Love Is Hell

Lina.

It had been a week since the day Garrett, Pat, and I had gone to the park. Honestly, I really, really wanted to go back.

Now, it was Saturday: my relaxing day. My mom didn’t have to work, so our little family of four -Mom, Danny, Joey, and I- stayed home during the day and just simply spent time with each other. Currently, I was sitting on the couch reading, my mom was making lunch, Joey was on the floor playing video games, and Danny was lying next to him, trying to make a car out of legos.

I was seriously debating on driving out to the park to sit on the swings when I felt my phone vibrating from its place in my pocket. I pulled it out only to see an unrecognized number flash on the screen.

I pressed the talk button and said, “Who is this?”

“Hey, nice to talk to you too, Lina!” the voice on the other line said sarcastically. “It’s Halvo. I’m having a little get-together at my house tonight, a club meeting. Wanna come over?”

I sighed. “How many people will be there, Eric?”

It was almost as if I could hear him shrugging through the phone. If I were with him in person, I’m positive he would have. “Just me, the guys from my band, John, Jared, Kennedy, Garrett, Pat, and a few other guys. It’s just gonna be a small hangout. Oh, you’re supposed to bring Courtney, too.”

“I dunno. Maybe. I’ll have to talk to Courtney. What time should we come over?”

“Does six sound good?”

“Maybe. I need to talk to Courtney first.”

“Lina, you have to come! We didn’t get to dance with each other yesterday!” he whined over the phone. “It’s our tradition. We can’t break it!”

I grinned, remembering. It was true; every Friday we kept up the tradition and danced with each other. Two weeks ago, Halvo had been grounded so we had to dance via Skype.

“I’ll try to come, okay, Halvo?” I said.

“Okay. Call me back after you talk to Courtney!”

“Alright. Bye, Halvo,” I said, pressing ‘end’ with no intention to call him back.

I quickly dialed my best friend’s number.

***

“Court, why did you even bring so many of your own clothes to my house?” I asked as my best friend pulled shirts out of her backpack and threw them on my bed.

When I called her and told her about Halvo’s “club meeting”, she immediately wanted to go and rushed over to my house. Now, she was piling blouses on my bed and eyeing them with indecision.

“Don’t laugh at me...but I want to look nice because Pat’s going to be there.”

I smiled. “That’s kind of sweet. For you, at least.”

She stuck her tongue out at me and said, “I really like him. I don’t want to make a fool of myself.”

“Court, how do clothes have anything to do with that? You look great in anything you own. Seriously.”

She sighed. “Just help me choose a blouse, okay?”

I got up looked at the shirts she had lay on my bed. It was weird for Courtney to be so worried over a boy.

“I like that one the best,” I said finally, pointing to the one in the middle.

She tilted her head and stared at it. “Me too. I’m going to go change,” she said, before grabbing the purple shirt and walking to the bathroom.

When she came out, smoothing the invisible wrinkles from her shirt, I said, “You and Pat are pretty cute together, Court. You won’t make a fool of yourself.”

“Thanks, Lina. Now we need to find you an outfit,” she said, walking to my closet. “I love this one! It’s so you.” She held up a white tank top with a faded, gray rose taking up space on the shirt.

Not really feeling like arguing, I slipped into the shirt after stepping into the bathroom.

“It needs a little color,” Courtney said, scrunching her nose and looking at my normal skinny jeans. I raised my eyebrows at her for a second before reaching for my red scarf that hung on my bedpost and wrapping it around my neck.

“There. Now you look hot,” she said, and I laughed. Seconds later, we were out the door.