December 24th, 2010
“It’s Christmas Eve, Jordan!” my mother announced one I came down the stairs at around one o’clock in the afternoon. “You don’t look excited!”
“I just woke up, Mom,” I told her grumpily, knowing that she wouldn’t be surprised, since everyone knew that I hated mornings. “Not to mention that I’m seventeen years old. I think I’m a little too old to get excited about you and Dad putting presents under the tree.”
My mother made a face. “You’re never too old for Christmas.”
I shrugged as I reached up into the cabinet for a box of cereal, sitting down at the kitchen island and pouring it out into a bowl when the doorbell rang.
“I’ll go get it,” my mother volunteered when she saw that I wasn’t about to move from my spot.
I continued eating, shoveling the cereal into my mouth so I wouldn’t fall back asleep. It might have been one in the afternoon, but that didn’t mean I wasn’t still tired…
“Why am I not surprised that you’re still in your pajamas, eating breakfast at one o’clock in the afternoon?” Lexi asked with a smirk when she saw me. She was fully clothed and ready for the day, while I definitely wasn’t. Her makeup and hair were done, and I would have been lucky if I didn’t have any line markings on my face from my pillow.
“You know I’m not a morning person,” I grumbled, shoveling a spoonful of cereal into my mouth.
“I know that. So, Jordan,” Lexi smiled now, changing the subject and completely sucking up to me as I readjusted myself in my chair. “So, you know… AJ has a Christmas party tonight…”
“I’m not going.”
"But, Jordan!"
"You know you can't make me, Lexi."
“You are literally the most pessimistic person I have ever met in my entire life!” she exclaimed, her hands traveling up to her hair. She looked like she was about to pull it out. “Come on! I know you don’t like parties, but it’s Christmas Eve! And it’s AJ’s party this time, not yours. Please come?”
“You’re not going to talk me into going,” I informed her as she jumped up and sat on my kitchen island. “You tried talking me into going to a soccer game at Cambridge a few weeks ago, and I didn’t go to that. I want to stay as far away from Cambridge and parties so I don’t have to see--”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah, you don’t want to see Jesse,” Lexi sighed, rolling her eyes at me now. “But the game was good, Jordan. Their soccer team always wins when they play at Cambridge because of their lucky net.”
I rolled my eyes at her now. “That’s ridiculous. There’s no such thing as a lucky net.”
Lexi shrugged. “I don’t know. All I know is that they cherish that thing so much that it isn’t even funny. It’s really weird, actually.”
“Everything about Cambridge is weird,” I grumbled, knowing she’d know who I was talking about.
“I don’t like Jesse as much as you do, but that shouldn’t stop you from going to a party,” Lexi sighed. “But you don’t even have to deal with him after the school year ends. You’ll just have to get through a couple more months of him.”
I said nothing as I poured myself another bowl of cereal, not in the greatest mood at the thought of parties and Jesse Jacobsen. It was almost January, which meant I only had six more months to deal with Jesse…
“Well, Jordan?” Lexi now asked after a few minutes of silence, the only sound being me eating my cereal. “Will you please go to AJ’s party? It really will be a lot of fun.”
I had skipped out on Christmas parties ever since freshman year when Jesse had kissed me and Dallas and Trinity were all lovey-dovey. Those weren’t exactly memories that I wanted to be reminded of.
I let out a sigh, knowing that there was no way I was going to get out of this unless I agreed to going with her. “Fine, I guess I’ll go if it means you’ll stop bugging me about it.”
“Yay!” she squealed, wrapping her arms around my neck and nearly choking me as I continued to try and eat. “This party is going to be so much fun, Jordan! Just wait and see!”
I couldn’t really agree with her. She knew that I didn’t like parties in general, especially when a specific person that I didn’t want to see could have been there.
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“You don’t look happy,” Chelsea informed me with a smirk as she plopped down next to me on AJ’s couch. “But I shouldn’t really be surprised about that, now should I?”
“Parties are too peppy for me,” I shrugged, as if the dancing bodies around us were no big deal at all. “I’m not a peppy person.”
Chelsea snorted. “That’s for sure.”
"You know, you could be a little nicer about it."
"Is there even a point? You know it's true."
I only rolled my eyes at her, not saying anything to fight back with her now because I did know that it was true. It wasn’t like I was depressed or anything, but I liked just hanging out with my friends more than hanging out at a party. Was that even weird? I didn't think so, but everyone else seemed to...
“Have you two seen Aimee around?” a voice suddenly asked form above us, and we turned to see AJ staring down at us in concern. “She’s just disappeared suddenly and I don’t know where she is.”
“Same with Bruce,” Lexi suddenly said, popping up beside AJ now. “Can you guys help us find them, please?”
“If it gets me out of this party,” I muttered, jumping up from the couch and brushing myself off. Chelsea followed right after me, and the four girls and I quickly split up in search for our redheaded friend and the blonde idiot.
There were so many people at this party. Aimee literally could have been anywhere, especially since she loved to be the life of the party…
I kept ramming into people as I continued to look around, and I only grumbled as people apologize for running into me. All I did was wish that I was at home with my family, even though I wasn’t a huge fan of Christmas like they were.
When I ran into someone else for the fifteen time, I looked up and expected them to apologize to me. When I looked up though, I nearly ran for the hills.
I groaned when I saw him. “What are you doing here?”
“Your friend invited me. The redheaded one,” he shrugged, and I felt like killing Aimee for inviting him to the party. It wasn’t even her party; I was sure that she only did it to annoy me. “I thought I’d come and see if I could find you out of all these people. I guess I could.”
I scowled at him. “Yeah, well if you could un-see me, that would be really great.”
“Wait a second, where are you going?” he asked when I tried to walk by him, and he grabbed onto my arm to stop me from running away from him like I always tried to do. “You don’t want to get away from me that badly, do you, Emery?”
“That’s only part of it,” I snapped, ripping my arm from his grasp but not running away. “I have to look for that redheaded friend of mine and Lexi’s dumbass boyfriend.”
Jesse smirked at the last part. “I’m guessing you’re not a fan of this dumbass boyfriend guy.”
I looked away. “There’s just something not right about him. Not including him being a complete idiot.”
They had been dating for a few months now, but there was still something I just didn’t like about him, not counting the fact that he was so stupid that it wasn’t even funny. Something was just… off about him.
“Maybe he’s gay,” Jesse shrugged, but I shook my head and made a face. That definitely wasn’t it. He and Lexi were always all over each other. I was about to tell him that I didn’t know why I didn’t like Bruce, but he continued on before I could. “Okay… Well, maybe he likes someone else that isn’t Lexi.”
I remembered again how he and Lexi were always all over each other. But that seemed to be more likely than him being gay…
“Maybe you really just don’t like him because he’s stupid,” Jesse said now, and it made me glare at him again. “You’re a smart girl, so stupid people probably really annoy you. I know stupid and oblivious people annoy me.”
The way he was saying this made me think that it had a double meaning, but I decided to brush it off and ignore it. He wasn’t what I had to focus on right then, even though it was really hard to focus on anything else when Jesse Jacobsen was around.
“Did you have any luck?” Lexi now asked, coming up beside us with Chelsea by her side. I shook my head, and neither of them even acknowledged that Jesse was there with us. “Neither of them are down here.”
“Do you think they’re together somewhere?” Jesse suddenly butted in, and this caused the two girls and me to turn to glare at him. He tried to look as innocent as possible. “What? Maybe they were kidnapped or something. You never know.”
I rolled my eyes at him and scoffed, passing right by him and toward the stairs. The two other girls followed me as well, both of them feeling the exact same way toward Jesse as I did. None of us wanted to deal with him.
“She’s not in my room,” AJ told us suddenly once we got up the stairs, now coming back to join the three of us in our search. “She could be in my brother’s room though, I guess. It’s the only room in the house that we haven’t checked.”
“So she has to be in there, or she left,” Chelsea shrugged, making her way over to AJ’s brother’s room before any of us could even say anything to her. And without a second thought, she swung the door right open and turned on the light.
And much to our surprise, Aimee and Bruce were all over each other, right on AJ’s brother’s bed.
The four girls and I stared at the two of them, completely wide eyed. I immediately looked over at Lexi, who seemed to be too shocked to even function for a few moments. But soon, her eyes filled with tears and she spun around, running as quickly as she could down the stairs and right out of the house.
AJ immediately bolted after her, and I assumed that it was more because she didn’t want to face Aimee than to comfort Lexi, but that wasn’t that important at that moment.
Chelsea and I stood there for a few seconds, neither of us moving or even saying anything to either of them. This wasn’t something that I was expecting; I didn’t think that Aimee had any interest in Bruce. She never even talked about him unless Lexi brought him up! She hadn’t ever shown any interest in him before!
“Well,” Aimee started, her nose in the air as she got off of Bruce. “Now you guys know.”
“How could you?” I seethed, not knowing of anything else to say. “Both of you! How could you do something like this to her?”
“I’m just gonna go…” Bruce excused himself now, passing right by Chelsea and me as quickly as he could. We didn’t even try to stop him, because he wasn’t the one that we were going to yell at. Yet.
“How long has this been going on?” I demanded, not allowing Aimee to leave when she tried. She crossed her arms over her chest snottily and scoffed, not answering my question. “Aimee! Answer me!”
“I don’t have to do anything you tell me,” Aimee snapped, still refusing to look at us. “And I don’t have to tell you anything. It really isn’t any of your business.”
“Hell yes it is,” Chelsea shouted, nearly pushing me out of the way so she could get closer. “That was one of your best friend’s boyfriend! Therefore, it is all of our business! You know how long Lexi’s liked Bruce, Aimee! You knew!”
“Like it matters. We’ve been seeing each other pretty much the entire time he and Lexi were together,” she shrugged, as if it was no big deal at all. It made me want to walk right over to her and punch her as hard as I could have.
“Lexi has liked Bruce even longer than they’ve been together!” Chelsea nearly screamed now. “She’s liked him a hell of a lot longer than you have!”
“So? Jordan liked Dallas even longer than Lexi liked Bruce and she still had no chance with him,” Aimee now scowled, and this caused me to push Chelsea out of the way now so I could get closer.
“Do not bring me into this! I had nothing to do with any of this!” I couldn’t help but shout, not caring who from downstairs heard me. “Dallas and I have nothing to do with you acting like a slut!”
She smirked at me. “At least I can get a guy. You two are still without boyfriends, like you always have been. And do you want to know why?”
“Not particularly,” Chelsea denied, but I knew Aimee wasn’t going to listen to her.
“Because you, Chelsea, are nothing more than a clumsy, klutzy, weird nerd. Maybe if you lost the glasses and stopped falling all over yourself you’d be able to get a guy,” Aimee informed her maliciously, and I couldn’t tell if Chelsea’s eyes were now watering or if it was just my imagination. “And you, Jordan…”
I knew I didn’t want to hear this. I was sure I already knew about everything she was going to say anyway.
“You’re stubborn, pessimistic, and just really depressing to be around. Also, you’ve been in love with the same guy for nearly all your life,” she continued on, and I wasn’t going to interrupt her by telling her that I had only thought that I was in love with Dallas, and I didn’t feel that way any longer. “You need to keep your options open. Like Jesse, for example. If you gave him a chance to just hook up with you, I’m sure he’d take it. At least you’d have more experience. It’s not healthy to be attached to one guy for so long. And honestly, you’re not very pretty.”
For some reason, this hurt more than anything else, and I felt tears suddenly spring to my eyes because of it. How did Chelsea or I have anything to do with what had just happened between Lexi, Aimee, and Bruce?
“Hey, you guys know your two friends are crying outside downstairs, right?” a new voice now said from the doorway, and we turned to see Jesse Jacobsen standing there, looking completely confused. But when he saw the tears that were in my eyes, his confused face immediately turned to anger. “What’s going on here?”
“Nothing, I was just leaving,” Aimee smiled too-sweetly at him, picking up her jacket from the bed and hurrying by him. She pinched his cheek as she walked by. “We should go out or something later. Maybe you can give me a call? Jordan will give you my number. Won’t you, Jor?”
I scrubbed at my eyes and glared at her. “Hell no. Not even if my life depended on it.”
She laughed, turning back around. “Huh, as stubborn as always.”
“I’m gonna go see AJ and Lexi,” Chelsea quickly whispered, turning away now and walking by Jesse herself, leaving me all alone with him.
“So, do you want to tell me what just happened?”
“I’m not in the mood, Jesse,” I nearly grumbled, dodging him now and continuing my way toward the door. “Even more than usual.”
“Hey,” he said now, grabbing onto my arm before I could leave AJ’s bedroom and join the rest of my crying friends. “I come up here to see you crying, and you think I’m not going to do anything about it? Tell me what happened, Emery.”
So I did. I didn’t know why, but I told him everything that had just happened between my friends and me. He had no right to know, and I was sure he was just going to make fun of me for it later, but I needed to vent to someone. Anyone.
“Wow,” Jesse said, and I didn’t know where this was going to go. “I guess I was right when I said that they were together.”
I hit his arm as hard as I could. “That’s not important! What’s important is that I’m pretty sure I just lost one of my best friends, who’s been going behind our backs for months with our other best friend’s boyfriend!”
I scrubbed at my eyes, not wanting to think about what Aimee had said about me. I didn’t tell Jesse this part, because I honestly didn’t want to hear him laugh or agree with her. I was sure he wasn’t going to help me with anything at all anyways.
“You should just forget about her,” he merely shrugged, and the way he was talking about it made me want to his him again. “Obviously she wasn’t a real friend if she’s been doing something like that. I always thought that she was just a slutty bitch.”
I didn’t say anything to disagree with him, because now I really agreed with him. If he had said this to me a week before, I would have stuck up for my friend and say that he was wrong, but after everything that had just happened… Everything was different. Jesse Jacobsen was actually right, and I believed with everything he had said.
“You’re right,” I sniffed, wiping at my eyes one final time. “She’s not worth the tears or the sorrow. She’s always been… mean. But we’ve been friends with her for so long. I never thought that she’d really be capable of something like this…”
My eyes were watering again, and I didn’t know if it was because she had called me ugly or because I had just lost a good friend that I had known for years…
“Hey, don’t start crying,” Jesse tried when I started sniffling again, placing his hands on my shoulders. I didn’t even try to push him off like I usually would. “Emery, she isn’t worth it.”
Before I even knew what I was doing, I stepped forward and rested my head on his chest, just wanted to be comforted by someone.
And much to my surprise, he didn’t push me away. He actually wrapped his arms around my shoulders and held me tighter. Though it should have, it didn’t feel awkward at all. Surprisingly, it made me feel so much better.
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This may or may not be the last time I update in a week and a half. I just want to finish this story so badly that I might write it while I'm at my weekly family reunion... If you've read Thin Line (which you should have, if you're reading this...) then you'll know about how I go to Lake Tahoe for a weekly family reunion every year. :)
And I don't know if I've ever told you guys this before, but a few chapters back, when Jordan mentioned how Alex and Lexi would sound good together and then another one of the girls said Alex sounded better with Chelsea, I did that on purpose. Because originally, Alex was going to end up with Chelsea and Dalton was going to end up with Lexi. xD I just liked how it sounded the other way around so I switched it.
Two chapters left!
Please COMMENT, VOTE and FAN! <3