Well, here is the next chapter. I am not sure how it turned out, but you can decide what you think about it. A big thank you to all my reviewers!

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Mr. Wellington just asked us another question, but I didn’t raise my hand. He wouldn’t have called on me anyway; he never called on anyone other than that Laura girl. But it didn’t really matter. I wouldn’t have raised my hand even if there was a chance he would have call on me. I never raised my hand in any of my classes. There was too much of a risk that I’d have ended up saying something utterly ridiculous and making a complete fool of myself. So I never raised my hand, and the teachers never called on me either. I make sure of that. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if most of them didn’t even remember my name. They graded my papers and tests and checked my name as ‘present’ on the attendance sheet, but were they asked to point out just exactly who Lola Boulevarde was they would have been at a loss. If they had ever identified me at all, it would have only been because I was the only one whose name they didn’t remember. I had perfected the art of being invisible.

Most people consider being invisible a bad thing. They long for attention, for recognition. They can’t understand that those are the very things that I wanted to, needed to avoid at all cost. If I had never become accustomed to receiving attention, I wouldn’t ever go to terrible lengths to achieve it. And if I never got used to recognition, it wouldn’t hurt when I was suddenly and inexplicably ignored. It’s much more enjoyable to have never tasted heaven than to be told it was a mistake and sent back the other way. That was what happened to Everett Johnson.

It’s quite sad, actually. Everett was an only child, beloved by his parents and family. They had encouraged him to be himself, to be unique. So he was. The only problem was that children are just like adults: different equals outcast. I still remember my first day in kindergarten. Everett had walked in, a new T-shirt bought especially for his first day of school draped across his skinny shoulders, expecting to be loved and accepted by all. If only that T-shirt hadn’t sported a llama, he might have had a chance to pretend he was the same as everyone else. But as it was, llamas were a big ‘no-no’ in the Kindergarten Cool handbook. He was instantly dubbed “the llama freak.” From then on he was universally shunned. Then his parents started fighting. Suddenly, with his parents on the edge of a sticky divorce, he was missing the loving attention they had always given him; they were too busy with their own problems to notice him. Everett had become completely invisible—at home and at school—and he couldn’t stand it. Shaking my head, I watched as Everett desperately sought for recognition, as he desperately sought her attention. The poor boy just didn’t understand. It only hurt more when you wanted to be recognized. Everett was one reason I always made sure I stayed forgotten. I didn’t want to become desperate like him.

It wasn’t hard to maintain my invisibility. Being invisible was just like breathing to me. At school I just never did anything to draw attention to myself. I wasn’t a part of any group, but I wasn’t a loner either. I was constantly on the fringes, just far enough away to not actually be a part of the group yet just close enough to not stand out. My outfits were carefully crafted so as not to gain notice. I never did exceedingly well in my classes, yet I never did terribly either. My grades were average, as was everything else about me. I was never a part of any committee or a member of any club or sports team. At school, it was easy to be invisible. And at home, I’d always gone unnoticed. As the fifth of eight children—all girls—it’s only to be expected. After all, I was no more special than any of my sisters; in fact, I was less so. Ariel was the oldest and Susannah the smartest. Then came the twins: Maria, the star athlete, and Becca, the family rebel. Last of all there was Josie, the prettiest of the family, and Carrie, mother and father’s “little princess.” And me? I was just Lola, the one who washed the dishes on Monday and took out the trash on Thursday, squeezed right between a set of identical twins and a beautiful sister. And that’s how it always was. At times, I greatly envied my sisters and the attention that they received, both good and bad. But I knew it would never be for me. I would always be invisible. It was better that way.

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Good. Wellington had just called on Laura again. Considering the question and her ‘oh so enthusiastic’ response, it would be a while before he turned his attention back to the rest of us drooling Neanderthals. I glanced around the rest of the classroom. No one was really listening anyway. Now was the perfect time. I casually slipped a piece of folded paper and a stub pencil out of my cargo pants pocket. Discretely observing my fellow classmates I pondered what to write. Yes, that would do. I quickly scrawled a sentence on the scrap paper. Lola Boulevarde tried to commit suicide last Wednesday in the girl’s locker room. Satisfied, I tossed the note onto my girlfriend’s desk in front of me. It would be all over the school by the end of the day. But by then it would have Lola about to commit suicide with a rope made of Warrington’s dirty sweat socks when, all of a sudden, Coach Peter barges into the girl’s locker room professing his undying love for her—complete with dialog and description (“her eyes sparkled like the night sky as she realized she loved him in return…”). I almost had to laugh at the stupidity of it all. Not only was it a complete and total lie, but no one would ever guess that it was I, Andrew Zambino, who was the source of all the school’s best rumors. After all, I was captain of the football team and a guy; I was the last one they ever suspected. If anything, they probably thought it was all the work of my girlfriend, Emma Harris. As the school gossip, such rumors were always labeled as ‘her work’. However, that idea was as artificial as the rumors themselves. I mean, yes, it was certainly her big mouth that spread the stories. But those skillful fabrications were all mine.

Actually, now that I think about it, many of the things that were considered fact at the school had started at my hand. Take, for example, Everett Johnson. He’s a strange kid what with his llamas and all, but the rumor about him was top notch work. All it took was a little hint to Emma, a mention that Everett’s parents were getting a divorce. The news spread like wildfire. And, unlike some rumors, everyone believed this one. After all, it gave an explanation as to why he was so weird. People wanted to believe it. No one likes a mystery. Even in those detective novels, the hero is trying to solve the case so that it’s not a mystery anymore.

But why did a guy like me feel the need to make up wild tales about his classmates? Some might say it was because I enjoyed seeing my fellow human beings suffering, but that’s not true. I didn’t enjoy seeing people in pain, and that certainly wasn’t my original goal. People just ended up hurt as an unavoidable consequence to my rumors. I didn’t try to hurt them. And it wasn’t just because I had an over-active imagination, though that certainly contributed. No, I loved the powerful feeling that came with creating a successful rumor. I lived off of that energy surge. In fact, that extra rush was what drove me to star levels as the high school quarterback. Having control over other people’s lives made me feel invincible. After all, no one could hurt God.

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Please tell me what you think! If you have any suggestions or ideas of what you might want to see in this story I would greatly appreciate hearing from you. :)

Reviewer Responses (this story only):

LiKePiNk: I'm glad you thought it was successful, and I hope you enjoy this chapter as well. Thanks!

Luneko: You flatter me. :) Thank you so much for your criticism that the characters should be more rounded and deep. Now all I have to do is figure out how to do it! I'm not sure how much success I will have in this particular story when making round characters. Just the way this story is set up, it's almost impossible to not have rather two-dimensional characters. Though, perhaps that helps with seeing different skewed point of views? (I can only hope!) Well, I just hope that perhaps you get some enjoyment out of this fic either way.

VTvivian: Thank you! I'm glad you thought it was convincing. That was what I was going for.

Galleena: Yes, I do agree with you. Sometimes you just need a break from all of the angst. Though in all honesty, I wasn't really thinking about any of that when I was writing the story. :) It just came out! Thank you so much for the review and I'm glad you liked it!

Aslan Israel: Wow! I'm glad you like it so much. Hopefully this chapter did not dissapoint.

yourxtuesday: Thank you! My goal was to show both people's differences and similarities, and the different views that can come from it. I'm so glad you liked it. :)