The Dumped Club

15- Annual Buzz

And so it began. The annual buzz that makes me want to curl up and stay under my duvet until the whole school year is over. Fred's birthday.

There you are- on the other side- thinking,"Why is that so bad? It's a birthday party!". Hear me out. Fred's birthday parties are annual events. He invites so many people to his parties- from Year 7s to Year 11s. He's certainly not the most popular boy in the whole school but the Darwins are known to throw the best of the best parties. Normally, there's lots of food, music and dancing involved- if you don't get body-shamed or getting cat-called the day before the party. See here's the thing, when people got excited for a party, they got excited for a party. Not only would they plan their own outfits, hair and other stuff, but some have the audacity to judge and shame others on their style and how they celebrate at the party.

That's what happened every year. People would go to others and insult them which leaves less than half of the people invited at the party while the others are crying their eyes out. Ah, the effects of peer pressure- they can totally destroy you. But you have to learn to be resilient and not care about what they say. And unfortunately, every single year, Amy has to drag me out of our house and go to the freaking party, even if I was the one crying my eyes out. It usually goes by her abandoning me to go talk to Jess and Ryan, me silently sitting by the side and eating nachos like a saddo and my best friends arriving at the last minute. Well, ex-best-friends now I guess.

But it was going to be even larger this year- Amy told me that their parents had rented a pizzaria for a few hours and about 75 people were invited. That was practically over half of the size of our year group. If no one got sent home crying by Amethyst's remarks, which was highly unlikely. Fred's birthday was everything everyone talked about Monday morning and I was already sick of it by the time first period began.

"Have you heard Fred's having a party?" Faith tried to change the subject from her parents' recent divorce at breaktime. Her eyes were bloodshot and brimming with tears every ten minutes but she said nothing.

"No!" I raised my voice, tone dripping with sarcasm. "My sister's totally not best friends with his siblings."

"Sorry," Faith smiled weakly. She sniffed and looked at the silent Grace on her left. Love and Prudence were in the library, working on their Citizenship project so it was just us three.

"I don't want to be there," Grace said, throwing her rubbish in the bin. "75 people is not really the amount of people I want to socialise with."

"Who says you have to socialise? You could just stand by the punch bowl and pig out on whatever food they have," Faith suggested. "I would do that."

"You know they always have those dumb 'get to know you' type of games. Or spin the bottle. Or getting locked in a cupboard. I don't know, but my point is I will have to socialise- even if I have to ask for the toilet, and I don't want that."

It carried on all the way until Wednesday 11th March, Fred's birthday. Amethyst and Kaydence were obsessing over dresses they would have to spend their life savings on to wear to his party. It was like a Y9 bloody prom. As it was every year.

I sighed, twiddling my pen in Geography and waiting for the last bunch of people to arrive at the classroom so the lesson could begin. The football team barged through like a bunch of obnoxious prats and sat down like they were the Greek Gods. You can really see that I dislike them, don't you?

"You're coming to the party, right?" Fred took his seat next to me.

"Yep. Happy 14th." I said.

"Right," Fred sighed. "No sentimental wishes like 'I hope you get everything you wish for'. Was expecting more from a Tumblr quote book like you."

"I get them from Pinterest, thank you very much."