The young girl’s bright eyes shined, shone, were shiny with unshed tears. “Why did you do this to me? Isn’t my life bad enough already?” The young old man just cackled, and walked toward her, the nife, knife in his hand. Do you think that I care?”
“Adéle?”
Someone was calling her name? But who could it be?
“DUH” Adéle realized that someone was actually calling her name. “RENEE!!!!! Can’t you see that I was trying to write here? I was almost to the good part.”
“So? You write all the time. Come on. We need to go shopping. I still need to buy clothes for out church trip.” (Hopefully Adéle will pay.)
“Renée, I told you I’m not going. I want to go the writer’s camp this year. I go with you guys every year.”
“But you’re the only one who will pay—I mean help me find the right clothes.
However, Adéle was not stupid. She knew the only reason that Renée wanted to go shopping was so that she could find a bunch of expensive clothes, then pretend that she forgot her credit card, and Adéle would end up paying for everything. She didn’t want to go through that today. The last time Renée had maxed out her card. With anger flashing in her eyes, she said, “Well, that’s your problem. Why don’t you go and ask Victoire to go with you? She likes to shop too. I’m kinda busy.”
Renée’s face fell with disappointment and selfishness. “Oh, well since your writing is more important to you than my shopping disaster, I guess I’ll go and find someone else to come with me.” With that she spun around and strode out of the café.
Adéle immediately regretted her attitude, but she was tired of her own concerns being put last in her “friend’s” eyes. If she wanted to get into that writing camp, her story needs to be worthy of the camp.
“Guess who.”
The familiar voice warmed her up immediately. “Hey Noël,” she said with a smile on her face. “You can remove your hands now.”
“Dang, I thought you wouldn’t guess who I was.”
“Oh, yeah, because there are 50 Noël’s who randomly come into this café and cover my eyes.” She said teasingly.
“Yup, you got that right.” At that, both of them burst out laughing. “So what are you up to?”
“Oh, you know, working on my story for the writing camp, and Renée wanted me to go shopping with her--- or rather she shopped and I paid.” She laughed without any humor.
Noël had sympathy in his eyes. He could only imagine what was going on in her life. He truly felt sorry for her.
“How come you’re not coming with us on our church trip? I really wanted you to come.” Realizing what he just said his faced turned red.

Adéle blushed, and said, “I know, I wanted to come too, but this is my last chance to go that writing camp. And every year, I chicken out and go with you guys.”
Noël knew that she wanted to be a writer. If letting her go to that camp meant he wouldn’t see her, he was willing to go through that. He wanted her to be happy.

“Well, Adéle good luck with your story. In the mean time, wanna go to the park and hang out?”

Adéle knew that by going to the park, she was sending him mixed signals. But at the same time, she wanted a break. Smiling up at him, she said, “Yeah, sure. Let’s go.” She picked up her stuff, grabbed her cappuccino.

Walking to the park, they talked about school, parents, pretty much anything they could think of.

When getting to the park, they sat on the swings laughing at all the stupid things they used to do at this park. For a while, they sat there silent, staring at each other. Noël leaned toward her, and she knew what he was going to do. I shouldn’t be doing this. She thought, I have a boyfriend. But at the same time, I don’t really love him. I’m in love with Noel. She leaned forward, and pressed her lips against his. She was in heaven. No kiss had ever felt like this.
Noël was the first one to break away from the kiss. “I’m so sorry Adéle. I shouldn’t have done that. You have a boyfriend.” Noël kept mumbling to himself.
“Noël, it’s okay. I just wish that this didn’t happen now.”
Adéle knew what she was in for now that they had kissed. She would have a hard time hiding her feelings.

“Um, uh, yeah, well I guess we should start heading home.” The situation had made staying at the park more awkward.
Grabbing her arm to stop her from walking away, Noël said, “Adéle, are you mad at me? I said I was sorry, but I would really like to try and take this relationship farther. Okay?”

Adéle looked at him in wonder. She couldn’t figure out why he would want to go out with her. She didn’t think she was that pretty anyways.

“But Noël, why me? I mean, out of all the girls you could chose, why is it me?”

Noël let out a breath of air, ran his finger through his hair, then said. “We’ve been BFFS since Preschool. You were always different from all the other girls, and one thing led to another. I would really like to take this relationship further.”

Adéle thought about it for a moment then laced her fingers into his. “Well, we’ll just have to see how this goes then?”

Noël smiled so wide, and looked so much like a little kid that Adéle had to laugh. Then she broke away from him running. “You can’t catch me Noël!” And she continued to run though the park.

“We’ll see about that Adéle!” With that, he ran after her, grabbing her arm and pulling her down onto the grass.

Oh no, I am not going down without a fight. She thought. She squirmed and pulled until she managed to get away from him. The she started to walk away toward her house. She stopped and turned around to see Noël still sitting there watching her.

“Are you coming Noël?” At that, he jumped up and ran to her grabbing her hand. They continued to walk towards her house.



“MOM! I’m home! I’ll be upstairs in my room!” She dashes up the stairs to her room, and comes to a stop in the doorway. Élodie is sitting in the middle of the room, everything around the room askew.
“Élodie! What are you doing in my room! Get out! MOM! “
“I just wanted to borrow one of your shirts to wear to school. They are soooo cool!”

“Liar! You know you wanted something. What were you doing in my room?"

“Okay, don’t get mad, but I was going to borrow one of your stories for a contest so I can win first prize and use the money to go shopping.”

Adéle burned up with anger and said. “ELODIE! Are you stupid? No one, NO ONE! Not even my own twin is allowed to have any of my stories! And you know that! Write your own story if you are so desperate to win! GET OUT!”
“Jeez! You don’t need to get so selfish. It’s just one story.”
Élodie runs down the stairs yelling. “MOM! Adéle is being selfish and won’t let me borrow one of her stories for my contest!”

“Chérie, you know Adéle works hard to write those stories. She’s not going to give you one. That’s fair. Write one yourself!”

“Mama! Je ne peux pas ecrire comme elle!” (I can’t write like her!)

“Honey, no one can write like Adéle. She has her own style. Write your own story. You might win!”

“UGGGHHHHHH! MOM! That is soooo not fair!” She stomps up the stairs in frustration, and slams the door.

Adéle sighs in relief. “Whew! That was a close one! THANKS MOM!”

“Anytime chérie. Come down and have some crepes.”

Adéle’s stomach rumbled at that word. She was really hungry. “I’m coming mom!” She dashes down the stairs, runs in to the kitchen grabbing a plate and a couple of crepes. She wolfs down two in a couple seconds.

“Chérie, slow down, you don’t want any cramps. If you eat any faster, I’ll go crazy!”

Adéle laughed at the crazy look on her mom’s face. Just to make her mom laugh, she stuffed a crepe in her mouth and made a monkey face. Her mother burst out with laughter. “Adéle! Stop it! You are being very silly today. What is going on?”

“ Oh, nothing much, I got a new boyfriend today.”

“Oh you finally broke up with Xavier?”

No, I’m still dating him. But I’m going out with Noël.”

“Well, I think you should tell Xavier that you feel different about him, and you are thinking about dating Noël.”

“Mama, you don’t get it. Nobody dumps Xavier. It’s like, he’s the dumper, and I’m the dumpee. So, I don’t think it’s possible. And, he’s the most popular boy in school.”

“And you are a beautiful young girl, who deserves better than that jock. Tell him, ‘nobody dumps Adéle Seline Francis and gets away with it.’ he is not worth your time chérie.”

“Yeah, I know, I just don’t know what to do. I like Xavier, but not as a boyfriend. And I’ve liked Noël for a long time now. Ugggghhhh! I don’t know what to do!”

“Well, follow what your heart says chérie. I know you’ll do the right thing. You need to get going. Xavier is going to wonder where you are. You know how that boy gets.”

Boy, did she ever.




“Hey, Xavier. What’s going on?”

“Nothing much babe, whatcha up to?”

Adéle really didn’t like the way he called her babe. Noël would never do that to me. She thought. She knew today was the day for them to breakup.

“Xavier, we need to talk about----us.”

“Okay, talk to me. Is something wrong? Do I have a zit on my face/”

“What? I want to talk about us and you’re worried about your pretty boy face? See, that’s one thing I don’t like about you. You are soooo self-centered sometimes! I think we should breakup.

“WHAT? What are you talking about? Everything was going okay. We were so close to becoming more close.”

“Oh, you mean third base? Yeah, YOU were ready. I wasn’t though. I don’t love you like you thought I did.”

“Okay, you know what? You can’t break up with me, you know why? Because I’M breaking up with you.”

I knew this would happen. She thought. “You know what? You can’t do that. I already broke up with you. You aren’t worth my time anymore.”

“Fine, you owe me this, is there someone else involved?”

“Actually, now that you ask there is. You know Noël? Well, we’ve had feelings for each other, and um,---- yesterday we kissed, and I realized that I didn’t ‘love’ you anymore. I’m sorry Xavier, I really am.”

With that, she walked out of the café, shaking with shock. Then she ran all the way home, and called Noël. “Hey Noël? Yeah, I’m going to the camp. I’ll miss you too. Love you. See you. Click.

Then she called a 1-800 number.

“Hello? Is this the Paris Young writer’s camp? Yes, I’d like to register for this summer. Yes. Adéle Seline Francis. Yes. Thank you.”