Chapter 4—Laura's POV

Ah, summer!

I love summer with all my heart. I live for summer, you might say. This is mostly because I hate school. I guess I'm kind of a "dumb blond," although I hate the phrase. My grades are, okay, pretty horrific, but I'm not dumb or anything. Jeez.

Anyway. Summer! I love everything about it: unlimited mall time, string bikinis, getting tan, not having school…oh yeah, it rocks.

This particular summer was promising to be like any other, coming with the good things and with the bad. The bad would be having creepy Brad Nickel practically stalking me and my mother's Fourth of July cook-out. But the good canceled out the bad, so I was happy.

June is my favorite month, I have to say. It just holds so much promise for the summer days to come. And it's not as hot yet, which is good because when it gets hotter, my hair becomes a giant frizzball—so not attractive.

My friends and I were lounging in my best friend Marissa's basement. Marissa's rich, so we usually hang out at her house. Her basement is sweet, with a huge plasma screen, unlimited DVD selection, CD's galore, and lots of food. Plus, her parents aren't usually home, which is a plus for us.

So like most other days, we had the house to ourselves. "We" was me, Marissa, Lainey, Emily, David, Seth, Austin, and Ryan. Our normal group.

The boys were playing video games on the plasma while us girls looked on, chatting and drinking sodas. David leaned over and whacked Seth as Seth's rocket blasted David's. Then Ryan came along and blasted them both into oblivion.

Seth tossed the controller aside. "This is boring," he announced, grabbing Emily's soda and downing it. "Let's do something fun." He grinned at Emily suggestively. Emily practically melted right there. "Yeah," she mumbled. Seth and Emily have been going out about six months and they are, well, prone to make-out sessions.

I groaned loudly. "Please, can we lay off the making out for once?" Emily turned bright red, but Seth just laughed.

"Oh, fine," he said. "What do you think we should do, then, Laura?"

I shrugged. "I'm just tired of you guys always leaving to play tonsil hockey, that's all." The others nodded and "yeah"ed.

"Are there any good movies out?" piped up David.

"Nah," replied Austin. "Nothing new. Just a bunch of lame stuff."

We lapsed into silence. I drained the rest of my soda, crumpled the can, and tossed it at Ryan. (He was my latest crush, I should add.) He held up his hands to fend off the can. "Hey," he said. Ryan had long, shaggy dark hair and bright blue eyes. "No can-throwing."

I grinned, then threw the can away. "Marissa, you got any popcorn?"

"Of course," she replied, "but let's get out of here. Come on, let's go to the mall or something."

The boys let out terrible groans. "No," moaned Seth. "Please. Anything but that." The boys had spent countless days carrying bags for us, and apparently they were done with that.

"There's nowhere else to go," sulked Marissa.

David let out a large, obnoxious belch. "I'm starved. Let's get some pizza."

"Yeah," agreed Ryan, standing up. "Pizza sounds good."

"Fine," I consented, giving in. "Let's go get pizza. Maybe we'll see somebody out there."

"Like who?" asked Emily, as we trooped up the stairs.

I shrugged. "Hot guys." We laughed.

It was hot out, unusually hot for an early June day. I was glad I was wearing a new hot pink tank top and short white shorts. I dug around in my pocket to see if I had any money. I did.

"Laura, is that you?"

I winced-I knew who the voice belonged to before I turned around. "Yes, it's me," I responded.

Brad Nickel grinned, walked up to me, and casually slung an arm around my shoulders. Ew! I ducked out of his embrace. "Uh, what's up?"

"Nothing. Just heading to get some pizza," he replied, not even bothering to pretend like he wasn't staring at me. Don't stare at me, you creep!

"Oh, that's cool. But-"

Grinning maliciously, Ryan sidled up beside me. "That's lucky," he said. "We were just getting some pizza, too. My name's Ryan." He stuck out his hand.

Brad shook it. "Brad Nickel."

Introductions were made. I threw Ryan a dirty look and he smirked. It seemed he'd picked up on the Brad-stalkerish kind of thing.

"So, Brad." Brad and Ryan were now walking side-by-side at the front of the group. "How do you know Laura?"

"Well," said Brad, "it's kind of complicated. I know this girl, Bailey, who knows Laura…" before long he'd launched into the story of me, Bailey, Jen, and Dell. Of course, my friends had heard it a thousand times. It was pretty creepy, though, how Brad knew the entire thing.

When he finished, and my friends had had a nice, long laugh at me, Ryan turned around to look at me and made a face. I stuck my tongue out at him (very mature, I know), and he laughed.

We'd reached the pizza place by now, and the nine of us entered and sat at a large, round table. Somehow Brad ended up next to me, but at least Ryan was on my other side.

"So, Laura, what have you been doing lately?" Brad asked me.

"Oh, not much," I said sweetly. "Just, you know, hanging out."

"We should hang out sometime," he suggested. Oh yeah, really subtle.

"Um…well…okay…"

"We could all hang out together!" Ryan jumped in enthusiastically. "It'd be fun!"

I clenched the salt shaker. The urge to dump its contents on Ryan's head was very tempting, but I restrained myself. Instead, I just stomped on his foot under the table.

Or so I thought.

"Ouch!" cried Emily. "Somebody just stamped my foot!"

"Weird," I commented loudly, before Ryan, who was much too perceptive for my liking, said anything. "Er, waitress! Waitress!"

The waitress, a girl only a couple years older than ourselves, stood before us with her hands on her hips. "What?"

"I, uh, need a refill." I shoved my cup into her hands, then got an idea. "So does Emily." I reached for Emily's cup, which was half-full. "Oops!" I had, er, accidentally dumped her remaining Coke straight onto Ryan's shirt.

"God! Laura!" He jumped up, staring down at his shirt. "What was that for?"

"Sorry, Ryan!" I said, tossing him some napkins. When he looked down at me, I smirked at him. Now what? I mouthed. He'd always been a horrible lip-reader, to our constant irritation, but he got the gist of what I was saying, and made a face.

I smiled at him, which only made him angrier. I could see the anger flashing in his eyes. And then I got scared. Was he really mad? Maybe I had gone too far.

Or maybe he'd want revenge…

Either way, something had started just now. I wasn't sure what, but it would be interesting to see it unfold.