Pusher

thirty-two.

"Maybe I should get a haircut," I mused, holding my locks so that they hung shoulder length. I tugged at the ends. "Maybe I should just shave it all off."

"You would be, without a doubt, the hottest baldie I know," Ellie said, not even bothering to look up from her knitting needles. She propped herself up on her elbows, lying stomach down on her bed. The cartoon cats printed on her knee socks swayed back and forth as she kicked her feet.

Final exams had finally concluded, our last one taking place this morning, and we were given the rest of the day off while the teachers finished getting all their paperwork in for the semester. So naturally, it was a great excuse to get milkshakes at Benny's and to come back to Ellie's house to hang out.

Her room was exceptionally pink. She never had a chance to repaint or replace the furniture her mother had picked out for her in our early middle school years, and even back then it was premature for her age. But since then she had taken the time to cover up the tacky decor with some of her own. Band posters plastered the walls, a miniature model of the solar system was hung from the ceiling, and the entire contents of her closet were flung across the floor.

The strap of a particularly lacy pink bra was hooked onto the corner of her vanity mirror, the one I was admiring myself in. I looked past my own reflection and focused on hers, simply watching the methodical way she wove the yarn and pushed her scarlet hair behind her ear.

A thought interrupted her needlework and she dropped it in front of her, reaching across her quilt to dig into my purse. She nearly knocked it off the edge of the bed in her attempt.

"Did you bring the movies? It's been ages since we've had a girls night and I'm seriously craving some romcoms and popcorn."

I pulled a face, turning around to look at her. "We watched the notebook together two days ago."

Ellie rolled her eyes. "I said a girl's night," she said with an exasperated sigh. "We started that movie right after school. It was a matinee."

I flopped onto the bed beside her just as she pulled out a black leather bound book. Maverick's book.

"You got a new journal?"

"Uh, no. I gave up writing poetry for a while," I said, scraping together a quick lie. "I found that at school. I've been meaning to turn it into lost and found."

But that was possibly the worst thing I could have said because Ellie immediately flipped open the pages and began scanning the doodles and messy scrawl.

"I wonder whose it is. I'll bet they've got their name in here somewhere," she said before fanning open the page and holding it up to me. "The handwriting kind of looks familiar. Don't you think?"

"I don't recognize it," I shrugged.

I dug my nails into my palm until the skin was indented with little half circles, fighting the itch to snatch away the book and tuck it against my chest. It felt wrong to let her riffle through Maverick's private thoughts, even if they were anonymous.

"Well whoever it is has a huge thing for Star Wars," she hummed, flipping through the pages until she was all the way at the back, the most recent entries. She drew in a gasp, her eyes bugging out of her head. "And for you!"

"Wait. What?" I stuttered.

She tipped the page towards me, displaying the word "Angel" written in an elegant font and sandwiched between two sketched wings. I shook my head, dismissing it before the idea had time to worm its way into my mind.

"That doesn't mean anything, Ellie. It's just a doodle. Tons of artists draw angel wings."

"How can you be so blind?" she asked. Her finger jutted onto the page, pointing to the small symbol worked into the lower right corner of the design. "There is a heart. A heart!"

Well, there was, I couldn't argue that. But I could still argue.

"That doesn't mean it's about me. It could be short for Angelina or something."

Ellie, once again, rolled her eyes. They went so back into her head I briefly contemplated going to her priest and requesting an exorcism. I was snapped from the thought as she spoke in her emphasized patronisIng voice. "There are only two Angelina's at our school and neither of them goes by Angel."

"I don't go by Angel," I practically shrieked.

But once Ellie was set on an idea, there was no convincing her otherwise. She lept to her feet, cat-covered socks dipping into the mattress as she jumped from one foot to the other, singing "Somebody is crushing on you! Somebody is crushing on you."

Once my cheeks had been dyed a deep shade of crimson, I stood up beside her and snatched the book from her grip and shoved it back into my purse. It did nothing to shut her up.

"Doodle boy and Angel sitting in a tree, K-I-S-S-I-N-G. First comes love, then comes—"

I reached for the pillow and whacked it across her chest before she could finish the song. Ellie burst into a fit of giggles, flopping back onto the bed. She sat cross-legged, slouched back into her headboard.

"Don't be so afraid of true love, Angel," she teased. An immovable grin was plastered onto her cheeks.

"True love doesn't exist. I'm not even sure the regular kind of love exists."

"Oh, don't be so pessimistic. Of course, it exists," she insisted, reaching across to slap my arm. "Besides, who am I going to go on a double date with if you don't hook up with Mystery Boy?"

"Ellie, you'd need a boyfriend too if we were going to go on a double date," I scoffed. Her cheeky grin spread and then it dawned on me that she'd need a boyfriend too if we were going to go on a double date.

My jaw swung wide open but I managed to get a few words out. "Tell me everything!"

She burst into another fit of girly giggles before answering. "You remember Emanuel? The guitar player from my church. Well, I practically trampled Melanie Golding so I could stand next to him when the congregation was hosting that lunch thing for the homeless and we kind of hit it off. He asked me to go to the park with him this weekend."

"I can't believe it," I said, my fingers pressed in front of my lips. The obvious elation she felt buzzed right through the air and into me as well.

"Well you better believe it because you're helping me pick out an outfit."

And then I was trying not to stare at my best friend as she shimmied out of her shorts and t-shirt, dropping both articles to the floor. Her polka-dotted underwear hugged her hips and I forced myself to drop my eyes to my hands before my cheeks could turn scarlet all over again.

She pulled a pink sundress over her head, twirling for me. The dress flared out and exposed a few more inches of her thighs, which shouldn't have flipped my stomach considering I was staring at her in her underwear just moments before.

"What do you think?" Ellie asked.

I opened my mouth, but my ringing cell phone cut me off before I could even begin gushing. I tugged it out and glanced at the caller ID. Maverick.

If he even tried to ruin my girl's night with Ellie I was going to skin him alive. It was bad enough I couldn't spend the weekends with her anymore.

"What?" I said into the receiver. There was a pause. For a moment I could only hear shuffling and distant voices. Ducky's maybe.

"Your mom's a nurse, right? You've got medical supplies at your house?" Maverick asked. He sounded out of breath and his voice was a little raw. It only made it sound even deeper.

"Well, yeah. What's going o-"

"I'm texting you an address now. Bring it there."

"Bring what there? Gauze? Disinfectant?"

He hesitated a moment, leaving my mind enough time to reel in a million different directions. Anxiety penetrated my skull and soaked every thought with blood.

"All of it. Grab everything you've got."