Paperboy. (h.s. au)

16.

Look at the picture. Just look.
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Sometimes, I get a little embarrassed when I tell people where I work. In the library with old ladies. But then, I stop being embarrassed when I remember that it's so much better than any other job I could get at my age. I work with the sweetest old ladies- however dramatic and prying- who give me snacks and regular reading breaks. Honestly, I couldn't ask for a better work situation. I ought to tell them someday.

As I push open the almost broken door to the library, I also do so with a sigh. Sleep didn't come so easily last night. I just lay awake, not really thinking about too much and not really thinking about nothing either. So, in the time that I wasn't sleeping, I finished a book, sorted through my camera pictures, tried a new braiding technique for curly hair (it didn't work), and tried sleeping again. By this time, it was about 2 in the morning and I had gotten pretty annoyed with my not being able to fall asleep.

So I texted Harry in hopes of some company and conversation. He had answered within ten minutes, and we talked for a little less than that before I fell asleep for the night, not to wake until the morning came.

Now, I unload my shabby work bag into my shelf/cubby inside the big, semi circle desk near the door. I find myself a chair with wheels to replace the chair without wheels, and I start procrastinating. The ladies left me a note saying they'll "be back in a jiff" because they've gone to the grocery store to restock our snack supplies. I'm spinning around, staring at the ceiling and wondering if anyone is as tired as me right now. Then I think that that's a pretty selfish thing to wonder. Of course there's someone out there more tired than me. Somebody always has it worse.

I'm closing my eyes and breathing deeply when I hear the bell ring, signifying the door being opened. I groan to myself and sit up in my chair. It's Victoria. The Victoria I haven't seen all summer. What's she doing here?

She flips her blonde hair over her shoulder and grins over at me. "Babe! Hi!" I never could grasp the concept of girls calling their other girl friends 'babe,' but I answer anyway.

"Hey! It's nice to see you!" I get up and hug her over the counter top. "What's new with you?"

She smiles and sighs, "Well, not too much. I attended a party last weekend. Very exciting. Lots of cute guys, let me tell you. You should come next time. That's actually why I came- to invite you to a party Saturday. It's at my new friends house and it's gonna be really fun and his friends are adorable and there are some nice girls that I don't hate too." It's like she didn't even take a breath, it all came out in one, very enthusiastic sentence.

Sometimes, I feel like I need to nap after having a conversation with Victoria. It's about time she entered the party scene that was so magnificently popular with the kids our age. She was always a little more sociable and a little more likable and just a little more than Lily and myself. Not that it was a bad thing; we liked the diversity- needed it almost.

I find it hilarious that she was actually inviting me to a party. Has she not seen me even try to speak to a stranger? How in the world could I take on a whole house party of them? There's no possible way that it would go well.

"Sounds like fun Vic-"

"It's so fun. I met a bunch of new people and there's this one guy who kind of resembled an angel and his friends are also angels and everyone is so fun and there's good music and I love my party clothes and it's so much fun Robin you have to come." It's like every time she spoke, she did so in run-on sentences. Where a normal sentence would end, she replaced the period with and. It really bothered me at times.