**Calvin's POV**
'Makes sense that I was the only one that wasn't invited to this stupid, fucking outing,' I thought while looking at Shiloh and Wynn, who were cuddled up on the bench like that. I'm the only one who would point this out to Lith, the only real one in the friend group. But when someone calls a whore a whore, they become the bad guy. Fine. If Lith liked getting cheated on, I wouldn't interfere.
Guess it's my turn to talk, huh? Time to clear up any of the lies that the rest of them told you about me when it was their turn to talk.
Why am I the outcast? Simple. Shiloh hated me. Ashur hated me. Adrian hated me. Brianna hated me. Wynn, Brianna's lapdog, hated me. The only people who didn't hate me were Lith, David, and Rashidi, but somehow Shiloh managed to poison Lith against me, and Rashidi stopped talking to me soon after. I thought David was the only non-asshole person in the group, but seeing as how I wasn't invited to the outing, I was wrong.
Everyone in the group lives in the same community, except me. That meant that every single day, after school, I would be the only one that had to go home to a boring community in the rural areas of the country. It didn't just stop there. Every morning, I would hear about whatever wacky adventures they had the evening before. Of course, I wasn't happy about that, but I'm not enough of a dumbass to blame them for my poverty.
What made me mad, however, was this: despite there being nine people in the friend group, only a few of them truly matter. These few are Shiloh, David, Ashur, and Adrian. They made the decisions, mostly, and they carried the energy of the group.
The rest of us didn't matter: Howin and Wynn were comedic relief, ain't nobody remembers Brianna until they need to ask where Shiloh is, and for a long time, Lith didn't even realize that his brother was the one who everyone cared about, not him. In terms of Rashidi, well... Everybody likes Rashidi.
As for me... I don't know. I thought for a long time that I was one of the dominant members, but it was eventually revealed that it wasn't the case. The reason for this was because of one person: Shiloh.
This girl must have thought I was Satan himself. She was the type to be nice to your face, then talk shit behind your back, then talk shit to your face, then be nice to you again. Confusing, huh? Exactly. I preferred dealing with Tianna, and that means something.
I remember back when Lith was still bitch boy Lith. (I say that with no malice, of course. That's really who he was.) He came to me with some bullshit ultimatum, trying to get me to change who I am because Shiloh said so, or else he would stop being friends with me. I didn't expect him to follow through with it, but here we are.
He would never have done something like that before, but if there is one thing that I could even agree with Shiloh on, it's that after Adrian died, that guy became cold.as.fuck. It seemed like he would have dropped any of us if he had the choice. I guess I just drew the short end of the stick... or Shiloh threw the short end to me.
After leaving the friend group, I floated around other groups for a while and noticed that the problem wasn't me. It was them. David and I still spoke occasionally, but for some reason, I wasn't invited. I was tired of these guys treating me like shit, so I still went. I knew that just my presence would make the atmosphere unbearable. I would use the lemons that I was given to make the sourest lemonade possible.
I surveyed the area for David. I didn't need to crane my neck or anything, because I was tall enough to see over most obstacles. All the people from the group looked at me with caution or surprise when I saw them. I gave each of them the biggest smile that I could, to increase their discomfort.
Eventually, I saw David get out of a taxi with Howin. It made sense. I forgot David would sneak out of his mom's radar to take the taxi that Howin's mom charters.
He didn't see me yet, but he already seemed nervous. His apprehensive gaze explored each person who was present, and he looked like he was trying to recall something each time. He had his phone to his ear. He was probably trying to convince his mom that he wouldn't get gunned down by some criminal while he was out of her bosom.
I was farthest away from the group, so I was the last to be seen. His gaze seemed to last the longest when it landed on me, and I could have sworn that I saw him make a face. 'Didn't expect me to be here, did you?'
By the time I was in front of him, he had already put away his phone.
He craned his neck upwards.
"Yo," I said.
"Hey Calvin, I was worried that you didn't see the email cause you didn't respond. I'm glad that you're here."
I fucking knew it. He didn't expect me to be here. Funny how this is how you treat your friends, Dav-... Huh?
Did he think I was stupid? "What email? You didn't send me an email."
"What do you mean?" said David. He checked his email account before showing his phone to me. "Since you don't have a phone, I just used this." He sent the email about a week ago. It was a long, enthusiastic, goofy letter. I read all of it on the spot.
'Huh,' I thought. Leave it to David to be the only good person in that group. I always knew that he was the only one who cared about me.
"Oh yeah! That email..." I hit myself on the head, pretending to have forgotten. "So, why are we meeting again?"
"It was in the email."
"..."
"..."
"I forgot."
"Today is...that day" He responded. "I just thought that we should be together to celebrate it, considering..." He allowed the sentence to trail off, but I knew what he couldn't say.
"Welp," I clasped my hands. "This shit gonna be hella depressing, then."
David stared silently.
"I'm just saying."
"You're always just saying." He mumbled, turning away from me.
Suddenly, a hand touched my shoulder. A hand on your shoulder in the middle of the night was not something good where I came from. I jolted and let out a few curses.
The person let out a rehearsed-sounding laugh. Ashur came up beside me and sparked a conversation with David. While Ashur spoke, David looked uncomfortable. The way Ashur was ignoring me was pissing me off, too.
"Why are you dressed up so fancy tonight?" David asked playfully.
Ashur struck a pose like he was in a movie and pretended to brush some dirt off of his shoulder. That shit was cringe.
"This is how I always dress when I'm going out."
Yeah, right? This guy was dressed in an orange turtleneck sweater and jeans, which wouldn't be so bad, but he was also wearing this expensive-looking school shooter ass trench coat. In addition, he was wearing an expensive-looking silver watch. To top it all off, he had on some stainless steel, semi-rimless glasses from some expensive ass brand.
He was probably standing meside me on purpose, so the difference in our clothes was evident. What a clever way to announce to the world that I was the only one here who had problems in life.
I still had to give him some props, other than looking like he was about to be the first-ever black school shooter, he looked good. His dark skin suited the colors, and he was tall enough that the trench coat didn't look like a dress. If he was a little more fit, he would probably be an eight out of ten.
Anyway, this guy still had his hand on my shoulder and was still pretending I didn't exist. I had to deal with it.
'Take your hand off," I said firmly.
He stopped in the middle of his sentence like I was a rude interruption. "Oh hey Calvin, I didn't see you there." He looked genuinely surprised to see me there.
"Take your hand off of my fucking shoulder."
David and Ashur's eyes instantly became vigilant. It was like they were both looking at bombs that were about to go off. They all liked to look at me with that expression as if I was the source of the problem.
Ashur slowly removed his hand and then patted me on the arm. "I'm just kidding, Calvin, you know that I like to play around."
I was about to tell him horrible things involving his mother, but before I could speak, an annoying, disgusting, terrible voice rang out from the side.
"Hurry, Ashur. I don't want to wait anymore." She complained.
I shuddered with disgust at the sound of her voice, but David's eyes widened as his neck swung in its direction. "Tianna!?" He exclaimed.
'Oh, hi, David!" She greeted. "Everything okay?"
"What is she doing here?" He asked Ashur in a hushed voice.
"I invited her,"
Gears turned in my head as I processed the situation. See, the only reason that I was so angry at not being invited was that I overheard this girl talking to some of her friends in the hallways at school about it. I might be bad, but this girl was worse than anything that I could ever be. She was one of the main reasons that the group split up.
"Don't worry, bro," said Ashur, patting David on the back. "I'll keep her under control." Something about the way he ran off to her with his tail wagging behind his back made that promise seem void to me, though.
"Why don't you tell her to leave?"
"Ashur will leave with her." He bit his lips, as he usually did when he was nervous. "And I don't want to hurt her feelings."
"HA!" I didn't think that this guy could be any more of a nice guy. "That bitch needs to get her feelings hurt."
David sighed, looking at the backs of Ashur and Tianna as they strutted away. The sight almost made me vomit. Were they together? They did always say that black guys usually go after white girls. Tianna wasn't Caucasian, but she is so fair-skinned that she might as well be. The only thing to tell you she's black was the texture of her curly hair. She even had the white girl build, if you know what I'm talking about.
If you don't know what I'm talking about, I mean that in both areas of importance, that girl is flat, flat as a board, flat like paper, flat like the earth, flatter than your computer's screen, flat like-
"Let's just go inside." David decided. "Lith won't be here for a while," He walked towards the gates with dread in his steps. "Yep, this shit is gonna be depressing."