There's a Playground

I could not describe how glad I was that it was the weekend. Sure, I still woke up at six in the morning, but I didn’t have school until tomorrow. And that was a relief in itself.

Last night, after I agreed to be his girlfriend, Max and I pretty much just sat up and talked in my back yard. I climbed back through my window around three and was currently not liking the fact that I’d only gotten roughly three hours of sleep. I hated my natural sleep schedule…

Yawning, I continued to lay in bed for a while longer, just staring at my opposite wall and contemplating getting up. Which I’d have to eventually because there was no way that I was going to be able to ignore my bladder all day. And there wasn’t any chance of me falling back asleep anytime soon, most unfortunately.

Around seven, I finally rolled out of bed and made my way to the bathroom. I smiled as I thought about last night. My heart was still racing pretty badly and I could still feel those butterflies in my stomach. Max was, honestly, an amazing kisser. I still couldn’t believe that my best friend in my life was now my boyfriend.

That was still such a strange thought to me…

And probably would be for a while…

I sighed as I walked out of the bathroom, flicking off the switch and walking into the living room. Mom was still passed out on the couch, the DVD play screen for “Push” replaying on the television screen over again. I smirked before walking into the kitchen, grabbing a package of PopTarts. I opened them up and broke off a piece, placing it into my mouth before I walked back to my room. Ugh…I needed to find something to do…

For the next hour, I sat on my bed with my sketchbook in my lap and drew. It was around eight thirty that my mom finally came in to check on me. “So since we didn’t talk last night, you have to spill,” Mom declared as she came over to sit on my bed with me. I smirked and rolled my eyes, looking up at her.

She’d pulled her bright blonde hair back into a messy bun and her bright blue eyes were behind a pair of rectangle-framed glasses. I had always been amazed with how different my mother and I looked from one another. We were pretty much complete and total opposites, other than our height situation. She was about a quarter of an inch taller than me and loved reminding me of that fact. I’d gotten my looks, definitely, from my father. With my dark brown hair and sage-green eyes, I was definitely my father’s daughter. I got my bone structure and everything like that from my mother, though.

I took a deep breath, but couldn’t hide the smile on my face. “I thought you said that you and Craig were just going to be friends?” Mom jumped right in before I even had the chance to speak. I smirked, looking up at her and brushing my hair away from my eyes before I began speaking.

“We are, Mom…”

“But you have the smile of someone who’s got a boyfriend. Who is it? What happened last night. Spill. Now.”

“Mom, would you chill out!?” I whined, frowning at her as I closed up my sketchbook. She smirked at me and then ran her fingers over the separation of her lips, miming locking them and throwing away the key. I just rolled my eyes at that. Mother was impossible with keeping quiet while I was trying to talk to her about things. Which was why I never talked to her about things. It just…didn’t work out. At all.

“Well, it was really great. I had a lot of fun with Craig.”

“But…?”

“Mom! Chill out!” She looked at me innocently and gave me a grin, her palms raised in surrender as she waited for me to go on. See what I mean by her not being able to keep quiet when I was trying to talk? “But I don’t like Craig as anything more than a friend. So we agreed to stay friends. And then Max asked me out later last night and I said yes.” She smirked at me. “I’m done now. You can talk.”

“Oh good, ‘cause I was going to start talking either way. Max asked you out!?” she asked. I nodded quietly, sighing and wondering what she was going to have to say about it. “So now you and Max are boyfriend-girlfriend?” I nodded quietly. “Awesome! That’s great! Me and Shannon always knew that you two would end up together! Oh that’s so great, honey! Way to go!” It was all said in, I’m pretty, a single breath, and I sighed as I blinked and smirked at her. Mom reached over and hugged me tightly before letting me go.

“Oh I have got to get Shannon and Max over here for dinner sometime!” she exclaimed. Oh shit. Our mothers together in the same room with us now a ‘couple’ would not turn out well. I could tell already.

“Mom, are you sure that’s the best idea? Ms. Green is really busy, I know that.”

“Oh relax, I can wait until she has a day off. Don’t worry about it, baby,” she told me as she left my room in a flurry of activity.

“You’re so embarrassing…” I mumbled, frowning and laying back on my bed. “Damn it…”

I sighed as I sat up and ran a hand through my hair. I was so glad that she didn’t try to have the sex talk with me…

----

Max and I walked to school together Monday morning, but I admit that it was slightly awkward. But having his calloused hand in mine was nice… Despite the awkwardness of it, of course. I let his hand go when we got inside and to his friends. Craig was there and I didn’t really want to have to face the guilt of dating Max while I had turned him down. Which I already felt guilty enough for as it was…

I walked to English with Max, a small smile on my face as we took our seats and chatted amongst one another during the class lecture. This week it was on literary devices that we’d all gone over time and time again. Silence fell upon the room, though, as a girl walked in. She looked rather nervous and, from what I could tell, was shorter than I was. She had long black hair and dark brown eyes, black glasses set on her delicate face. She walked over to our lecturing teacher, handing him her yellow schedule. I smiled, another new girl? And all within two weeks of my arrival.

Woah. Had I really only been here for a little over two weeks? Damn… It felt like I’d been here for a lot longer than that…

“Class, this is Gabriella. Gabriella, please go sit down anywhere you like.” She was instructed and I smiled warmly at her. I noticed Max watching her curiously and I couldn’t help the stab of jealousy that struck through me as I glared over at him. He looked at me innocently, flashing his teeth in a smile at me before his gaze turned concerned. I rolled my eyes and shook my head, shrugging lightly and turning towards the new girl. Gabriella walked towards us and I saw that the only desk available was the one next to mine.

I smiled at her and she smiled timidly back, sitting down next to me and taking out her notebook and began taking the notes that we’d need.

By the end of class, Max and I had introduced ourselves to Gabriella and learned that she preferred to be called Gabby or Gab. Which worked perfectly fine with me. Gabriella was kind of a mouthful. I also learned that she and I pretty much had the same schedule. Only she had a last period class when I didn’t. I offered to show her around the school and she agreed.

I was glad that I got to steal her before the whores and sluts got to her…

The bell for lunch rang and, as Max and I walked together hand-in-hand, Gabby followed behind quietly. “So where did you move here from, Gab?” I asked, turning my attentions towards her as I slowed my walking pace so that she could walk beside me. She tucked her black hair behind her ear and smiled at me quietly.

“Arizona,” she said quite simply, nodding to herself. I smiled down at her. I was still surprised that she was shorter than me, but, then again, I probably shouldn’t have been.

“Really? Our friend Craig is from there, too.” Woah, wait what? I turned to Max, tilting my head to the side in confusion.

“Seriously? I didn’t know that…” I stated, frowning to myself. Max only smirked and squeezed my hand. Gabby didn’t seem to notice, she just smiled to herself.

“That’s cool…” she murmured as we walked through the doors to the cafeteria. When we got to the table, I introduced Gabriella to everyone. Skye and Craig were, for once, eating with us. Skye was sitting next to Ronnie and Craig…well, he certainly almost shoved Robert and his girlfriend out of their chair for her.

I was really glad that Craig wasn’t harboring any bad feelings about the whole Homecoming thing. In fact, he seemed rather…infatuated with Gab. Which I thought interesting. I ended up giving my chair to her so that she could sit while I sat on Max’s lap a bit awkwardly.

“So where in Arizona are you from, Gab?” Craig asked from across the table. I smirked at him, my eyes darting between the two dark-haired Arizona natives.

“Wendy, can I come over tonight after band practice?” Max whispered in my ear behind me, keeping me from hearing Gabby’s answer. Which I didn’t mind much, but still. He was slightly distractive. I smiled as I turned towards him and nodded quietly. “Yay!” he exclaimed, squeezing me before planting his lips on mine firmly for a few seconds.

I felt myself blushing and I sighed as I turned back towards the bustling table. Skye was watching me with a triumphant grin, not helping with my embarrassment. But no one else seemed to notice, so that was good…

The bell rang and I hopped off of Max’s lap and smiled down at Gab. “C’mon, I’ll show you where our next class is and stuff,” I told her, offering her an arm as everyone else stood. Max still had his hand attached to mine and as the new girl stood, he kissed me quietly before heading off to his class.

Skye and Craig gathered around quietly, grinning as we all walked together to our next class.