Chapter Forty-Six: Elly

I just knew that Paul was going to ask me out again for this weekend. I had put him off last weekend because I told him my family was going to do "family things" all weekend, which really wasn't much of a lie (well, I guess it really was) because our family things consisted of us eating meals and my helping Mom with the weekend laundry and cleaning. All I did last Friday and Saturday nights was read, text, snack, and watch TV.

So Monday before school, I asked Mom if I could have a sleepover party Friday night for my girlfriends, and she said how many, and I said seven or eight and she said okay...that she would buy some pizza and soft drinks, and we could all sleep in the basement and everybody could bring sleeping bags. So I texted Paige, Mary, Kylee, Jayla, and Hannah and met up with Mia and Camilla before school, and everybody said super and that they would ask their moms. By lunchtime Tuesday it was all set, and sure enough Paul came by and did his "let's go get some ice cream routine" but when he asked me out, I told him about the sleepover and said I had family plans for Saturday and maybe some other time. I'll go out with him again, I guess, after all who else is going to go out with me. But not so soon after that last boring date.

Friday night, everybody came over around 6:00 and Mom helped us bring the pizza and soft drinks downstairs, and she said we were on our own. "Enjoy your girl talk." The first 30 minutes all we mostly did was eat pizza and drink diet soft drinks...I don't know how many calories we saved by the diet drinks because all of us had about four or five pieces each, and I confess that I think I had six. After that, the subject quickly turned to boys. Boys that we definitely wanted to date, boys that we might like to date, boys that we would never date, and for those of us who were allowed to date guys, what were their pros and cons.

Then Mary, she's always trying to rile everybody up and start something, bless her, said let's make a list of the ninth grade boys we'd least like to date. Immediately, Kylee and Camila shrieked, looked at each other, and then yelled out at the same time, "Marcus!" And everybody laughed at that, and Hannah said what was his problem and Kylee said, "Marcus being Marcus is Marcus' problem; he's too full of himself and immature," and everybody laughed again; this time it was more like hooting than laughing.

Then Hannah started in on Mia and asked where would she rate Luke on the date or no date list, and all Mia would do was smile in such a sweet, shy way, and that made Hannah just tease her all the more. The more I'm around Mia, the more I like her, the better friends we're becoming. Hannah wouldn't let up and then she said for Mia to tell us "what was up with her and Lucas and 'libraries.'" and Hannah pronounced libraries like it was 10 syllables long...she said Luke and her were going to the library three times a week at school, which I knew about, but now they were "seeing each other" on Saturdays at the public library (which I didn't know about) and where were they really going on Saturdays.

All that time Hannah was teasing her, Mia just smiled and looked so happy; it was so obvious that she's really into Luke...that it didn't matter what Hannah or anybody else said. Finally, Hannah said she wasn't going to stop teasing her until Mia said why she liked Luke so much, and you could just see Mia thinking really deeply about that and she said something like, "He's the sweetest boy I've ever met, he cares about what I think and treats me with respect, and we talk about all kinds of things, and he asks my opinion on things, and I just love talking to him and being with him and walking along with him and holding his hand."

There was this long pause after Mia said all that, she was really serious...not joking around like we all were, then Mary said, "You'd better hang on to him then," and this was from Mary who called Luke a ragamuffin at the beginning of the year. Then we were off to another subject. But I kept thinking about what Mia had said. I have to confess that I was envious of her and Luke...Paul has never held my hand when we were walking somewhere, and he's never asked me about what I thought about anything except stupid sports questions and games. So later in the night when we were all getting really sleepy and things were getting quiet and Camila and Paige had already fallen asleep, I walked over to Mia and the two of us went over to the fireplace and just sat and chatted for about 15 minutes.

I told her that I had really enjoyed eating lunch with her on Mondays and Wednesdays and was glad that she and I were becoming better friends and that she was a really sweet person and I was happy that she and Luke looked like they had a relationship with potential. Mia smiled and said that she also was glad to get to know me better and thanked me for the nice comments about her and Luke. She said that Luke had stuttered a lot and was nervous and quiet when she first started talking to him, but then as they had gotten to know each other, that he had stopped stuttering and even told her that when he really liked a girl, he got "all nervous." Then she said that Luke had paid me a compliment one day right after Ms. Hawk had asked the three of us to be on the Yearbook staff next year and work together on assignments...that Luke had said that Mia and I were the two sweetest, nicest girls in the ninth grade, and he liked us both a lot and was looking forward to being on Yearbook staff with us.

It was then that I remembered that night last fall at the football game when Luke was so nervous around me, and all those other times in eighth grade and this year, and then I realized that he may have been that way because he had a crush on me. Right then while Mia was still talking, I tried to imagine what it would be like to date Luke, and I tried to imagine what my parents would think of that. ..that they probably wouldn't be too happy about it. Finally, I just decided to put any thoughts of Luke and me out of my mind. I had enough to worry about right now. Still, after our talk, I felt a little jealous about Luke and Mia...is it wrong of me to feel that way?