Too Many Saturdays: Chapter 1

[My first attempt at YA chick-lit]

“And then Joss was like, ‘well I kinda like it…’ and I was like ‘oh my god! I love care bears too!’ we so like had this like heaps deep connection!” gushed Liz, overrun by her own deluded excitement as we walked from the bus stop to the local library after school one obnoxiously hot November day. I grinned and giggled but mentally rolled my eyes, I really don’t know why I put up with this.

Liz is one of those girls who falls in love every week; and every time it’s the “perfect” guy, or “the one” as she likes to call it. Of course, the guy will always say or do something that changes him from the “one” to “that total asshole who broke my heart”, all in the space of a week.

I, on the other hand, was very different. Liz was always in love, where as I was almost never. I don’t know what it was, but the idea of being tied to someone like that terrified me. I preferred my “romance” short, sweet and nickname-free.

Meh – I just figured I was a head case.

“Alice, are you listening to me?” Liz asked, flustered; her harshly cropped, bronze hair illustrating her frustration.

“Huh?” I’d spaced – again.

“I said do you like wanna come shopping at Blue Skies with me on Saturday? It’ll be fun!”

“Oh god, are you going to stalk this one too?” I whined. We’d spent far too many Saturdays trawling around the local mall after Liz’s latest conquests. Always in vain of course, as the three boyfriends she had had consisted of a warcraft geek, a sleezazoid and a guy who she dated for a week and a half before he dumped her for moving way too fast.

Well, I did try to tell her that discussing her extensive wedding plans with him may make him a bit nervous. But does she listen…

“Ouch!” I exclaimed. She’d punched me.

“Its not ‘stalking’,” she replied defensively, her murky hazel eyes wide with pseudo-innocence “I need new… umm…. Socks!”

“Socks?” I asked, my voice dripping in skepticism.

“Yeah socks!” she chirped, now more confident in her story “Hey, we should go to A-mart – I’m sure they’d have… err… socks!”

“And that would have absolutely nothing to do with a certain boy who I happen to know is employed at that establishment, would it now?” I accused her, bemused.

“No!” she cried

I stared.

“But we really should go between eleven-thirty and two because…” she glanced at me, defeated “oh why do I even bother?”

I rolled my eyes again, externally this time. Yet again I am dragged into stalking some poor boy until Liz looses interest or he invariably crushes her every hope and dream.

Still, Stalking means mall.
And mall means music shop.
And music shop means music shop boys.
And music shop boys mean Angus.

I couldn’t help but grin.

~

[TO BE CONTINUED]