Comrades to Nemeses

“Come on, girls!” Mrs. Garcia scolded. “We have to leave to shop now if we’re going to be getting home to get ready for soccer in time.”

“Okay, Lindsay,” of the two girls, Eden agreed, and Jade did as well, heeding with a frown, and saying, “Okay, Mom.”

Eden Cicors-Green and Jade Garcia were extremely close friends, and they spent so much time together that they practically lived at each other’s houses and constantly had sleepovers together.

As the girls buckled their seatbelt, Mrs. Garcia called, “Are we going to Staples or Target?” she called, because the girls were in the 3rd row of the car.

“Target!” the girls bellowed back, and Eden whispered, “So we can buy more than just supplies.”

“Edie!” Jade giggled.

1 hour later…

“Girls, we’re going to be so late!” Mrs. Garcia shrieked as the girls grabbed the shopping bags from the trunk.

“Eden, come on, sweetheart,” a calm voice greeted.

“Mom?!” a startled Edie accidentally dropped the bags she was carrying.

“Ed, come on, your dad is going to arrive at the house in fifteen minutes. We have to go home.”

“What?!” Jade shouted, the bags she was recently handling crashing to the ground.

“Oh, I forgot, Jade, I’m so sorry! Dad’s coming to pick me up!” Eden said, and the two began hurriedly buckling into the car and driving away.

50 minutes later, Eden’s father, Mr. Green, pulled into this house. “So, Ed, what are you going to do this weekend?” Mr. Green asked as he picked up Eden’s luggage.

“Well, Noelle’s coming over; I texted her a couple of days ago. And remember, I’m having a sleepover at her house.”

“Right. I assume that you’ll be taking all of your things over to her house?”

“No, because she’s moving over to Northbrook (yay!), right behind Mom’s house, actually, and Noelle’s family is boxing everything today. I’m helping her.”

“Nice, honey.”

“Mom, come on!” Noelle pleaded. “We have to have our sleepover here!”

“No, Elle, you’re going to do it at John’s house, or not at all,” Ms. Gentier persisted. Noelle, like Jade, was on first-name terms with our parents.

“But we can keep boxing my stuff!” Noelle said.

“Nope,” Ms. Gentier decided. “Case closed.”

“I’ll ask my dad, Ella, it’s fine,” Eden said. “Take your bags. He lets me do anything.”

“Kay,” Mr. Green answered, and Noelle and Eden started to cheer and jump.

The two spent the night practicing gymnastics, dancing, making friendship bracelets, talking, eating, and watching shows.

“I still can’t believe you’re moving right next to me!” Eden shrieked when the lights had been shut off.

“Yeah… I know… do you really think that Jade will like me?” Noelle asked, a definite and audible tone of worry in her voice.

“Oh, you’re not still on about that, are you?” Eden moaned. “Noelle, what’s there not to like about you?”

“What if she thinks I’m taking you away from her?”

“Nonsense. You’re both my best friends. You two are so alike that I should be the one that’s worried; you’ll take each other away from me!” Eden laughed, and Eden knew that Noelle had relaxed.

Fast forward one month to the first day of school… at the bus stop…

“Hey Edie!” Noelle greeted Eden, who had just been conversing with Jade. Eden turned around and warmly hugged her friend. “Hey Ella!” 

Jade looked Noelle up and down, and Noelle immediately became tense. “Hi… Noelle, is it?”

“Yes,” Noelle stammered. “Jade, right?”

“Yep.” Jade couldn’t help but keep an icy tone to her voice.

Thankfully, the bus arrived, and the girls climbed on.

“Uh, Ed, aren’t we sitting in the back like we always do?” Jade said, stopping halfway on the bus to watch Eden and Noelle sit together on the first seat.

“Please sit down, Jade,” the bus driver reprimanded.

“Nah, not today, but maybe tomorrow,” Eden called back. Today, we have to sit in the front so that Dawn can see everything.”

‘The first day of seventh grade really isn’t going as planned,’ Jade couldn’t help but think.

Days passed, and things became colder and colder in Jade and Noelle’s relationship, although that was only on Jade’s side. Noelle tried wholeheartedly to communicate kindness to Jade, but Jade brushed it away.

Jade refused to hang out with Noelle, and that resulted in Noelle and Eden’s friendship to become closer and closer, just like Jade feared.

And at one point, it came to the breaking point.

“I’d like to get the vanilla ice cream with raspberry sauce, chocolate syrup, and walnuts on top.”

“And you?” the employee nodded toward Eden.

“I’m getting a cookie dough ice cream topped with whipped cream, please.”

“Alright. That’ll be $13.47, girls.”

The two paid, took their ice creams, left, and sat on a bench in the park.

“So, Avril, what did you want to talk about?” Eden asked, scooping a spoonful of ice cream into her mouth.

Avril was a girl in the same grade as Eden, and they’d always been friendly toward each other, but had never said more than that. “Well, Eden, I thought you should know about a recent rumor that’s gripping the entire 9th grade.”

“About me?”

“It involves you, Noelle, and-”

“Jade?” Eden exasperatedly guessed. Avril nodded, and Eden sighed resignedly.

2 years this feud had been going on for, and it was completely one-sided. Sure, Eden spent more time with Noelle than Jade, but only because Jade was too rude to Noelle for Eden to bear. Eden would desire for her two best friends to befriend each other for as long as she lived and longer.

Avril continued, “Yes, Jade. She says she’s going to confront either you or Noelle, or both of them. Quite frankly, she’s mad. In two different senses, in this case.”

“When will this happen?” Eden’s body became tense.

“Definitely by the end of 9th grade, if not, surely before the beginning of 10th.”

“Alright.”

4 weeks past, then 5, and 6, and school had almost ended, and Eden believed Avril’s information faulty; but on the last Monday of the school year, Eden received a letter in her locker.

‘Dear Eden,

I’d rather keep myself anonymous for now, though I doubt you won’t guess who I am. You’ll be bound to have recognized my handwriting. After 2 ½ years of your befriending Noelle, I can’t take anymore. You left me for Noelle Gentier in the dust. I was nothing then, and I am still to you now. Well, I’ve had enough. Sit with me in the cafeteria on the last day of school; the less drama, the better. I hope you realize your mistakes by that time. If not… feel my wrath. I’d like nothing more than to face you in anger.’

Eden slammed her locked, slid down it, and crumpled on the shining tile and ripped the paper to pieces.

“I can’t believe Avril had been right,” sobbed Eden.

And, as many people believed, when you dread something and would like nothing better than to slow time forever, it seems to speed forward uncontrollably.

So, the days whizzed by, and reluctantly, Eden left Noelle in the cafeteria to sit with Jade.

“So, what do you want?” Eden asked Jade reproachfully.

“I want to reconcile our friendship,” Jade answered desperately. “I’ve missed you!”

“I’ve missed you, too, but not when I’m with Noelle.”

“Listen, Edie, I would like to apologize to both you and Noelle. I was terrified that I would lose you to Noelle, and I took it out on her by resenting her. All I want is another chance to become best friends again and-”

“But we never didn’t become just friends.”

“-But I want to regain the bond. Please just spend the entire summer with me to have another chance, please!”

Eden had to think and eat for about 6 minutes. She agreed.

And so… Jade and Eden regained their bond and spent their entire summer days together, eating ice cream, swimming, crafting, and having endless sleepovers. They became as close as friends as ever.

Until one night, when Eden had been caught once again.

“Oh my gosh, yes, Noelle!” the voice carried out of the Cicors’ house, and into Jade’s window. Jade knew that voice. Her arms seized into tension of such intensity.

She rang the doorbell of Eden’s door, and heard Noelle’s voice say, “That must be the pizza, I’ll get it.”

And steps were heard by the betrayed ears.

Noelle’s voice was extremely laughable. Eden walked up, laughing, “Noelle, do you have the pizza yet…?”

She doubled back when she saw Jade, and Jade said directly to Noelle, with such resent and ice in her voice they were shooting daggers, “Hi, Elle, I have to see my bestie to talk to her about something. Please leave.”

Noelle’s pupils dilated. “Okay.” And she left.

“Come, Jade,” Eden said, and led Jade into her bedroom, though she didn’t need to; Jade could walk there with one leg in her sleep.

“You said your grandma was coming! You said you couldn’t have a sleepover!”

“Well, Jade, you isolate me constantly, and I’m sorry, I tried to become friends with you again, but you reproach Noelle so much that I can’t take it. It’s as if you think that if I hang out with you so much, I’ll take your lead and ditch Noelle for you. But I like her. I like her personality, and everything about her. But you make me extremely uncomfortable every day when you mention Noelle’s name. So, no, I’m not listening to you, please leave and never come into my lawn again.”

Eden showed Jade out of her house and slammed the door.

The rest of the summer was filled with thoughts of revenge from Jade; filled with laughter and happiness from Noelle; and Eden showed a majority of happiness, but that one sliver of sadness for the loss of Jade, and the other sliver of anger for the reason Eden had needed to ditch Jade.

And finally, to Eden’s dread, 10th grade began.

“Yes! I have a locker next to you, Edie!” Noelle shrieked and celebrated with a mini happy dance. 

But Eden had been looking past Noelle, frozen. On the other side of Noelle, unlocking her locker, was Jade.

Surprisingly, Jade ignored both of them. And this behavior continued. In band, in chorus, in science, English, French; it’s as if they had never met. 

The girls met each other’s gaze in Mr. Byacelli’s Pizza Palace, in Chuck E. Cheese’s, in Wendy’s, McDonald’s, Shane’s Ice Cream Place, in Mr. Cue’s Roller Skating and Ice Skating Arenas, and neither interacted.

And they never talked again, truly becoming strangers to each other.