After meeting Ricky, I couldn't stop thinking about him. While I set up my new room I had the radio going and it was like it knew what I was feeling before I did. Almost every song that played was about finding love, looking for love, or keeping love. I danced to each song while hanging up my posters and my clothes. It was like I was in a Disney channel movie and I was the leading female character.
Now obviously since I was ten, I've never had a boyfriend and since I don't have an older sister I could only go to my mom about all of this. I didn't think mom was ready to talk to me about boys so I just kept it all inside and just took mental notes of everything.
After I hit my attention span for putting away my stuff, I headed out to the backyard to see what it looked like. I grabbed my sketchbook and pencils before heading out the back door, just in case something caught my eye. "Where are you going" asked my mom seeing me walk through the kitchen. "Just going out back to check it out." "Alright, but you should go introduce yourself to the next door neighbor's children. We plan to be here awhile so you should give a good impression to make some friends." Now she's not wrong but in my head I already had friends and it waa her fault I couldn't see them anymore and since we had just moved we still don't have phone service for our house phone. "Alright fine but if they don't like me from the beginning you can't get upset and say I didn't try" I say half joking. Then I think, what if my older brother had already made friends with them? You see so far anytime my brother makes friends they usually all just find me annoying and never want to include me especially once they realise how much of a nerd I am. Which made me feel like not even trying to make friends.
After realising that, I look down at my outfit and see how dirty I look from falling out of that tree. I rush back to my room to do a quick change and it tales longer than I thought but once I finally find the right outfit I quickly put it on. Now all my fashion tips have come from my dad so far, I love my mom but her fashion does not match my at all. She's jeans and flannels, mean while I'm skirts, shorts, and t-shirts with lots of colors. So what I'm wearing is a jean skirt, white spaghetti strap shirt with a pink low-cut shirt, and my favorite pair of black wanna-be converse.
I have a good look going but my hair is still a mess. So I go into our bathroom but I can't find my hair brush. "Hey mom, where's my hair brush?" "Uh it must still be in a box. Look fpr the boxes that say 'kids bathroom'." "Okay" I yell back a bit frustrated. Thankfully those boxes were just in the hallway. I rummage through them and finally find my hair brush and another hair tie, the one in my hair was a bit worn down and stretched out. Looking in the mirror I brush my hair and try to see if i want it up or down. I decide to leave it down and while I'm finishing with my hair I feel someone watching me again only this time I know who it is. My step dad is in the hall for however long he's been there and kinda freaks me out a bit cause he's never done that before or at least that I've noticed. "Uh whatcha doin'?" I ask. He crosses his arms and asked " he real question is what are you doing?" For some reason my heart begins to speed up before I say "Uh nothing just brushing my hair." "What's with the new outfit then?" "Mom said I should go say hi to the neighbor's kids and I figured why not look good." "Uh huh, well I just came from Sheryl's house and she said her second oldest son wouldn't stop smiling after coming back inside." I think to myself, could that be Ricky? No way, no boy has ever continued to smile after talking to me. I say "yeah and what's that got to do with me?" "Well I'm just curious about if you may have met him or not and that if he's the reason you changed your clothes." My heart rate continues to keep going and my tummy feels weird. "Hey relax I'm just curious" he says with a laugh. "Not like it'd be the end of the world if you had a crush on the neighbor's boy." Oh great so this is what my older cousins were talking about. What I'm feeling is only temporary and shouldn't last long at all. They've all had crushes before and they never lasted long. Guess this will be my first, but maybe I should just ignore it so it goes away faster.
"Well no way would I ever have a crush on anybody I just met, besides I have more important things to do than chase some boy" I say trying to convince not only him but myself too. "Alright calm down I know you're focused on softball more than anything" he says while laughing and raising his hands. My mom then walks up and asks, "What are you two talking about over here?" "Ah just messing with Lala that's all" he says with a smile. "Yeah no worries just goofing around" "Okay, well you better hurry up and get out there the sun will be going down soon; and there are coyotes around here." I think to myself, great something to be afraid of on top of weird feelings for a boy I just met. "Alright I'm going. Are my brothers and sister out there already?" "Oh yeah they've all already made friends with the kids next door and the house after that." "Okay time to attempt some friendships" I say with a smile.
I walk out the front door and see my little sister hanging out with some girls. They're laughing while playing with their dolls and pretending to have a party. I don't see my brothers though so I guess they must be at one of the two houses. I say hi to the girls and introduce myself. "Hi there, my name is Lala. Who are you?" The first girl to speak is small, about six years old, short blonde hair, and blue eyes. "Hey, my name is Ari and this is my older sister Brianna." Brianna is a bit tailer than her sister, but not by much. She has long light brown hair with some blonde high lights and blues eyes too. "Have you seen some weirdo boys running around?" "Yeah they're at our house with our brother Brynt and our cousins; Ricky and Deryk" says Ari. "Yeah they're playing videogames in the living room. Want us to take you over there?" I look around and kinda figet a bit. Before I answer, another girl walks over and she's really pretty. "Hey guys" she says to Ari and Brianna. "Are you two the new girls around here" she asks me and my sister. I say "Yeah, we got here just a few hours ago." She looks me up and down. It kinda weirds me out a bit cause the last time a girl did that she ended up hating me and I still don't know why. This girl though seemed to be a bit nicer though and was super pretty. She was a bit short, nine years old maybe, shoulder length blonde hair with lots of volume, gorgeous brown eyes, great smile, and smelled amazing. Then out of no where she screams, grabs my hands, and starts jumping up and down. "What are you doing!" "You're the girl my brother was talking about!" "Um what brother!?" "My brother, Ricky! I'm his little sister, Jaime!" "Nice to meet you! Why are we jumping though!?" "Oh sorry, I'm just excited because he really likes you and the way he talked about you I could tell that it's a love at first sight kind of thing." "Well that's sweet but I'm not sure if I feel the same way, I mean we just met today." "Well obviously you don't know now silly but give it time and you'll see that you do."
I was so confused and happy all at the same time because a boy actually likes me even though we had just met. The only time this happened was at my school with this boy named Tony but I didn't like him either. He always followed me and my friends around trying to kiss us or hold our hands. one time he chased me up a tree and we almost got in trouble cause I was too afraid to get down. I climbed higher than I should've and he was way too short for me to trust for him to catch me. He actually took my first kiss but after he did that he stopped following me or wanting to hang out. I think my older brother talked to him or they became friends and so he didn't want to have a crush on his friends little sister. It was whatever though, I still had my friends so it wasn't a big deal.
"Okay, if you say so" I say laughing while trying to catch my breathe from all the jumping. "Okay let me get a better a look at you" she says while turning me around. The other girls watched and my sister continued to play while Jaime was looking at me. "Alright you have a lot of good things going for you. You have gorgeous green eyes, long beautiful hair, soft brown skin, and a pretty smile. Buuuuut you could use a little makeup to accent all of your strengths and build up your weaknesses" she says with a devilish smile. I look at the other girls and they seemed just as confused as I was. "Alright girly it's time you came to my house." "Okay but I was going to introduce myself the guys." "Oh sweetie you will and they'll all be lost for words once I'm done with you." I'm not sure why I trusted her so much but I didn't really have anything to lose. Besides I didn't really know anything about makeup because i wasn't allowed to wear any yet. So i figured my mom and step dad couldn't get too mad if I came back wearing some if I had made a friend in the process. "Uh okay" I say while she wraps her arm around mine and walks me to her house.
The other girls stay with my sister which was great because she needs friends too. Jaime and I get to her house, which is huge and her front yard is huge too but not as huge as her backyard. Her dad had a big shop in the back where he spent a lot of time after work and on the weekends. There was a huge trampoline that had me all excited because I had never seen one before. Mom worked hard but wasn't able to afford things like that and that wasn't terrible. We walk into her house and say hi to her mom before rushing off to her room. "Well hello there, you must be Lala" she says with a smile. "I'm Sheryl, Jaime's mom
Well I'm also Deryk and Ricky's mom too" she says with a laugh. "Though you've already met my Ricky" she says with a devilish smile like her daughter's and that was a bit weird too. "Um uh yeah, it's nice to meet you" I say all nervously. "Come on mom we gotta go" says Jaime pulling me along. "Okay, but dinner will be done soon."
Jaime and I run off to her room which is very pink and full of clothes. She had clothes in her closet, on a chair, in her huge dresser, and in a big pill on her floor. I don't think I've ever seen this many clothes other than in a store. "Don't mind the mess, i go through a lot of wardrobe changes" she says while staring at me. "Oh no worries my room can get way worse if I let it" She walks to her dresser and grabs a huge box which I'm sure is loaded with makeup. She opens it up and I was right. she had eye shadows, lipsticks, lip gloss, blush, foundation, and eyeliner of so many different brands. She was really thinking about how to do my makeup and i could see she wasn't quite sure where to start. "How about we just do some eye shadow, lip gloss, and some eye liner?" "Hmmm I guess that could be enough." "Okay, my favorite color is green but I think some brown sparkly eye shadow would be best to bring out the color of my eyes." "Oh you're good. Ooo and we can do a cherry flavored lip gloss, my brother loves cherries." "Okay, but why does it have to be flavored" "Oh well I was hoping to have you stay the night because my brother wants to get to know you and hopes to steal a kiss." "Oh okay well um I doubt my parents will be fine with that and what makes him think I would let him kiss me" I say a bit irritated at his level of confidence. "He doesn't like girls as much as he likes you and for it being the first time ever meeting you, I think you two are destined to be together." I'm a bit freaked out at this point and kinda ready to run back home. My heart is going so fast and I'm getting a bit dizzy too. This has never happened to me before and I'm totally unsure of what to do or say. "Well I'm really glad you two like me so much but ireally don't think we're going to get together anytime soon." "Oh no worries he still has a girlfriend he's trying to break up with anyway so dating you isn't possible right now." "Wait if he has a girlfriend then why does he want to kiss me!?" "I just told you he doesn't want to stay with her." "Oh okay so he's going to kiss me to help break up with her, great wonderful so what I wanted to be for him." "Hey chill, I doubt he'll do it.He may seem like a player but he's really sweet and caring." "Yeah, okay. I'll believe that when I see it. You know lets not put makeup on me and I'm just going to go back home. It's almost dark and I have softball practice tomorrow anyway so i can't stay the night." She looks a bit sad now and I feel really bad but I just don't want to take another girl's boyfriend like that. Whether we're destined or not. She lets out a big sigh and says "Okay, tell him to chill for now and if you want to have a sleep over with me tonight I promise to wake you up in time for your softball practice." "Okay sweet because I wpuld love to have a sleep over with you." "Although you should let us come with you to see how awesome you are" she says with a sly smile like she's already plotting a new plan to get me and her brother together. "Alright but you guys will have to behave and let me focus." "Deal."
We walk out of her room and I was too busy talking to her to pay attention to where I was walking. I walked right into Ricky. We both fall to the floor with me landing right on top of him. "Oof!" I lift myself up a bit and see him staring at me with a huge smile on his face. "Well it's good to see you but would you mind getting off me, everyone is staring" he says looking up. I turn bright red and scramble to get off of him. I was so embarrassed and everyone around was laughing and smiling at what just happened. Even my step dad was there for that and he was laughing more than anyone else. I stand up and reach out for Ricky's hand to help him up. "Sorry about that" I say while looking at my feet trying to hide my face. He then lifts my chin up and says with a smile "it's fine nothing hurt or broken." He then winks at me and out of no where I giggle. "Ooo look out Cory, it seems your daughter likes my son" says Scott, Sheryl's husband. Great another one who has seen and picked up on my feelings. "Hey uh Jaime you ask you're parents about me staying the night and I'll ask mine." I turn to my step dad and I don't even get the words out before he says "it's fine with me but you have to go ask your mom." I nod and run out of the house trying to run fast to use it as a reason of why my cheeks are red. I finally get home and run through the door. My sibblings are all in the living room huddled on the couch watching spongebob. I walk into the kitchen to see mom making dinner and I try to slow my breathing before talking. "Hey sweetie, you okay" she asks a bit worried. "Yeah I'm fine, but I have a question and it's fine if you say no." "Okay go for it." "Alright so I met Sheryl's daughter, Jaime and she wants me to stay the night. So can I stay the night over there?" "Well it's our first night here, don't you want to sleep in your new room?" "Not really. Jaime is awesome and I really want to get to know her more. Her and Ricky also want to come to my softball practice tomorrow. So i was hoping we all could go and have an awesome time in town." "Okay well, what did Cory say?" "He said it's fine with him as long as you're fine with it." She stands there quietly thinking to herself and finally says "Alright but practice starts at eight in the morning so you all better be up and ready before seven thirty cause it takes at least twenty minutes to get into town." "Yay! Sweet! Thank you so much! I'll make sure we get to sleep before midnight!" I give my mom a big hug and a kiss before rushing back over to Jaime's house. Before I leave my mom stops me. and asks "are you not going to take anything with you?" "Well I guess I should take some pajamas but we're so close I don't need to bring a change of clothes if i have to come back here to get ready anyway." "You should take your clothes with you, I'm sure getting ready with Jaime would be more fun." "Okay, I love you." "Love you too sweetie."
I go to my room to hurry up and pack some clothes for practice and grab all my softball gear to put in the back of the Rodeo so I don't forget any of it. I put everything in my bag and rush to the front door almost knocking Ricky down again. "Ah! Jesus what are you doing here! Ugh you almost gave me a heart attack!" "Relax, it's dark outside and your dad asked me to walk you over to my house because of the coyotes" he says with a smile. "Oh okay, well I have to put my gear in the Rodeo for tomorrow and then we can walk to your house." "Awesome. Hey Jenn!" I was surprised he knew my mom's name but I guess it wasn't too weird. I walk to the back pf the Rodeo holding my stuff and trying to open the back. "Hey let me help" Ricky says while going to grab the handle to open the back. He looks at me while doing it and smiles while grabbing my bag full of softball gear. I can't help but look right back at him. It was like time stood still for a minute while we stared into each others eyes. I finally shake my head and say "Okay well we should hurry up and get back to your house." He looks away and closes the back of the Rodeo. Still smiling he says "whatever you say hun." I turned beet red and could help but smile while turning away to not let him see. He then turns my head back to face him and says "don't look away I want to see you." I realise what's happening, I move away and say "how can you flirt with me while you have a girlfriend?" We start walking to his house before he gives me an answer and at the point I'm a bit irritated. "Well you see she's kind of abusive and not all there in the head. Our relationship is a bit toxic and I don't want to be with her anymore" he says staring at the ground as we walk. "Well now I feel like a jerk" I say staring at him. "I'm sorry I didn't mean to make you sad or anything" "It's fine. I'm glad I told you a little bit and honestly it was really easy which is a bit weird since I've only known you for a few hours." I laugh and say "Well it seems I'm pretty easy to talk to, your sister told me a lot in just the hour we were hanging out. I was pretty happy to find out that you want to kiss me but a bit sad that you have a girlfriend." I bump his arm and smile at him. "I've honestly never felt this was towards anyone before and am a bit scared because I don't want to get hurt." He grabs my hand and we stop walking before saying "Lala there is no way in a million years that I would ever hurt you or ever let anyone else hurt you." I look into his eyes and can see that what he says is the truth. "I uh um don't know what to say." I've heard those words said to me before but never in this way and my stumoch seems to have butterflies flying around like crazy. "It's okay, you're still pretty young and still learning. As much as I want to kiss you, you still have some growing to do. For now we can just be friends." "Okay. I can handle being friends" I say with relief. We start walking again and I hear in the distance some howling which obviously freaks me out. Ricky seems to notice and holds my hand tighter. "It's okay they're pretty far away from the sound of it. Plus you have me to keep you safe" he says with a huge smile. We finally get to his house and open the door. My step dad and everyone yells "finally!" We both start to blush and go our separate ways. "Dinner is ready everyone" yells Sheryl. We all eat dinner, play a few rounds of Uno, and then we all go to bed.
I tell Jaime everything that happened between me and her brother which just assures her that we're meant to be even more than before. After that we finally calm down enough to pass out from such a long and eventful day.