I didn't understand it. I hadn't had an anxiety attack like that in months, not since I had started my medication. Before that, I would regularly explode in fits of rage over little things, even stuff smaller than what had happened the day before. But not once had I had this issue since I began the medication. I was finally starting to think I'd never see that side of me again.

So why did it happen then? Sure, I was getting upset at everyone fighting, but I went from "upset" to "exploding with anger" in a matter of seconds. There had to be some reason why, and I needed to figure out what it was so that I could avoid it in the future.

I sighed as I set my cup in the sink and closed my eyes. It wasn't even six o'clock in the morning, yet I was already feeling stressed out. I turned to the two bottles of medication I took each morning. One was for depression, the other for anxiety. I stared at them, then squinted my eyes as if I was trying to tell them, "You better work today." Obviously, I knew there was no way it would affect anything, but that didn't matter to me in that moment.

I turned, barely avoiding stepping on Dusty, who was playing with his favorite mouse right at my feet. "You don't realize how good you have it," I spoke to him. Dusty, as you might guess, didn't react a bit to that. In fact, he only moved closer to me and began to play with both his mouse and my foot at the same time. "Ow, ow! Hey!" I pulled my foot back. "At least wait until I have shoes on or something."

"Alexis?" I heard Auntie's voice chime. She popped her head through the archway that was between the kitchen and the living room. "Are you alright?"

"I'm fine, Dusty was just being a pest," I responded.

Auntie shook her head. "I don't mean about that." She stepped into the kitchen, and I quickly realized she must have just gotten out of her morning shower. "Are you feeling okay? Is your anxiety too high or too low? Actually, can anxiety even be 'too low'?"

I shook my head and sighed. "I'm okay, Auntie. My nerves are fine today. I probably just... forgot to take my meds yesterday and didn't realize it." I was pretty sure that wasn't the case, but memory is a funny thing like that. Either way, I smiled to make Auntie feel better. "See? I'm alright. Nothing to worry ab-OW!"

Dusty had gone to bite at his mouse. He missed his target, so his teeth got my toe instead.

Auntie giggled. "He's gotten so playful lately. It's hard to believe he's the same cat we adopted only four months ago."

"He's also lost quite a bit of weight." I picked Dusty up. "He was a fat thing when we got him, remember?"

Auntie nodded. "I don't think I had ever seen such a fat cat in my life. Now, he's just average sized." Auntie reached out her hand and gently pet him. Dusty responded by trying to grab Auntie's hand with his front legs. "Do you feel up to going to school?"

I nodded. "I've already missed the first three weeks of school this year. Don't really want to miss any more if I can help it." I looked up at Auntie and smiled again. "I'll be okay today, promise."

"Alright, but don't be afraid to contact me if you need to."

I nodded silently. I could tell that Auntie really had no idea what to do when it came to raising a child. My father was only a few years younger than her, so she never really experienced child raising as an adult. Not only that, I was practically already 18, since my birthday was in three months. I won't lie, I felt bad that I was the first "child" she ever raised, especially since I was a garbage bin full of problems. I think most people would act out at this age, but I just wanted to be as little of a burden as I could be.

"Alexis!" I heard Juri call as I walked through the school doors. Today, I had chosen an outfit that was the exact reverse of yesterday's. By that, I mean the dress was yellow instead of pink and the pull-over jacket was pink instead of yellow. Beyond that, the outfits were identical.

Juri, on the other hand, had opted for monochrome today. A black tank-top with a white top of some sort under it (I wasn't going to ask what), along with a white skirt that she had black knee-length pants under. Trevor was at her side wearing a shirt that had the cover of a classic retro FPS game on it. He also had a pair of jeans on.

"Hey," I spoke with a light wave. My eyes couldn't help but drift as I saw several students look at me, turn away, then whisper to each other.

"Are you alright?" Juri asked as she and Trevor both rushed up to me.

"Fine..." I pried my eyes away from the students around me. "Did I miss something yesterday? Why is everyone staring at me?"

"After... well... what happened in the cafeteria... Someone said they saw you being carried through the hallways by a blonde girl. You looked completely unconscious. Rumors about why that happened... might have gotten a little out of hand..."

"Out of hand?" I questioned.

"I doubt anyone actually believes any of them," Trevor began. "But some were as minor as 'the blonde girl knocked you out' to as major as... uhh..." He rubbed the back of his neck. "Well, let's just say that the particular blonde girl in question is known for being a bit... promiscuous..."

Well, that bit caught me of guard.

"So they think that we..." I made some hand gestures. "...So much that I passed out?"

"There are some pretty wild stories about her... I don't know how many, if any, are true... But yeah, pretty much."

"Well, I do remember there being a blonde girl in the bathroom... I don't remember much else, though... I was blinded by tears and my brain was working at 10% impulse."

Juri tilted her head.

"Ha! I get that one!" Trevor suddenly shouted out.

"Great, you're both nerds," Juri responded. "How about we talk about what happened, though. Like, what caused you to suddenly freak out like that?"

Of course that question would come up. I needed to think of something to say and quickly.

"Hi there! Are you doing better today?" a voice called out to me. I turned my head around to see... her.

Just like the first time I had seen her, she was beautiful. Her hair was blonde and fluffy and looked so soft. Her eyes were amber, just like I remembered, and a pair of red glasses sat on her face. She wore a blue sleeveless dress that had a floral pattern around the bottom of it. She was wearing a pair of flip-flop sandals on her feet.

"Y... yeah..." I found myself staring at her. I was so enraptured by her that it perhaps took me a bit too long to notice something wasn't quite right with her eyes. I suddenly snapped back to reality when I noticed, her right eye wasn't looking at me, at all! It was pointing up into the corner of her eye. "Wow... you..." I realized I was about to say something bad and quickly shut myself down.

"I'm glad to hear that." The girl smiled at me. "You don't have a clue who I am, do you?"

"Uhh... no, not really, sorry." I rubbed the back of my neck. "I think... we ran into each other one time?"

"Quite literally." The girl giggled. "I was running away from a couple of bullies, and you were running the opposite way, and BANG!" She slammed her hands together. "Instant collision."

"Ah, sorry about that... I wasn't exactly looking where I was going."

"Oh, it was no problem at all. I regularly run into things myself." She pointed at her right eye. "No depth perception."

Juri cleared her throat, causing me to turn to look at her. "Seems you've, quite literally, run into the school's resident clutz. Her name is Ditzy. Ditzy, this is Alexis."

"'Ditzy'?" I turned to look at the girl. "Your parents named you Ditzy?"

Ditzy giggled and shook her head. "No, no, that's just the nickname everyone calls me. It's cause I'm such a clutz and usually crash into stuff regularly. I think I'm also a bit stupid. My real name is Allea Vera." She held her hand out to me. "I was also the girl that helped you out yesterday, when you were in the bathroom."

That's why she seemed familiar yesterday! "Well, it's nice to meet you." I shook her hand. "Is it okay if I don't call you 'Ditzy', though? Seems... a bit mean to me..."

Allea nodded. "You can call me anything you want to. I don't mind 'Ditzy', though. I've been called much worse names."

"How worse?" I shouldn't have asked that.

"'Skank', 'Slut', 'Bitch', 'Derpy', 'Freak', and a few other things that are... not so nice." Allea shrugged. "A lot of people really like to make fun of my right eye. I can't move it, though, so nothing I can do about it, watch." She began to move her left eye all around, yet her right eye never shifted from its place. "See?"

"Ditzy!" I heard someone shout.

"Oh! That's Cynthia! I gotta go. She'll get mad if I'm not there right away when she calls. Nice meeting you, Alexis!" Before I could respond, she turned around, ran a few steps, then promptly slipped on one of her sandals and smacked face-first into the ground.

"Are you okay?" I asked as I ran over to her.

"Yeap!" Allea literally bounced to her feet, fixed her sandal, and took off again. At the end of the hall, I could see Cynthia standing there. She was holding a school book in one hand while the other was planted firmly on her hip. Cynthia thrust the book into Allea's hands and the two walked off together.

"I still don't understand how those two are friends..." Juri spoke up.

"Rumor across the school is that Cynthia just uses her," Trevor responded. "I mean, didn't Ditzy just say that Cynthia would 'get mad' if she wasn't there right away?"

I debated that. There was something about the way Allea had acted. Normally, at least according to television, someone would be afraid of the other person in this case. Yet, when Cynthia had called Allea's name, I had seen her eyes light up. It was something akin to how a dog gets excited when you call their name. "I feel like Cynthia can't be that bad if she's friends with Allea."

"How do you figure?" Juri raised an eyebrow at me.

"Often, bullies are just as insecure as the people they bully. They try to hide those insecurities by lashing out and being mean. Sometimes, when you actually get to know the real them, you find they're actually not so bad."

"Counter argument: They could also just be a cold-hearted bitch."

Both Trevor and I gave Juri a hard glare for that statement.

"What? I'm just saying..."