Missy Meany sat down outside her porch Friday afternoon, a duffel bag and suitcase in tow, with tears welling up in her eyes. Her parents, irate that their daughter didn't even make the cheerleader team this year let alone captain, threw her out of the house. Their voices were still echoing through her entire being.

"Missy, do you not realize all the time, effort, and money we've invested in you and your cheering career?!" Mrs. Meany yelled at her daughter, despite Missy's counterarguments.

"But mom..." Missy said at a much lower decibel level, "I tried to tell you two back in the 9th grade, I didn't want to do cheerleading anymore...I thought you understood me...I only did it because it made you happy..."

"Well you should've realized by then that we had already invested close to twenty-thousand dollars in this. You can't expect us to just let you throw all of that away." Mr. Meany retaliated, backing her mother in this argument. The house went silent for a moment before Mr. Meany sighed heavily, "I want you out of this house after dinner. Your mother and I want nothing to do with you."

"Um, yeah sure, whatever..." Missy replied sarcastically, looking at her nails. Her parents hadn't changed their pose at all when Missy looked back up at them, "Seriously...you guys are kidding right? I mean, there's no way..." Silence ensued for a painfully long time.

"WHAT?!" Missy exclaimed at last, "You can't do that! Where will I go? I don't have money to afford even a hotel!"

Mr. Meany confided, looking at his wife for a moment then back towards Missy, "We should at least financially aid her until she can support herself."

"What? What's that supposed to mean?" Missy said, shocked at her parents' unmoving stance.

"Missy, you're 18 now, and you since you're not going to become a cheerleader, you need to learn how other adults face the real world." Missy's mother said, "We don't want to do this to you, but we feel, given the circumstances, that it's the only way we'll be able to get through to you. I blame myself for allowing you to become so...attached...to us" these words stung Missy when her mother said them so cold-heartedly, "But no matter what, we still love you Missy, and if you happen to fall into more bad times, we'll let you back into our house."

Missy couldn't believe what was going on, one minute her parents were congratulating her on getting a solid 85 on her Algebra test, the next she was getting kicked out of the house for something that she felt wasn't her problem.

'Why should I get punished for something that I totally didn't do.' Missy thought to herself 'I mean, I soooo told them this a long time ago."

She had packed all of her 'essential' belongings in her bright pink suitcase while packing up some extras in a matching duffel bag, realizing that not everything she'd need would fit in her already exorbitantly huge suitcase.

Outside on her porch, Missy noticed a storm was approaching. It was then that something clicked in her mind. She instantly got up and marched back into the foyer, wiping the stray drops from her face, staring straight at her parents.

"I don't know where you got this idea, but saying I'm almost 18 doesn't make it so." Missy steamed, "For you guys to kick me out, I have to be legally emancipated, which I just happen not to be. Therefore, I have every right to stay here until I'm 18, a decent job, AND a place for me to stay that's within my budget."

Missy's parents stared at their daughter for a moment, mostly in shock at their daughter's apparently extensive knowledge of how the legal system worked.

"That's a very good point Missy." Mr. Meany said with a sort of half-smile, "You haven't even set one foot off the property and you're already learning about the real world. Very well, you've made an exceptional argument, you may stay, but don't expect to free load your way out of this one, young lady." He went back to the day's paper, reading up on his stock investments.

"Yeah fine, whatever..." Missy said in her usual fashion, content that she made her point, "So, um, where's the, like, newspaper section for this kind of stuff?" Her father simply flipped to the corresponding page listing in the newspaper, making sure not to lose his own place, removed the section and handed it to Missy without looking or even speaking to her.

Missy spent the rest of the evening looking through the various apartment and job listings, matching together what she felt was doable. 5 headaches and 9 short naps later, she had amassed a fairly small pile of listings that she became even the slightest bit interested in. She decided during all of this that she would look for a job over the weekend, then begin looking for a place to stay once she felt she had enough money to pay for rent and food. Rubbing her forehead once again, she looked at the clock placed above the fireplace. It was only 10:32 PM, two hours since the fiasco earlier. Missy took a hand-towel out of the drawer in the kitchen and ran it under cold water before putting it on her red and raw forehead. She never had to do work as intensive as this before, the only thing comparable being a car wash in middle school, and even then she barely worked, except on her tan. She lied down on the sofa, deciding to call it a night. She was just about to fall asleep when her mother walked in holding a cup of tea.

"Missy, what are you doing here? You really should go to bed now, you have a big day tomorrow, don't you?" Mrs. Meany said, almost in a motherly voice, but a detached hollowness still presided, "Come on, let's get you upstairs."

Missy sat upright, but refused to move from her spot on the couch, "If you and Dad are really following through on this, I better start losing familiarity with this place, shouldn't I?" She looked at her mother, who was now tearing up almost as much as Missy had only moments earlier. Missy's mother grabbed her by the shoulders and pulled her into a truly heartfelt hug, lasting for several moments before Mrs. Meany let go of her daughter.

"Sweetie, I understand where you're coming from, and I respect your decision," She started, gulping air in between phrases, "But we still love you no matter what. We would be horrible parents if we let you sleep down here when you have a perfectly good be upstairs. Besides," Mrs. Meany had a slight smirk on her face, "What do you think you'll be sleeping on in your new apartment?"

Missy sat with a slightly clueless look on her face. "So what you're telling me is that...I'll be taking the bed with me? Even though it's technically yours?"

Missy's mother sighed humorously and shook her head. "Missy, that is your bed, you sleep on it don't you?" she said softly to her daughter, "Of course you're going to take it with you, there would be almost no point in us keeping it anyway."

Missy looked her mother in the eyes before breaking down herself, mostly from stress, and repaid the hug with an equally forceful one of her own. Missy grabbed her notes from the coffee table, went up to her room, and quite literally collapsed on he bed, allowing it to envelope her being. Once again, she had almost fell asleep when her phone rang a familiar tune. Missy lazily grabbed the phone and looked at the caller ID.

'Ned Bigby...Why the hell are you calling me...?' Missy slid the phone up and placed it to her ear, "Um...hi Ned."

"Yeah, hi..." Ned's all-too familiar voice replied through the speaker, "Listen, I was driving around with some friends, and I passed by your house, and I thought I saw some luggage outside. I'm just calling to make sure you know about that."

'Oh crap I forgot about my stuff!' Missy thought to herself before frantically voicing into the phone, "Oh uh yeah don't worry haha yeah I know about that I better go bring it back in a storm's comin' y'know." Her voice was almost incomprehensible at the speed with which it was delivered.

"Ok, well I'm still outside your house," Ned replied, slightly embarrassed, "You know, just making sure nobody's trying to steal it...heh heh..."

'Um, wow...that's kinda weird even for Bigby...' Missy slipped into some flip-flops and headed down the stairs, "Oh, okay. Well, thanks. I, uh, appreciate that..."

Missy opened the door to find that Ned Bigby, her one true crush, was in fact in front of her house. Cautiously, she raised her hand in a waving fashion while she bent over to to grab the duffel bag. Apparently she packed it just a tad too much, and one of the seams broke, spilling clothes and health-and-beauty products everywhere.

'Great, as if this day couldn't get any damn worse...' Missy thought to herself as she tried to salvage the bag as a carrier while she repacked it as best she could. She heard a car door close, and looked up to see Ned briskly walking over to help her. If there was one thing she could say she loved about Ned, it was that he was so selfless in his efforts. Even though she plotted all through middle school all the way until the 10th grade to get him to go out with her, he still treats her like everyone else. He grabbed some of the larger items, such as her shampoo and conditioner, while she continued with her lip glosses and other tubular objects.

"How can you do this Ned?" Missy asked the boy next to her with a near-rasp in her voice.

"Do what?" Ned replied quizzically, putting two large bottles in the new duffel opening.

"Care enough about me to do this despite all that I've done to you?" Missy said slightly heartbroken, reminiscing all the times she tricked him into going out with her, sometimes against his will.

"It's just who I am Missy, I can't go around NOT being nice." Ned smiled as he put a friendly hand on Missy's tired shoulder, "Besides, what is all of this stuff doing out here?"

Missy just smiled coyly as she put the last of the items in the bag, "Well, if you help me out tomorrow I may just tell you." She winked to Ned before setting the duffel bag down in the living room of her house. She came back out to get her suitcase when Ned put a very welcomed arm around Missy.

"Is this another one of your plans to get me?" Ned asked comically, making Missy laugh and smile with integrity, something she hasn't done for a while.

"No..." Missy strained out of her mouth, "I just need to get some stuff done, and a car would really be helpful."

"Well, I wasn't planning on doing anything regardless, so I guess I'll have to accept your offer, Missy." Ned smiled as her looked at her with his deep blue eyes. Missy couldn't help but giggle slightly, Ned always knew, regardless of what he said, how to make a guy, or girl in this case, feel better in an instant.

"Really? Aw thank you Ned!" Missy practically leapt into Ned, giving him a big hug and a matching kiss on the cheek. "I'll call you tomorrow when I'm ready, if that's all right with you?"

"That's perfectly fine Missy." Ned began to backstep towards his car, "Goodnight Missy, hope you sleep well."

"Thanks Ned, bye!" Missy yelled out as he drove away, 'I hope you sleep well too...' Missy pulled her suitcase alongside the ruined bag, and looked down at her phone. It was already midnight, she must've spent more time with Ned than she thought. She quickly grabbed a comb and went into the bathroom, running through her hair a few times to get out any loose knots. After that, she went upstairs to her bed, and promptly fell asleep, feeling elevated to a higher level than she felt all day.