Chapter 51

AMBER'S POV
Motherhood had taught me along with a whole bunch of stuff, the ability to feel multiple emotions at the same time effectively. How else do you explain the myriad of emotions that were coursing through my body as I listened to Jay talk about the meeting he had attended in my place.
My son had almost being expelled, not suspended or warned or reprimanded, the school had almost expelled him if it wasn't for Jay. Along with my life, I owed the man, the future of my stupid son. They usually said it wasn't safe to be indebted to someone for so long and for so many chances but the case with Jay Harley was unavoidable.
I listened impatiently as he narrated everything that had happened at the school. Turns out, Frankie had wanted to be part of the popular kids so much he had to comply with their stupid demands. Accepting to do a dare that would have such repercussions? How badly did he want to be popular?
'The reason he had to do the dare was because he was coerced into it, Amber" Jay's voice pierced through my trail of thoughts and he sat down next to me on the couch.
'Coerced? That's unlike Frankie, if it was Danny I would have understood it but Frankie?" I understood what Jay was pointing out but Frankie wasn't one to yield to peer pressure.
Jay sighed, 'He went to them, that's what he told me. He wanted to be a part of them"
I couldn't hide my surprise, 'A part of them?" I was confused also, did he mean a part of the popular kids? When had that ever been a good thing? When?
Last I remembered, being popular didn't get you more than shallow friends that didn't know the first thing about you or about what you liked doing or even liked. You get invited to parties you'd never have gotten the chance to attend, that's one perk of being popular but what else? You get voted as Cheer captain partly because of qualifications and mostly because your best friend is popular enough to pull some strings.
What else? You start moving with a new crowd and slowly stop talking to the only real friend you had made in Drama club. Wait, there's more. You stop applying for roles in plays cause apparently, drama peeps are nerds and geeks. Then you start going shopping more than you paid visits to your favorite place in town, the library. No, you weren't forced into it, you wanted to belong. Its that simple.
Let's move further a bit, you go ahead to win miss influential pageantry and gets a whole ass party planned just for you. Its crazy how much you can achieve just by moving with the right crowd. Did I say, right crowd? I meant popular crowd. Then prom comes, your popular new best friend wins along with the most popular kid in all of Oxford Oaks, the basketball team's captain.
Skip to the after party, you get an invite cause you're moving with the popular crowd now. Your new best friend that was supposed to be chaperoning, disappears, but not after getting you drunk in the guise to help you ease up. So, you're drunk now, with a stranger who happens to give the best kisses, you get laid by someone that doesn't even know the color of your eyes and 9 months later, you give birth to triplets.
Let's not leave out the fact that he just up and vanishes after the night of the encounter and you're left to fend for yourself after your mum had disowned you cause you had somehow ruined her own dreams, not yours, no, not yours, hers. Your children are your greatest achievement but you never ever forget all that you've lost.
Bottom line is, it never ends well when you chase popularity. Mel and i can both testify, even though we had totally different experiences with trying to be who we weren't, hers didn't end as badly as mine had. It would freak anyone out to find out the repercussions of aiming for the skies without a ladder, but there's just some things you'd understand better if you experience them.
Reminiscing was something I hadn't really done with anyone asides myself whenever I took those long trips down memory lane in my head but as I sat with Jay with Carol's cookies and some scotch, I had company on my trip back to the past.
'Do you remember when Melissa forgot the most important part of the routine?" I asked amidst laughter and Jay's face lit up as he remembered. God, it was a terrible thing, laughing at what had almost killed my best friend but you can't blame me.
Mel had spent the previous week before the performance, using Jay to make Daniel jealous and when it was time for the performance, she had forgotten the last part and as she flipped backwards instead of forward, she crashed into our human stack and we all went crumbling down harder than Humpty Dumpty.
Carol walked into the living room with her bag in her hand, 'Aren't you going to go pick up the kids? Its way past their closing time" she pointed towards the clock and I almost spilled drink all over Jay as I jumped off the chair. I had spent most of the day time traveling with Jay, I had totally forgotten about my kids.
Mel had also asked me to help pick Stacey and Ken Jr up but there was no way I was going to get to the school on time besides, the car was at the mechanic. What was I going to do? It seemed Jay sensed my confusion cause he stood up and asked, 'Do you want me to pick them up?" I couldn't put such a burden on him, he had done enough already.
'No, I'll just phone Mel to pick them up. Don't worry" I tried to sound convincing but I knew Mel wouldn't be able to do that also.
'How about Daniel picks them up? He lives close to the school anyways. Besides, the kids know him already" Jay offered and I gave it a thought. The kids did know Daniel, it was a good idea. Jay Harley to the rescue, again.