It's Complicated

Chapter Two

"If we are going to your house, what am I going to wear?" I pleaded with Josie while following her to the car. Stanley took us to eat at my favorite restaurant downtown, the ambiance of the place was a mixture of classy and casual, they always served the most delicious tasting food there. Stanley had also ordered a congratulations cake for me; it was a strawberry cheesecake, my favorite. My brother was always the proudest of me when came to my successes, my biggest supporter.

After we ate, Stanley went home to get ready, and Josie was attempting to drag me to her house to get dressed. I was not too happy about that.

"First of all," She replied "It's not if we are going to my house," She mocked, "We are going to my house, second of all, you sure as hell know that the clothes in your closet are boring as hell." I gasped as we both hopped into the vehicle.

"What about that dress I wore for your birthday last year?"

"Too long."

"The one I wore to Levi and Stanley's Christmas party?"

"Too little cleavage," She retorted. I gave it some more thought.

"Oh, I know, what about the outfit I wore that time we went to the festival," I had a little bit of hope that she would have agreed for me to wear that one at least. "You did say that you liked it," I continued trying to read her expression. I was desperately trying to get out of wearing Josie's clothes. It wasn't that I didn't like her clothes but I knew that once she brought out her party options, it would be something that I felt uncomfortable wearing. Unlike me, who was the ultimate bookworm with no social life, Josie had managed to master the young adult life being both a grade A student, and somewhat of a social butterfly. Not only did this girl love learning and all that it entailed but, she also loved and followed all the latest makeup and fashion trends. I loved my best friend but, her fashion choices vastly differentiated from mine.

"Sophia please stop trying to get out of me being your stylist tonight," She grinned while I sighed, she did have a point. Though Josie was hardly a negative influence, she always knew how to persuade me to do something that I didn't want to do. Although, that didn't work when we were at the Christmas party last year and she had dared me to kiss Levi. Part of me didn't want to because I knew that she had still liked him, but part of me wanted to do it, because I wanted to get the pressure of my first kiss over with and what better person to do it with than Levi. Aside from Stanley and Josie, Levi was the only other person that I trusted, not because he was my brothers' best friend but because he and I had a relationship of our own. I always liked him and he had always flirted with me but we never crossed that line and we never spoke about it either.

We continued the drive to Josie's house; it was about 15 minutes away from town. My mind wondered if tonight would be the night that I get my first kiss, but I highly doubted that that would happen, who would even want to kiss me anyway. I didn't want to be a bookworm by choice, that was just the way my life had panned out. I wouldn't have minded being a popular girl who had a footballer boyfriend and many friends or however those storybooks told it. Instead, my personality led me to be more inclined to reading books than making friends, it was easier to lose myself in the fantasy of a book rather than to exert myself in real life. It was a real miracle how Josie came into my life so suddenly and decided that she wanted to be my friend, and even then I didn't think that this friendship was going to last, but here we are today, Josie being the sister that I never had and I appreciated her every step of the way.

We continued to drive in silence as we arrived at Josie's suburban neighborhood. She lived in a two-bedroom house with her mother, who she never got along with. Josie's father had died four years ago as a result of a vehicular accident, that ended in his brain death. Since then Josie's mother was not herself, she turned to alcohol as a source of comfort, and she was often violent. When Josie started college, she had to work to provide for herself since her mother no longer cared about life. Presently, Josie finally got a job that interested her. She had applied to a prestigious law firm which accepted her to do an internship for the summer. Although she would be making less than minimum wage, she was optimistic about gaining the experience that was required to pursue a law degree. In order to earn the extra money though, she worked at a fast food restaurant every weekend, or whenever she was able to put in an extra shift in the night during the weekdays.