"Adopted By" Oneshots!

Birthdays

Book: Adopted by Mean Girls
Matilda's Age: 16

Today felt weird to me. I'm not sure why, and it didn't feel like a bad thing to me. It just didn't feel like a...normal day to me.

And then I checked my phone.

Lex's Birthday!

My best friend Lex died six months ago. And today would've been her Sweet Sixteen.

Lex had big plans for her Sweet Sixteen. She was going to rent out the entire arena that my derby team had matches in. And that was just for the morning. At night, she was gonna rent out this super fancy Italian restaurant with the most amazing pasta in the world, according to her. Our whole derby team was invited, and so were most of the kids in her school, cause sadly, Lex and I went to different schools, me being homeschooled almost my whole life.

I opened up my personal email and checked the starred messages. As expected, the e-vite for Lex's party was still at the top. She also sent me a text personally the day she sent out the invitations.

Hey Tils! Save the date for my Sweet Sixteen! You know the date, love you, see you at practice!

Little did she know that she wouldn't be around to celebrate...

I took a deep breath and pulled out a random notebook. It was completely filled with notes from my freshman year history class, but one page at the very back was still empty. I ripped the page out, grabbed a pencil, and sat down at my desk.

Dear Lex:
Happy Sweet Sixteen. I miss you, I miss you so much, you know that right?
Our derby league isn't the same without you. I'm serious, since you've died we've done horribly and skated as good as giraffes with broken legs.
I moved up to the adult leagues last month and had to leave behind our friends. Yente, Ver, Sammy, they're all too young or too inexperienced to move up. I mean, it's been my dream, and I'll be at the arena for most of my time after school, but I've been with those girls for years. First you die, then I have to leave...what's next?
It hurts me that I can't go to your party tonight. I had the dress all ready and everything, and you know better than anyone that I absolutely hate dresses. But alas, I have to spend tonight at home, and I've known this for about half a year now.
Since I know you'll never be able to read this, there's something I want to confess to you. I had a crush on you for two years, leading up until the day I met Ellie. A massive crush. You could say you were my gay awakening. I have no idea if you liked me back or not, but I knew for damn sure you weren't straight. Remember when you came out to me? You fell out of your closet at 5:30 in the morning at a sleepover and yelled "Morning Tils! I'm polysexual!" at top volume and your mom woke up. Her response was so funny: "I support you Lexi, but you have to learn to be quieter next time."
There was no "next time." I knew you were asexual, your mom didn't. You were gonna come out about a week after you died. You had everything planned, including the horrible dad joke you were gonna use to come out to our derby team. Too bad you never got to use those dad jokes, they were genius. A little too corny for my tastes, but genius.
Happy birthday, Lex. I love you so, so much.
~Matilda Leigh Henson

AN: Thanks to SIXSQUIPSIMP verunica-soysauce and one of my Discord friends for letting me use them in this chapter!