She's had it easy her whole life.
Adored by all and hated by none, at worst ignored and left alone.
Everybody liked Monika.
She and I went back a long way, back to the kindergarten days actually.
I do not remember seeing her for the first time, but I remember the day I noticed her.
One thing I liked back then, and even now too, was drawing. And kindergarten was great because drawing was a daily activity, unlike in schools in later years.
Most of time the teacher gave us free rein as to what to draw, but often the task was designed to inspire imagination, like how the world would look like a hundred years from now.
I remember that one specifically because that's when I first talked to Monika.
She was a bubbly girl who never just sat with one friend, always moving around and hanging out with different kids every day. I suppose everybody was her friend in her eyes, while I was a type who asked my Mom once why I had to call the kids in my 'classmates' when they were not really my mates, but just some randos I got stuck with.
So this once, Monika sat next to me, when we were told to 'draw the future.'
I immediately had a great idea of drawing the future as a post-apocalyptic world. A bit too 'dark' for a 6-year-old? Perhaps. But I thought it was cool and original. I was an edgelord before I even learned the word.
I drew a city in ruins, corpses on the ground. Beasts with horns flying in the burning sky, spitting fire from its mouth.
Then this girl, Monika, exclaimed.
"Wow! That's so cool!"
I didn't know her well back then, and I wasn't that outgoing in the first place so mostly did things on my own, so maybe, that was the first time anybody other than the teacher who praised my drawing.
I was quite pleased.
Inspired and excited, I got to work, adding the details, trying my best to color everything perfectly so that they didn't spill over the outlines.
Monika just sat and watched me draw for a while, fascinated.
Then I asked her, perhaps just to be a little friendly for a change.
"Aren't you going to draw as well?"
"Oh, right!"
The silly girl slapped her forehead with her palm as if she had forgotten. I thought it was kind of cute.
We then spent the next few minutes in silence. We were immersed in our own drawings, and just as when I was about ten or fifteen minutes away from finishing, Monika leaned on me and shoved her sketchpad in front of my face.
"How does it look?" She asked.
I was more confused than shocked when I first saw the picture.
It was pretty much a copy of what I was drawing, composition-wise. Even the bodies lying on the ground and the creature in the sky was exactly in the same position as mine. However, she Monika-nized(a word that became popular some years after the incident) the picture.
There were flowers growing around the dead bodies. The horned beast was more like an alicorn. Instead of spitting fire it was shooting rainbows. The sky was the same red but it wasn't burning, rather, it was filled with rose petals.
"Why did you copy my picture?" I asked her, irritated.
"I just thought your picture looked really cool, hehe," she said, as if she had done nothing wrong.
"You can't just do that. This is my idea."
"I made it better though."
"How?"
"Mine's happier!"
And with that, she got up, ran to the teacher with her sketchpad.
From a distance I saw the teacher smile and pat on the pest's head.
I was annoyed, but whatever.
I knew mine was better, so I kept on working on it.
I managed to finish the picture with not much time left, and the picture turned out perfectly. It wasn't always the case that I was satisfied with my own drawings, for I set a very high standard for myself, but this one was something I thought was really good.
When I brought the sketchpad to the teacher, though, her reaction wasn't what I expected.
"This is good, but Blaire, isn't this Monika's idea?"
I was shocked. Paralyzed with anger and fear — am I going to get in trouble now?
But the teacher, Ms. Chamberlain, was kind. She knelt down on the floor to bring her eyes level with me, placed her palm on my shoulder, and comforted me.
"You are very good at drawing, Blaire. You don't need to follow anybody else's idea. You have a good imagination yourself!"
I cried in frustration.
That was only the start.
For weeks and months followed, Monika sat next to me every time we were told to draw something. And every single time, she copied my idea and finished the picture before I could finish mine, without fail.
The teacher grew more concerned each time because I, Blaire, once praised in every art class for my drawings, was suddenly becoming a copycat. She never told me off, but I received countless lectures about how I should believe in myself more and be more confident in my own ability.
And I never told Ms. Chamberlain it was Monika who was copying me. Every time, I just stood there and listened in frustration.
"Blaire!"
My daydream of the bad old days shattered at the sound of the cheerful voice calling my name, the voice that was a bit too familiar to me for my liking.
"You are late again."
I told Monika, putting out my cigarette on the concrete.
"I'm sorry, heh, and geez— you stink!"
"Shut up."
Giving me a frown of disapproval for my bad habit, Monika took out the lollipop from her mouth and shoved it into mine.
"Eat this."
She ruffled my hooded head, then turned and led the way.
I still don't like this girl.