is, and I left my lunch at home today which means I have to subject myself to the school's spaghetti surprise. But… I guess things aren't totally awful. I have a bunch of friends who really care about me, and who buy me coffee when I look sad. Things could be worse.

"Yeah," I say, and I mean it, "I'm alright."

"Good. I was getting a little worried. Iris seemed worried too, and so did Rosalya and Alexy when I talked to them earlier today." Geez, am I the talk of the school today? "But I'm glad you're alright. The start of the semester should start off right, right?"

"Right!"

The corners of her eyes crinkle as she smiles. If I wouldn't knock over all my art supplies and get paint on my favorite sweater dress, I'd launch myself over and hug Violette. "By the way, have you gotten a chance to meet Deborah?"

Immediately, the image of a pretty girl with cool clothes and really nice hair pops into my head. So much happened yesterday, I almost forgot about my run-in with her in the bathroom. "Yeah, I have," I say. "I mean, we talked for like a second, but I met her. Do you know her?"

She bobs her head excitedly, and I feel this small twinge of what I instantly recognize as friendship jealousy. Which makes no sense at all because I don't even know this girl and she's probably really nice. Maybe it's just because I love Violette so much and I don't want to share her with anyone. "She went to school here before she started her music career. We were friends."

"Music career?" I ask, impressed.

"Yeah, she's a great singer! And she's so nice. I think the two of you would get along really well." I try to smile because Violette's smile is so big, but I still can't get rid of that funny tingly feeling in the pit of my stomach. "I wonder how long she's going to be able to stay in town, though… When I talked to her, she said she was going on tour soon… Or maybe she is on tour so she can only stay for a little bit." Violette sighs. "Too bad she won't be staying. I really missed her."

"So were you guys really close?"

"Deborah was friends with almost everyone. We haven't stayed in contact very much, but…" She shrugs. "I think everyone is happy to see her again."

"Well, a friend of my friend is my friend, right?" I say.

Violette laughs. "I don't think that's really what the saying is, but… Maybe we can all spend some time together so you can get to know her. Like have a picnic or a barbecue or something. Oh, well, I guess it's still cold, so…"

"Yeah, maybe we can all do something! That would be fun." Her eyes practically light up, which only makes me feel even more guilty about the discomfort I'm feeling. I don't know why I'm feeling so on edge about Deborah — Violette has only had good things to say about her, and Violette is the nicest person in the entire world. I try to tell myself that it's just because of everything else (Ken and Castiel), and I'm just making it all up in my head. "Let's plan something."

"Okay! We should let Melody and the others know. They'll be so excited!"

It's nice to see Violette so excited and pumped up about this. When I met her, I thought she was super shy and mousy and quiet, all of which are true, but I'm so glad I've gotten to know her. I need to stop being such a Debbie Downer and be more supportive. Sometimes I forget that high school isn't the be-all and end-all, and no matter how frustrating boy problems are, they'll always be there, so I might as well keep looking forward and hope for the best.

Besides — I'm always up for making new friends, and according to Violette, Deborah would be a great new friend. I've always wondered what it's like to be friends with a rock star.

Closing Song: "Out of the Woods" - Taylor Swift

Kind of a filler chapter that's transitioning into the Deborah arc. Sorry it's taking a little longer to get these chapters out; I've been super tired after work and haven't been writing much.