by CJ Adler
“Nope,” I say, popping the p. “That's Grey's gig.” Of course, that earns me a death stare.
Susie smiles at Troy politely. “Hey, Mister,” she greets him.
“Hey, Susie,” Troy replies back, still fawning over the innocent-looking child. He's always had a weakness for kids and kittens. “I'm Troy,” he introduces himself, getting his name right this time.
“Well, Troy, my name isn't Susie. It's Lucy,” she corrects. “That raging lunatic,” she points to Max, “just insists on calling me 'Susie'.”
“Ignore her. It's Susie,” Max insists as he continues to glare daggers at her.
Troy's face lights up as he looks back at Bells and me. “Did you guys hear that? She said my name!” he says giddily. “Susie just said my name.”
I swear he stopped listening to her as soon as he heard his name come from her mouth. Info goes through one ear and leaves straight through the other when it comes to Troy.
“It's Lucy,” Lucy corrects yet again.
“You're super cute, Susie!” Troy ruffles her hair, her smile now faltering.
Yeah, 'Susie' is going to stick. I'm not going to be able to remember her real name when everyone is calling her 'Susie'. It's the same with 'Boss Man'. It takes effort to actually call him 'Greg'. Now everyone else just resorts to calling him 'Boss Man' too.
“Hey!” Someone comes sprinting our way before picking up Susie. “Don't go wandering off on your own, Luce. I got a game today. I can't keep running after you. Go back to Ma.”
“No, brother!” Susie protests in a formal tone of voice. “She bores me.”
“Your mother is almost as bad as you,” Max states under his breath in a hushed tone.
“She's welcome to stay with us!” I tell the stranger, excited at the possibility of looking after her.
It's then that the guy holding Susie turns to look at me. He removes his football helmet, his face turning to one of horror as it registers in his head. “Hell no! I'm not entrusting my little sister in your care! No way! You're the last person I'd ever leave her with.”
I pout. “Aww, c'mon, Laiken, please,” I insist. “I'll look after her myself. I promise, Lai.”
“That's what I'm afraid of,” Laiken murmurs from within his football get-up. “No offense, Aqueela, but you're kind of crazy.”
“How can such an adorable girl be related to you? She's so beautiful and you're so…revolting and unappealing.” I frown at Laiken before making sure to add, “No offense.”
Susie erupts into giggles. She grins up at me from Laiken's arms. “I already love you.”
I stick my tongue out at Laiken and pull a face. “See. She loves me. I love her. Let me keep her—” I catch myself and awkwardly clear my throat, “I mean, let me look after her.”
“No,” he answers bluntly, protective over her. She's probably the first girl I've ever seen him genuinely care about.
She frowns up at her big brother in bewilderment, shell-shocked by his words. “Why 'no'? Why not 'yes'? Why not bring girls like her home? Then I wouldn't pull pranks on your girlfriends all the time.”
“Luce—” he drawls, “—you got to stop doing that. Melinda is getting freaked.”
“Belinda is a loser,” Susie replies. “You might as well date him,” she says, gesturing to Max.
“Give her to me!” I shout, now convinced that she's my mini-me. Laiken hesitates, doubtful.
“Please, Lai,” Susie begs, her innocent eyes widening a fraction. She juts out her lower lip and gives him the most effective 'puppy eyes' I've ever seen in my life.
“She's funny.”
“Yeah, she is, but she's also not well in the head,” Lai whispers to his little sister, loud enough for the rest of us to hear.
“Oh, please! Please! Please! Please! Please!” Troy begs Laiken with hopeful eyes. “Pleeeease.” He tugs on Laiken's arm in desperation. “BroDude, please! I'll even let you buy me something nice!”
Max crosses his arms over his chest, adamant in not being swayed. “Please no. She's the reincarnation of Hitler.”
I hit Max and Troy upside their heads and then turn back to Susie and Lai with a sheepish grin. “I can be responsible when I need to be. I promise,” I try to reassure Laiken with a lie.
Susie bursts out laughing again when she sees Max and Troy rub at their heads in pain. She's a sadist, a girl after my own heart.
“Yeah right!” Grey snorts, refusing to believe that I have even a single bone of responsibility within me.
“Please, Lai,” Susie begs him for the millionth time.
Laiken sighs before turning to his fellow popular person whom he can trust: Bella Bensten. “From one sane person to another sane person, will you take care of her?”
“Of course, Lai!” Bell agrees, over their last argument. She offers them both a smile despite the both of them having insulted her in the past.
Susie scrunches up her little face and frowns at Bells. “No. Not her. She's dating that weirdo,” she objects, pointing to Max again as she continues to ignore his glares. “She also wears trashy stockings.”
Bells mouth falls agape at this. “I do not, you spoiled little brat! You wouldn't know stylish if it hit you square in the face.”
“I want to go with her!” Susie protests as she points to me. “She's funny and I want to be just like her when I grow up.”
“Stop trying. You're an exact replica,” Jay tells her sweetly. She smiles, delighted.
“As if we need two Aqueelas in this life,” Max comments under his breath.
“As if we need one,” Grey adds.
“Fine,” Laiken reluctantly agrees as he hands over his little sister to me, “but just know that I will destroy you if something happens to her.”
“It's actually pronounced as desTROY,” Troy corrects him like a fake smartass.
“That's what I said,” Laiken argues. “Destroy.”
“You're not putting enough emphasis on the 'troy' part,” Troy explains, irritating everyone in the process.
“Yeah, yeah. I hear you, Lai,” I tell him as I place Susie on the floor, only for Troy to pick her up and put her on his shoulders. “Good luck with the game, Lai. You guys better win. Go Wild Cats!” I raise my first in the air, feigning enthusiasm— I honestly could not care any less.
He rolls his eyes at me. “You mean, go Burnsville Blaze,” he corrects before sauntering off toward the football field, thinking that he owns it.
“You don't know the name of your own school's football team?” Grey asks me, blown away.
“Nah. Never kept up with school stuff,” I confess as we make our way to our seats.
“See you later guys. Gotta go warm up with my girls,” Bells, head cheerleader, waves goodbye to us as she makes her way down to the field where the other cheerleaders are.
Meanwhile, the rest of us take our seats. It's Simo (on two seats), open chair, Grey, Troy, Max, Susie, Jay, me and then another two open seats for Blubber and Benley; I have no idea where those two went.
The stadium is packed with people I recognize and people I don't. Music is blasting loudly through the speakers as we all wait in anticipation for the game to begin. The bright stadium lights have lit up the field so that it's visible through the evening darkness. Everyone is in lively spirits, conversing and stuffing their faces with junk food. It's so noisy that I can barely make out my own voice.
In the distance, you can see the football players coming out of the guys locker room, one by one, all dressed in their football uniforms as they begin to warm up, same with the cheerleaders. In the meantime, the mascots are competing against one another in order to keep the crowds going until the game starts.
“Hi, Aqueela,” someone greets me.
I turn in my seat to see Nancy Montry herself. She hates me but I still managed to persuade her to come to the game by using Mason, her cousin, as bait. Mason is star quarterback, or was star quarterback before he quit. Nonetheless, he's filling in for his team today. I convinced
Nance to pitch and surprise him.
“Hey, Nance,” I greet. “Can I call you 'Nance'?”
“No,” she retorts rudely.
“Well, Nance, there's an open seat right there beside Grey.”
Grey, upon hearing his name, turns his attention to me, only for his eyes to fall on Nancy. He finally notices her presence. “Who invited you here?” he asks her, stunned, as she takes a seat beside him.
I don't fail to notice him fidgeting in his seat, clearly uncomfortable with having her so close to him. I hold back a smile, barely hiding the urge to giggle.
“Aqueela did,” Nancy answers, just as surprised to see him here as he is to see her.
“Of course, she did,” Grey mutters, sending me a glare.
I wink at him and mouth 'you owe me one'.
Jay puts two and two together as a picture-perfect smile cascades over his lips. He places his hand on my knee before leaning into me. “You're so cunning and manipulative,” he chuckles, sending tingles down my spine. “It's kind of hot when you're not doing it to me.”
“Don't be weird, Jay,” I say, a grin tugging at my lips.
I almost do a double-take when he takes my hand into his and begins playing with my fingertips absentmindedly, a boyish grin on his face. He's the definition of 'cute', especially when he's zoned out. He always seems to have this innocence in his blue eyes when daydreaming or thinking hard about something. He seriously makes my heart do flips and my stomach do somersaults.
I come out of my little trance of admiration when I hear Nancy speak again
“I finally get to meet all your little school friends that you're always so busy with.”
“They're not my friends. I barely know these people,” Grey clarifies, clearly ashamed and embarrassed of us.
Troy, who hasn't been paying any attention at all, unexpectedly takes the opportunity to throw his arm around Grey. He tugs him forward before holding his cell phone up in front of them. “Selfie time! Say cheese, BroGrey!” he exclaims excitedly as he quickly clicks the button on his phone, the camera flashing, a photo of the two taken. “Dude, you're not even smiling. People would think that we're strangers. People would think that you haven't even been to my house before,” he tells Grey as he inspects the photo closely. “You could have at least pouted.” He makes a 'pouty' face to emphasize his point.
“We are strangers,” Grey argues, shoving him away as he turns back to Nancy in shame.
“Right,” Nancy drawls, humoring Grey, a small giggle spilling from her lips.
'Taking pictures with my homies at the game. Giving them some fame and something to tell their grandkids about one day. I'm so friggen cool. I heart myself <3 L.O.L. Follow me. Do it now! I'm the best human to ever exist,' Troy updates his Twitter account.
“You're so conceited and self-involved,” I tell Troy, swatting his phone out of my face.
He ignores me and continues texting himself a gazillion hearts and lovey- dovey faces. He's truly in love with himself.
Bells soon returns, except, she's not alone. Infuriated, she drags Benley and Blubber along behind her by their ears.
“Ow, ow, ouch, ow, ow!” The two of them whine, trying to get free from
Bell's insane grip of steel.
Bell practically chucks them at me, the both of them collapsing right on top of me as a result. “I believe these two belong to you,” she says through clenched teeth. “They've both been flirting up a storm with my cheerleaders, completely distracting the team from our routines.”
I shake my head at Blubber and Benley, feigning disappointment. In reality, I expected no better from them. I hastily push them off of me. “Can't take you two anywhere,” I mutter as I gesture to them to sit down in the two seats open beside me. They fight for the one directly next to me. Benley wins. Blubber, fortunately, ends up sitting two seats away from me.
“What the hell is she doing here?” Nancy speaks up upon seeing Bells standing before us in her cheer outfit.
Bells, already mad, is now seething. “The real question is why are you here,” she rebuts, voicing her anger. She's never been one for conflict, that is unless you manage to anger her to the extreme.
“You're wearing so much make-up, I didn't realize that it's dress-up-like-a- drag-queen day,” Nancy resorts to petty insults on Bell's physical appearance as per usual.
Usually, Bell would not respond to such a pathetic insult, but tonight is not the night to mess with her. She's already peeved as it is. “That's rich coming from the girl with more rolls than a damn bakery!” Bells hisses back, beyond mad.
Nancy's mouth falls agape at this.
Grey, caught in the middle, pretends not to notice.
“You're such a stuck-up, rich, preppy drama queen!” Nancy shouts at Bells, furious.
Grey hums a tune to himself quietly as he purposely glances around, feigning ignorance to the situation at hand.
I turn to Jay to see his head thrown back over the edge of his seat and his eyes closed, his face parallel with the ceiling as he breathes in and out softly, his hand still firmly interlocked with mine. He's fallen asleep and the game hasn't even started yet.
“And you're just jealous that I have it all and you have nothing,” Bells replies back just as menacingly.
Nancy stands up this time 'round and gets right up in Bell's face. “I'm glad my cousin opened his eyes and dumped you. I always knew he could do a billion times better.”
“Get out of my face!” Bells commands, pushing Nancy away from her. “Respect the bubble, you bubble!”
Nancy makes a move to retaliate. Fortunately, I'm quick to get up off of my seat and jump in between the two before a physical fight can break out. I hold my hands up, separating them. “Woah, girls! You're both ugly. Let's drop it,” I try to diffuse the hatred between the two.
“Shut up, Aqueela!” They both retort in unison before shoving me out of their way so that they can claw each other's eyes out.
They end up slapping each other while wrestling over Grey. The poor guy's in the middle of them, being slapped unintentionally and accidentally in the process. Nonetheless, he's still pretending to look off into the distance despite them practically being on top of him.
Grey catches my amused gaze and shoots me a pleading look. “Lawson, I can't believe I'm saying this but…help.”
I nod and turn to the morons. “Hey, idiots!”
Immediately, as if knowing exactly who I'm talking to, Max and Troy look my way. I point to Bells and Nancy. Their eyes widen and they quickly work on putting a stop to the catfight.
“Ladies, ladies,” Benley says as he eagerly gets in between the girl fight, “there's plenty of me to go around.”
“Not helping, BoyBand!” I shout, tugging him back to his seat before he gets himself killed. He's so desperate for female attention that he puts Blubber to shame.
“Not the face! Not the face!” Troy yelps before getting punched by Bells in the face just as Max's hair gets pulled by Nancy.
I sigh as I take a seat on Jay's lap, finding him comfier than my own seat.
“Chicks be crazy!” Max shouts at the top of his lungs as he tries to escape, but it's too late for him. “Girls be trippin'! Them squabbling ladies!”
Jay must wake up from all the commotion, 'cause next thing I know, I'm being lifted off of the ground. He places me down behind him as if to protect me from getting in harm's way. He proceeds by grabbing Bell's by the waist, throwing her over his shoulder, all the while dodging Nancy's attacks, as he hands her over to Max whose nose is bleeding, again.
Grey takes the gap to tend to his precious Nancy. Max, on the other hand, takes Bells back to her cheerleading squad.
Jay dusts his hands before flopping back down into his seat. With that, he's off to sleep again.
Troy's only concerned about his appearance. He takes out a compact mirror from his front jeans pocket before checking his face, dabbing here and there with tissues. “Okay, which one of them messed up my perfec
tly styled hair?! Someone's gotta pay,” he whines, patting his hair down in order to try and get it like the way it was. “Dammit! I looked like a Greek god before this. I was so hot I was melting molten lava!”
“No, you didn't, and, no, you weren't,” I reassure him, earning a scowl from him for just trying to help.
Troy, now extremely self-conscious for once in his life, glances around in panic as if feeling eyes on him. “Why the hell is everyone staring at me?” he asks as he tries to hide his bruised face and messed up hair.
No one's even looking his way.
“Oh, flip! I probably look like some hideous sea creature right now,” he says anxiously as he tries to bury himself in his seat. “Make them stop staring at me, Aqueela! Make it stop! I can't take it! I think I'm losing it. There are eyes everywhere and—”
I slap him through the face. “Get ahold of yourself, man!”
After that, he seems to cool down a little. He updates his Twitter account and posts a picture of his blue eye, lying through his teeth about how he got it.
'Shiznit got crazy. Just got in a massive fight. You think I look bad, you should see the other guy. LOL, OMG, TGMI!'
“What?” he asks when he sees me staring. “I need to let my fans know that their ringleader is all good.”
“You lied. You got beat up by two girls. Also, do you even know what all those acronyms you used mean? Obviously not. Plus, you've only got two followers, one of them being Max,” I point out the facts.
“I can't feel anything. Everything hurts and feels lame all at the same time,” Max huffs, sore.
Susie shakes her head at all of them. “Boys, am I right?”
“No kidding, kiddo,” I agree as she high-fives me.
Suddenly, the commentators' voices come through on the mega speakers situated all around the stadium, “Ladies and gentleman, the football match is about to commence. Please take your seats. We will begin shortly.”
“Finally!” I breathe out in relief as things start to get back on track...or so I think.
Benley nudges me. “Hey, Aqueela?”
“What is it, BoyBand?” I answer him.
“Stop calling me that!” he snaps at me before his eyes fall on the field.