The Jesters Fool- Chapter 1

The first chapter of a novel following Brooke Taylor, a senior at a prestigious boarding high school. This chapter world builds and introduces the reader to her friends and father.

I left my favorite pair of sneakers at home, I realized sadly, two hours into the six-hour drive to school. I left them on my wooden chair, the toes pointing toward my bed, in the corner of my room. The cute white shoes I had been planning to wear on the first day of school were no longer an option. I sighed. I had planned on wearing those new, pristine Air Forces while showing off my cute outfit- the first day of school was the only day I had planned to dress up all year. My goal was to dress like the seniors had always dressed. Preppy, and clean, mature but with an appropriate taste of innocence and naivety. Now I can’t get the shoes back until my parents come to visit me for Thanksgiving break, and on the last first day of high school, the underclassmen might look at me with a little less awe. 

“Are you excited?” Dad asks me, changing from the left lane of the freeway into the right lane, preparing to exit the highway so we could grab something for lunch at a sketchy small-town diner. I always hated the food we ate on the way to school, I also hated the food at school. The only food I really enjoyed was the fresh, home-cooked meals that mom made when I was home for the summer. 

“Senior year.” I nod, my lips in a tight, half-forced smile. I thought it was obvious that I didn’t want to talk, but apparently, my body language didn’t read the same to him. 

“You know, Mom and I are just so proud of you, honey, the amazing young woman that you’ve grown up to be.” 

I nod again, “Thanks, Dad,” I sigh, as we finally exit the highway. He always gets sentimental on car rides.

“So, any plans for college yet?” I press my fingertips to my temples, subtly trying to rub away a migraine, “I mean, with Timberline's prestige, you could get in anywhere.” He laughs cooly, brushing his hand through his graying hair. 

Timberline Preparatory High School is the most prestigious school in the nation. Kids have to be geniuses to get in there, or parents with deep pockets- very deep pockets. Me and the majority of other students fall under the latter category. Sure, we have our fair share of smart kids, and I myself am not stupid, but almost every kid who came in on an academic scholarship ended up leaving within a semester. Issues with bullying, the elitist preferences of the faculty who were by no means wealthy themselves, and pressure to pay for unnecessary SAT prep tutors were all cited as reasons why they dropped out so quickly. “I still have a year to figure out where I’m going, Dad.” I muttered under my breath, “Besides, the places I applied to with early decision won’t even get back to me for another month or two.”

“What about early action?” He asks, keeping his voice the same, although I could sense his frustration growing. 

“I don’t want to be stuck with a college, Dad,” I mutter, probably in a disrespectful tone, under my breath.

“Brooke, you gotta take some initiative here. Your mother and I did not pay all of this money just for you to throw your life away.”
“I didn’t ask to be sent to Timberline!” I exclaim, punching my thigh for an exaggerated sound to echo throughout the car. Nobody at Timberline wants to be there. It's like a full-time nannying service to watch your teenagers for you. Filthy rich parents send their children to school there, under the guise of prestige and legacies, and completely forget that you exist for nine months out of the year- except holidays, those can be for family time. The picture-perfect Christmas�" mom, dad, dog, and kids all gathered around the tree. “Sorry.” I apologize, before he can even scold me for my tone. I tuck my hair behind my ear as Dad pulls into the parking lot of the diner. 

“I just want a good future for you, that's all.” Dad smiles, opening his car door and stepping out. There's an awkward tension between us that I know will not break until I get to school, and then I’ll pretend to be sentimental and cry because I’ll miss him. I won’t actually, but I’ll pretend, just like all the other kids do. The parents appreciate it when you put on a show for their goodbye. It makes them feel like an essential part of their child's upbringing. 

I follow Dad in through the doors to the diner and sit down in our normal booth. The waitresses come and go so often that in my four years of going to and from Timberline, I have never seen the same lady twice. Today it is a man, not a woman, who takes our order. As he pulls out his notepad, straws that he had kept in the same pocket of his apron fall on the table, he picks almost all of them up in one frantic scoop, but several remain on the table, he casts them a forlorn look, then proceeds to ask us what we’d like to order while clicking his pen open and closed several times and making awkward eye contact with us. We recite our usual orders, and he looks at us in confusion as we don’t so much as glance at the menus. 

“We’re usuals,” Dad tells him in response to his wide-eyed stare, and the man nods slowly, taking in our faces.

“It’s my first day, I wouldn’t know.” Dad and I smile politely as he walks away, still frantically scribbling our order down on his notepad as he walks.

I laugh, “It's gonna confuse the poor guy when he never sees us show up again.” Dad shrugs, picking up one of the straws the waiter left behind and peeling the wrapper down partially. “Don’t you think you’re a little old to be doing that?” I ask, watching him as he brings the uncovered part of the straw to his lips. He shakes his head, blowing the wrapper at me. It hits right between my eyes.

“Bullseye.” I crumple the wrapper up in front of his face, and he pouts, mocking the face I used to make when I was younger and he would do that to me. Isn’t it weird how the roles are reversed now? But I had always been the more mature of the two of us.

The waiter returns, placing a burger in front of me and a stack of chocolate chip waffles drenched in maple syrup in front of Dad. The two of us share amused looks across our food, subtly switching plates as the waiter runs back to the kitchen to grab our drinks. “Guess they're hurting for help.” Dad smiles, shoving one of his fries in my face. I wrinkle up my nose, declining his salty offer. He shrugs, moving his hand down and dipping his fry in my syrup.

“Dad, that's foul!” I crinkle my nose in disgust as he takes a bite and fakes a smile.

“You should try it, it's really good.” He tells me around his napkin. I can tell by the way that it's pressed tight against his lips that he's spitting the fry out.

“I’ll pass.” I laugh, taking a chocolatey bite of my waffles as the waiter returns with our drinks. Dad always gets a Cherry Coke, and I get a Diet Dr Pepper. That's been our tradition since high school started. I prefer Diet Coke now, but it feels weird to break tradition on my last drive up to Timberline. “Thank you,” I smile, as the waiter places the drink in front of me. I can smell the synthetic cherry flavoring without even having to bring it to my lips.

Dad accidentally takes a drink of my Diet Dr Pepper as the waiter walks away. He makes a face, “This tastes like barbecue water.” Then grabs the Cherry Coke from me and pours it down his throat dramatically. Trying to replace the taste in his mouth.

The rest of our meal is uneventful, filled with the awkward pauses in conversation that one would expect from a father and daughter who hardly knew each other beyond the surface level. I’ve had high school boyfriends that knew me more than my dad does. 

The waiter refills dad's Cherry Coke three times before we ask for the check. Dad places some cash on the table, before shoving up from his seat. “You ready to hit the road again?” He asks, pushing his hands deep in his pockets and heading towards the door. I nod and follow him outside. The late summer humidity hits me as soon as I step out the door, the sticky summer air clinging to my bare skin.

“It’s been a hot summer,” Dad observes, unlocking the car.

I start fidgeting with the AC the second that he starts the engine up, “Yeah, maybe it's our sign to fix the air conditioning at home.”

“Oh come on, it works most of the time.” He laughs, looking over his shoulder as he backs out of his parking spot. 

“Except when it gets over a hundred degrees, when we really, desperately need it working. Preferably double time.”

“We live in Minnesota, when has it ever gotten over a hundred degrees?”

“Well, it got to ninety-five around the fourth of July. Remember? Grandma was worried it would be too hot to watch fireworks and planned a whole movie night in her mildewy basement as a backup.” 

“Good thing her AC works then.” He refutes, I laugh and then turn up the volume on the radio so I don’t have to keep talking.

I hate classic rock. I would rather listen to sorrowful songs of the depressed ‘it’ girls of the music industry, but if KISS keeps my father silent, I’ll suffer contentedly. I subtly pull my earbuds out of my backpack and pull on the hood of my Timberline sweatshirt. I press play on my music and drift to sleep with the laments of Lana Del Ray playing in my head.

The car jostles as it hits the first of many potholes. Waking up, I pause my music and rub the back of my neck. My back is sore, and my butt hurts from half-sitting and half-lying in the same position for so long. “We’re here!” Dad grins, turning down the volume of his own music and pulling up to the gates outside of the ancient campus that is Timberline.

The highly religious school has been around since the late seventeen hundreds, and a sign almost as old as the original building hangs right before the entrance, projecting a time-worn and faded list of the seven deadly sins: pride, greed, lust, envy, gluttony, wrath, and sloth. Directly beneath their bold font reads, “Exodus 15:7”. A chill runs through me as we cross the old sign; the manipulation of the Bible feels almost like an ominous threat.

“Good to be back,” I respond with forced enthusiasm, as the ornate gate swings open after Dad scans his parents'/visitors' pass. “For the last time,” I add, trying to hint at the fact that I was excited to be done with this. Dad is oblivious to my tone, as usual.

“You’re really gonna miss this place next year, huh?” He asks, driving at the impossibly slow speed of fifteen miles an hour down Timberline's one and only on-campus road, which leads to the only parking lot for the whole school. During the year, only teachers who live off campus use it; however, on the first day, it's open for parents to park as they help their children move in. Students aren’t allowed to keep cars on campus, so this is the one time that you’ll ever see the parking lot full.

The blacktop is cracked and old, in desperate need of refinishing. They redid it the summer after my freshman year, but two Midwest winters full of brutal ice storms later, it already needs repaving. The painted lines could also use a touch-up. The white arrows are almost nonexistent, coated in salt stains from winter, and the yellow parking lines are so severely faded they're basically white.

“I miss driving when I’m here,” I tell Dad, tapping the dashboard of the car affectionately.

“I doubt anyone misses your parking. It's best we keep you away from the parking lots as much as possible.” He laughs. I’ve only hit a parked car in a parking lot once. Yes, it was possibly a Mustang, and yes, I may have cleaned half the paint off its front bumper, but it only happened once. 

“If I weren’t here all year long, I wouldn’t struggle to park so much.” I’m only half-joking. Dad knows I despise Timberline and allows me to get away with ragging on the school if I half hide it in a poorly veiled joke.

“You love it here.” He reprimands me softly, pulling into the closest open spot to the Senior dormitory. Shifting the car into park, he turns to me before opening his door with a sigh, “I know you hate it here, but don’t let that stop you from enjoying your senior year.”

“Yessir.” I move to open my door, but Dad grabs my arm.

“Don’t tell your mother that I’m saying this, but have fun. As long as the Principal and the Police don’t have to get involved, everything is free rein.”
“I’ll do my best to have fun while staying out of prison.” Getting around the rules, although risky and a fun spike of adrenaline, is so not my thing. I enjoy being in my dorm by the 10 PM curfew, and I never leave campus without the proper permissions necessary. Call me old school, but man, am I afraid of authority figures being mad at me. I always find it best to play it safe and abide by the rules, and Dad knows that full well.

“That's my girl.” He smiles, ruffling up my hair as if I’m his son who he’s sending out onto the field for his first little league football game. He gets out of his door and pops open the trunk, grabbing one of my boxes. I watch from the mirror as he turns and smiles politely at the other parents walking to the dorms themselves. I fix my hair quickly and apply a coat of sparkly pink lip gloss before grabbing my backpack and getting out of the car.

My body aches, and I stretch dramatically, raising my hands high into the air. My back doesn’t pop, but my body suddenly tenses as someone's fingers are digging into my sides. I laugh, turning to see who grabbed at me. It's Lexi, my best friend since sixth grade. She’s the only person here who I knew before high school, our relationship only growing as we continued our education together. 

Her family could never afford a school like this, but her mom took a teaching job here when she was in eighth grade. The year of separation broke my heart at the time, but now I’m more than grateful, because it allowed me to go to all four years of high school with my best friend in the world. “Lex!” I wrap my arms around her neck in an excited embrace. I haven’t seen her all summer, and coming back to her is like finally being back home. She's closer than family, my best friend.

“Brooke!” She hugs me back so tightly I begin to wonder if she's crushing my lungs. “I have the BIGGEST surprise for you!” She pulls away from me with a huge grin splitting her face. Her teeth are straighter than I remember, and whiter too. She must have gotten work done on them this summer.

I lean in close and whisper in her ear so my dad doesn't hear, “Did you kiss Thomas King?” Thomas has been her crush since forever. He lives next door to her, and the summer before freshman year, she had met him. Her parents constantly told her about the sweet boy next door, which originally turned her off to the idea of him, but then, when she had gone outside to read that fateful morning, she had fallen in love at first sight. Even the idea that her parents would approve of her dating him didn’t make her crush go away. Thomas was like a drug to her; just the thought of him drove her crazy. He was her best friend during the summers when I wasn’t around, and he knew her almost as well as I did. The fact that she went to a private school for rich snobs like me, and that he was zoned to one of the worst public schools in the state, made for interesting conversations between them.

Lexi blushes, playfully hitting my arm, “No, but he’s part of my big news.” I c**k an eyebrow, waiting for her to go on, “Our moms became friends, and my mom talked his mom into working here as the librarian this year!” That poor woman. Last year, our old librarian quit because too many kids were arguing over who would get to check out the last copy of The Scarlet Letter, the day before the English AP test, because none of them had read it at the beginning of the year, like they had been supposed to.

“Does that mean?” I shake her shoulders, waiting for her to tell me that the boy of her dreams was about to be attending the same school as her.

“Yes!” She shakes her head excitedly, the blonde waves turning almost white in the sun. “Thomas King is going to the same school as me!” We do that weird squeal of excitement that only girls in movies do, and then laugh at ourselves. 

“Lex, that's amazing!” I hug her again�" her excitement is contagious. My dad clears his throat behind us, reminding me that he's there. “Oh, Dad, that box looks heavy. We should probably bring that to my room now.” I smile, grabbing a slightly smaller box from the back of Dad's car. “Shoot, I forgot what room I’m in,” I struggle to grab my phone out of my back pocket with my hands full. 

“Do you want me to check?” Lexi asks, laughing. I nod, and she grabs my phone, holding it up to my face so that it unlocks, and then goes to my messages. She scrolls for a minute, trying to find the text that Timberline sent out to students individually around two weeks ago. “Ha!” She exclaims, finally finding it, sandwiched between a conversation that I had been having with my roommate from last year, and a group chat with me, my parents, and my grandma. 

Lexi's eyes go wide, and she looks at me with the dopiest grin on her face. “Please tell me that they accidentally assigned me a room in the guys' dorm,” I laugh, despite the dirty look that Dad gives me.

“Brookie, we’re roommates!” 

“OH MY GOSH!” I don’t think I’ve ever felt this level of unparalleled joy in my life. If it weren’t for the awkwardly large box in my hands, I would be doing that comedic jumping and squealing thing again. “Lex, this is going to be the best year ever!”
“Why's that?” A guy's voice asks. I can hear footsteps come to a stop beside Dad, and I awkwardly shuffle-step-turn so I can see who it is. 

“Marcus!” I exclaim, shoving my box back into the trunk of Dad's car, before jumping up and wrapping my arms around his neck in a giant hug. His voice is deeper now, and it feels weird knowing that I didn’t realize that it was him at first. He’s probably taller too, but I have no way of knowing for sure. I should start carrying a tape measure or something with me, just in case of situations like this.

Marcus and I had met during the fall exam week of sophomore year. I had been so tired that I had accidentally gone to one of the boys' halves of the dorm instead of the girls. I found my way to room 213, my room number, and felt wary because the door was kept open a crack. Me and my roommate at the time left our door locked at all times, but we were both exhausted from constant studying, so one of us must have forgotten to close it all the way. Pushing into the room, my steps had immediately faltered. It wasn’t my room. I was on the boys' half of the dormitory, and there was a boy lying in the bed next to the door. I dropped my books and screamed. From there, Marcus and I had become inseparable best friends. 

“I missed you, dude.” He grins, tussling my hair in the same way that my dad had done moments before. It must be a guy thing. 

“I missed you more, idiot.” I grin, “How have you been?”

“Not great,” I am about to give him my sympathies when he adds, “It's hard going a whole summer without you.”

I laugh and grab my box from the back of my car. “Shut up,” I tell him, and my dad gives him a glare.

Dad hasn’t come to accept the fact that I might one day get a boyfriend�" that I would tell him about. I would never date Marcus, of course, but Dad also doesn’t understand that. I admit that Marcus and I flirt more than average friends do, but the two of us are strictly platonic. We just excessively flatter each other for fun. Strictly a confidence boost between close friends. When Dad walks a few steps ahead of us, Marcus dramatically shivers and makes a face about Dad's cold demeanor towards him. I laugh again and shove my box into his empty arms. “Maybe he’ll let me keep you around if you seem useful.” Lexi laughs with me as she grabs a box from the car for me, too. I grab the remaining box, which is evidently the heaviest, and I stumble for a few steps, trying to stop myself from dropping it.

“You want to trade?” Marcus asks, but I shake my head, set in my determination, and continue marching�" stumbling�" forward.

We walk like that up to the door of the dorm building. Lexi gives me a sheepish grin, watching as I struggle to readjust the box in my arms. “Hey, Brooke.” I sigh, sensing what she's about to ask me. “I left my student ID inside when I brought my stuff in.” 

“Lex!” I exclaim, setting my box down on the sidewalk outside the senior dorm doors. I grab my phone out of my pocket and pop the case off, pulling my ID out from its place between my phone and its case. My ID is slightly sticky and stays in my hand for an uncomfortable second before I pry it off and hold it in front of the machine. The door beeps, and I pull it open. My dad pushes past me to hold the door open for the rest of us. I set my phone and ID on top of my box and try to lift it back up.

My summer in the weight room doesn't seem to have paid off, though; it takes me a couple of tries before I finally manage to lift the box. My phone slips to the edge of the box, and Marcus grabs it before turning to me and making a face.

“Why is your phone so sticky?” He asks, placing the ID against the back of my phone and popping the case back on. He awkwardly shoves it in my back pocket, trying his best not to touch my butt, especially in front of my dad. He tries to wipe the stickiness of his fingers off on his jeans, but the endeavor appears to be unsuccessful. 

I shrug, almost dropping my box. “I spilled pop on it yesterday.” Marcus sighs in mock disappointment and laughs along with Lexi. My dad just scowls. We got into an argument about how I have to be more careful with my belongings over my soda spillage incident. “Marcus, be a gentleman and trade boxes with me.” I smile politely, in a fake flirty voice. 

“You had your chance.” He says, walking past me and into the dorm building. Lexi and I giggle.

“See what I have to deal with all year?” I ask my dad as I walk past him, nearly falling on the step up I have to take in the hallway.

“You poor baby.” He shakes his head. He looks disappointed in me, but I don’t care. He's the one who’s abandoning me here, again. 

The stairs up to the girls' floor look daunting. “Do you guys just want to take the elevator?” I ask, pretty positive that I will fall backward and die if I try moving this box up the stairs with me.

“I don’t know Brooke.” Marcus says, biting the inside of his cheek, “I just had a pretty long car ride, I could really use the steps right now. It’s good for my legs, you know?” His family lives less than four miles away from Timberline�" I know that because the two of us snuck out of Timberline once last year and walked to his house. The rule-breaking horrified me, but it ended up being a fun day regardless of the constant rush of adrenaline that ran through my head throughout our escape.

“Shut up,” I tell him, and walk, as quickly as I can, to the elevator and hit the up button.

“We’ll race you up!” Marcus exclaims, realizing that I’m going to have to wait a minute for the elevator to make it down to the ground floor. He, Lexi, and even Dad take off at an awkward sprint, boxes in hand, trying to make it up to my dorm before me.

Whatever. If taking the elevator and not dying means losing, so be it. I can all but picture myself crushed to death at the bottom of the steps, my heavy box on top of me.

The elevator dings, and the doors open. I move to the side as the Rashid family begins getting off. I smile politely at Brianna, who casts her eyes away from me and walks forward.  That girl can hold a petty grudge- freshman year, we both had a crush on this crazy smart kid named Will. I think she just liked him for the fact that he was the only person in the school with better grades than her twin brother, Aaron.

Aaron is the senior class president this year. Which makes sense; he has it all�" he's crazy popular, one of the best sprinters in the state, and plays soccer. He has incredible grades; he’s really the ideal high school student. 

After Brianna, a younger girl follows after her. I’ve never seen her before. Aaron and I are good friends, so I decide to introduce myself to the girl who I assume is his younger sister. “Hey,” I smile at her. I don’t see Aaron around here, so he must be in his dorm or off with friends somewhere, or something. “I’m friends with your older brother, my name’s Brooke.”

“Mackenzie,” She says, trying to conceal a grin. “My brother talks about you a lot.” I laugh, and she pushes her curly hair out of her face.

“Don’t give her a big head.” Aaron laughs from behind me, wrapping his arm around my neck. I stumble forward with the added weight, and Aaron jumps in front of me to stop me from falling on my face in front of his family. “Sorry about that.” He mutters, blushing. “Let me help you get that upstairs, wouldn’t want you falling.” I nod, appreciating his concern.

“Thanks, Aaron.” I smile my appreciation to him, “It was nice meeting you, Mackenzie,” I say over my shoulder to his sister as we enter the elevator. She waves goodbye to me. Their parents smile politely, unsure of what to make of me.

Aaron takes the box from my arms, and I hit the button for floor two. “Jeez,” Aaron mutters with an amused smile, “What do you have in here?”

“The dead bodies of my enemies,” I tell him with a serious expression, looking him straight in the eyes. Aaron laughs again.

“You’re so weird.” I have to give it to him; that is probably the only appropriate response in this situation.

“Thanks.” I grin, flipping my short brown hair over my shoulder. Aaron shakes his head in amusement. 

“You know,” He starts and then stops, biting the inside of his cheek like how Marcus does when he’s debating between saying something out loud or just keeping it in his head.

“What?” I ask, feeling my cheeks warming slightly. Aaron's kind of cute, and something about his dark brown eyes draws me in.

“I had the biggest crush on you last year.” My blush deepens. “I begged Mr. Braclay to make us partners for that stupid Great Gatsby English project that we failed.”

“No way,” I laugh. We had done so poorly on that project; it was probably the worst grade he had ever received in his entire high school career. I’m surprised that my failure to follow clear project instructions didn’t scare him away. “I thought that me describing Daisy and Myrtle as ‘floaty balloons’, and claiming that the stupid green light had no literary importance would have totally scared a smart guy like you away.” Looking back, it wasn’t my best work ever, but our group paper definitely deserved a passing grade. Maybe a low B, if we’re being generous.

“I thought your title was genius, I was literally in awe of your creativity.” He smiles, shaking his head. 

“‘The Romantic Satirization Of The American Dream’, was some of my best work.” I agree, beginning to play with my hair, so I have something to do with my hands. “Although,” I argue, “I believe that ‘A Penitence Repentance?’ was my best title I used for an English essay last year.”

“What was that one for?” He asks, creasing his brow in thought.

“Macbeth. Something about the guy who murdered the king and then married his wife. I think it was like… incest or something. I don’t know, I didn’t really pay attention to the play, the title was the only thing I had going for that essay.”

“I can definitely understand what I saw in you.” Aaron laughs, and I pinch my lips together.

“Good, I feel like my talents are often under-appreciated,” I confess to him, only half-joking. I did genuinely feel like nobody at this school actually understood me. I was like an awkward outlier in a school of people heading towards success. I don’t even know where I want to go to college. 

The elevator stops, and the doors slowly open. Aaron follows me off, struggling under the weight of the box. I check my phone to see what room Lexi and I are in, and then lead Aaron over to room 216, where the door is wide open, and Dad, Lexi, and Marcus are pretending to have been waiting for me for hours. Marcus is at one of the desks, head between his hands as if he’s stuck on homework. Lexi is hanging her clothes in her half of the closet, and Dad is lying in my bed, pretending to nap.

When Aaron and I step into the room, Lexi pauses what she’s doing, looking from Aaron to me and making a face, as if she's appraising how we would look together as a couple.

Dad sits up in the bed, casting a glance at Marcus whom he’s convinced I have feelings for, and then turning to Aaron. “Thanks for helping me, Aaron.” I smile as he sets down the box on the side of the doorframe. He nods and shrugs. Marcus shows no signs of hostile jealousy, and Dad shrugs slightly.

“It wasn’t that heavy, I think you were just being dramatic.” He tells me, a grin on his face, as he stretches out his arms.

“Shut up,” I tell him with a laugh, “I’ll see you later, okay?”

Aaron nods before turning to leave after waving goodbye to everyone in the room. Marcus looks at me with a sly grin on his face, and Lexi's eyes are so wide I can practically see the hearts floating around behind them. “Ooh.” She sings before going back to organizing her excess of clothes. 

“No dating,” Dad tells me, standing up and running his hands through his hair. Marcus makes a face behind Dad's back, and I try my best to hold in my laughter. “But Aaron seems like a very nice boy.”

“Guys!” I exclaim, “He just helped me carry my box because I was talking with his family.”
“What a romantic start.” Lexi sighs. “What's it called? A- A meet cute!”

“I already know him. We’ve been friends for a while.” I inform the group, but Lexi just makes an exasperated sound, “Shut up.” I laugh, pushing the back of her head lightly, and she playfully stumbles into the closet. I close the door and laugh as she bangs from the inside, begging me to let her out. I’m about to give in and open the door, but Marcus shoves me out of the way, leaning his back against the plastic-y wood. 

“Sorry, Lex,” He says, feigning distress in his voice, “The door’s stuck. Timberline must have given you a faulty closet.”

“Oh my goodness!” I can hear her mutter a prayer under her breath, going along the lines of, ‘I’m too young to die like this, I swear I’ll pay attention in religion class this year if you let me live.’  “Am I seriously stuck in here?” She asks, her pounding becoming more frantic, “I am way too claustrophobic for this!”
“For real? My bad,” Marcus laughs, pulling the door open, allowing a very frightened Lexi out. She looks like a cat with its fur on end, warning the cause of its distress to back off.

“I hate you.” She laughs, shoving his chest, “I hate you too.” She adds, turning to me. I deserve that one, I know how scared she is of small spaces.

“Sorry, Lex.” I giggle; she isn’t able to keep her face scrunched up in anger for long, and that's one of my favorite things about her. 

“Hey,” Dad says, breaking the moment with his suddenly solemn voice, “I’ve gotta be going, kiddo.”

I hold back my excitement, “Oh, I’m sorry, Dad. I guess I lost track of time.” I hug him, allowing him to squeeze me tightly against his chest. “I’ll see you at Thanksgiving break.”

“Bye, Bug,” he frowns, walking over to the door, “Have a great time here, okay?”

“Yes, sir,” I call after him, closing my door behind him.

“I think I’m scared of your dad.” Marcus confesses to me, “I think he wants me to like you.” He shudders in mock disgust.

“You wouldn't dare like her!” Lexi exclaims, “Aaron would get jealous.”

“Shut up,” I haven’t been this happy since the last time I saw these two. They’re my favorite people in the world, and I love them so endlessly.

“I love you, though,” Marcus says, in an attempt to make up for insulting me.

“Whatever.” He lies on my bed, the sterile plastic mattress crinkling under his weight. I shove him off so I can put my sheets on.

“You’re making the bed for me?” He asks, his eyes so wide that he looks like he’s doing an impression of Puss In Boots from one of the Shrek movies. “They have such good service here. I might never leave.”

“Get out.” Lexi laughs, “It's girl time.”

Marcus gives me a hurt look, hoping that I insist he stays, “We’ll hang out with you again later, Marcus.” I tell him, “Don’t you have any guy friends to hang out with? Or roommates to meet?” 

“Yeah, I met him for a minute. Some transfer kid.”

“Oh?” It’s very unusual for people to transfer into Timberline, especially in their senior year.

“Yeah, some kid named Thomas-”

“No way!” Lexi exclaims, drowning out the rest of Marcus’s sentence with her scream of excitement.

“Am I missing something?” Marcus asks me, and I nod, making a kissy face, turning towards Lexi. “Oh.” He nods, laughing at her. “Girls are weird. Anyways, I guess the two of you should come down to my dorm later, then.”

“See you then.” I smile as he leaves the room, and Lexi waves at his back, a stupid grin still playing on her lips. We shamelessly play into every feminine stereotype, and probably single-handedly set back the entire feminist movement several decades with our immature behavior.

Author's Note

Please leave me every comment you can! Specific editing, any negative comments, changes I should make, and even any compliments or positives that you see in my writing are also always encouraging.
You have my absolute sincerest thanks in your time editing this! You have no idea how much it means to me.