Priceless / l.h. (Hiatus)

chapter eight

November 2008

I sat at my kitchen table with Calum. We were planning my thirteenth birthday even though I turned thirteen in July. We always have my birthday parties a couple months into the school year so I can invite a lot of my classmates and have bigger, better, parties. It was always my mom's idea to do this so I just always went along with it.

So far we decided we would go to the arcade for the day. Our hometown has a huge arcade that has laser tag, mini golf and of course a bunch of other games. It's pretty sick. We also chose pizza for our food because what's a birthday party without cake?

"So who's invited so far?" I asked Calum, he was in charge of making the invitations. 

"Me, obviously," Calum winked and then continued. "David, Will, Vincent," Calum continued to read the names off the list.

My dad walked into the room and smiled at us. "What are you two boys up to?" He asked.

"We're planning my birthday party for this weekend!" I explained happily.

"Are any girls invited?" My dad asked, raising his eyebrows and smirking.

"No, we thought we weren't allowed to, we weren't last year," I said, looking at him.

My dad nudged my shoulder. "Luke! You're thirteen now, it's kind of ridiculous if we don't let you invite girls."

"Yes!" Calum cheered and started writing down some names. 

My dad chuckled and walked off after grabbing a glass of water. I looked at Calum.

"Who're you inviting?" I asked.

"Blaire, Amy, Lou, Genevieve, Lori," Calum read off.

"Wait," I stopped him. "You're inviting Genevieve?" 

"Hell yeah I'm inviting Genevieve!" Calum yelled. "She's totally into you."

I'm not going to lie, I blushed. "She is?" I asked.

"You can't tell? She's always all over you and trying to get on your good side. And she hated when you brought Brooklyn into our group. I'm pretty positive she thought Brooklyn was your girlfriend or something," Calum laughed.

"Brooklyn, add Brooke to the list," I said, mostly avoiding the conversation, but I did want her to come.

I didn't want Calum to catch any look on my face or somehow read my mind. I was shocked, really. Genevieve is the hottest girl in our grade. She's one of the only girls who already wears makeup and she also dressed differently than most girl. But over all, she's still one of the hottest girls. And she was into me? I couldn't believe it.

"You really want to invite Brooklyn?" Calum asked.

"Yeah, why wouldn't I?" I asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Is it really good for our reputation? I mean, she's not really the most popular kid in our school," Calum said.

"I don't care, she's my friend and I'm inviting her," I responded.

"Alright," Calum gave in, writing her name down.

***

I walked into school the next day with all the invitations in my backpack. I was excited for my birthday, this year was going to be good, I already knew it. I spotted Brooklyn on my way down the hall and ran to her.

"Brooke!" I yelled, on my way.

She stopped and turned to look at me. She smiled softly.

"I'm having a birthday party this weekend," I said, digging into my backpack and picked out the invitation with her name on it. "I want you to come."

"It's your birthday?" Brooklyn I asked me.

I shook my head and chuckled. "My birthday is in July but my parents always like to have my parties during the school year so I can invite more people."

"Oh, well happy belated birthday," Brooklyn smiled shyly.

"Thank you," I chuckled. "Do you think you can make it?"

"I probably can, I normally don't have plans," Brooklyn said, playing with her hair.

"Oh, well, good! Now you do," I smiled.

I felt a tap on my shoulder and turned around, my eyes meeting Genevieve's brown ones. 

"Am I invited, Lukey?" Genevieve asked, blinking her eyes and smiling.

"Of course," I said quickly, feeling my body heat up as a dug for her invitation. "Here you go," I said, handing her the card.

"I'll definitely be there," She said and then walked off.

I turned around to talk to Brooklyn again to ask her one more thing but before I could say anything, she was already gone.

This was shorter than usual, my apologies.