He Ruined My Life (#Wattys2015)

Chapter II

In a flash, the day was over. I walked with my group, as usual. I wasn't mad a t them for forgetting my birthday. We never managed to keep track of these things. I even sometimes forgot when it was Christmas! This kind of thing happens a lot in our group.

We talked about really random stuff. Leah was ranting about some stupid idiot that nearly ran her over in his car at school. Apparently, according to her, "HE SHOULD HAVE BEEN DENIED HIS DRIVER'S LICENSE!" We understood how infuriating it was. Our school was located in such a location so that cars could use it as a roundabout to drive, which was good for the drivers, but really infuriating to us. Nick was talking about soccer. His coach had cancelled the soccer meet, which was, by the way, tomorrow, and he got mad since his parents were going to scrape away some time to pick him up by car from the sports facilities. If he told them, they would go crazy. That sucked quite a lot. That happened to me once in volleyball.

Basically, in the days where we would rant about stuff, the only people talking were the ones ranting. So Cameron, Erik and I all practically had our mouths sealed all the time.

The one amazing thing in our neighborhood was that we all lived on the same block except for Erik, but his house was just one block away and still really close. One by one, our group dispersed.

When I was on the porch, I took out my keys and opened the door. Instantly, my dog, Barbarossa, leapt on top of me. I named him after the actual historical figure because of his shaggy fur in various shades of gold and red, which Barbarossa (the actual historical figure) apparently had for his beard and hair. It also matched my hair color. He was some kind of mutt which we couldn't identify the roots to, but he is very smart. That explains how he knew today was my birthday.

"Hey Barbarossa!" I said to him. He wouldn't respond to any shortened version of his name for some reason. "Whoa, get off!" He had started licking me all over my face. But, being the wild thing he is, he didn't get off.

Someone from behind picked him off me. "Happy birthday Alysse!" My brother, Kent, said. We had the same straight red hair -- only mine barely reached my back and his almost reached his neck -- and the same black eyes. He was only a couple of years older than me, but he was so much taller. We were both pretty athletic, but my skin was darker than his. Our similarities stopped there. Kent was pretty good looking and had about ten "secret admirers", and one of them was Leah. Me, not so much. Kent was popular. I was in between popular and unpopular. Kent had a normal name. My name was really rare, and the people in Starbucks never got it right. If I told them my full name, I would end up with a cup that said "Alexandra" instead of Alyssandra. If I told them my nickname, it's always "Alice" or "Alise".

"We've got a really good surprise for you." He said.

"What is it?"

"You'll find out soon. Go do your homework."

I didn't have much homework. I raced through my Algebra 1 worksheet in about fifteen minutes, and finished the required reading in English in about five. My Spanish stuff was a basic review worksheet I got done with in about five more minutes. There was an entire hour left before dinner. After that, I would have an excuse to read the tenth volume of my history encyclopedia and possibly play some volleyball with my neighbors, Kate, Daniel, Will, and Melissa. I think Kent might join too, if he's done with his homework by that time, which he usually is, even though he's more of a basketball guy. I just sat there, checking my homework about ten times until I remembered the "Mystery Surprise". So I ran to my parents' room. Mom wasn't there since she was preparing dinner, but dad was hunched over a pile of test papers. He was a teacher at the lower school division.

"Hey dad." I said.

"Hey Carmen." He replied, not looking up. This was a little inside joke between us. Not even my best friends knew about it. Once, I told him I didn't like my name since it was so rare and kept getting mixed up with "Alexandra" or "Alice". He asked me, "What do you want to be called, then?" I had thought about this a lot and replied, "Carmen." Then, he had taken special care to call me Carmen all the time. Mom and Kent also tried to keep up with this, but often failed. So to the whole world, I was Alyssandra, to my teachers, friends, and family, I was Alysse, to my best friend group, I was Al (Since the majority of us were boys, Leah and I made up boy names. Leah was Leo, I was Al, but nobody ever bothered to call us that.), and to my dad, I was Carmen.

"So apparently Kent said there was some surprise gift for my birthday,"

"Thats correct."

"And I'm done with my homework, so I kind of want to know what it is--"

"Don't you have a science on The Velocity of the Sparrow in Flight due next week?" He interrupted.

"Yeah, but I'm practically finished. All I need to do is to write a conclusion which I haven't even thought of and give it a catchy title. I'm stuck, so I was planning to use the weekends for some inspiration and--"

I looked at his face and realized that the surprise was on my laptop. My dad had never been a good actor, and judging from the smile playing on his lips, I knew that I was correct.

"Uh, you know what...I'll go."

I bolted up to my room and found my laptop misplaced in a corner of the table instead at the normal place at the bottom of the shelf. My parents had clearly been messing with it. I opened it, typed in the password, and could not believe my eyes.

"Hello, Alyssandra, welcome to Facebook!" The blue and white webpage said. There were notifications on a tab. I clicked on it.

LeAhX: OMG Al you finally got Facebook! Welcome to my world!

Camera: Hi Al, this is Cameron. Happy birthday!

NICKKKK: YAY IM HAPPY FOR YOU WELCOME TO FACEBOOK

Erik: Hi. You know whats up, so I'll spare my hands some typing.

There was another really random friend request from some really random dude with a name CHASE_THE_SUN, but I didn't bother with that. I ran to my dad's office and tackled him in a hug.

"Yay! You finally got me Facebook!" I scream.

"Happy birthday! You can play on it until dinner." My dad says.

"YES!!! I LOVE YOU SO MUCH DAD!!!"

"Go thank Kent. He came up with the idea."

So I ran to Kent's room.

"Kent, thank you so much, I cannot express it, thank you so much, you are the best brother ever, you're so great, you're the greatest person to walk this planet..."

"Hey, what up with the excessive comma splices? But yeah. You're welcome. Enjoy it."

I hug him, then go off. I send "hi" to all of my friends, but none of them are on. So I check out the random dude I don't know. I decide that this is exactly what Facebook is all about, so I accept his request.