The Boy Who Lives In My Garage > jariana (COMPLETED)

five

The weekend passes with numerous naps, zero homework, and a cosmic bowling event Rosalinda dragged me to that ended up as lame as the shoes we were forced to wear. On Sunday, Rosalinda texts me before noon—an hour I wasn't sure existed on the weekend—and asks if I want to go to the mall. We haven't been shopping in forever, and I have some leftover birthday money to spend.

After one tiny lie about finishing my schoolwork, Mom agrees to my shopping plan, because how much trouble could I get in at the mall?

She wouldn't like the answer to that question.

I sit outside with my hands shoved in my jacket pockets while I wait for Misty's van to pull up. Misty Smith is a junior at the private school a few miles down the road from my house. We met at a party a few months ago, where Rosalinda immediately befriended her because she has: 1, a car, 2, an older sister who purchases alcohol for us, and 3, a working fake ID.

Rosalinda was using Misty at first, but it didn't take long for her to become more than a source of alcohol. She became someone who laughs at our dumb inside jokes. Who sticks up for us when someone else treats us like shit. A friend. I feel bad for Misty. She gets made fun of because she's overweight and because her family doesn't have as much money as the rich snobs who make up the rest of her school's population. It's good that she has us to stick up for her, too.

The sound of Misty's van reaches my ears before I see it coming down the street. It's the kind of van with few enough windows to make you wonder if there's a dead body or a child molester in the back. Though I don't know exactly what year it is, it's old enough to only have seatbelts for the front two seats. Misty claims that she likes the muffler-challenged van, that it has more character than the flashy new cars her classmates drive, but really it's the only vehicle she or her family could afford.

Rosalinda is in the passenger seat, so I climb in the back. It smells like McDonalds French fries with a hint of cigarette smoke. The van's stereo system—if it can be called that—is broken as well, so there's no music to drown out the sound of the muffler. "Hey," I say, pushing clothes and papers out of my way.

"Hey," Misty says as she backs out of my driveway. She's wearing jeans and a hoodie with her blond hair in a ponytail. Her school has a strict dress code, so she dresses for comfort on the weekends. Even when we go to parties, she doesn't bother with nice clothes or makeup.

"Hola, chica," Rosalinda says. Unlike Misty, comfort is the furthest thing from Rosalinda's mind. The mall is an opportune place to meet guys, so she's wearing dark jeans and a tight, long-sleeve shirt that shows off her ample cleavage. As usual, she's not wearing a coat.

My mall-shopping wardrobe falls somewhere in between the two: jeans, a scoop neck T, not quite as revealing as Rosalinda's, and Uggs. I was going to wear my heels, but I haven't forgiven them after my drunken clumsiness on Thursday night. My ankles still hurt.

Rosalinda turns so she's facing me and pats the dark brown curls around her shoulders. "Hair up or down?"

The smell of the gel she used to scrunch her hair into tight ringlets is strong. I'm jealous of her curls and think they're too pretty to shove into a ponytail holder, so I say, "Down." Rosalinda nods and turns back toward the front of the van.

"That's what I told her two minutes ago, but she didn't listen," Misty says as she turns left out of my subdivision and onto the main road. Rosalinda smacks Misty on the arm, and she protests with a laugh and an "ouch."

"I'm allowed to get more than one opinion," Rosalinda says.

"True, but you never listen to what I have to say. Like bowling last night. I told you it was going to suck, but did you listen? No. You went anyway. And what happened, Ariana?" she asks as she glances in the rearview mirror. Her green eyes are pretty, but sink too far into her face. Someday I'll teach her how to use eyeliner to highlight her eyes and blush to bring out her cheekbones.