by
Linda
ver since Valerie started going with Nick, her boyfriend, our friendship seemed to begin to fall apart. It didn’t seem fair she was spending her time with Nick more than with her best friend.“Well, Alisha, gotta go, now.” Valerie picked up her bag and began to walk out of my room.
“Wait, Valerie. You’re not going out with Nick tonight, again, right?” I asked, a hollow space beginning to form in my stomach.
“Yeah.” she wasn’t looking at me.
Our friendship is collapsing, soon.
“I guess.”
“I thought you were sleeping over.” I sat on my bed staring at her sadly. “You promised me, didn’t you?”
“I can’t remember, you never invited me over for a sleep over.” she was a million miles away. She forgot that I called her last night and asked her to come and sleep over!
“Even if you did, well, I’m sorry, Alisha, but tonight is Nick’s birthday.” she sort of shrugged, one of her foot out in the hallway, one in my room.
I wanted to yell at her right now, she was spending too much time on Nick. But I let her go, because it was Nick’s birthday. Besides, there are many more days ahead of us for her to come over and sleep.
“Okay, well, see ya tomorrow. And tell me how it went, Val. ‘Bye.”
“’Bye.” And she left without a smile, as if I were Godzilla.
For the next few days, she never called me or even sat with me at lunch. She was totally glued to Nick. When she past me walking down the hall, I smiled at her, and she ignored me! Then when Nick was shouting her name across the hall, he’s like a magnet and Valerie is attracted to him.
One day, while I was hanging around my room, I heard the phone ring from the living room. I heard my mother’s voice murmur, and she yelled upstairs,
“Alisha! It’s for you!”
I quickly sprinted downstairs and grabbed the phone, hoping it was Valerie.
“Hi, this is Alisha.” I said calmly.
“Alisha, I’m so sorry!” It was Valerie. She was crying.
“What happened?” I asked, worried if someone in her family died or something terrible than that occurred.
“N-Nick and I-I broke up.” she said, between sobs.
“You what?” I cried, surprised. I thought they were going to go through high school, at least.
“Act-Actually, I d-dumped him.” she repeated, whimpering, and hiccuping. The both of us were silent for a moment.
“But, why did you dump him?” I asked, wondering what in the world could Mr. Right do wrong.
“He insulted me right in front of his friends . . . and then, he apologized . . .”
“Then what happened?” I continued asking, letting the story flow through my brain.
“I for-forgave him, and h-he wanted me to pr-promise him something -”
“What did he want you to promise him?” I interrupted, rushing her.
Valerie took a deep breath and said into the phone line, “He wanted me to st-stop being your b-best friend. Nick wanted me to himself.”
My jaw was hanging low. “He what?” I squeaked. “Wanted you to stop being best friends with me? He wanted to hog you to himself?”
“Yeah. S-So I said, ‘No way! Alisha is my best friend. I won’t lose her over you!’ And I broke up with him.”
I was glad she said that. That meant she still cared about our friendship. “Valerie? Wanna come over to sleep at my house this Saturday?” I asked her, cheerfully.
“Definitely! We can stay up all night talking, and eating popcorn, like we used to. It’ll be so cool, we can try out some new hair styles . . .”
I could already see that our friendship is being pasted back together again.
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