His Best Friend's Sister

Chapter 3

"I'm sorry for getting your car wet," I said sheepishly in the passenger seat of Ricky Heinrich's car.

Ricky laughed. "I'm sorry for getting you we—" he cleared his throat. "For splashing you with water."

"Somehow, I actually forgive you," I replied.

"Well, good," he smirked. "I think the last time you were mad at me was when you were in the eighth grade."

I furrowed my brow. "Wait, when?"

"Don't you remember... Alexander and I were going to Davenport amusement park and you wanted to come really bad and Alexander kept saying no..."

"Oh yes!" I exclaimed, as it all came back to me. "You always used to tell Alexander to let me hang out with you guys, but you didn't back me up that day!"

Ricky chuckled. "So, you remember?"

"Of course, I do!"

*

No, Anastasia, you can't come with me and Ricky to the movies.

Come on Alex, just let her come.

Why? She's a pest.

No, she's not, and she'll like the movie.

Okay, fine.

*

I paused for a moment then turned to Ricky, "So why didn't you back me up that day?"

There were a couple moments of silence with the exception of the raindrops hitting the car.

"We weren't actually going to any amusement park," Ricky said quietly.

"What?" I asked, with narrow eyes.

Ricky had a wide grin but remained silent as he let the steering wheel slide between his hands.

"Where did you guys go?" I probed, smiling slightly myself.

"We spent the night in the city," he finally admitted.

"What?"

Ricky was holding back laughter. "We bussed to the city. Spent the whole day and night, met some questionable - but nice - people, hitchhiked back home-"

"Hitchhiked?" I interrupted once more, aghast.

Every time I showed any sign of horror or dismay, Ricky would struggle even harder to hide his laughter.

"Look, Anastasia, I wasn't ever supposed to tell you this -"

"I can't believe you guys," I continued. "Such little rebels at only fourteen... man, if I tried to do anything like that at fourteen... what am I saying? If I tried to do anything like that now, Alexander would kill me."

"Alexander looks older than he is, so we were able to do some fun stuff-"

"I don't want to hear it!" I cried. "What happened in the city, will forever stay in the city."

Ricky chuckled and shook his head. I was taken aback at how comfortable I felt sitting here talking to Ricky alone. I thought of how I was too shy to even talk to Ricky the last time I had been alone with him. There had been one night recently, where Ricky was sleeping over at the house. Unfortunately, Alexander and I shared a bathroom, and I had been brushing my teeth in my pyjamas, when Ricky entered the bathroom to do the very same. Mortified, I continued to aggressively brush, burning a hole into my own reflection in the mirror. Instead of leaving, Ricky silently grabbed the tube of toothpaste, squeezed a pea size amount onto his brush, and began brushing his teeth right beside me. I didn't dare look at him, and we never said a word to each other. The sight of his grey sweatpants in my peripheral vision made it hard to do so. But if I had known it would've been this easy to talk to Ricky, maybe I would have said something.