“That’s what you keep saying,” Nick shot back, “And yet it’s funny how not a single rumor has shown up about you.” Sure, there had been rumors in there about a couple of Maddie’s siblings, but maybe the girl just did that to throw people off. It was just hard for Nick to believe it was anyone else, when the only person who had known she had stolen that space heater was Maddie.
Although she wasn’t typically a grudge holding kind of girl, when it came to Maddie, sometimes she just couldn’t help it. “Right, because I’m totally the kind of person who would write terrible things about people.” She remarked sarcastically. The other girl made a good point though, it was funny that she hadn’t gotten in trouble for stealing the heater; apparently leadership had bigger things to worry about or something. The way she saw it she got away lucky, because normally something like that would have been looked into.
Again she found herself rolling her eyes at Maddie’s remark. It was one she was fairly certain parent’s just used to scare kids into being happy. “Maybe you should take your own advice,” she pointed out, her tone snarky. “Wow, I’m…impressed, sort of.” Nick wasn’t mean enough to not acknowledge that Maddie had done something nice, even if it seemed sort of out of character. “That would have sucked,” she agreed. “Ledger’s a cute kid.” Nick had dealt with him from time to time in the daycare.
Great, so a three year old really was more worthy of Maddie’s friendship than she was. Well, that kind of sucked. “Maybe you aren’t so bad, kids can usually pick on people’s true natures,” she commented. “Or he just hasn’t spent that much time with you.” Sometimes Nick didn’t think Maddie was as mean as she wanted people to think, but those times were few and far between.
Taking a deep breath, Nick tried to tell herself to stay calm, Maddie just wanted her to get upset. “Fine, whatever.” She answered sharply, not willing to get into and argument here and now. She scowled at Maddie’s dig, sure she was called ‘Runt’ because she was baby of the family, but it wasn’t because she was scrawny. “I’m not scrawny, and that’s cute, now you’re saying my family should have killed me? That’s low, even for you.” Okay, so maybe that wasn’t what Maddie was saying, but that’s kind of how Nick heard it.
She wasn’t even sure if she should acknowledge that comment, because clearly it was one meant to get a response from her. “And what exactly do you expect the kids to pay you in?” Nick commented instead. Figuring the whole part of this conversation was out there anyway, why not continue it. When Maddie started walking away, Nick was kind of relieved. It wasn’t that she actually enjoyed fighting with her or anything, and yet she couldn’t stop herself from adding. “You should hang that picture on your wall as proof that you can be nice.”