A.N: Well, it's been what? Like five months? I'm sorry about that, finding time with my classes is difficult enough, but on the bright side, I'm taking a creative writing class right now, so hopefully newer chapters and stories will be written/styled better! Anyways, thank you all for the support, and we shall move onto the next chapter!
As Nazz and I were walking, my mind kept wandering to what Jonny had said. Even though Jonny told me to stay away from her, she didn't seem to pose any threat and was just trying to have a friendly chat. I decided not to shut her out completely, but I was going to stay wary of her.
"So what are you doing out here anyways?" Nazz asked.
"I was just talking with Jonny, we've become pretty good friends recently." I answered, not going into too much detail about what we were talking about.
"Oh, that's nice," She said, but her tone didn't sound interested. "So are you and Marie dating?" She asked, pretty straightforwardly.
"Uh, yeah, we are actually, why?" I responded.
"Well, I saw you two holding hands earlier today, so I just wanted to know for sure." She spoke, unnervingly upbeat. I was definitely going to stay wary of her, something didn't seem right in this conversation. There were a couple minutes of silence, and by that time we had turned onto the street my house was on. I thought that I might be able to survive my encounter and that I was just overreacting. To fill the silence between us for the last stretch to my house, I asked a question.
"So why did you want to walk me home?"
"Well I just wanted to catch up with you a little, and to talk with you a little bit." Nazz replied. Once again, Jonny's warning about Nazz crept into my head and my subconscious tried to find any ulterior motives to what Nazz was saying. However, I tried not to let my suspicion show. We got up to my house and at that time the sun was setting, but it wasn't dark enough for the street lights to turn on yet.
"Alright, well thanks for walking with me." I said, trying to end this interaction with Nazz as quickly as possible without being too rude.
"Oh so this is your house?" She asked as she stopped to look at it. I kept walking up to my porch which was quite dark as it was facing away from the sunset.
"Yeah, it is." I said as I started to fish my keys out of my pocket. Nazz walked back up to me, and I eyed her out of the corner of my eye, annoyed. As we walked up my driveway, I said thanks again just incase she didn't hear it the first time.
"Oh yeah, no problem, I just wanted to talk with you for a little bit." She replied, and she seemed to be fiddling with her hands, looking down. "Hey, I have to tell you something first." She started as we walked up to my porch. I stopped in front of the steps and turned to her.
"Yeah? What is it?" I asked looking at her.
"Well, it's about Marie. I wanted to warn you about her." She said, still looking down at her hands. "I overheard her talking with May a few days ago, saying how 'he was falling for it like last time.' I didn't know who she was talking about at first, but, I think she was talking about you, Edd." Nazz said, looking up at me with worry in her eyes. This completely caught me off guard, and I stood there like a deer in headlights. I recovered quickly, but I still didn't know what to say. We stood there for some time, before I asked a question.
"Are you sure she was talking about me, or was she talking about someone she had been messing with?" I said, a small grin on my face.
"Well, that's what I don't know! It might have been, I didn't hear much else besides that, but that's what I'm worried about. I can't trust her anyways, she just doesn't seem like she's truthful. Listen, I just wanted to let you know that, I'm not sure how much you can trust her." She finished with a sigh, not making much eye contact after doing so. I thought over this for a minute, before making a response.
"I can handle myself, don't worry, alright?" I asked her, trying my best to reassure her. I still wasn't sure if this was all part of some plan, so I was going to make sure I kept a sharp eye for anything.
"I know, I just, really don't want anything bad to happen to you." She said as she hugged me, catching me off guard yet again. I hugged her back, very wary and confused about her actions.
"But why are you so worried about me? Sure, I get that we were friends for years a while back, but why worry about me now? Seriously, I can handle this if it's true." I said, putting extra emphasis on "if it's true." We pulled away, and she still seemed worried.
"I know you can handle it, I just always worry about the 'if not.' I'm sure you can handle it, but if you need someone to talk to, I'll be here." Nazz replied.
"I know." I said, nodding my head. "Well I'll be going inside, you should get back home too." I said. She agreed and I went inside my house. I hoped that whatever Nazz was planning, it wouldn't end badly for Marie and I. Even if Marie had said that, she was probably talking about someone else like Eddy falling for a trick she pulled...right?
…..
It took some time to finally convince myself that Marie wouldn't do anything like that to me, especially after remembering all of the things I was told Marie had gone through after I left. I had my doubts, sure, but they weren't anything to worry about. I wanted to tell Marie about what had just happened, but I knew that the outcome of that would be a fight between, Nazz and Marie. The only question that was still bothering me about the whole lie, was why Nazz would lie. What would she gain from it? I don't think she wants me, especially after what Jonny told me about her after her breakup with Kev. I don't know why she would want to mess with Marie like this, unless she really doesn't like Marie. I still didn't know the details as to why they hated each other so much, and sure, I had the basics from Jonny, but I felt like details would help me. As much as I wanted to get the answers, though, I had to sleep, as it would probably be too late to go over to Marie's place.
…..
Tuesday felt like a normal day when I woke up, but then I remembered that I would have to ask Marie about her past with Nazz. It never is good when the day gets started off in a bad mood. I was worried, worried that Nazz and Marie would start a fight if I let the details slip out, worried that what Nazz had said was true, and worried that everything could take a quick turn today. I went through my normal routine, but I knew that the whole morning was ruined, just because of a single question I would ask. I felt like I didn't have to overreact about it, but I couldn't help it. I got to school and sat at my wall like normal, listening to music. It was only a minute later when Marie came sauntering up to me, grin on her face. I only gave her a half hearted smile, and I popped an earbud out to hear her.
"Hey, are you alright?" She asked, tilting her head to look at me.
"I just have to ask you a question later, that's all." I replied, trying to give a reassuring smile, but it probably came off as forced.
"You sure you want to ask me later? Seems like it would be better if you asked me now." She said, narrowing her eyes to look at me.
"I'm pretty sure." I stated simply.
"I don't think so. Go ahead and ask me." She said.
"Just promise me to keep your emotions under control for now, please." I asked. She looked thoughtful about it, before looking me straight in the eyes.
"I can't promise anything, but I'll try my hardest." She said.
"Oh God, I hope nothing bad happens," I groaned under my breath. "Alright, so why is there so much bad blood between you and Nazz?" I finally asked. Marie looked at the ground and furrowed her brow.
"Well, we both tried to shove our problems onto each other, trying to put the blame onto the other as much as possible if things went wrong. I guess that's why." She said, never taking her eyes off the ground.
"Is that all?" I asked, still looking at her. There was a long pause before she broke.
"No, it's not. We both said things that hit a little too close to home, some things I really don't want to forgive her for. I'm sure she doesn't want to forgive me either, but I don't care at this point. Why do you want to know, anyways?" She finally asked, looking up at me.
"You were right yesterday, Nazz is up to something. I talked with her yesterday and she said things that really put up some red flags." I said, taking a quick look to make sure Nazz wasn't around.
"Really? What did she say?" Marie asked forcefully.
"She said that she overheard you saying that I was falling for it again like when we were younger. She thought you were talking about me, and that you were planning to trick me or something. I don't believe her though. It seemed that it was all a little planned out by her." I said, and as I explained, the look on Marie's face got more disgusted than before.
"Of course she would pull something like that. Don't worry, I can handle this." She said as she looked in the direction of the cheerleaders table.
"No no no no! I can handle it, trust me. I just need to get a plan together." I said, trying to keep her from starting the fight I was worried about.
"Fine, I'll trust you on this one." She replied through clenched teeth.
"Hey, listen. It'll be alright, got it?" I said with a small smile before kissing her. As I came back, I saw her with the tiniest of smiles on her face too. She looked me in the eyes and smiled a little bit wider.
"You really should do that more often you know." She said. I laughed, and was going to reply, but the bell rang before I could. We went to our classes, and I had time to think about what to do about Nazz. I could easily just ignore her, but that would only last so long before Nazz would try something else. Nazz may not have the best plans to sabotage my relationship with Marie, but she will probably be persistent, and while I feel like I can control my feelings over what she says, I'm not sure about Marie. I had to find a way to finish this, and quickly. As much as i wanted to think about it, though, I had to focus on my period, Kevin came up to me and asked me if that Saturday would be a good time for the party. I had completely forgotten about it already, but I agreed to it and he said he would work out a time later. I put it on my calendar on my phone so that I wouldn't plan anything else on that day. It would be nice to have a little party with some of my old friends, even if they have changed. Who knows, maybe Ed, Eddy and I will get into trouble at this party like the past. I chuckled a little bit, remembering all the shenanigans we used to get into. I got to calculus, and Marie was waiting for me like last time, except without the sly grin.
"So have you come up with a plan yet?" She asked, her arms crossed.
"No, not yet," I sighed, "I've had to work on my classes, I'll tell you when I think of one."
"Listen, I told you before, I have my own plan if yours doesn't work out." She said cracking her knuckles. I grinned and shook my head, knowing she was only half joking.
"As much as I would like to say that would work because it's easy, it wouldn't solve anything. It would probably make more problems than before. I thought about it earlier, and she might not just be trying to go after me to break us up. I just want you to keep your emotions in control, because if either of us lose our cool, she'll have what she wants." I told Marie.
"Wait, do you think I don't keep good control of my emotions?" Marie asked me, her eyes showing genuine hurt. I immediately hugged her to make sure she would feel better.
"No, I didn't mean it like that. I just mean both of us have to keep her in the back of our thoughts. We can't let her bother us and let her get to us, otherwise she'll get what she wants." I said, holding her close. The warning bell rang as she hugged me back, and we both let go as I walked into class.
"Hey!" She snapped just as my hand reached the doorknob. I looked back confused as she took a step to me. "You forgot something!" She clarified as she gripped my shirt collar and pulled me in for a kiss. I made a big show to roll my eyes jokingly at her, but in all honesty, I liked it when she did stuff like that. We went through calculus, so I didn't have time to think of a plan. After school, Marie and I headed to our separate homes, and on the walk home I thought of a plan. I needed a way to stop persistence, which is much easier said than done. I must have gone through fifteen different types of plans before I got home, and still none of them worked. The more ideas I tried to come up with, the more the thought came into my head that the next step Nazz might try to go into is to spread rumors about us with the entire school. I knew it was just a possibility, but it still worried me. Not only that, the plans I kept coming up with would end up being straight up mean to Nazz, but as much trouble as she's trying to cause, I don't want to hurt her. After all, that could just backfire and blow up right in my face. After another hour of thinking up a plan while doing homework, I thought of a plan. I knew if Marie and I talked to Nazz, she couldn't convince us of one of her lies. I knew Marie hadn't said anything like what Nazz was trying to convince me, but with Marie there, she could disprove it. Now I only had to think of where we could confront Nazz and talk to her about her lies. I took a look at my phone's calendar and smiled. I had a plan.
A.N: So, I'll be honest: I don't like this story as much as when I started it, pretty much at all. I've learned a lot from it, no doubt, and I appreciate it, but I'm not sure how good the ending will be. I don't want to say "expect a bad ending," but don't get your hopes up. I want to give it a good ending, but I also want to get it done. I feel it has turned into a mess, and with my schedule and updating, it's a slow mess. Enough with my rant, please do tell me your opinions on this chapter in the reviews, if you like how I'm writing, how I can improve it, etc. And please don't feel like you're being too harsh, this fic has turned into a learning experience for me, I appreciate criticism. I'll try my best to update it sooner than five months from now, and thank you for reading this. Have a great day!