Author's Note: I finally got a chapter up woop!
I'm currently reading 2 very intense university courses at once and that paired with my mental health issues has lead to me being completely burned out.
I've been wanting to update for a long time now but I've just not had the energy or mental capacity but I finally managed to do it so I'm proud of myself.

I unfortunately don't have the time to spend editing it, so I apologize for any mistakes that I've missed.

THE NEW GIRL

It was Thursday afternoon when Mrs. Fisher told the class that they would get a new classmate next week.
The excitement spread through the classroom and everyone forgot about what they were doing and started talking about the new classmate.
Neal was the only one who wasn't even a bit excited, instead he just dreaded the new addition to the class.
Since Curtis Hagen had left, it had all gotten a lot better in their class and Neal was getting along with everyone.
He feared that another bully would show up or a kid that in some way or another would ruin the good atmosphere.
The new classmate were everything the others were talking about for the rest of the day and when it was time to go home, Sara was so distracted talking about it with another girl that she didn't even say goodbye to Neal.
The excitement continued on Friday and Neal, who had come to love being in school, kept staring at the clock, wishing the time would go faster.
Over the weekend he forgot all about the new kid because he was kept busy.
Elizabeth and Peter had decided to go on a date night which meant that Neal got to spend some time with Mozzie, even if Peter hadn't been too excited to hear that Mozzie was the only available babysitter.
Peter had actually started to like Mozzie but he simply didn't trust him.
The agent was of course right not to trust Mozzie, when they arrived home Neal wasn't in bed like he should have been, instead they walked right in on a lesson about how to pick a lock.
Elizabeth had just laughed at the situation and offered Mozzie some wine while Peter had loudly scolded the man.
He did not like the mental image of an older Neal and Mozzie pulling off cons together.

When Monday came, Neal arrived to school to find that his classmates weren't playing like they normally would, instead they were all huddled together by the classroom entrance, no one wanting to miss the arrival of the new kid.
Neal spotted Sara and walked over to her.
He asked her if she wanted to play with him but she shook her head no, so Neal stood next to her, not wanting to play alone.
Sara suddenly bumped his shoulder and then leaned in closer to him.

"I met her."

She said, whispering so that none of the others would hear.

"She's my new neighbour."

He immediately felt threatened by the fact that Sara and the new girl lived so close to each other, because if they became friends it meant that they could play together every single day if they wanted to.
Sara didn't seem to notice that Neal felt uncomfortable about the whole ordeal, instead she just proceeded to tell him that the new girl and her family had moved into the previously empty house at the end of Sara's street.
It felt like they stood there forever before it was time to go inside and the class felt disappointed since no new kid had showed up.
Five minutes later the door opened and a stressed man came inside, apologizing to Mrs. Fisher before he ushered his daughter into the classroom.
Mrs. Fisher had a few quiet words with the father before he left and closed the door behind him.

"Why don't you introduce yourself to the class?"

The girl nodded before she confidently walked to the front of the class, not showing any signs of being nervous.
Her name was Alex Hunter and when she sat down behind Sara and the girls happily greeted each other, Neal knew that she would in fact ruin things.

When it was time for recess, Neal waited patiently while Sara and the other kids swarmed Alex.
He thought that Sara would only talk with Alex for a while and then come back but she didn't, in fact she seemed to have completely forget that Neal was waiting for her.
Eventually he pushed through the crowd of classmates to get to Sara, who was standing next to Alex looking very proud to already know the new kid.
He didn't understand what was so special about a new classmate anyway, no one had ever shown this kind of excitement when he was new.
Of course the others had been afraid of Curtis but he still thought their excitement was a little over the top.
Sara spotted him and grinned before she pointed at him.

"Alex this is my friend Neal"

She said and they quickly said 'hi' to each other before Neal looked at his friend.

"Wanna go to the swings?"
"No, I wanna talk to Alex"

Neal nodded before pushing through the crowd again and going to the swings alone, trying to ignore the hurt he was feeling.
He tried to get Sara's attention throughout the rest of the day but she was suddenly completely uninterested in everything they used to do together.
She played with Alex at recess, sat next to the girl in lunch and seemed to only talk to her or about her.
When it was time for art class, Neal thought that he would finally get to talk to Sara because they had started a project together last week.
They were making a movie poster and they had decided to make a movie poster with Satchmo and Sara's cat Tellus.
The story of their "movie" was that the two animals were FBI agents just like Peter and they were catching bad humans.
Unfortunately now that Alex had joined their class they were an odd number which meant that one pair would have to turn into a trio.
Sara of course volunteered when Mrs. Fisher asked who Alex could join and soon the presence of Alex ruined even art class for him.
He tried to communicate with the girls but it was really hard to get a word in and half of the time they weren't even listening to him.
Before he knew it the entire plot for their movie had changed and now it was instead two FBI agent cats, Sara's cat and Alex's cat, who were chasing after dogs.
Satchmo who had previously been wearing a badge was now dressed as a robber.

"It's two against one"
Alex said when he tried to protest the change and Sara decided to agree with Alex.

Over the course of the week it only seemed to get worse.
Sara only wanted to play with her new friend, they always sat next to each other at lunch and Sara seemed to completely forget that Neal even existed.
At home the adults quickly realized that something was wrong but Neal kept quiet, not wanting to tell them that school had gotten tough again.
The weekend came and he momentarily forgot about the whole thing until a new school week started and he was painfully reminded again.
Neal was swinging with two other boys, who he had played with now that Sara was playing with Alex, while looking at the girls who were sitting on the ground, talking about something.
Alex suddenly got up and ran inside, probably to use the bathroom, and Neal saw his chance.
He jumped off the swing and walked over to her.

"Hi, Neal"

She greeted happily as if she hadn't been close to ignoring him for a week.
He sat down on the ground as well and looked over at the door to make sure Alex wasn't on her way back.

"Can we play together?"

He asked, figuring that there were no use beating around the bush.

"Alex-"
"You only play with Alex"

He interrupted and Sara looked a little guilty.

"We can play next recess?"
"Promise?"
"I promise"

Neal felt happy with that, at least he could get one recess with his best friend.
He got up of the ground and walked back to the swings.
Neal spent his next lesson with the smaller group.
The teacher said that he was making a great progress in his reading and writing and that he might soon be on the same level as his peers.
As soon as they were told they could pack up their things, Neal hurried to grab all his stuff and then run back to their regular classroom and put everything in his bag before he went outside.
The smile on his face disappeared when he saw that the rest of his class had already made it outside and that Sara and Alex were playing together in the wooden playhouse.
For a second he thought about just giving up and joining the kids playing football but then he decided that Sara would have to live up to her promise.
He marched over to the playhouse where the girls seemed to be pretending to be bakers.

"Sara, can we play now?"

He asked and Sara looked up from the plastic container, that she had filled with sand and pretended it was dough.

"I'm playing with Alex but-"
"Sara, you promised!"

He whined and Sara looked down on the ground but didn't say anything.
Alex looked at the two of them before she put her plastic container down and decided to physically place herself in between Sara and Neal.

"She doesn't wanna play with you."

She said and crossed her arms to appear tougher.
Neal felt frustrated that Sara wouldn't play with him even for one recess, they were best friends for crying out loud, but he was even more frustrated that Alex thought that she could just show up and steal Sara from him.
Neal took a step to the side, so that he could see Sara again, and then he reminded her once more that she had made a promise to him.
Alex took a step to the side as well and was yet again blocking Sara from his view.

"She wants to play with me, I'm more fun and I'm not afraid of ghost stories."

Neal froze, he couldn't believe that Sara had told Alex about their failed sleepover.
Sara lifted her head again and walked to stand next to Alex, her cheeks now sporting a shade of pink.

"I'm sorry, Neal."

Neal felt like crying but he resisted the tears, because he wasn't going to cry in front of the girls.

"Sara is MY best friend, now."

Alex announced from out of nowhere, looking awfully smug.
He went from being close to tears to being full of anger in less than a second.
He didn't even know what he was doing, one second he was just glaring at Alex and then in the next he pushed the girl so hard that she almost fell over.
Neal immediately regretted the action and was just about to apologize to Alex when she pushed him back.
He stumbled out of the playhouse but managed to not fall.
The push made the regret disappear and instead he was just fueled by anger and jealousy.
Alex seemed just as angry because she came out of the playground and pushed him again.
Neal pushed back and then within seconds both kids were on the ground physically fighting while Sara stood in the playhouse's door opening, keeping a safe distance, yelling for them to stop.
A teacher heard Sara's yells and when he saw the fight, he started running towards the kids but before he could even reach them, the fight ended.
Neal had accidentally crashed his elbow into Alex face and the sight of blood, running from her nose, caused him to regain control of emotions and realize what he had done.

"Alex, I'm sorry."

He said but the girl just glared at him.

"I hate you."

She grumbled just as the teacher reached them and helped Alex get to the school nurse.
Sara glared at him too, as if this entire thing had been just fault, before she stormed off to join her new best friend at the nurse's office.
Neal was left, sitting on the ground, consumed by guilt and feat for what his adoptive parents would say when they found out.
He slowly got up from the ground while he felt the impulse to do what he always did in pressed situations, run.
Neal actually considered it.
He remembered when he had pushed Curtis and had ran away, it had of course led to him being in trouble either way but maybe this time he could stay with Mozzie for a while and wait until the adults weren't disappointed any longer.
Neal actually considered it but his plan was foiled by Mrs Fisher who had seen the commotion and had now joined him.
He looked up at his teacher and felt a knot in his stomach when he saw the disappointment in her face, if it was so hard to see her disappointment then he couldn't even imagine how hard it would be to look at Peter and Elizabeth's faces.
Neal got up and he yet again considered running but Mrs. Fisher seemed to anticipate this and quickly grabbed his arm.
Mrs. Fisher had brought him inside and given him a lecture on why fighting wasn't okay, which made him slightly frustrated because it seemed like he was the only one being lectured when there were two people in the fight.
She didn't feel the need to get his parents here right away but she did contact Elizabeth and told her that she wanted to have a chat with them after school.
When Alex and Sara came back from the nurse, Alex with paper in her nose to stop the bleeding, Mrs. Fisher made them all sit down before trying to get any more information about the situation.
None of them would speak up though and it ended up just being their teacher trying to make them friends again.
Her words did nothing though because for the rest of the day the girls avoided him as if he had a contagious disease and Alex seemed to constantly send him dirty look.

The day ended way too quickly and soon he found himself waiting in the classroom, trying to look at everything but his teacher.
Soon the door opened and he saw that both Peter and Elizabeth had decided to show up.
Peter looked over at him and he immediately looked down on his shoes, partly because of shame and partly to avoid seeing the disappointment.
He listened as Mrs. Fisher told them that she had noticed the tension between him and the girls and then the fight that had taken place.
It felt like forever before the teacher finally felt finished and allowed them to leave.
Neal spent the entire way home looking at his shoes and keeping his mouth shut, even if the adults tried to get him to talk.
When they arrived home they continued their efforts to get him to open up but with no luck.
Eventually they decided that he could sit in the corner and think about today.
He wasn't sure if the punishment was a strategy from them, if it was it certainly worked.
With nothing to distract him, he did start to think about the day and the hurt he had felt when he found out that Sara had been talking about him to Alex came back.
Then it was joined by the hurt of Alex saying that she was Sara's best friend and then he started to think about last week and how much it truly hurt to have his best friend not being his best friend anymore.
Sara had been such a good friend and now he had just been replaced.
He kept thinking about it and the more he thought about it, the more it hurt.
It hurt so much that it felt like he could barely breathe and once the first tear had escaped his eye, the sobs started.
A couple of strong arms suddenly lifted him up and he instantly threw his arms around Peter's neck.

"Sara don't wanna play with me...she just plays with Alex"

Neal said in between the sobs and Peter hugged him a little tighter.
When he had calmed down, Peter placed him on the couch and he was handed hot chocolate by Elizabeth.
They sat down on either side of him while he started telling them everything that had happened since Alex showed up.

"Why didn't you tell us sooner, sweetie?"

Elizabeth asked and Neal shrugged his shoulder.

"I didn't want to bother you."
"Hey, you know you can tell us everything, kid."

Peter said and Neal nodded, he knew that but it was harder to actually tell them.
He knew very well by now that they were nothing like James but the insecurities were still there.

"Am I gonna get punished?"
"Well there's got to be some consequences for your action, buddy."
"But it wasn't my fault."

Neal protested while he wondered if Alex parents would punish her or if they would just feel bad for her.

"It doesn't matter how upset you are, it's never okay to hurt someone."

In the end they decided that he wouldn't be allowed to watch TV for a week, which was a punishment he could live with, and that he had to apologize to Alex, which he wasn't too happy about.
Neal looked up at Peter, flashing him his puppy eyes.

"I really am sick."

He insisted but Peter just shook her head with an amused smile on her face.

"You're not fooling me, kiddo."

Neal had tried to act as sick as possible when Peter came to wake him up, trying to stay home from school so that he wouldn't have to face Alex and Sara.
He had insisted that he had a fever and had planned on holding the thermometer against the light-bulb, like he had seen a kid do in a movie, but Peter had stayed in the room and watched him.

"I am sick!"

He repeated and Peter just sighed and looked at his watch.

"We're going to be late."

Neal didn't budge so Peter simply picked him up and carried him downstairs.

"He says he's sick."

The agent informed his wife with a smile.
Elizabeth looked at him with concern written all over her face and he thought he had managed to trick her.

"Oh, that's too bad. Then you can't come with us for the dinner at June's tonight."

Dinner at June's were always fun, partly because he got to meet June and Mozzie but also because they always played fun games together.

"I wanna to June!"
"If you're sick then you should stay home and rest."
Neal sighed as he realized that the adults had outsmarted him and he grabbed his spoon and started to eat his cereal.

There was a tension in the room as Neal yet again found himself sitting in a room with Mrs. Fisher, Sara and Alex.
Elizabeth had called and told the teacher everything that Neal had said and she had felt the need to get the kids to talk it out.
Alex was sitting with her arms crossed, looking angry over the fact that she had to be here, and Sara was looking down at her hands.
None of them would speak, so Mrs. Fisher had to step up to the plate again.

"Sara, I think that it is wonderful that you and Alex became such good friends so fast but don't you think Neal feels a little left out when you only play with Alex?"

She asked and Sara looked up at Neal with a guilty look on her face.
It seemed that she had been thinking this whole thing over since yesterday.

"It made me sad."

Neal admitted and Sara's eyes filled up with tears.

"I'm sorry."

She said before she flew up from her chair and more or less threw herself at Neal, almost causing him to fall off his chair.
Sara hugged him tightly while she kept apologizing, saying that she hadn't even thought about his feelings and Neal looked over at Alex.
At first he planned to be smug about it but then he realized that despite her stoic stance, Alex's eyes looked really sad.

"You can play together all three."

Mrs. Fisher suggested and Sara nodded, excitingly.
Neal looked over at Alex and they both nodded which made the teacher feel like she had resolved the conflict and let them go and enjoy what was left of the recess.
Sara ran ahead of them while Alex gave Neal a serious look.

"I don't like you, Neal."

She said.

"I don't like you either."

He responded, even if he felt like he could grow to like her.
Alex glared at him one last time before they both went to the swings were Sara was waiting for them.
They may not be friends but at least for now they had a truce for Sara's sake.

Author's Note 2: Just wanted to say that I am not trying to make Sara mean here or something.
This entire chapter was based on what happened to me when I was around 10-11, when my best friend (who's still my best friend) was so obsessed with her new friend that she completely forgot about me. It was awfully painful but it happens. I just wanted to make it clear that I did not intend to make her mean or something :)