#franklindstarter

“Come on, hop in. I’m heading up to Main Street for Food Truck Friday.” 

Diana needed a break and she was desperate to do something to get her mind off Austin. He was gone and graduated now, and she felt she was nothing but alone in Mauve. She knew she’d be fine and that she’d move on soon, but still, she felt as if a part of her had left the state with him. So, she sat at a bus stop waiting to go somewhere — anywhere — but home. A bus came towards the stop, “Do you know where the number 7 goes?” She said to another person waiting for the bus.

Kit is standing against his locker in the hallway, aimlessly people watching, when he turns to the person next to him and asks, “What do you think Mr. Maclean does in the summer? My vote is that he yells at kids to get off his lawn, and if there aren’t any kids around, he throws almonds at the tv screen when the stock market doesn’t go his way.” He points at the sweater-vested teacher, standing across the hall.

Monty had mixed feelings about the end of the school year. He felt good because he had managed to get through all of those annoying final exams, and would be returning the following school year as a senior. He would also be captain of the football team and a member of multiple sports teams. He found solace in athletics. Then there was the bad part of the last day of junior year; getting closer to dealing with what's going to happen after high school is over. Monty had a busy summer ahead of him doing things he had no interest in like applying for scholarships, searching for universities, getting community service hours, studying for the SAT and ACT, and doing all sorts of things to make his college apps look better. But he didn't really want to focus on how boring his summer would be right now, rather wanting to focus on the conclusion of a good year. Yearbooks seemed like a promising outlet.

“How is that fair? Yellow team should be in first. We won the Tug-of-War every round!” 

Diana could barely remember a time before her mother was sick, but when she was very young, the two of them would always walk down to the beach and feed the seagulls. Diana’s mother wasn’t well enough to do it anymore, so sometimes, she’d ask Diana to do it for the both of them. So, that morning, Di had grabbed a little bag of breadcrumbs and walked down to the sparkling lake in the park, tossing the crumbs to the ducks that were waddling nearby. It was a weird hobby, she knew, but it comforted her, and with everything that had been going on, she needed it.

Kit had been sitting, reading his book at the coffee shop all morning. Well, that wasn’t entirely true, for the first two hours he had been sketching — his drawings which now lay on pages that covered the table. He looked over towards another who was on the patio, a person who he recognized from school, “Any drink suggestions? I finished my coffee an hour ago and want to try something else”

"I was seriously close to ditching this for a day surfing at the beach, but hot boys playing tug of war has almost made it worth it.” Diana really wasn’t one for field games, but she knew as well as anyone, you couldn’t hold onto your popularity without making appearances at all these events.