Before

A Chapter by Haley Smith

"His name is Nic," Brandi told me.

"He is so hot," I said. I couldn't stop staring at him. I don't know why. Well of course I know why. He was really, very hot. We were at a football game and he was playin' -- quarterback.

"He lives in our neighborhood, you know," she said.

"Really?" I finally stopped staring and looked at her. I smiled a little but on the inside my mouth was big and huge and my teeth were glowin' brighter than the stadium lights.

"Mhm. I can't believe you've never seen 'em. He's always out by the pool playing with Oscar and all them."

I turned my head the other way cuz I heard Hillary and Jillian screaming for our team; they'd bought some nachos and a pretzel. I was starving.

"Hey, don't you guys think Cassie and Nic would be cute as s**t together?" Brandi said. My cheeks were real red but I was smiling still.

Hillary's eyes got real big like they always do, and she had this babyface, more babyish than mine even, and these chubby cheeks and she looked so cute like Dakota Fanning but with really dark and long hair. And braces.

"Yeah, oh my God! You guys should totally go out. But be careful, he's got this batshit crazy ex named like, I don't know, Mystie or something? If she gets your number she won't stop f****n' calling, I know that much. It happened to Ashley," Hillary said. She took a big bite of her hotdog and a really loud slurpy sip from her Coke.

Jillian click-click-clicked on her phone and then looked up at the rest of us. "Hey, there's a party tonight, you guys wanna go?"

"Hell yeah," Brandi said. She had a big ol' smile on her face. "You wanna go Cassie?"

I still wasn't really comfortable with them yet. With anyone. But I wanted to keep the people I had. The first weeks of school f****n' killed me. I was so embarrassed and nervous and a complete loser and I finally had some people. I didn't know who they were, but they were people. Girls that I could get along with and that weren't dumb b*****s. I had a whole bunch of butterflies in my stomach. Should I go? Should I tell my mom? I'll just say I'm at Brandi's staying the night. Oh my f****n' God I've never been to a party! Only birthday parties. What's gonna happen? I wanna be liked. I don't wanna be a loser again.

I blinked and stopped overthinking everything and smiled and said, "Yep."

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