ANYTHING AND EVERYTHING
Chapter Fifteen

Friday, November 4, 2005

Jack, Rose, Tommy, Autumn, Fabrizio, and Adrienne were walking to their lockers when Autumn said something.

"You guys...you know my cousin Cassandra? Well, she is coming here for a month from Mexico and she is going to be coming to school here. And she has to stay at my house," Autumn said.

"You mean your dorky cousin from those family pictures you have?" Adrienne asked her friend.

"Yeah. But my mom said we have to be nice to her and make her feel welcome." Autumn laughed. They made disgusted faces until they heard the door to the school open. They turned around. Autumn’s cousin looked totally different. She had on a gold halter top that was practically see-through and black pants with gold boots. Her black hair was up in a high ponytail and it looked like a horse’s mane was coming out of her head. She was walking like she was the most popular person in the world, with half of the guys in the school staring at her in awe. She came up to her cousin and her cousin’s friends.

"Hey, Cassie," Autumn said, surprised that her cousin looked like this. Cassandra had come from the airport at about three AM, and Autumn had fallen asleep by then, so she hadn’t seen her until now.

"Um...don’t call me Cassie anymore. My name is Cassandra!" she exclaimed, and then looked at Rose, Adrienne, Jack, Tommy, and Fabrizio. "And who are your little friends here?"

"That’s Rose, Adrienne, Jack, Tommy, and Fabrizio," Autumn told her, giving her a mean look for getting so mean about the Cassie incident. Everyone else was already getting a bad feeling about this girl, but they still said hello to her.

"I guess it was nice to meet you all. I’d better go to my locker," Cassandra muttered.

Rose took Jack by the hand, and said, "Come on, Jack. Let’s get away from her." Once they were in their classroom and sitting down, Rose asked, "Jack, you weren’t staring at her like those other guys were, were you?"

Jack looked shocked that she would think that, but he said, "Rose, you are the one and only girl I will ever love. You trust me, don’t you?"

"I love you, too, and I trust you."

"Good."

*****

Later, Jack, Rose, Adrienne, Tommy, and Fabrizio were at Adrienne’s house, and they were all spending the night and were waiting for Autumn to get there. The doorbell finally rang, and they got up to answer it. They saw Autumn standing there with her purse and huge overnight bag. Autumn, Rose, and Adrienne always overpacked. They looked behind Autumn, saw Cassandra there, and sighed. They already hated that girl.

Autumn mumbled, "My mom made me bring her," and everyone nodded.

"Hey, Cassie...uh…I mean Cassandra," Adrienne said, trying to be nice. "Why don’t we all go swim in my pool?"

All seven of them put their swimsuits on, grabbed some towels, and went outside to Adrienne’s pool. Rose, Adrienne, Autumn, Jack, Tommy, and Fabrizio all got into the pool, but when they asked Cassandra to come in, she just sat on a deck chair, and said, "Ugh...no. I don’t swim."

After a few moments of awkward silence, Tommy said, "Let’s play basketball in the pool!" He pointed to the basketball hoop that was on one side of Adrienne’s pool. The others agreed. They had three teams, Jack and Rose, Tommy and Autumn, and Fabri and Adrienne.

They were playing for a while when Rose jumped on Jack’s back, and screamed, "Let’s play like this!"

Autumn got on Tommy’s back and Adrienne got on Fabri’s when Rose tried to get the basketball from Adrienne. When she couldn’t get it, Rose whined, "Jack! She won’t give me the basketball!"

Jack started laughing. Everyone else laughed, too, and Adrienne said, "You want the basketball, you come get it!"

Adrienne tried to throw the basketball across the pool, but she had bad aim and it went way over the fence.

Autumn said to her cousin, "Cassandra! Will you go get the basketball for us?"

Cassandra looked over the fence, made a face, and said, "Ugh...no."

Adrienne pretty much lost it, and yelled, "I have about had it with you, Cassandra! You are always sitting on your ass and you are always rude to people! Hell, we didn’t do anything to you! So, go get the damned basketball!"

Cassandra called her a bitch and got up to get the basketball. When she got to the other side of the fence, they all got dressed and went inside. When Cassandra came back, she didn’t see them, so she went inside to try to find them.

When she saw the six of them in the living room talking, she got mad, and yelled, "What made you decide to ditch me?"

"Chill out, cousin. We just felt like going inside," Autumn told her bitchy cousin, who was getting very impatient.

"Well, you could have told me," Cassandra insisted.

"Or we could have not told you, which is what we did," Jack said, and everyone laughed except Cassandra. Just then, the doorbell rang.

"Oh, that’s the pizza we ordered!" Fabrizio said, and he got up to answer the door.

The delivery man was standing there with three boxes of pizza. He said, "That will be twenty-nine dollars."

Fabrizio turned around towards the living room, where everyone else was, and yelled, "Adrienne! Bring me the pizza money!"

Adrienne came to the door. They paid the pizza man, brought the pizza to the living room, and sat down. Everyone except Cassandra took some and started eating.

"Cassandra? Aren’t you eating anything?" Rose asked, trying to be kind to her friend’s cousin.

"I don’t eat pizza!" she snapped.

"You don’t do anything fun," Tommy muttered under his breath, but Cassandra didn’t seem to hear him.

"Uh...Adrienne? Do you have anything else to eat?" Cassandra asked.

"Do you think I order pizza every night? No! Go to the fridge and get something," Adrienne told her. She was getting very annoyed at this girl’s attitude, but tried to be nice, since she was her friend’s cousin. Cassandra got up, went to the refrigerator, got something out, and went back to the living room.

"Dude, let’s watch a movie or something," Tommy suggested.

"How about Mean Girls?" asked Autumn, holding up the movie that she had gotten out of Adrienne’s DVD cabinet that was under the TV.

"Ugh…no. Chick flick," Fabrizio said, and took Titanic out of the cabinet.

"Talk about a chick flick. That’s a total romance movie," Rose said teasingly, even though she was happy to watch it because it was her favorite movie.

"Hey, at least we guys don’t cry at the end," Jack joked. Adrienne hit him on the arm, took the movie from Fabri, and put it in the DVD player.

*****

The next morning, Adrienne and Fabrizio woke up on one of the couches in the living room and saw that Autumn, Tommy, and Cassandra had all woken up. Autumn and Tommy were eating leftover pizza for breakfast, but Cassandra was just sitting in a chair, reading a magazine. Adrienne wondered why Cassandra was so conceited, but pushed that thought from her mind as she tried to be nice to her. Adrienne and Fabrizio went over to Autumn and Tommy, who were sitting at the kitchen table, and got some pizza. They started talking and eating.

"Look at the lovebirds on the couch!" Fabrizio said, pointing to Jack and Rose, who were sleeping snuggled next to each other on one of the couches.

"Should we wake them up?" Autumn asked teasingly.

"Aw...they look so peaceful," Adrienne commented, even though she thought it would be funny to wake them.

"So? It’s almost 11:30, and we don’t want to wait all day for them to wake up," said Tommy.

"We did go to sleep at, like, five o’clock this morning, so they have a reason to sleep in," Autumn told them.

"Well, we are all up, so I am waking them up, too," Tommy said.

"And I am helping!" Fabrizio said.

The four of them walked over to the couch that Jack and Rose were sleeping on. Tommy grabbed a pillow, hit them with it, and yelled, "Hey, you lovebirds! Get your asses out of bed!"

Jack sat up, and groggily asked, "What?" He moved his arm, accidentally pushing Rose off the couch.

She sat up on the floor, and screeched, "Jack! What was that for?"

"Oh, honey, I’m sorry! It’s their fault...they hit me with a pillow!" Jack told her, and offered his hand to help her up. But Rose declined his offer and started hitting him with a pillow for revenge.

The six of them were having a pillow fight when they heard Cassandra say, "You guys are being very disturbing. Think you could keep it a little quieter?"

The others rolled their eyes. Everything would've been perfect if it wasn't for Cassandra.

Chapter Sixteen
Stories