Baby Just Say Yes

Three Years Ago

"Rayleigh, come here!" Her mother told her exasperatedly. "I need to talk to you."

"Mom, I'm a little busy." She replied to her mother through the heavy oak door, quickly exiting out of the program she had running on her laptop. She opened up the Internet and went to youtube and typed in a random video so it wouldn't look suspicous to her mother.

"I mean it, Rayleigh. Right now. If you don't open the door, I'll have your father open it."

"Daddy wouldn't invade my privacy." Rayleigh replied. Just then, she heard her phone go off across the room. "Shit!" she whispered.

"What was that, Rayleigh?" Her mother asked suspicously.

"Um...my CD Player...hang on." She told her mother rushedly, running to her phone and turning it off. Her parents weren't aware that she had a phone. Of course, if they did, they'd moniter every person she talked to, what was said, when it was said, and if she could talk to the person again. As had happened for her entire life. She wasn't about to let them find out she was still talking to her friends that they considered 'bad influences.' Like Matt, Johnny, Zacky, and Jimmy. And Brian. How could she forget about Brian? The boy she'd had a crush on since she'd met him seven years ago, when she was seven years old. She sighed happily and opened her bedroom door.
"What were you doing on the computer that took so long?" her mother enquired, walking over to the laptop. Rayleigh smiled, knowing her mother wouldn't be able to find her chat dialogue. She kept it locked and hidden in a file within a file within a file, and even her mother wasn' t meticulous to dig through every single file on her daughter's comptuer. Her nose wrinkled when she saw the video playing on youtube.

"It's a local band." She explained to her mother.

"With those unruly boys that you like to chum around with." Her mother told her disprovingly. "I don't want you around them, you know that, Rayleigh."

"And I don't care. They're my friends."

"They're hoodlums."

"They're cool." She argued back. Her mother sighed.

"No, Rayleigh Anne. They're a bad influence, and if you continue to talk to them, they will only lead you down a road of drugs and alcohol and sex and--"

"Mom, stop. They're not that bad when you get to know them." Rayleigh cut her mother off.

"...I mean, seriously, Rayleigh. How many teenage girls have they impregnated that they don't even know about?" Her mother continued.

"None, mother." Rayleigh rolled her eyes. She was used to this whole schpeil. Her mother did this regularly when she discovered any ties whatsoever to her friends that weren't from church or choir.

"...Especially that Brian. He's the worst of the lot. What with playing that...that..." She started.

"Guitar." Rayleigh rattled off immediately.

"Yes. That instrument of the devil. And his fake I.D. And not to mention how many times Mrs. Alison has heard from Mrs. Weber that he's been seen with skanks."

"Mom, that's not true. You can't listen to hearsy." She told her mother.

"But I am your mother, and I don't want you around them." She told her, stopping her rant.

"I'm fourteen, mom. I can choose who I hang out with."

"If they're from the church, then yes, you can. But other than that, no, you may not." her mother told her sternly.

"Whatever. I have to go to the mall."

"Oh! You're going shopping!" She told her daughter excitedly. "Do you need any money?"

Rayleigh inwardly smiled. This worked every time she used it, no matter how many times it had actually been a lie so she could go hang out with the friends hr mother called 'hoodlums.'

"Yeah, I might need a couple of dollars." She admitted, giggling evilly on the inside. She bit her cheek to stop it from escaping.

"Oh, no. More like a couple hundred, darling. Remember, nothing is worth doing that's not worth doing all the way." Her mother told her, pulling a few hundred dollar billls out of her pocket. She handed it to Rayleigh, who placed it in her Green Day purse. Her mother wrinkled her nose, but left the room.

"Be back by nine, okay?" she told her daughter as she left the room.

"Yeah!" Rayleigh replied, locking her door and following her mother down the mahogany staircase to the foyer. She pulled on a form-fitting Misfits hoodie, and walked out of the house. As she pulled out of the driveway, she put on a demo CD of Brian's band, which wasn't named yet. She loved their sound, and she really felt the music. She listened to it all the way to Brian's house, where all the guys were meeting up. She walked into the garage, where she saw her friends sitting around a table, playing poker.

"Hey, Ray." The guys all said simultaneously.

"That's where my Misfits hoodie went." Brian accused jokingly. She smiled and rolled her eyes.

"Yeah, okay, Bri." She chuckled. "If you had a feminine Misfits hoodie, I'd die."

"Seriously?" Brian asked her. She giggled.

"Yeah...of laughing so damn hard." He sighed.

"You lose!" Matt told his friend. Brian sighed and put his cards on the table.

"Dammit, Ray." He smiled. She knew he was joking. "Whenever you come by, I always lose."

"We all know it's 'cuz I'm so pretty I distract you." She joked back. He squinted his eyes, and walked up to her so she could feel his breath on her face. He was still taller than her, and she had to look up to meet his gaze.

"Damn straight." He whispered quietly enough so that only she could hear him. "Yeah, sure."

"Oh, stop it, Haner. I need to use the bathroom. You guys finish up while I go do that." She told her friends, walking into the Haner's house. It had become like a second home to her, more homey than her actual home. She smiled when she saw Brian's mom and dad sitting in the living room.

"Hi, Ray." They told her at the same time. "It's nice to see you again."

"Hi, Mr. and Mrs. Haner." She replied as she walked to the bathroom. She attended to her business, but when she opened the bathroom door, she walked straight into Brian's chest.

"Uh, Brian? I hate to break it to ya, but I was in the bathroom." she told him.

"I know." he shrugged.

"And you were gonna walk right in?" She questioned.

"That was the basic plan." He admitted.

"Brian."

"Yes?"

"That's gross." She laughed.

"Really?" He asked her, again, getting close enough so that his breath was on her face.

"Yeah, really..." she said, this time, her voice not as confident as she'd like.

"So it would be gross if I, say, did this?" He asked. Before she had time to reply, his lips were on top of hers, and the bathroom door was shut. She pushed her against the counter, and placed his hands on her curvy hips. He broke his lips away from hers and moved them to her neck.

"Brian." She moaned.

"Yes?"

"The...guys...are out there still..." She told him, her sentence broken into fragments. She'd dreamed about this for so long. But she'd never imagined that Brian liked her too.

"So?"

"They might decide to come and join us."

"That wouldn't be good. Nobody else can have you. Only me." he growled into her throat, letting her go.

"Okay." She said, catching her breath. You leave first. Then I'll go out."

"Why can't we go together?"

"Because I came to go to the bathroom, and God only knows what you came to do."

"To do that."

"Well, save it for later, okay?"

"So there will be a next time?" He asked her, eyebrows cocked. She smiled, and kissed his lips.

"As far as I'm concerned, yeah, there will be a next time."