Some days later, after we did our college classes and College X Games practice, I was with my best friends sitting in our favorite coffee place The Bean Scene and we were watching PJ's beret girlfriend Lucy doing her poems on the stage. Then I saw Lola coming down the steps. I went to her and we greeted each other. It was raining that day so I offered to take her dripping wet green coat and buy her a coffee, which she gladly accepted. After we found a different table to sit at, I put her very wet coat on an empty chair and then I went to tell my friends I was going to have a chat with Lola. Then I told them that Lucy could have my seat after she was done with her poem recitals.

Once I got the coffees, I sat down at the table with Lola. We all talked about our college lives and how much we were enjoying it. We were enjoying our lessons and I was enjoying practicing for the College X Games and she was enjoying her West Side Story rehearsals. Then we talked about our pasts. I let Lola go first.

Lola said that she lived with her family in Toledo all her life before she enrolled in Spoonerville College. Her father was a criminal lawyer and ran his own lawyer company that he built himself. He still does to this day. Lola's mother was a vice president of a marketing company and the company would promote anything, whether it was a movie, a tv series, a video game, a book, a new toy, the latest perfume, the next coolest car, the next exciting vacation destination – I could go on, but I'm sure you get the idea. Lola had three younger sisters, whom all were still in high school.

Lola told me as humbly as she could that she was a class princess ever since she started day care. She studied very hard in her lessons and she was a grade A student and she was the student body president for all four years in her high school, which I thought it was very impressive. She reminded me a lot of one of my best friends from high school Stacey, who was the student body president of my high school for all four years we attended to. But she also humbly admitted that there were some things she had never been good at. She was never good at sports, except cheerleading (and she had been the cheerleader captain of every school cheering leading team she had been on ever since elementary school) and she wasn't very creative. She was more practical. And she had plenty of boyfriends or more like boys who had a crush on her and never really wanted a deep relationship with her, so she didn't really view them as boyfriends.

Then it was my time to tell her about my past. I didn't really want to because I never really liked talking about it even with my best friends or the girlfriends I had in high school, but I did because she told me her past. So I started with about how for the first eleven years of my life I lived in a caravan with my dad and I never knew my mother because she died in a car crash sometime after I was born. But I tried to make the most out of it while I could, especially with doing things, such as taking part in awesome sports like skateboarding, playing football, baseball, surfing at the beach and water-skiing among them, grabbing a tasty burger from the latest burger stand and watching the latest coolest movie at the movie theatre among the many things. Then I moved to Spoonerville and into a house for the first time. That was when I met my neighbour and my very best friend PJ, who was also the closest thing I ever had to having a brother, for the first time. And we continued to keep it up since this very day.

Then I told Lola about my life in school. I never really liked school ever since the first day I attended day care. Among the many things I didn't like about was that no matter how hard I worked, I never got the best grades. I graduated high school as a C student and I never thought that I would be get into any college at all. And also because I got bullied a lot. Probably because I looked differently than most of the other kids and I was very clumsy clumsy, but it all changed at the end of the ninth grade when I did that fake Powerline dance at the end of the student body assembly to impress my crush at the time, Roxanne, and then when I danced with the real Powerline later. And I got a chance to prove my skills like acting, playing football and talent shows.

"I'm so sorry for what you had to go through," Lola said. "I know the popularity chain can be so demeaning. I knew I was the most popular girl back in all the schools I did, but I knew it was because the other students thought I was beautiful and not because they thought I was smart and practical. I just focused on being the best I could. I never cared about the popularity food chain and I don't miss it. Nothing about it was worth it."

When I became the coolest kid in my school, I managed to keep my popularity up for the next three years, but I never let it go through to my head. I tried to help everyone and make sure no one would be bullied like I was. And I was just glad that I never became a bully like all the bullies I met during my life. And even though I was getting bullied by Bradley Uppercrust III and the Gammas, it only made me glad I never sank to their level and I was the bigger person.

"Anyway, I'm very proud of you, Max, for going through what you did and becoming the bigger person," Lola continued. "With all you've been through, I bet you could write a self-help book about it to help people who had been through what you've been and become the bigger people like you."

I thought that was a good idea and I still do. I haven't written it yet, but I never forgot it and I still want to write it. If I do manage to write it and get it published, I aways knew that I would dedicate to Lola for giving me the idea.

"But no one cares here who's popular or not," Lola went on. "Anyway, I know I have more to learn about you, but so far, from what I know, you're so amazing. You're so cool, so talented, so smart, but more importantly you're a nice guy. I like the way you're looking after your best friends."

"Thanks, Lola. And from what I can tell, you are just as kind and smart as you are beautiful."

"Aww, thanks, Max." Then Lola kissed me on the cheek and that made me do my goofy laugh. Then I cleared my throat and I held up my cup of coffee. "Well, here's to the new chapters of our lives."

Lola held her cup up and we toasted it.

"So, did you have any girlfriends?"

Then I told Lola about the two great high school relationships I had in high school. The first one was Roxanne and we had a very happy one until she had to move to Santa Fa with her dad sometime during the eleventh grade in 1997. After that, I started a new relationship with a girl called Lisa after she learned that her boyfriend Chad cheated on her. We had a happy relationship too until she had to move to Augusta because she was accepted into a different college, but we still remained good friends and kept in contact with each other. Roxanne, on the other hand, didn't, but I knew it wasn't her fault. She did write me a letter to let me know how she settled in Santa Fe and how much she missed me as much as I missed her. I wrote one back. After that, I received nothing from her. But I wasn't upset because I knew that Santa Fe was far away from Spoonerville and she had a lot going on.

"Wow!" Lola said, after I finished. "You may only have had two high school relationships and I may have had more boyfriends, but at least you have managed make yours deeper and meaningful. Another thing I respect and admire about you. I wish one of my boyfriends I had back in high school was like you."

"Thanks, Lola."

Then we both finished our delicious coffees.

"Well, I have to go now," Lola said, getting up and putting her coat back on. "Thanks for the delicious coffee and the lovely chats, Max. I really enjoyed them."

"So did I, Lola," I said.

"Are you looking forward to the College X Games?" she asked me.

"I am," I said. "I'm a bit nervous, but I believe I can do it. I'm incredibly focused."

"Well, I hope you notice me when I come to see you."

I was amazed to hear that. "You're coming to see me?"

She laughed. "Of course. I've seen you and your friends work so hard with your training. I can't wait to see you win. Bye, Max. And good luck."

Then I watched her walk back out in the rain, feeling very confused emotions all at once.

"Hey, bro."

I snapped out of my mind and got back into reality. I turned to see my friends PJ, Bobby and Lucy standing next to me. "Hi, guys. What's up?"

"What's up is that the place is closing," PJ told me.

"Yeah," Bobby agreed. "This place needs its sleep as much as we do."

"Oh, yeah," I yawned. "Let's head back to our beds."

Then we started to walk out.

"So who's your latest girlfriend?" PJ asked.

"What girlfriend?" I said.

"Nice try, Max-o," Bobby said. "So, come on, who's the latest chick?"

I decided to tell them about Lola and everything I've done with her since I met her in the Clue Rave, because they knew about all about me and my girlfriends since high school, including the very first one, Roxanne.