"Ouch!" I yelled as I fell onto the floor.
"Sorry bout
that!" my best guy friend AJ said to me as
he held out his hand to help
me off the ground.
"I'm sure you are!" I replied. It was always
like AJ to
act like a nut case - especially around me.
"Hey E, what
are you doing tonight?" AJ asked me as
he readjusted his sunglasses on his
nose.
"Nothing so far," I told him.
"Want to get together?
We could shoot some hoops.
Brian beat me at the last game and I'm dying to
play
him. You could come along too...."
"Sure, what time?"
"Uh...7?"
he told me while shrugging his shoulders.
"Kay, see you then."
I replied as I turned around
only to be knocked to the floor a second time
by
my best friend Jessie.
"Lezleeeeeeeeeeee!" she yelled as she fell
on
top of me.
"Do you always have to make such a grand
entrance?"
I asked her as I shoved her off of me and
started to gather up my binder and
daytimer off the ground.
"Yes I do!" she said smiling as she
tossed her blond hair
over her shoulder and shifted her book bag.
"Well
at the rate you and AJ keep doing this, I'm
going to be permanently crippled!"
I said laughing at
my own joke. Jessie laughed and then started over to
her
locker as I followed behind her.
We stood there for a few seconds as Jessie
fumbled with her lock until it finally opened. She
grabbed her stuff and
then the two of us
headed off for the bus stop.
"Guess who?"
a weird voice asked me as they
covered my eyes when we got to the bus stop.
I
had no clue who it was.
"Uh.... Sean...Mark...AJ…Nick?
I dunno...Jess
help me out!" I pleaded.
"God! You can't even figure out who I
am?"
the voice said. At that point I knew it was Nick. He
took his hands
away from me and then turned me
around to give me a big hug.
"Well
sorry but with that weird voice you
sounded more like Mrs. Lange than anyone!"
"Ahhhhh!" shrieked Nick as he crinkled up his face at
the thought
of being compared to our math
teacher Mrs. Lange.
"Nasty!"
Jess laughed and I gave Nick a smug look.
We talked for a few more minutes until
the
bus came to take us home.
~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~
"Mom, I'm
home..." I called from the front
entrance of our two story Florida home.
No answer.
"Mom?" I called again. I slipped off my shoes, walked
through the hall, through the kitchen and out the back
door into our backyard
where I found my mom
swimming I our pool.
"Hi mom!" I yelled
as she came up for water.
"Hi honey! How was school?"
"Fine..."
"What did you do?"
"Nothing."
"How
can one 17 year old like you not do nothing?" she
asked me as she shielded
her eyes from the hot sun.
"I dunno..." I replied. Every day it
was the same old
thing. She'd ask me what I did, and I'd reply nothing.
"Well,
there are some brownies on the counter and
there's lemonade in the fridge,"
my mom said just as she
dove back into the water to cool down.
When she
surfaced again I told her I was going over to
Nick's in a bit and then went inside
to call Jess. But not
before I had grabbed some brownies and a glass of
lemonade
before my siblings got to the whole pan.
~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~
"Don't
you two ever go home?" I asked as I opened
the door to my room. Jessie and
AJ were sitting
contently on my bed eating Fudgee-O's and listening
to my
Sugar Ray cd.
"No..." AJ replied his mouth coated with chocolate.
"Let me guess," I said as I walked over to my window
and looked
out, "You two climbed the trellis, got
on the roof and pried open my window."
"How'd you guess?" Jess said, her voice
dripping with sarcasm.
"She's onto us PJ!" AJ said to Jess who we called
PJ most of
the time.
"You know, one of these days you two are gonna
break your
necks climbing into my room and I'm gonna
have to sympathy for you!" I said
with a grin as I
flopped down onto my window seat.
"Well gotta go!"
AJ said abruptly as he grabbed
three more Fudge-O's and shoved them into his
mouth
before mumbling a good bye to us and leaving.
"Well, well,
well...wasn't that your
dream come true?" PJ said mischievously.
"AJ
on your bed - and you, just dying to get it
on with him. Too bad I was here!"
she said laughing.
"Yeah, and it's too bad he doesn't know!" I
replied.
Jess was my best friend, and the only one I had ever
told about
my crush on AJ.
Ever since I had met AJ way back in third grade,
I had
fallen for him. It was just something about him.
He was always so spontaneous
and so upbeat that I
fell for him instantly.
However, I had never had the
guts to tell him.
"When are you gonna spill it to him?" PJ asked
me.
Her head on the floor, her legs and body on my bed
as she dangled over
the edge.
"I can't. Aside from you, he's my best friend. We've
been
friends forever...I don't know how he'd take
it." I said as I shoved a Fudgee-O
in my mouth.
"Well, eventually you're gonna have to tell," she
said.
"Yeah I know."
"Hmm...Lezlee Kaitlin Dawson
and Alexander
James McLean...I think it has a nice ring to it!" Jess
said
as she picked up the phone.
"WHO ARE YOU CALLING?" I asked
reaching
for the phone.
"For god's sake! Brian!" Jess said as she dialed
her
boyfriend and my friend Brian, he was friends with
myself, AJ, Nick and
Jess. He was older than AJ, Nick,
Jess and I but none the less he acted like
he was three
years younger than us!
"Hi Bri!" Jess squealed
into the phone. I rolled my eyes
as she kicked me. The two talked about getting
together
tonight at which point I said I was going over to
Nick's to play
AJ in basketball. "Ok, well uh...Lezlee's
coming too, so why don't we all
see you at about 6:45
or so at Nick's?" she confirmed. Bri said yes,
so
it was settled. Jess hung up the phone and stood up.
"SHIT!" I
yelled as I looked at the clock, "Only
30 minutes to get ready!"
"Oh
brother.... you're getting done up to go sweat
and play basketball with 3 guys.
2 of which you aren't
even interested in, and one who you won't even tell you
like!" Jess said rolling her eyes, but none the less she
sat me down
in front of my make up
desk and plugged in my hot rollers.
She pulled
my hair into a ponytail, wrapped some hair
around the elastic and started to
roll in some hot rollers
for curl. She then did my make up and threw me
some
hip huggers and a Baby - G tank top
from my closet and my Nike runners. I got
changed,
took out the hot roller and threw my shoes on as Jess
fixed her
Capri pants and T-shirt and threw on
her sandals.
