Finding My Way
Chapter 5

I left right after Mrs. Flannigan, hoping to avoid confrontation with Ben. He didn’t follow me, but honestly, I hadn’t expected him to. He wasn’t a nice enough person to try and apologize after I told him off like that. But he deserved it and I didn’t feel bad in the slightest.
“Any news?” I asked as I walked through the door to my house.
“Nothing new.” My mom smiled weakly and I nodded, trying not to seem disappointed. I asked this every day when I got home, hoping there would be new information or clues as to where Loretta was or who had taken her. I should’ve been used to being let down after three months. But I just couldn’t bring myself to accept that my little sister was gone. I couldn’t wrap my mind around the fact that I would never see her again.
“How was school?” My mom asked, bringing me back to the present.
“I got the part.” I smiled.
“That’s great, honey! I’m so proud of you.” She smiled. “I knew you would get it. So who’s the lucky Romeo?”
“Thanks, Mom. And um, Ben. Ben is…Romeo.” I hesitated, not wanting to think of all the time I was going to have to spend with Ben.
“Ben Jackson? Really?” She sounded surprised, but I could hear her smiling without even seeing her.
“Yup.” I sighed, collapsing at the table to start my homework.
“Oh are you kids seriously still not getting along? It’s such a shame; you two were such great friends. You know, Sharon and I used to always say you two would get married one day.” I actually laughed when she said this.
“Yeah, Mom, that’ll happen.” I said sarcastically. Sharon, Ben’s mom, and my mom were insane if they thought Ben and I would end up together.
“You never know. We’re still rooting for you two. It’ll happen.” She winked before walking out and I sighed, picking up my pencil and starting my history homework, laughing to myself at how deluded my mom was. I could never even imagine myself with Ben.

*                    *                    *                    *                    *

The next day, Ben asked me if I wanted to come over and run lines. Reluctantly, I said yes. It was a short and simple conversation. He didn’t try and mention anything about what happened the other day, and I thought it was smart that we just left it alone and pretended like it never happened. That didn’t mean I wanted to go to his house after school though.
I knocked on the door and Sharon answered it, enveloping me in a tight hug.
“Oh, Valerie! You haven’t been over here in years! I’m so glad you’re here! Congratulations on the role of Juliet, by the way. But of course they’d choose the prettiest girl in the drama club to play Juliet.” She smiled at me and I blushed.
“Thank you, Sharon. I’ve missed you! I mean I know that I saw you a couple of weeks ago, but I was on my way out the door and we didn’t get a chance to catch up!” I smiled. I loved Ben’s mom. She was the sweetest woman I knew. I hated that when I distanced myself from Ben, I distanced myself from his family too.
“Ben’s in the upstairs TV room.” She smiled and walked into the kitchen, resuming her baking. I took a deep breath and started up the stairs. I stopped in the doorway and saw Ben studying his lines intently. I waited for him to look up and notice me, but he was too engrossed in the script.
“Hey.” I said shortly, leaning against the doorway.
“Oh, hey Al- um, Valerie.” He smiled weakly, obviously remembering I told him not to call me that anymore. I didn’t think he would actually listen or even remember that I had said that to him, but a wave of guilt flooded over me when I saw the pained expression on his face.
“Look, I might have overreacted a bit yesterday, but that doesn’t mean I’m sorry. I meant what I said. I only want to deal with you when we’re working on the play or at dance or during stage combat. But regardless, we need to forget about our ‘feud’ and focus on the play. We need to get along for Mrs. Flannigan and everyone else. We have to be professional.” I finished my statement and sat on the couch opposite Ben.
He just nodded and I took a deep breath. “Shall we start?” We went through the whole script of our scenes together, then went back and practiced the first few more, really delving into our characters. We had a couple of laughs when we stumbled on our words or read the lines entirely wrong, but other than that, we didn’t have any friendly interaction. We kept strictly to the script. When we were done, it had been a little over an hour and it was just about 3 o’clock.
“I should probably get home, chores and homework.” I smiled tightly, glad I was finally going to get away from him. He followed me downstairs and to the door.
“So…I’ll, uh, see you tomorrow? At school?” He asked awkwardly.
“Yeah. See you.” I said shortly, walking down the stone walkway.
“Hey, Valerie?”
“Hmm?” I turned around halfway to see Ben.
“I didn’t mean what I said before; you really do deserve this part. You’re a great actor.”
I nodded and continued walking back to my house, a slight smile gracing my features. No, stop it Valerie. You hate him. Just because he said one nice thing doesn’t mean he isn’t still a jerk! I yelled at myself internally. But it was still a step up from yesterday, and it was more than I expected from him. 

Sorry for the wait (:
What do you think will happen with Valerie and Ben, will they ever get along?
Haha anyways, thank you all so much for reading!
It means so much to me!