Sara pranced through the hallways, her blonde hair flopping as she jumped to a stop in front of the twins.
“You will never guess what just happened.”
Slamming her locker shut, Emily leaned against the wall as she regarded Sara with an amused expression. “I bet Will finally asked you out,” she said, referring to the guy who had been in love with Sara since freshman year. He always found any opportunity he could to talk to her and the way that he looked at her just proved that he really cared about her.
“Wait, what?” Sara furrowed her eyebrows at Emily’s words. “How’d you know that?”
Emily shrugged her shoulders. “I’m a good guesser.”
“And Taylor told us,” Ali chimed in, pointing down the hallway at Taylor’s tall figure as she dug through her locker. Emily rolled her eyes at her sister for giving away how she had found out about Will and Sara. “How’d he ask?”
“He came up to me in the hallway and just asked. It was cute how nervous he was though.”
Ali’s locker rattled loudly as it slammed shut. “So,” she began, “when’s your first date?”
Sara raised an eyebrow at her friend’s question. “You must be assuming that I said yes.”
The twins nodded simultaneously only to receive a head shake from Sara.
“Don’t assume,” Sara corrected.
“Don’t assume what?” Taylor asked, joining the conversation. Her hair was pulled up into her famous bun and she was wearing a jacket that said Ellison Boy’s Basketball in big block letters across the chest.
“That just because Will asked her out, it doesn’t mean that she said yes,” Emily said, filling Taylor in on their topic of discussion.
Taylor’s mouth dropped open. Her eyebrows raised as her eyes widened significantly. “You did not.”
Ali nodded. “Oh yes she did."
“I can’t believe you didn’t say yes!” Taylor cried, still staring at her blonde friend in shock. “Will’s so nice!”
“I know he is! I’m just not ready to for a relationship yet until I’ve fully explained my past relationships to him!”
Ali and Taylor shared a knowing look.
Over the past few weeks since they had first met at the start of the school year, the three girls had gotten closer, they had shared a lot about themselves with each other. Ali had told Taylor and Sara, but mainly Taylor since Ali had been aware already, of how jealous she was when it came to Emily. For some reason, Ali always felt like everything Emily did was better. Taylor had enlightened the girls on the reason why she had transferred schools. Apparently her dad had gotten a job at Ellison High as the new boy’s basketball coach, and her family had moved into the school’s district. Finally, Sara had told the girl’s about her past abusive relationship. The news had come as a surprise to Taylor, as well as to Ali, who hadn’t known until then.
Taylor placed a hand on her friend’s shoulder and gave her a sincere look as she spoke. “You can’t move onto the next chapter in your life if you keep rereading the last.”
Emily raised an eyebrow at Taylor’s words. “Well, that was surprisingly deep.”
“Thank you.” Taylor removed her hand from Sara’s shoulder and placed it on her chest to give a little bow. “I’ll be back again next week,” she joked.
“It was good advice though,” Ali pointed out.
Nodding, Sara agreed with what Ali had said. “It kind of was.”
“Hey, why do you guys seem so surprised? I could be a therapist if I wanted to be.”
Emily laughed. “You shouldn’t be. Then when we all come to you to talk about our problems it won’t be free.”
Ali and Sara nodded in agreement.
“Here comes the boyfriend,” Taylor alerted, gaining all of the girl’s attention even though only one of them had a boyfriend. All of them stared down the hallway as Liam and Lukas headed in their direction, attracting attention from nearly everyone in the hallway. Both of the boys looked like visions of perfection as they walked up to their friends. Lukas gave Ali a flirty smile, happy that they had been able to become friends after their bust of a date.
It had been two weeks since they had gone out together and since then they had been hanging out and spending a significant amount of time with each other. Ali found herself liking Lukas even more despite how open he was with the girls he hooked up with. Now he had a few girls that thought they were his girlfriend instead of one, yet that didn’t stop him from spending all of his time with Sara and Ali. A few people even asked if he was dating them, only to be surprised by the fact that Sara was his cousin and Ali was only his friend.
The girls made room for Liam as he smiled at them all and walked through them to get to Emily, who he wrapped his arms around in a tight hug. Lifting her off of the ground, he spun her around once before setting her back onto her feet. Liam placed a small kiss on Emily’s lips, brushing her blonde hair behind her ear.
Ali couldn’t help but notice that ever since the two had become sexually active, they were much less publicly affectionate than they had been. They also seemed to be much closer than they were before. Emily hadn’t stopped smiling in two weeks, and for some reason it seemed that Liam was always the cause for her smiles.
“So what are you ladies talking about?” Liam asked, his arm slung around Emily’s shoulder.
“Oh, nothing really, just about how Sara’s a heartbreaker. You know, the usual,” Ali sighed, shrugging her shoulders at the end.
“It runs in the family,” Lukas joked in response to Ali’s statement. “We can’t help it that we were born with devastatingly good looks.”
Sara furrowed her eyebrows at her cousin. It baffled her sometimes how narcissistic he could be.
Squinting her eyes, Ali made a show out of staring at Sara, then looking her up and down, and then doing the same to Lukas before shaking her head and speaking. “Are you sure that trait didn’t skip you? I see Sara’s “devastatingly good looks” but I think you’ve missplaced yours,” Ali joked, repeating Lukas’ egotistic words.
“Burn!” Taylor yelled, throwing her hands up.
Emily started to laugh at Lukas’ expression, obviously shocked by Ali’s statement.
“Damn man, do you need an ice for that burn?” Liam asked in between his chuckles.
Sara patted her cousin’s back. “It’s okay Lukas, we can’t all be gorgeous.”
Lukas’ feigned a hurt look at Sara, then at Ali for starting the joke, but Ali only gave him his signature smirk in return.
“Yeah yeah, whatever, shouldn’t we be going to class now anyway,” Lukas questioned trying to get the attention off of him.
Taylor pushed away from where she was leaning against the locker-lined wall and nodded. “Yeah, we’re gonna be late to creative writing if we don’t go now.”
Liam and Emily said there goodbyes and headed off down the hallway in the direction of their classes, while Lukas, Taylor, Ali and Sara walked in the opposite direction to the language hallways. Taylor and Sara sped ahead, purposefully leaving Ali with Lukas. They were always trying to play matchmaker, even when Ali had told them that Lukas and her were not going to be together.
As they followed behind the two girls, Lukas bumped Ali sideways, sending her flying into the lockers. He had caught her off guard, and had even scared her a bit with his sudden motion. She had always been slightly clumsy, especially when she was caught off guard.
“Hey!” she groaned, even though she hadn’t hit the lockers hard. “What was that for you German jerk?!”
Trying not to laugh at the name she had called him, Lukas flashed an innocent smile at Ali. “What ever do you mean?”
“Oh you know what I mean."
“Come on, stop leaning on the lockers or you’re going to be late to class,” Lukas sighed jokingly as he pulled Ali away from the locker he had bumped her into and pulled her down the hallway to her class. Tingles shot through her arm where he touched her, and she couldn’t ignore the thoughts that filled her mind of how amazing his hands would feel in other places.
Ali shook her head to rid her mind of such thoughts as the late bell rang, signaling the start of class. Her eyes widened instantly as she realized that she was late, and just her luck, she was only two doors away from her classroom.
Lukas picked up his speed, his hand still holding Ali’s wrist as he stopped in front of her classroom. Suddenly, Lukas leaned down and gave Ali a hug before he let go and pushed her into the room where she was met by 24 pairs of eyes, two of which belonged to Taylor and Sara who were smirking at her as she entered.
