Sincerely Sarah (entry 3)

Dear whatever the heck I'm writing in,

I called you "friend" last time, didn't I? I suppose we're friends now? Or perhaps that's too formal? Sorry, I don't mean to be clingy. It's just I haven't had a friend (besides Jake) since...well, the middle of 8th grade.

I think I should hold off on acknowledging you as a friend though. I get attached too quickly.

Anyways, maybe I should tell you why people don't like me. Friends open up to each other every once in awhile (or every entry).

Well, my friends became different. This wasn't an out-of-the-blue phase. My friends started to act strange in 6th grade. They became distant. My phone calls were rarely returned, my Facebook messages were ignored, my texts had silly replies like "lol omg cool story," and they just talked to me less. When I attended school dances, they ditched me (although if they stayed with me, I probably wouldn't have met Jake). This went on until the beginning of 7th grade. I thought that everything had adjusted back to normal.

The middle of 7th grade came. My friends became more interested in boys, popularity, growing up faster than they could handle, and mainstream music than me. I wasted my breath many times trying to express my concern. The weird thing is that even when they didn't talk to me, they still invited me to the mall every week. They hung out with me during our annual events. But they never really bothered to invite me to other things than our traditions.

My friends were Mary-Jane Jensen, Stacey Daniels, Ella Phillips, Laurie Samuel, and Nathalie Ann Sawyer.

Mary-Jane seemed more like the leader of the pack. Her beauty's dominant over the other girls' looks with her long, sandy brown hair that she's been growing out since the fourth grade. Her deep-set, gunmetal blue eyes are easily her best feature; they stand out against her pale skin. Her body figure is a ruler, so she isn't curvy, but her face makes up for it. She doesn't need to wear an ounce of makeup, but she often wore silver eye shadow or eye glitter and pale pink lipstick. She'd usually wear her in different types of braids or down with a braid running through it. Her outfits were styled with much sophistication. Despite her fancy clothes, her accessories and shoes were always bold, sure to make a statement. To this day, she's maintained the height of five feet and six inches since she entered middle school (she's lanky). I've never met someone as beautiful as Mary-Jane Jensen or someone so hurtful and two-faced.

Stacey Daniels was no Mary-Jane Jensen, but she was one to be afraid of. She looked sweet and she acted sweet (most of the time), but she could tear you down in seconds if you made one wrong comment. Her beauty was nowhere near Mary-Jane's, but her look was angelic. The shape of her face resembles an oval. Her eyes a glimmering hazel that looked more green. Her hair was blonde and wavy, reaching her shoulders the last time I saw her. I've heard from others that she dyed it golden brown and got it cut into a bob. Her skin was slightly tanned, but people say that she started tanning regularly. She'd wear a lot of classy clothing and some high-class name brands. The expensive, luxurious look entertained her. Part of her style was showing off how much money her parents had. Wealthy was an understatement. When we'd all go to the mall together, she would treat everyone to something. She'd buy me luscious, sugary chocolate bars from foreign countries. Designer shoes and jewelry still remain in my closet from her former generosity. After the clique was finishing shopping, she'd treat everyone to creamy Jelatto with sprinkles. She also had a habit of name-dropping (I still think she did it purposely) and bragging about her family's riches. I don't think that'll ever change about her. She had a awful motor-mouth that could offend a lot of people. Her comments were sharp and quick-witted, always delivered on point. I don't think her nasty habit of having a foul mouth and an enormous ego will ever change either.

Ella didn't look radiant or stunning like Mary-Jane or Stacey, and she knew that. Ella had several insecurities about her appearance when we were friends. She had copper hair that barely dipped past her chin. Her long bangs covered her forehead (which she referred to as a "giant patch of unflattering membrane"). She had gleaming, topaz colored, almond shaped eyes with long eyelashes. She hated how her eyes were so noticeable. They made her sharply pointed chin stand out with her glossy, short hair. She was a petite girl, but she always wanted to loose weight; she hated her thighs and feet. She had unusually big feet for someone her size, but I thought her thighs were average. Her skin was pale, and she looked a bit like a vampire. Especially since she stuck with darker clothes and makeup. She could be sweet but ended up turning nasty and cold after Mary-Jane's abrasive personality rubbed off on her. She'd like to throw others under the bus when she was feeling bad about herself. Her own insecurities took over her completely and turned her into a monster. 

Laurie Samuel perfectly fit the definition of an "Uptown girl." You could practically hear Billy Joel every time she gracefully walked into the room. Laurie didn't just walk. She did the walk: strutting with the utmost poise and sophistication. Her left arm wouldn't leave her curvy hip, often clothed in the latest trend in Paris. The other arm was either free to dangle by her side or if she was feeling particularly fabulous, she would use it to shift her glossy, voluminous, mahogany brown mane out of her face and tuck it behind her ear. Flawless lighting reflected on her unnatural chestnut highlights across her sleek side-swept bangs. A radiant, glowing complexion of lightly sun-kissed bronze coated her sharp face. Natural peach-colored like blush covered her prominent cheekbones. Laurie was blessed with having seductively heavy-lidded eyes that were the most alluring shade of  green with a dark blue rim. By the time we all finished fifth grade, she already started to develop a curvy waist that almost every girl in our class would kill for; she looked like she could be Jessica Rabbit's daughter. She looked at least three years older than she actually was, and wearing makeup enhanced that. She would line her eyes in black eyeliner all around: the rim, the upper lash line, and the lower lash line. She contoured her nose and cheeks, too. Depending on her mood and stuff, she'd wear either a red-orange lipstick, a bright red one, or a nude lipstick with some clear lip gloss over it. High school guys were asking her out on dates when we started 7th grade. She lied about her age to get dates after that started happening. I never thought of her as someone who had a personality or someone remotely interesting until she became a vindictive, cunning, deceitful person. She was interesting then, alright. Sassy and fiery became her new-found personality. If anyone tried to get in the way of what she wanted, she'd snap. When she was angry, she was even worse than Stacey sometimes. Barriers in Laurie's language were nonexistent. Crude and foul-mouthed words escaped her lips. She'd cuss towards anyone who provoked her. She also became a bitter and unlikable person. I don't normally believe rumors, but I do think the stuff I hear about Laurie doing things with older guys that she probably shouldn't be doing is true. I don't even think that she was that pretty or likable because she was so fake and stupid.

Nathalie Ann (who we called "Nattie" or "Nat") was sweet as a pastry, but often didn't know exactly who she was inside (like how I am now). She was a follower for sure, but she was more like a filler or a lost and lonely person. Her features included golden brown skin with a pair of russet colored heavy-set eyes and jet black hair. She was gorgeous. No one could top Mary-Jane for me in the looks department, but she was second place. She was prettier than Stacey. I'm surprised that guys didn't ask her out very much like they did with Laurie. Nat kind of resembled a younger Halle Berry. There wasn't much to say about her, but she was definitely the nicest of the clique, looking back on it. Unlike Stacey "Mi$$ Moneybag$" Daniels, she was generous. Instead of using her money to buy friendship, she used money to buy things to make friendship nostalgic. I still have all of the trinkets she bought for me, because she wanted to. Not because she felt she had to. She used her BIRTHDAY MONEY to buy us things out of the blue. And if she only had one pencil left and class and her enemy (even though she didn't really have enemies; enemies had her) needed one, she'd give it away and get in trouble for using a red pen on a test. I remember she carried around a medium pink purse. She always had what she called "essentials" in it. Those were hair ties, salt-water taffy, money (she never carried more than twenty-six dollars in cash and two dollars in change with her unless it was for a school trip or the mall though), granola bars, rubber bands, paper-clips, skin lotion, lip gloss, bobby pins, safety pins, and feminine hygiene supplies (I hope you understand that it's apart of human life and are mature enough to not laugh).

I guess that was kind of pointless, singling all of them out like that. That wasn't my intention though. Giving a brief description of them was my main goal, but Mary-Jane and Ella were really the only "brief" descriptions. I thought that I could go into more description of their actual personality and what happened with us later. I don't feel very comfortable talking about this at this stage of our friendship. It is far too early for me to discuss something like that. I'm not even sure if you want to be my friend yet. We'll have to wait and see. I bet you want to know a little about me though?

You see me writing in this all the time, but you don't have eyes. I could tell you what I look like if that would interest you. I guess it might.

I have strawberry-blonde hair that's not shoulder-length but not too long either. My hair just ends at the bottom of my under arms in small squiggles of a fine mixture of light orange and honey. Flexuous and sleek would be the best adjectives to describe the style of it. The color of my irises are a fusion of cyan and cerulean. My eyes are almond shaped and my skin is peaches and cream, except slightly more livid. I refer to my skin tone as a "smoothie of peaches with extra cream on top." I have a much smoother complexion than most girls my age, which I'm grateful for. Even though it's a bit bigger than I'd like to be, my olfactory nerves (yes, I actually refer to it as that) are nose is relatively diminutive. Long eyelashes were yet another gift given to me by genetics. I have small toes and long fingers. My hands and feet are average sized. I'm also thin. Not skinny or stick-like but thin with slight curves.

I can't tell you too much about my personality. As I've explained before, I'm not exactly sure who I am. Finding myself is something that I need to work on. For certain, I'm not a bad person. I'm not heartless, malicious, hurtful, or mean-spirited. I would like to think of myself as a kind person. I do things for others and I'm "nice." I just haven't found much of a fire inside of myself.

Speaking of fire, do you remember when I told you someone burned my former soon-to-be future school down? Well, it wasn't really mine; I only stepped inside of that building twice. Anyways, I didn't actually have the full story on it. When I said that there was an arsonist and students were being questioned, that was a silly hypothesis that I concluded. I can't help my inquisitive mind and my bizarre imagination. But the reason I believed so was because the way that everyone (the teachers, staff, even some students, etc.) was so hesitant to release details. I don't mean major details. I mean the way it happened, when it happened, and all of that stuff. I know that some students were talking to authority about the high school. Conclusions were jumped to by myself. I theorize things too much. Maybe my parents watched too many NCIS episodes in my presence when I was a kid...

My parents were never mentioned to you by me, were they? Well, this is only our third conversation, so I guess it makes sense. Still, I'm a bit surprised I haven't told you about them.

About nine months ago, my parents decided to become separated. I thought they would split up and divorce. I really did. However, they got back together three months ago, just right when school was about to end. To this day, I still think they're going to divorce. I've never looked at them as mom and dad. Ever since I was six, Mother and Father were the only names I addressed them by. I know that sounds bad. It sounds like I'm an ungrateful child that doesn't love my parents. Indeed, I do love them. It's just that they've never really been parents to me.

My whole life has been alright or even good at times (aside from now). In the early years, I was sort of spoiled. My parents gave me almost any toy I asked for (within reason). Barbies, baby dolls, plastic food with a fake kitchen, Ty Beenie Babies, Webkinz, and plush dolls were given to me as if Christmas never ended. Yeah, wealth ran pretty well in my kin. I was showered in gifts. But it never felt real. They felt more like fairy godparents with an unlimited credit card. Often, I'd end up feeling selfish or materialistic, even as a young one. It felt like they gave me gifts out of obligation, rather than love. Or maybe they just thought of me as a human being to satisfy and give things to.

They treat me strangely. They're almost like the parents of Peanuts characters, except they have faces and don't say "Wah wah wah."

They separated because of me. No, I'm not being insecure or sympathizing myself. I really do think that. I've always believed that I was a "surprise." It makes perfect sense. My parents got married when they were really young. They had me not too long after they were married (I was born about barely eight months after they eloped). Everyone believed that I was "early." Not me though. I don't believe my parents care about me like they should. My parents probably aren't in love like they should be. Maybe they are. Maybe it's just me that's getting in the way.

Anyways, that's enough social interaction for one day.

Sincerely,

Sarah