Looking At Us

34. shain

‘‘Megan Megan Megan Megan Megan!’’ 

     ‘’Oh my God, Shain! Calm your tits!’’ 

     I looked at her funny. 

     ‘’Oh, God,’’ Megan said, rolling her eyes. ‘‘Just breathe. What is up?’’

     ‘’I had the most amazing fantastical brilliant-stripes idea last night.’’

     Now she looked at me funny. ‘‘Brilliant-stripes?’’ 

     ‘‘There needed to be stripes in there.’’

     English class started, and we took notes on the types of advertisements in newspapers for our journaling period. Later, during our ten-minute break, I turned to Megan. 

     ‘’So. All this drama that’s going on between you and Cris and Cori and Sasha and Hadley . . . I thought I’d write a book about it! Mostly based on all this. You’d have different names, of course, but same idea . . . you and Cris would fall in love, Cori would flip out on you, and there would be a happy ending.’’

     ‘‘Ooh, I like the happy ending thing. So what’s it called?’’

     I frowned. ‘‘Not sure yet. But I have a few names for everyone so far.’’

     I pulled out my notebook from my pocket and handed it to Megan, who flipped through it eagerly. She found the page and read through it. 

     Then she looked at me. ‘’My name is Judy?’’ 

     ‘‘Yeah.’’ I grinned. ‘‘It fits. Do you like Cris’s name?’’ 

     ‘‘Jessi. Spelt with an I at the end. That’s weird.’’ 

     ‘‘Hey, Cris is spelt weird. Not my fault.’’

     Megan sighed and kept looking at everyone else’s names. ‘‘Cori . . . Brianne? Sasha is Cameron, that really doesn’t suit her at all . . .’’ 

     ‘‘I’m Madeline,’’ I told her. ‘’I really like that name.’’

     ‘‘Maddy,’’ Megan said, and I nodded. She said, ‘‘Cody doesn’t change.’’

     ‘‘Yeah, he does. His name is spelt with a K, see?’’

     ‘‘Again: that’s weird.’’

     ‘‘Shut up.’’

     Megan laughed. ‘‘Darrin’s name is Seth? That’s totally out of character for him! Who’s Hadley’s character?’’

     ‘‘Taryn.’’ 

     Megan’s eyes widened. ‘‘Wait, Erick’s in this? And his name’s Nicholas?’’

     I blushed. ‘’Um. Yeah. Madeline has to have someone to fall in love with.’’

     ‘’Oh my God. You’re so weird.’’

     ‘‘Yeah . . . I know.’'