And Peggy

63

The four of us sat there admiring Alex and Lia. Then Alex started waking up.

"Well, hi, Alex." Angie laughed.

"Hi." He said sitting up trying to move Lia off of him gently. "What are you guys doing in here?"

"Watching you." I said.

"Watching me sleep?"

"Watching you with Cornelia." Eliza said softly.

"Oh." He looked down at the sleeping girl's face. "She's adorable."

"I never would have thought you of all people would be so great with kids." I said.

"Please don't tell anyone, okay?"

"Why not? It's nothing to be ashamed of." Eliza said sitting next to him. "It's a great quality to have."

Alex smiled and brushed the hair off of Cornelia's face. "I guess you're right."

"No arguing?" Maria asked stunned. "Damn."

"I won't argue over her."

Eliza rested her head on Alex's shoulder. "Have you always been good with kids?"

"I mean I tried to be. It's not like many people wanted to associate with me. Everyone hated my family. I just wanted someone to care about me; I wanted to care for someone. Now I have you, and John, and Peggy, and Maria, and now Cornelia."

"I'm glad you care for me." Lia said while rolling over to look at Alex. "I promise I'll care for you too."

You could see Alex's heart melt. He smiled and scooped up Lia into his arms. "You're doing just fine." Lia smiled and hugged him.

Monday (3 weeks later):

It was almost Halloween, and I was actually very excited. On Friday, I'd be going to the Halloween party at Alex's house. And Saturday, while some people were coming to my house for a small party I guess, Maria and I would be taking Lia trick or treating. Woah. Almost two months into school and we are already having a shit ton of parties. Was that a good thing? Sure.

At lunch, Sally came running up to me. "I can't believe Halloween is this weekend!"

"I know." I said just as excited as her. "Wait a second. You hate Halloween."

"Well I do, but I'm just excited to dress up I guess."

"Me too!"

"Why because you get to be Veronica and Maria gets to be JD?"

"No! I just love Heathers!"

"Mhm. Okay." She giggled. "Aw, you're red is all faded." She said as she played with my hair.

"Yeah, I know. I had to dye Alex's black again even though his was barely faded."

"Why? I thought he liked it."

"He needed it black for his costume I guess."

"What is he going to be?"

"Someone with black hair I guess."

Maria and Angelica walked up to us. "Hey!" Maria said sitting next to me.

"Hi."

"Where's everyone else?" Angie asked me.

"I thought you'd know."

Then John came in dragging Eliza and Alex followed by Laf and Herc. "Okay, can someone please tell Eliza that she needs to join in on our group costume that she doesn't know about?"

"No, because she needs to be Heather Duke." Sally said.

"That isn't a lie?" John asked as he let go of Eliza

"No!" Eliza said sitting down.

"Well can you tell Alex to cut his hair?"

"Why should he cut his hair?" Mar asked. "It's nice how it is."

"To make it match his costume!"

"What is his costume?"

"That is top secret information."

"Let him do what he wants!" I said.

"Yeah. I already had to dye my hair back for this stupid costume!" Alex said sitting down. "Besides, you're not cutting your hair!"

"Got 'em!" Herc shouted across the table at John.

"Fuck you!" John shouted back. He sat down and sighed. "Who will be the other person then? And this close to Halloween?"

"I will." Theo said as she walked up to the table. "Aaron said dressing up is childish, so I didn't have a costume planned. I'm in."

"You don't even know what the costume is." Alex said.

"I don't care. I'm in." John got up and pulled Theo away from the group to tell her what she was dressing up as. "Yeah, I'm so in!"

Hm...what can they be? You'll find out soon enough. HamiltonianEliza had suggested John and Theo's costumes a long time ago. Being it's a group costume, John, Alex, Laf, Herc, and Theo's costumes will obviously be related.