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Bella wasn't like the rest of her family - she had never been. The Bachelor family was one of the more conventional families in Sunset Valley. Her mother, Jocasta, worked a part time job at the bookshop, though she still had plenty of time to be a housewife. Her father, Simis, was a working man and one of Sunset Valley's best journalists. Her older brother, Michael, was a typical jock. Bella, however, leaned towards the weird, and as she grew older, she started to grow fond of things that were more gothic...
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When she smelled the tell-tale smell of her mother burning waffles and heard her yelling for them to "come an get it!", Bella hopped out of bed and went down the stairs. She was the first one down, so she took this time to have a chat with her mother.
"Good morning, Bella dear," Jocasta greeted her as she put the leftover batter in the fridge.
"Morning mum," she said. "Can Mortimer comes over for dinner tonight?"
At the mere mention of her best friends name, Jocasta stiffened. "Umm... I'm not sure. What about that nice Kaylynn girl? Then Michael could have Parker over as well."
Bella frowned. "I barely know Kaylynn, so no. Why can't Mortimer come over?"
Jocasta resorted to one of her favourite phrases. "Ask your father."
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So that's what she did. When Michael and Simis came downstairs to a plateful of burnt waffles, Bella asked her father.
"Hey dad?" she asked, and Simis gave her a glance. "Can Mortimer come over for dinner tonight?"
Simis shrugged. "If it's alright with your mother."
Bella gave an inward sigh of frustration. Would she need to spend all day trying to let Mortimer come over?
"Well, you have your answer now, dear," Jocasta said with a smug smile.
Bella rolled her eyes. "Why not?"
"Oh, uh..." Jocasta faltered. "He's, uh... Not a good influence."
"Just let her have her friend over," Simis interjected, and with a less than inconspicuous sigh, Jocasta relented.
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Immediately after breakfast, Bella rang up Mortimer.
"Hi, Bella," Mortimer's voice said over the phone.
"Hey! I asked mum and dad, they said you can come over tonight," Bella told him excitedly.
"Cool! What if I come over now, and then we can go to the park," Mortimer suggested, and Bella smiled.
"Sure! Come over right now and then we can go," Bella said with a nod, and then, after saying their goodbyes, Bella hung up.
The young girl dashed up the stairs and pulled open the doors of her closet. She looked at her options. Red dress... red dress... red dress... red dress... red dress... Yes! That red dress was perfect! She pulled it off of the clothes hanger and started to change. Almost as soon as she was done, the doorbell rang. Bella ran excitedly down the stairs and opened the door. There was Mortimer.
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"Hi!" she smiled, then pulled her friend into a hug. The two had been friends for as long as she could remember, and she found she had always been more comfortable at Mortimer's house than her own. So she tried to spend as much time with him as possible - hopefully he didn't get sick of her.
"Should we bike down to Central Park?" Mortimer asked, but Bella had a better idea.
"No. Maywood Glen is closer and way nicer," she told him, and Mortimer agreed with a nod.
"Sure!"
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The two of them jogged down the street as Maywood Glen wasn't far from the Bachelor home. Almost as soon as they got there, Bella engaged her friend in a game of tag, and soon they were sprinting around all over the place. Yelling and laughing, they were deemed an annoyance by everyone else who was there at the time, and soon they all cleared off. Soon, the kids had the glen all to themselves.
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"I just feel like no one gets me," Bella complained as the two rested after their game of tag. She was, of course, talking about her family.
"Really?" asked Mortimer, who wasn't used to deep conversations.
"Yeah. Especially mum. She doesn't like it that I only hang out with you." Bella scuffed the ground with her feet.
"I'm the only person you hang out with?"
Bella flushed. "No! Wait, yes... uh... I have lots of friends at school, you know that. But you're... y'know... my best friend."
"Oh right. I get it," Mortimer said with a simple smile. He tended not to understand the more complicated things in life. He wasn't dumb - he was actually rather intelligent - but he was an arty type, and he always had his head in the clouds.
"Wanna go play chess?" he suggested, pointing to the vacant table close by.
"Sure," Bella agreed, and they made their way over to the chess table.
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"I can't wait to grow up. Being a teen looks so fun," Bella remarked dreamily as they started their tenth match that day.
"But there's so much homework in high school," Mortimer groaned, "and you need to worry about
girlfriends."
"I guess... But Michael gets the same amount of homework I do, and he's a teen," Bella retorted, and Mortimer took a moment to consider his rebuttle.
"Yeah, but it's way harder."
Bella couldn't argue with that. It was then that she glanced down to her watch, and her eyes bulged when she saw the time. Eight o'clock - Jocasta would freak!
"Oh my gosh we gotta go home!" Bella cried, leaping out of her chair. She grabbed Mortimer by the wrist and they made a mad dash back to Bella's house in time for tea. When they got home, Jocasta was less than impressed, but she knew better than to yell at her daughter while they had company.
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"So what did you two get up to today?" Jocasta asked as they settled in for a dinner of autumn salad."
"We just hung out at the park, played some chest," Bella said, picking through her salad.
"How nice," she replied, and the dinner fell into an awkward silence. Oddly enough, Mortimer was the one to break it.
"This salad is really nice, Mrs. Bachelor," he complimented her, and Jocasta looked quite chuffed.
"Why thank you, Mortimer. The secret is..."
Jocasta launched into a long-winded spiel about her great great great grandmothers autumn salad recipe. Though Mortimer managed to put on an interested face, Bella could tell he was bored out of his skull. This was progress though. Jocasta liked anyone who complimented her cooking, and if Mortimer continued to do it, Jocasta might be more lenient in letting him come over. She could only hope.
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As the evening wound down to a close, Mortimer found it was time to go home.
"Thank you very much for the salad, Mrs. Bachelor. It was delicious," he said with a smile to Jocasta.
"My pleasure. Come any time!" Jocasta chirped. Bella suddenly felt hopeful. But the feeling disappeared as suddenly as it came. There was no way Jocasta would've changed her mind that quickly, it wasn't like her. She'd be the same old skeptical Jocasta she always had been in the morning.
Bella watched as he cycled away, waving goodbye as she did. She hoped he would get home alright, considering how dark it was. Once he was gone, Bella spent the last few moments of her evening on the swingset in the backyard.
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Somehow she had to get away from this family, even just for a little bit. She did love her family very much, there was no doubt about that. But she was so ill-suited to be a part of it that half the time she felt suffocated. She wasn't allowed to be herself, hang out with who she wanted to, or even like what she wanted to like. She just wanted to get away as soon as possible...
Suddenly, she had an idea.
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The next morning, Michael woke up early for his morning workout. He liked to keep in shape - if he wanted to be a superstar athlete he was going to have to be. As he did his workout and watched all the attractive people on the workout video, his mind drifted back to last nights awkward dinner. Why did Bella insist on making things weird by bringing Mortimer over? She knew none of them liked him very much, so why bother?
At least she has someone to bring over for dinner. Who do I have?. Michael sighed and switched off the video. He'd been feeling down about his distinct lack of a girlfriend, and today he'd decided he needed to talk to someone.
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He couldn't talk to his parents - they were too old to understand a modern teenage mind. So he went to the next best person, his best friend, Parker Langerak.
"Hey, guy. What's up?" Parker asked, sounding like he'd just woken up.
"Not much, just wondering if you wanted to hang out later," Michael inquired.
"Sure thing, I need to get out of the house anyway. See ya at Central Park, man." He hung up.
Michael sighed. It was just like Parker to not bother making plans and just show up whenever. While that worked out for Parker, it didn't for whoever he was meeting up with. But Michael knew well enough that when Parker made plans, he usually went straight to the meetup spot. So, after yelling to his parents that he was going out, Michael was out of the house.
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"Hey, guy," Parker greeted him as Michael arrived at the park. Sure enough, Michael's prediction had been right.
"Hi Parker, how's it?" he asked, and Parker gave a half-hearted shrug.
"Ok, I guess. You?" Michael could tell that something was up with Parker. He certainly wasn't his usual, lively self.
"Same as you."
Being the awkward teenage boys that they were, talking about feelings and problems. Unfortunately for them, both of them had problems they needed to talk about. Michael didn't know what Parker's problem was - although he knew that there was one - so he decided to just come out with his problem. It was better than organising an outing where they were just going to sit in awkward silence.
The two boys crossed over the park to a nearby bench and sat down.
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"How do you think I'm gonna get a girlfriend?" Michael asked in dismay, and Parker gave him an odd look.
"I dunno, man. Ask a girl out?" he suggested. Romance was definitely not his forte, but he was better than nothing.
Michael rolled his eyes. "It's not as simple as that."
"Well, what do you want me to say? It's not like I've ever had a girlfriend." Parker gave him a sideways glance.
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It was clear to Michael that Parker had too much to deal with in his own personal life to worry about Michael's girlfriend issue. So after a bit of friendly banter to put them back on good terms, Michael bid his friend farewell and they went their separate ways. Michael didn't feel like going home just yet, so he wandered around Sunset Valley for a while, trying to figure out his problem by himself. He could always wait until prom rolled around, then everyone would be after someone to go out with. Until he thought of something better, he would go with that plan. He arrived outside the gym and decided that he may as well work out while he was there.
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After hopping onto the treadmill, he started to think further about his problem. He supposed he could try and find someone between now and prom, but who could he possibly go out with? All the girls at the Community High School were either taken, uninterested, or lame. So really, there weren't any options. His train of thought was interrupted, however, when his foot slipped and suddenly he was face down on the treadmill. What a wonderful day...
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