Catching Up [Mara]

When she left her parents house, it was almost time to be at the cafe to meet Bella. As pretty much always, Hazel was running late, but today, that was absolutely not her fault. She was about to get going, when her mother told her she had to "Please come and help in the kitchen for just a second." As it turned out, this "second" took more than twenty minutes and when she managed to escape her mother, she knew she was going to be late for sure. And, sure thing, she missed the bus that would take her straight to town and now had to walk the whole way from her family's little house by the ocean. Usually, Hazel didn't mind long walks, but today, catching a ride on the bus would have been just perfect.

As Hazel came closer and closer to the center of town, the houses changed. Where she lived, most houses were a little bit run down. The constant salty breeze coming from the ocean caused the paint to peel from the outside walls of the houses and made them look a lot older than they were. And the houses were usually a lot smaller than the houses closer to the center of town. The houses in town looked all nice and tidy and some people even managed to grow a picture perfect green lawn in front of their houses. Hazel's family never bothered to keep the grass in front of their house all nice and green. The salty air just caused it to turn brown within a matter of days and even her mother, who tried to keep everything all nice and perfect around their house gave up on growing grass, let alone a garden with flowers, since flowers died almost as fast as the green grass did. Hazel always wondered how the people in town managed to keep their green gardens, but she figured the houses that were so close together in the center of town somehow blocked the salty air out and therefor gave the grass a chance to grow. And the people here in town could afford to water their lawn just about every day, which was for sure helpful when growing a nice and green lawn. Hazel shook her head as she realized that she was actually thinking about growing grass and a garden. That was so absolutely silly. That was something her mom would think about. Hazel started to smile and rolled her eyes. Every once in a while she realized, that she was not so completely different from her mom than she always said she was. And since she was mad at her mom for causing her to be late for her meeting with her best friend, the least thing she wanted to be was anything that resembled her mom.

After a half an hour walk, she reached the downtown like area and her eyes fell on the little cafe at the corner where she was supposed to meet Bella. Sure enough, Bella was already there, waiting for her with a steaming cup of coffee in her hand, reading a magazine. Hazel sped up her steps and crossed the street. She sat down across from Bella and sighed. "Hey Bella, I'm so sorry I'm late. I was practically out the door when my mom called me back and wanted me to help with something in the kitchen. And you know my mom: Saying no was not an option." She looked at her best friend with an apologetic look on her face. She and Bella didn't have too much spare time, with going to school and working afterwards, so spending some time at the cafe just for fun was a rare thing. That's what made her so mad at her mother for causing this delay. But now she made it and there was still some time left, before she had to get back to work, so she pushed the thoughts about her mom and her stupid request aside and smiled at Bella. A waitress arrived and asked her, what she wanted to drink and Hazel ordered a water. "So what was it that you wanted to tell me?" , Hazel asked her best friend. Ever since Bella asked her to meet her at the cafe for catching up and just talking, Hazel was practically dying to find out what is was, that Bella wanted to tell her. Her water arrived and Hazel took a sip, since the walk had made her thirsty while she waited for Bella to start talking.

Hazels smile grew wider as Bella started talking about her boyfriend.
„Well he’s really sweet, and really caring. He makes me really really happy, and I’m really glad I met him.“
Hazel nodded, still smiling big. That and nothing less was, what her best friend deserved. The red haired girl laughed when she saw her best friend basically glowing. And she was eager to hear more about this loving and caring and just sweet boyfriend. Hazel waited for Bella to keep talking. She knew there was no point in rushing her best friend, she would tell her what she wanted her to know all by herself. „He’s seventeen, we met by accidentally bumping into each other.“ Hazel tried to think of all the seventeen year old boys she knew but she couldn’t think of one, that would be a boy who could win Bella's heart. So there was nothing left but to wait for Bella to tell her more. For some reason, Bella took a deep breath as if it cost her quite an effort to talk about her new boyfriend. As if Bella had some concerns when telling her best friend about him.Why would she think such a thing? Hazel lifted her glass to her lips to take a sip of water when Bella finally said her boyfriends name. Stallion. „Stallion?“ As she realized, truly realized what Bella had just said, Hazel choked on the mouthful of water and started coughing.

It took a while until Hazel was able to stop couching. She looked at Bella ans raised one eyebrow. „Stallion?“ , she asked her best friend and was not able to hide the surprise and doubts in her voice. Caring and sweet were just two things that just didn’t fit in with all the things she heard about Stallion, the bad boy from District Four. Of course she didn’t really know him, but there was plenty of talk about him in the district. Hazel still was in some kind of shock. Her best friend Bella dating Stallion, the infamous bad boy from District Four. Yes, that took some time to wrap her head around. Bella was far from being someone to get in trouble and Stallion was just the complete opposite of who she was. He was everything Bella’s mom didn’t want her daughter to make contact with. Hazel was sure, that Bella’s mom must have been furious if she found out. Well, that was, if Bella had told her parents about her relationship with Stallion yet. Hazel could just imagine Bella’s mom freaking out and a smile spread across her face. As she looked at her best friend, Hazel’s smile grew wider and wider until she started laughing. „I bet your mom was more than happy about your new boyfriend...“ , she said between the laughs and didn’t hide the sarcasm in her voice. Hazel shook her head smiling and looked at her best friend. Stallion seemed to so not be the guy, Bella would want to date, but apparently there were still some things she didn’t know about her best friend. „How did you meet Stallion?“ , she asked. The first shock had worn off and now she was just curious how Bella ended up with District Four’s bad boy at her side.

So Hazel was absolutely right when she suspected, that Bella’s mom wasn’t exactly what you would call happy about Stallion being Bella's boyfriend. Hazel wouldn't have thought that Bella got grounded for dating Stallion, but then that was somehow just reasonable, at least from her mom's point of view. She wanted to stop Bella from seeing Stallion and locking her up in the house was probably the best way to do so. "Well thank god your dad stopped the punishment, otherwise we wouldn't be sitting here and you wouldn't have been able to tell me." Hazel winked at Bella. It seemed that the two friends shared a similar close relationship to their dads. If Hazel had a problem, she would always ask her dad for help rather than her mom, unless the problem concerned clothing or make up. But then it would more likely be her best friend she would ask rather than her mom.
Even though Hazel wasn't the girl to go all crazy about romantic things and love stories, she enjoyed listening to her best friend talk about how she met her boyfriend. "So it was something like love at first sight, wasn't it?" , she asked her, still smiling big. Well not literally love at first sight, because pretty much everyone, and Bella for sure, had met Stallion before, but her best friend would for sure understand what she wanted to say. It was so sweet, that he showed up at Bella's families shop, getting to know her before asking her out for a date. "And where did he take you for your first date?" , Hazel asked because she was extremely curious how this strange relationship between her sweet and almost shy best friend and the districts bad boy came into being. Maybe there was some time when she could accompany Bella and meet Stallion to find out who this boy, that stole her heart really was. Yes, she had heard a lot of talk about Stallion, but all the things Bella told about him didn't sound like anything she had ever heard about him before.