Chapter 15
"Carter!" I yelled at him as I crossed the street. He was outside shooting
some hoops.
"What?" he yelled without even bothering to turn
and look at me.
"This," I said as I marched in front of him and
shoved the letter in his
face. He backed up in order to focus in on the letter.
"What about it?" Nick asked looking puzzled.
"You took the
letter I wrote out of the garbage can and re-wrote it and
sent it to me, just
to spite me and show me you knew," I said talking a mile
a minute and making
no sense.
"Huh? Say what?"
"I wrote this letter to
AJ," I said talking slowly and emphasizing each
syllable as I went along,
"You took it out of the garbage can after I
crumpled it up. You took it
home. You read it. You laughed at me. You
thought it would be funny to send it
back to me. Well you though wrong," I
told him as I grabbed the collar if
his Orlando Magic basketball jersey.
"What are you on?" Nick asked
me.
"Don't play dumb Nick, you're the only one I know insensitive enough
to
pull something dumb like this."
"I swear, I didn't do it."
"Don't lie to me Nick."
"Look, I would never do something
like this to you." I loosened my grip and
looked in his eyes. He looked
hurt, I knew I had made a mistake.
"Do you swear on our friendship that
you didn't?" I asked him as I bit my
bottom lip.
"Yes. I swear,"
he said putting up his hands as if he wasn't guilty. I
dropped his shirt and
opened up the letter.
"Then who did this?" I asked him. He shrugged
his shoulders and offered a
suggestion as to who the mystery person was.
"You know it could be Ashley," he said. I shook my head.
"No,
at the bottom of the letter there was a smiley face and then a little
B. Ashley
wouldn't be happy if she found the letter and her name starts with
an A."
"Ahhh! But you see, if Ashley found the letter she would be happy because
now
she can blackmail you with it, and her middle name is Brianne. See! B is
her
middle initial. It'd be a good throw off for you!" Nick said offering
his
solution. I thought about it for a minute. Nick did have a point.
Ashley's
middle name was Brianne, and she would be happy if she found it.
After all this
was major blackmail material.
"That bitch!" I said as I opened
up the letter again. The more I looked at
the smiley face and the B, the more
it looked like Ashley's writing.
"So what are you gonna do?" Nick
asked.
"Nothing, what can I do?"
"Well, you could...gee...I
don't know..." he said as he scratched the back
of his head.
"I
guess I'll just pretend like I don't know. If I act like I didn't get
the letter
then maybe she won't bring it up."
"Yeah, that'd be good."
"Well then, I guess that settles it. As far as you and I know there was no
letter
and I uh...came over here to borrow...your math notes. There! Our
little secret?"
I asked holding my hand out to him. He shook it.
"Deal!"
"And look, I'm sorry about calling you insensitive.."
"It's
okay, I know you love me!" he said with a smile on his face, "Hey,
while
you're here do you want to play ball with me?"
"Sure," I replied
as he shot me the ball. I stuck the letter in my pocket
and started to play ‘21'
with him. For a few seconds I felt like my life was
back on track.
* ~
* ~ * ~ * ~ *
"Hey Jess, so you wanna do something tonight?" I
asked Jessie as we hopped
in her Jeep.
"Sure, I's not like I have
anything else to do," she said as she started
the ignition and drove out
of the parking lot of our school. The plan was
going perfectly. It was Friday,
the night of Jess' party and she had no clue
what was going on.
"Okay,
well why don't we grab a movie?" I asked trying to sound
unrehearsed.
"Fine with me!" she said and turned up the radio. It was her favourite
song.
"Oh baby baby, how was I supposed to know, that something
wasn't right
here," we both sang at the top of our lungs.
"Oh
baby baby I shouldn't have let you go," Jess sang. She suspected
nothing.
This was great. By the time the song had finished we had pulled up
in front of
my house.
"Kay, I'll see you tonight, how about 8:00?" I asked.
"Well, I might be at the mall until 8:00," she said. This was not good.
"Well, uh...you see....I want to see ‘Shakespeare In Love' and uh...it
starts
at 9:00, so be here at 8:30. Please?" I begged lying through my teeth
all
the while.
"Well," she hesitated. Please? I though to myself. "Ok,
but I thought you
didn't want to see that movie at all?"
"I
uh...changed my mind. Nick said it was good," dumb move I thought. Nick
probably
didn't even know who Shakespeare was unless he has been associated
with sports.
"Nick recommended it?" she said rasing her eyebrow.
"Yeah,
his mom made him see it," I said. That was a good one.
"Oh, well
that makes sense. It's not like he'd have gone on his own!" she
said with
a laugh. I laughed to and breathed a sigh of relief that she had
bought my awful
lying job.
"Alright, so 8:30?" I asked.
"8:30 it is,"
she said as drove off.
"Phew," I said as I walked up the stairs
and into my house. "Shit! I forgot
to get her a gift!" I said as I
slammed my hand on my forehead.
"Honey, why are you talking to yourself?'
my mom called from the living
room.
"Uh...nothing...mom, can I borrow
the Land Rover?" I asked as I walked into
where she was.
"Pleeeeese?"
I asked batting my eyelashes.
"Oh Alright, but one scratch or dent and
your father will kill you. I mean
it!' she said as I grabbed the keys off the
hook at the front door.
"I'll be back at about 8:00. I have to get Jess
a present for her
birthday," I called as I shut the door. I got in the car
and drove of to
Orlando Centre off of Sunset Blvd.
I parked, went inside
and started to look
for a gift. When I had finally settled on a baby blue Baby-G
watch for Jess
I headed out towards the car. Hey, the watch was the same as her
one before
until it broke. But I know how much she loved that watch. It never
left her
wrist.
* ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ *
"Wow! Looking great,"
I called to Jess who has set her hair up into a
french twist and stuck in some
hair chopsticks. She had on a white Tommy
tank top with a tiny tommy flag at
the top and her dark denim Tommy Capri
pants with the Tommy flag on the zipper.
And on her feet she had some tan
platform tami mat print sandals.
"Hey
isn't that the outfit Britney Spears is wearing in the new Tommy
ad's?"
I asked her.
"Yep! You're looking at a Miss Britney-Spears-Wannabee!"
she said with a
smile. I rolled my eyes.
"Come on or we'll be late,"
I told her as we got onto her Jeep.
"So this movie is supposed to be
decent?" she asked as we backed up.
"Yeah...oh crap," I said
as I pretended to look through my purse for
something, "I forgot my cell
at Nick's house yesterday and I'll need it to
call my mom with tonight,"
I said lying once again.
"Well, we can stop and pick it up. I left my
bracelet there too," she said.
How perfect can this get? I though. We
pulled up at Nick's house and the
both of us got out. We walked up. The gates
were closed. They were never
closed. This was not in the plan. I pushed the buzzer
anyway.
"Hello?" asked Nick.
"Nick let us in. Jess
needs her bracelet back and I need my cell.," I told
him.
"No."
said Nick.
"Uh...Nick I need my cell," I said repeating myself.
How dumb could he be?
We had made the code like 10 minutes ago.
"No."
"Nick, let me in!" I yelled. I couldn't figure out the hell what he was
doing.
"Fine! I was just playing! Use the back, ok?" he said
into the intercom.
Jessie laughed as the iron gates swung open and we walked
in and headed
along the stone path to the backyard. It was pretty dark and neither
of us
really knew where we were going.
"SURPRISE!" everyone
yelled as the huge spotlights came on us and a couple
of rounds of fireworks
were shot off from on top of the garage roof.
"What?" Jess said
her eyes bugging out as Howie snapped a couple of
"shocked" pics.
"Happy Birthday!" yelled Brian as he ran up to us and gave Jess a big kiss.
"Oh my god," she said as she put her hand over her mouth, "You guys
are
awesome!" The lantern turned on and you could see the mass of people
in
Nick's backyard.
There were streamers, balloons, Pineata's and Chinese
lanterns from one end of the yard to the another. It looked great and I
could
see a whole big buffet table set out with food and drinks. Everyone
came up to
Jess and said their hello's and happy birthday's and then we got
to partying.
Nick had moved the trampoline so now we had a whole dance
floor.
Two
huge speakers blasted out "Baby One More Time" cause we all knew
it
was Jess' favourite song and we got her to do the whole dance for it on
the mock
stage in the corner. It was great. We danced on for a while longer
and then we
started to open gifts. Jess practically knocked me over with her
hug when she
opened my gift. And she practically killed Brian when she saw
the silver diamond
ring he gave her It fit perfectly on her middle finger.
The inscription read
"Forever Mine" - it was so sweet. When the guys saw it
they all harassed
Bri about "tying the knot" but we all knew that he wasn't
planning
on it any time soon. After the gifts had been opened we ate cake
and Jess blew
out the 18 candles on her birthday cake. We socialized for a
whole longer and
then the BSB took centre stage.
"Hi everybody, I just want to thank
you for coming to PJ's party," Brian
began, "But know I want to sing
her a song with the rest of the guys here.
Is that Alright?" he asked. Everyone
cheered and soon the boys began to
sing.
They were absolutely amazing.
Their perfect a cappella harmonies
filled the room. I recognized the song immediately,
it was "Just To Be Close
To You".
"Like a flower to a
tree, that how close I wanna be, To your heart" Howie
sang. The boys blended
so well. We were all in awe, especially Jess who
started to bawl when Brian sang.
He came over and bent down on one knee and
sang to her.
Everyone "awww"ed
and watched on but it was me who was
completely mesmerized when AJ sang his verse.
I couldn't believe it. I had
heard AJ sing before but it was nothing like this.
I watched him as he
perfectly executed every note. I watched him until he looked
up and caught
eyes with me. I couldn't help but smile. It was at that point that
I knew I
was more in love with AJ than ever before.
