Hi I suck at updating but here's a thing.
Thanks for loving me


I yawned as I closed the door to my locker. I didn’t really want to be at school today, but I had no reason to stay home. My parents wouldn’t let me sleep in just because I was tired.

“You okay, hermano? You don’t look so good.” I turned slightly so I was facing Jaime as he walked up to me.

“Yeah, it’s just that Mike made me wake up super early this morning.”

He chuckled. “You know, eventually you’re just gonna have to stay up all night.”

“Please don’t speak that into existence,” I sighed. He laughed.

“Sorry. Hey, you wanna go out with us after school? We could grab some food and stuff.”

“As tempting as that sounds-

“No, please don’t ditch us again,” he cut me off. “C’mon, please come out with us. I can’t remember the last time we all hung out.”

He had a point, it had been a while.

“Fine,” I sighed, “I’ll grace your lives with my presence.”

“Shut up,” he said with a laugh. The bell rang so he patted my back and walked off to class.

I shook my head. I didn’t want to go out after school. In all honestly I wanted to catch up on the sleep Mike made me give up for Alysha, but I guess I had been abandoning my friends.

I threw my backpack over my shoulder and walked to my first class. I guess if I was gonna go out later I had to be in the right mindset. That’s what I kept telling myself as I wished my all my classes to go well.

***

“I’m just saying, if we leave earlier we can sit on her porch and wait. Maybe strike up a conversation.”

“Mike, that’s stalking. No!”

“But bro.”

I rubbed my temples, trying to soothe the headache that was inching its way into my skull. We still had a couple blocks to walk before we got home and Mike insisted on talking about his crush. Well, mostly about how to stalk his crush. It was starting to get creepy.

“Mike, I’m gonna say this because I love you: If you force me to get out of bed before dawn again, I will murder you.”

He put his hands up. “Fine, you win, you win.”

I sighed in relief and tuned my brother out as he rambled about all the homework he was assigned today that he probably wouldn’t do until tomorrow.

“So Tony said you’re coming out with us later,” Mike stated. I nodded. “It’s about time.”

“Yeah, yeah, I know,” I said dismissively.

“Seriously dude, I can’t remember the last time I hung out with you.”

I chuckled. “It’s funny, Jaime said the same thing.”

“There you go.”

We ended the conversation there as we entered our house. Mike stepped in before me and went straight for the kitchen, probably for a snack; I locked the door and headed upstairs. If I was going to go out later I wanted to make sure I took care of all my responsibilities so I could enjoy myself without distractions. Besides, Jaime wasn’t going to come pick us up for a couple hours.

I finished some calculus homework and another paragraph of my English paper before I decided that it was time to start getting ready to leave. I went to the bathroom to brush my teeth and redo my hair. I decided against changing clothes since this was supposed to be casual, and because my friends would never let me hear the end of it if I so much as changed shoes.

I still had a couple minutes to kill before the “I’m here” text from Jaime would arrive so I sat on my bed and opened the Facebook app. I checked on the band’s group that I joined last night, hoping to see some indication that someone saw my post. To my surprise there were two likes next to the bubble. As much as I hated to admit it, those likes made me feel prideful.

I scrolled further down the comments and read other introductions. There were some kids in the group that were as young as thirteen, some as old as forty. Most of the members were in that eighteen to twenty-five age range. Quite a few of them lived in California, but not in cities close to San Diego. There were some members from as far as the Philippines.

I exited the post and scrolled through the page’s timeline. There were a lot of “introduce yourself” posts, one post asking us to post the band’s merch that we’d acquired over the years, and one asking what other bands we all listened to. One post, however, caught my eye.

“Ok So! Some of us in the group thought it would be fun to do a pen pal project... because well it sounds pretty cool so if you want to participate just comment on this post!”

I bit my lip. A pen pal project would be kind of cool, and it would prove to my friends that I can get out of my comfort zone by becoming friends with someone I’d never met before.

I could sense the potential sex offender eyeing me through my screen.

I shook those thoughts out of my head and liked the post. It was an interesting idea, and I didn’t have to tell my future pen pal anything I didn’t want them to know. I quickly commented on the post right before Jaime texted me saying he was outside. I put my phone in my pocket and went to the room next door to get Mike.

“Hime’s here,” I said as I leaned against his doorframe. He sat up on his bed and cocked an eyebrow.

“Do you know if he picked Tony up first?”

“How am I supposed to know that?” I asked. I crossed my arms over my chest and looked at him as he started putting his shoes on.

“Could you ask? Tony always gets shotgun.”

I shook my head. Our house was fairly close to where both Jaime and Tony lived. In fact, the four of us lived within two blocks of each other. Tony and Jaime lived on the same block so usually when the four of us would hang out he would pick Tony up first then us. It always bothered Mike because he never had an opportunity to call shotgun.

“We’ll never even get there if you keep taking forever,” I said, half-joking. He rolled his eyes but slipped his Vans on and slipped his phone into his pocket.

“I’m getting shotgun this time,” he mumbled as we headed outside to Jaime’s car.

“Not if I beat you to it,” I said quickly. In a flash I took off running to the car that was now in view in the street. Mike, not missing a beat, took off after me.

My brother may have been taller than me, but the years I put in to soccer made me faster. I went down the stairs and out the door in seconds while Mike tripped over his own feet. He was fumbling down the stairs as I opened the front door and ran out to the street. I opened the passenger side door of Jaime’s car and quickly sat in the seat.

“Woah, where’s the fire?” Jaime asked.

I took a few seconds to catch my breath before I answered. “Mike wanted shotgun.”

He chuckled. “Well you’re lucky Tone’s not here.” I nodded.

Mike entered the car a few seconds later with a scowl on his face. “You’re a bitch,” he said.

I laughed. “Don’t be like that. It’s not my fault you’re slow.” He scowled deeper.

“Hey, what if I make Vic promise to let you have the seat on the way back?” Jaime asked, trying to keep the peace. It was a bit unnecessary; I was going to give him shotgun on the way back because I was a great brother.

“I really thought I’d get it this time,” Mike said to himself, obviously ignoring everything Jaime had just said. “Hey, where’s Tone anyway?”

“Good question,” I said. I looked at Jaime for an explanation.

“He had to take his sister somewhere, not sure where. He said he’d meet us in a bit.”

“If that’s the case then can we get Curtis?” I asked. The five of us would usually hang out, but because Jaime and Curtis were the only two with cars one of them would pick the other four up. The two of them had sedans so fitting five people in the car would be uncomfortable for the three in the back. That meant one of them would end up driving to our destination by themselves.

“Sure,” Jaime said with a shrug, “as long as he hurries his ass up.” I typed out a quick message and stared out the windshield for my best friend. Within seconds he was walking down his driveway to Jaime’s car.

“Looks like the gang’s all here,” I said when Curtis got in the backseat. Jaime chuckled before he put the car in drive and headed for the mall.

***

“There’s no talent out tonight,” Jaime said sadly. We were sitting in the food court watching all the people who passed us by.

“I thought you wanted to hang out, not check out girls,” Curtis said.

Jaime shrugged. “Think of this as a bonding experience.” Tony and I rolled our eyes. As much as we all loved Jaime, there was no denying that he was just as girl crazy as my brother, if not more so.

“Fine, let’s bond then,” Mike spoke. I looked at him.

“Mikey?” I asked. He shook his head.

“Everyone here can agree that the girls here tonight aren’t…what we’re looking for, correct?”

We all nodded. The girls in the food court weren’t exactly our type. For one, they were all middle-aged with kids, or they were kids. Or better yet, they were with their significant others and were nowhere close to looking for companionship from five guys all huddled up around a table.

“Well,” Mike continued, “there is one girl I’ve had my eye on- “

“Mike, stop,” I cut him off.

“But bro,” he whined, “I’m just looking for advice.”

“Advice on what?” Tony asked.

“How to get the girl.”

“No, you want advice on how to stalk the girl,” I corrected. Tony, Jaime, and Curtis looked at me with quizzical expressions. I just shrugged and continued to stare at my brother, which caused the other three to stare at him as well.

Mike blushed under our gazes. “Shut up,” he mumbled as he munched on a French fry.

“Let me explain,” I started. “Mike here has a crush on the new girl, Alysha, and insists on standing in front of her house every morning so he can ‘accidently’ run into her on our way to school and get her to fall in love with him.”

“That’s not completely true,” Mike mumbled.

“Then please, Mikey, enlighten us.”

“She doesn’t have to fall in love with me, just notice me a little.”

Tony “awed” at my brother’s confession. “Don’t worry Mike, we’ll help you get the girl.”

Mike smiled. “Thanks Tone.”

“And then we can help you plan the wedding! Where are you planning to go on your honeymoon? Cancun or Jamaica?”

“Shut up, Tone.”

***

I huffed as I flopped onto my bed. We had stayed at the mall for longer than expected. There were a few stores with sales and as much as I didn’t want to, we kinda went crazy with our money.

It was almost ten when we finally got everyone dropped off at their respective homes. The night was still young, but I was too tired to care. All I wanted to do was shower and turn in for the night. Unfortunately, Mike had rushed to the bathroom as soon as we stepped in the house, probably as payback for me stealing shotgun.

I pulled my phone out of my pocket and plugged it into the charger next to my bed. I scrolled through my social media apps, liking various tweets and pictures that I found interesting before I checked my notifications on Facebook.

Quite a few people had commented on the same post I had hours ago. I tried to look at all of them, but there were too many. I began to wonder who I would get matched up with. Would they be nice? Would I like them?

Was I thinking about this too much?

Probably.

I just wanted my future mystery friend to like me. it’s not like I had an obsessive need to be liked, but it was something I worked toward. I couldn’t stand if someone didn’t like me. I felt like if someone wasn’t too fond of me then they should at least tell me why. I rarely had to think about that though since not many people blatantly hated me.

“Bathroom’s free,” I heard my brother mumble as he walked past my door to his room. I sat up from my previous position and looked at the time on my phone. Mike had been in the bathroom for about half an hour, his usual amount of time in there.

I gathered some comfy clothes to change into and walked to the bathroom. I brushed my teeth then turned on the shower, surprised to find that my brother had left me some hot water, although I knew it wouldn’t last for long.

After my quick shower I retreated to my room. I turned on my alarms for school the next day and turned out my bedroom light. Today had exhausted me, and I could only hope that tomorrow would be easier on me.

Notes