Surreal ✿ M. Wheeler ✿

✿ two ✿

When Josie had woken up the next morning she was feeling a lot better. The night's events weren't on her mind anymore. She wasn't happy, per se, but she did feel like a heavy weight was lifted off of her chest. Now that her foster father was gone, she was ready for the freedom that her mother gave her. It was a rush of relief, what that woman would do when that horrible man was gone.

She dressed in her casual clothing. A red, long sleeved shirt with some overalls and her typical black vans. She brushed her hair for a total of five times before leaving her room. When she was younger, her real mother had brushed it fifteen times. Each time she'd have Josie count, making sure she did it enough. Now that Josie was brushing her own hair, she didn't really care if it looked like her mother's silky hair, she just cared that she still had it. There are a lot of ways a man can abuse a girl's head of hair.

As Josie ran down the steps of her house, preparing to leave and head towards Mike's place on her skateboard, she paused when she saw her skateboard by the door and realization sparked. The wheel was gone.

"Shit," she mumbled to herself. She had forgotten that one of the wheels had came off of her skateboard.

"Language," her mother said from where she sat in the dining room.

"Sorry," Josie said, mimicking her mother's sing song voice as she turned on the steps and ran right back up them.

She walked back into her room and closed the door behind her. Now she had no way of going to school with the rest of the party. She was going to have to get a stupid ride from her brother. Great.

As she paced around her room, trying to figure out how to get out of being in a car filled with questions, Josie's brown eyes met that of her walkie talkie. The one that she used to talk to her friends. Mainly Dustin, because he lived the closest to her. Now, don't let the word closest misguide you. Just because he was the closest to her house, doesn't mean going over there was a walk in the park. He was still a two minute drive away from her house. That was a ten minute walk!

As she stared at the walkie talkie, her mind clicked. Mike. She ran over to the walkie talkie, pulled her antenna up, and immediately started to go to adjust it so she could be on Mike's channel. He was always willing to give her a ride on his bike. She was pretty sure it wasn't going to change just for today. When she was sure she found the right station, she clicked the button.

"CaptainMike," she said through the receiver as she stared out of her window. She waited a few seconds for a response before clicking the button again, "CaptainMike, are you in?"

After a few seconds she heard her friend's voice, "What is it, RosieJosie?" Mike was the only one who could call her that.

They made the agreement when they were in the third grade. Mike had told her that her nickname rhymed with Rosie and he had told her that he was going to start calling her RosieJosie. Josie had then declared that she would start calling him CaptainMike because he was like the captain of their little group and she needed a nickname for him as well. They decided to call each other that when they were alone, or when they were talking to each other on their walkie talkies.

"I need a ride to school. My skateboard is missing a wheel. And before you ask, no I don't know what happened nor do I know where the wheel went," she huffed through the receiver.

"Okay. Do you need me to pick you up from your house?" he asked.

"Trying to get me all to yourself, Michael Wheeler?" she teased him. He didn't respond to her after that. This caused her to chuckle. "I was just kidding, Cap. My brother will drop me off so don't worry about it."

"O-okay," he stuttered from the speaker of her walkie talkie.

"O-okay," she mocked him. "I'll be there in five minutes. Tops."