A/N: Hello! Again, I really am sorry I don't get to update often. Nevertheless, thank you so much for the support and the reviews. Here's the next chapter! I'm currently editing the one after this. Enjoy Chapter 26, and let me know what you think! :)

CHAPTER 26: The Queen

"Did I say Anne? No, I think I said… Jam." Rodrick squinted at nothing, probably realizing that his reply made no sense.

I raised my eyebrows at him. "No… You said Anne." I noticed he closed his eyes for a moment as if mentally reprimanding himself. "Is this Anne the same Anne I know?"

He got down from the desk he was sitting on and looked at his invisible watch on his left wrist. "Oh, look at the time! It's really late. Don't you wanna go home yet?" There was no pause-whatsoever as he said those words.

I crossed my arms. "Hey... This is a really comfy chair."

He glared at me as he waited for me to get up and leave. Instead of doing that, I just put my feet up on the computer chair, ready to listen to the story. He rolled his eyes and groaned. "Yes, it's her." He sank to his bed. "We used to be best friends."

Meanwhile, big gasps and OMG's were popping in my head; but all I asked was "What happened?"

He narrowed his eyes at me. Part of me felt like I should stop interrogating him, but I ignored it. I didn't budge, so he just answered, "You know, you get older and become friends with others and stuff. And then suddenly you aren't close anymore."

Something about his answer was off. It seemed too generic. "That's it?"

He sat up and frowned at me. "What—if we were best friends when we were kids, does it mean that we have to be best friends forever?"

"No, it's not that. There seems to be something more between you two… I mean, we all felt the tension when you and Anne saw each other at the mall a few months ago. And then when I asked Anne about it, she gave me the silent treatment."

Rodrick scoffed. "I can give you that treatment too right now, if you want."

His reaction all the more confirmed that it wasn't just two friends losing their connection over the years. "Did you guys have a big fight or something?" He didn't respond when I said that. "Oh, I get it now. You guys became boyfriend and girlfriend, didn't you?"

"No!" he immediately replied in a defensive way. "Why do you care so much anyway?"

I'm just curious, I thought. But I knew that wasn't the only reason. "I don't know. Maybe it's because I'm trying to figure out Anne? I mean, I still haven't talked to her since the party. She's never at our lunch table whenever I get there…" I paused. And then I realized that I might be crossing the line. What if I was in his shoes, getting this kind of interrogation? "But you know what, never mind. Forget it. It's none of my business anyway." If he didn't want to talk about it then I'd just have to let it go.

I put my feet down and turned to get the papers from the printer. Our paper's finally done already. All that's left for the English project was to pass it and show the video we made to the class. I tried to distract myself from the thought of Rodrick and Anne's past by thinking of how the presentation would probably go. But the more I did, the more I got nervous.

He was quiet for a while. We both were. And then he sighed. "Fine. I'll tell you."

"Are you sure?" I turned my chair to face him again.

He added, "But after I do, forget about it. Don't make a big deal about it."

"I promise." I raised my right hand.

He sighed again. "We were just really close childhood friends, that's all," he started. I got up and went to sit beside him on the bed. "Our moms got along too, so we had lots of weekend playdates back then. We were inseparable…"

"And then?"

He lied down, head on the pillow and legs resting on my lap. I frowned. "And then middle school happened," he said as he stretched.

"What happened during middle school?"

He yawned while saying, "Things changed and stuff." Then he closed his eyes and pretended to sleep.

"Heeeyy!" I shook his legs but he didn't stir.

"Ssshh." A sly smile spread across his face.

I sighed. "What did you do? Did you do something stupid? Or did you fight over something?" I kept shaking him so he'd respond, but he still had that annoying smile on his face. "Did one of you start liking the other?"

His smile disappeared.

I got slightly excited. "Oh, I see. Who did? You or her?" No reply from him. I gasped. "You liked her, didn't you? Didn't you? What happened? What happened? What happened?" I poked his side and his arm again and again.

He clenched his jaw. "All right! Shut up!" Before I knew it he was already standing across me and glaring at me. He groaned and then sat on the floor. "You're so annoying."

I shrugged and gave him a sarcastic look. "The feeling is mutual." I sat down on the floor beside him. Both of us leaned on the side of the bed for support.

"Huh. Whatever happened to 'It's none of my business anyway'?" he said sarcastically, doing the quotation mark sign with his fingers.

I faced him. "But... you said you'd tell." Cue puppy dog face.

He looked at me, annoyed at first. I blinked twice, still keeping up my puppy dog act. After a few seconds, his face slowly softened and I saw a tiny smile on the edge of his lips. It worked. I think he almost let out a laugh. That tiny smile of his made me grin like an idiot deep inside.

He shook his head out of it, probably because he realized he was staring at me for a while. He sighed, and rolled his eyes as he looked straight at the door. "Yeah. Okay." He cleared his throat. I smiled and then faced the door as well. He continued, "At the time, she was my best friend, right? Middle school came, and I started feeling… different towards her. In the end of 7th grade, I decided to tell her how I felt. And then, well, I got rejected. Harshly. She said it was stupid, and childish, and we should be nothing more than best friends. And besides, she had a crush on this other dude."

"Ouch. First heartbreak?"

He ignored my comment and went on with his story. "I agree with her, though. I didn't think about it before telling her. But after that I decided to forget all about that stupid crush thing and act like nothing happened. She was my best friend again, and everything was back the way it was."

"Oh." I still couldn't connect that to their situation right now. "So if everything went back to normal, how come—"

"You keep interrupting me," he said. I apologized and pretended to zip my lip. He continued, "By eighth grade I've already moved on—it wasn't a big deal anyway. That was around the time Heather Hills's family moved to Plainview. And she was the hottest girl in school. I think everyone liked her, but we were seat mates in most classes and I knew she was totally into me." He said that without even a tinge of doubt.

"Oh, really?" I tried not to laugh.

He sharply turned to me upon noticing that. "What's so funny?"

I sat up straight and shook my head. "Nothing!"

"Hey," he started, a finger up in the air. "I know for a fact that girls act like they're not into some guys when they really are. I mean, tons of girls act like they're not into me, but they are. I know they are."

I chuckled. "Okay, whatever you say."

"All right, I'm done telling this story—"

I pulled his arm back as he started standing up. "No, no! Haha, I'm sorry, I'm sorry. Please continue."

He sighed and sat down again. "Before Heather became super popular, she talked to me a lot of times, asking for homework and stuff. That's how it was. Then here came high school. In the middle of freshman year, Anne came up to me and told me that she realized that she likes me a lot."

"What?" I replied, sounding surprised even though I already sort of saw that part coming.

"Yeah." Rodrick nodded, and pulled one of his legs up so his arm can rest on it. "So I told her in a nice, best friend kind of way, that I don't have feelings for her anymore, that she was like a little sister to me." He paused for a while. He was looking at the floor and touching—slightly scratching—it with his fingers. I wondered if he was just distracted, or if there was something bothering him in his mind. I was about to ask when stared straight at the door again and continued. "And then she just stopped talking to me. I tried reaching out to her but it looked like she was determined to ignore me for life."

"Maybe she was just embarrassed after getting rejected?" I said, partly in Anne's defense.

He scoffed and then shook his head. "Was she really? Next thing I knew, she was hanging around with Heather Hills and that other girl—what's her name?"

"Madison?" I remembered that girl from the country club with Heather, the same one who was always with her wherever she went.

"Yeah, her. Anyway they were really close. Anne went to parties, started going out with different guys. Everything seemed totally fine with her. And Heather Hills? She never talked to me again, except for that one time when she confronted me about my 'weird obssession' with her."

I think I saw them talking once. "Oh, that was during her Sweet Sixteen, right?"

"No. It was before you even moved here. The same school year Anne stopped talking to me."

I was trying to connect the dots in my head. "So she knew. You told her you liked her?" He shook his head. "Or maybe it was obvious. It was so obvious when I saw you trying to get her attention last summer—"

He glared at me. "During that time, I didn't make a move, okay? I didn't do anything. No one knew about it. Except for Anne." There was a short silence. Of course that's how all the dots were connected. Rodrick then cleared his throat and continued, "So I talked to Anne about it. And she got angry. She got really angry."

"What?" I said in disbelief.

"Yeah. Literally, what the hell. Then we got into this huge argument about our old frienddship, and how I used to liked her, and she was asking why couldn't I like her back, blah blah blah. I was telling her that she spewed out real harsh words when I expressed how I felt years ago, but I still agreed to be friends with her even though that happened." His voice started getting louder. "And then there she was getting mad at me for not wanting to be with her. Was she expecting for that tiny, stupid crush to just come back and it would get all romantic and shit?"

I was speechless for a moment. I didn't expect him to really spit it all out like this. "Wow. This is more complicated than I thought."

He calmed down a bit after a few seconds. "We never spoke to each other since. She kept hanging around with Heather and Madison… The three most popular girls at Plainview High." He sarcastically waved his hands in the air as if he was reading a huge sign.

"The three most—so they were like our school's version of Mean Girls or something? With Heather as the queen bee?"

"Yeah, you can say that. Except Anne was the queen."

I couldn't quite see how Anne could be the queen. "Really? Isn't Heather more popular?"

"She is. But it doesn't mean she's the queen. The evil queen," he said, the last part barely audible, but I still caught it.

"Maybe you're just saying that because of the history between you and Anne. She's been hanging out with my friends when I met her, and I can say she's nice."

He smirked. "Did you forget about your infamous 'iced tea' incident already?" I didn't reply. I get annoyed with myself and my blood starts boiling whenever someone brings that up. He had a point. But still, Anne never struck me as the bitch that made everyone else's life worse. It felt unfair to see her as a totally bad person without understanding her side of the story. I always perceived her as nice and friendly, well, up until that 'iced tea' incident. Rodrick raised his eyebrows. "See? You two are friends, but you don't know her well enough beyond the surface level."

I sighed. "Speaking of friends, what happened to Anne, Heather, and Madison? They're not exactly a trio anymore, right?"

He shrugged. "I was surprised too when I found out about that. But I don't know what happened. Maybe they got into some petty fight or something."

"Oh. I see." What he said may or may not support the idea that Anne is an 'evil queen.'

He looked at me. "The end. Happy now?"

I smiled. "Now we're even."

Hearing all this was honestly a bit overwhelming. I felt like I just dragged myself into this already-tangled situation between them. There's no turning back now, which also meant I have to be more careful not to spill even a single detail to anyone; and also in dealing with Anne and everyone else that could potentially make things more complicated. But at the same time, a lighter feeling balanced it out—Rodrick shared these things with me, even though it was quite personal for him. We're even.

"Okay. So whatever we talked about, whatever happened in this room, stays in this room, okay?" he said.

"Okay!" I held up my pinky finger.

"What the hell is that?"

"Pinky promise!" I said. He looked at me as if I was doing something so silly. "Come on, we gotta seal it."

He tilted his head and shook it. "That's lame. Let's try a new one." He held up his hand like he was about to shake mine.

"A handshake? Really? How original."

"It's not a handshake. Just do it."

I did so with my right hand. We did something like a sideway high-five. After our hands passed each other, he curled his fingers, forming a fist. I followed, and then we did a fist bump. After that, he held up his pinky. We sealed the deal with a pinky promise. I let out a small laugh as I stared at our interlaced pinky fingers. After a moment, I let go.

"We still ended up with a pinky promise," I told Rodrick.

"Hey! At least it's different. Remember that: hand slap, fist bump, pinky promise," he said, his hands doing the gestures as he mentioned each of them.

"It's still lame though."

"Whatever. It's still cooler than your little pinky promise." He made a mocking face when he said 'pinky promise'.

I laughed and lightly pushed his arm for making fun of me and the pinky promise. I saw a smile on his face too.

. . . . . . . . . .

"You okay?" Rodrick asked.

I took a deep breath. "Yeah. Just a bit nervous." It's the day of the presentation. Rodrick and I were sitting at the bleachers after I had lunch with my friends and he with his. What were we doing there? Nothing, really. We both just needed some fresh air before the big event of the day.

"Hey, we're gonna do great, okay? Don't worry."

"I'm sorry. I just tend to get nervous easily when it comes to these things."

"We don't even have to talk too much in front of everyone. Chill out. Everything's gonna be fine. Think positive!" he said in a very comforting way.

I smiled. "Thanks."

When English class started, our teacher quickly checked attendance and then the presentations began right after. He called pairs in a random order.

Most used PowerPoint to present, including Claire and her partner. Some others didn't have slides shown on the screen but they held up some pictures instead. Others literally just read notes from their paper.

"Very clear. Good analysis and conclusions. Your slides are also well-designed. Overall, good job," Mr. Martins told the pair who worked on Jane Eyre. The two thanked our teacher, and then walked back to their seats. Their presentation was so clean and professional—definitely a tough act to follow. It seemed almost the opposite of what we've prepared. I could only hope that ours would be as good, or even better.

"Heffley and Preston." Mr. Martins looked up from his list and then gave us a nod.

Rodrick and I both walked up to the front. "I'll get the video ready. You do the intro." he whispered behind me.

Before I could protest to that, he was already beginning to set up the laptop and speakers. I still felt butterflies in my stomach, but I did my best to ignore that.

Mr. Martins patiently waited for us to begin. I glanced at Rodrick, who gave a nod, signaling me to start with the introduction while he continued setting up. I took a deep breath.

"Um, hi," I said, maybe too softly. Most of our classmates were still focused on other things. I cleared my throat and began talking in a livelier tone. "Hello everyone! Rodrick and I have been working on Les Miserables, and for our report, we've prepared a video presentation, which Rodrick will play right about…" I looked at Rodrick, and he gave a thumbs up. "Now. We hope you enjoy our presentation!"

The lights were turned off, the video started playing, and I moved to the side so everyone could see it. Rodrick stood beside me and whispered, "Good intro."

"Thanks," I replied, although I began to feel more nervous about how this whole thing would go. Will the class like it? Will we pass? Or will Rodrick and I be forced to find a way to save our faces from lifelong embarrassment and failure?

Rodrick gave me a gentle pat on the back, as if he just read my mind. "We got this." I nodded and gave him a tiny smile then.

As the video was playing, I switched my attention back and forth from the screen to the class. The class bursted with laughter in a lot of parts, which I figured was because of our ridiculous costumes and acting. There were still a few who didn't pay attention at all, but most of our classmates were sitting upright and very much interested in what they were watching, unlike in earlier presentations wherein more than half were doing their own thing. Both Rodrick and I were glad that they appreciated what we've worked on. Mr. Martins, on the other hand, held a pokerface for almost the entire time. I wondered if he thought we didn't take the project seriously. I hoped not.

Once the video finished playing, our classmates gave a short applause. Claire had a huge grin on her face and gave two thumbs up. Mr. Martins just nodded and then cleared his throat so that the class would settle down.

"Well, that was…" he started.

He probably didn't like it, I thought as I looked at his pokerface expression. Whatever he says, you know you and Rodrick did your best.

"That was quite a unique report, I must say. I didn't expect such an interesting execution. And even though it was presented in a different way, you were still able to integrate the important details asked of you, including your analysis and conclusion, which, I think, were well thought of. To add to that, you were able to get almost the entire class to pay attention. And I believe they were also able to get some substantial points aside from all the laughter. Am I right?" he asked the class, and they agreed. "Well done, Heffley and Preston."

"Thank you, Sir," I responded with a smile. What a relief!

Rodrick began to give his own thank you speech as well. "Thanks, Martins! And I would also like to thank the acade—"

"You may now take your seats. Up next…" Mr. Martins interrupted.

"Fine, no thank you speech then," Rodrick mumbled as we went back to our seats.

. . . . . . . . . .

"Great job back there! Your video was so funny," Claire told me when we started walking to French class after getting dismissed.

"Thanks. I'm glad you liked it."

Claire started talking in a lower volume. "So, did you do all the work or—"

"No, no! In fact, making a video was Rodrick's idea." I didn't want all the credit just because people knew Rodrick was lazy.

"No way."

"It's true." I said in the most convincing way I can. "He helped out a lot. I seriously couldn't have done all that without him."

"You're welcome!" Rodrick said as he suddenly appeared beside me out of the blue, a playful smirk across his face.

"Ugh, Rodrick, stop startling me like that!" I lightly slapped his arm multiple times.

"Okay, okay, I got it." He moved his arm away from me, so I stopped. "No need to hit my arm! Geez. Such a violent person." He rubbed his arm.

I was about to reply, but Claire started saying something, "Oh, I think I left something in my locker. I'll see you two in class!" Before she turned and quickly walked back to her locker, she gave that hinting smile—the one she had whenever she teased me about Rodrick. Oh Claire and her discreet agendas.

Rodrick and I continued walking to class.

"Anyway," Rodrick continued talking. "We did it, Prescott." He gave me a high-five. "You couldn't have done it without me!"

"Same goes for you, Heffley. You couldn't have done it without me."

Again with that smirk, he replied, "That's also true."

"You're welcome!" I told him.

He just looked at me, smiling. "You know what? We should celebrate!"

"Celebrate?" I let out a laugh. "But the results aren't even out yet."

"Who cares? Come on." He grabbed my arm and started walking the opposite way, towards the exit.

"Wait, wait, wait. Right now? Dude, we still have 2 classes!" I pulled his hand back so he'd stop walking.

"Two boring classes. Now let's go!" He took a step towards that direction again, but I didn't budge. He turned to me, and raised both his eyebrows. I frowned and shook my head. He let go of my arm, and then whispered, "It's not like they'll find out."

I answered back in a low volume, "What if the teachers find out? Our parents will find out, then they will freak out and get mad at us, and the whole school will—"

He sighed and rolled his eyes. "Fine, fine. We'll go after." And we started to make our way back towards the classroom. "What a killjoy," he muttered.

I slapped his arm lightly. "Am not!"

"Am not," he repeated with a mocking voice and funny face.

"Shut up, Heffley." It was annoying, but I laughed anyway. He did too.

After a while, he started talking about the video again. "Haha, remember that part, when your face was all—"

I covered my face and shook my head. "Oh no, stop! That was so embarrassing. My acting was so bad." Then I looked up at him. "Yours too, by the way. And you were about to give an Oscars speech after the video? Psh."

"Are you kidding me? I deserved that speech. Mr. Martins was just too lazy to hear it…"

Our conversation continued as we walked along. At one point, though, the sight of someone interrupted both of us. The sight of her.

Anne.

She was leaning on one of the lockers, chatting with—guess who—Heather and Madison. The three were so engaged in their conversation, laughing amongst themselves. Who knows what they were talking about.

When Rodrick and I passed by, Anne's smile disappeared. That dark expression, almost a deadly glare, was something I witnessed again. Only this time, I was pretty sure it wasn't just directed to Rodrick. It was directed to me as well.

"I still haven't talked to her about… you know," I whispered to Rodrick.

He patted my shoulder, just before we got to our classroom. "There's a right time for that," he said.