Teen Ink

Ch. 3

“So Alice invited you over, huh? And you accepted, huh. Not many people are courageous enough to. Scared of me, I suppose.”
I nodded without thinking and she looked a bit hurt. “You think I’m scary?”
I didn’t know how to answer that. “Yes, well no and yes-I DON’T KNOW!”
The look was gone in an instant. “Calm down, Cowboy. It was just a question. I wasn’t expecting an answer anyhow. “ Then she poked her head up the staircase and shouted, “ALICE! GET YOUR TINY BUTT OUT HERE!” I guess she was tired of talking to me.
A groggy Alice walked down the stairs. Her eyes were still close. “My butt’s bigger than yours.” She said, in a matter-of-fact way. When this didn’t start a fight, she asked, “is Cassidiot here yet?” I was about to yell something indigenous but Madeline signaled for me to say quiet. “No. I don’t think she’s coming. The neighbor’s are having big a party- she’s there.”
Silence. Then, “I really slept that late?”
“Yeah.”
Then Alice started to walk back up the stairs and I shouted “Wait!”
“Cassidy? You’ve been here this whole time?”
I swallowed nervously. “Uh yes.”
Silence.
“Let’s go.” She grabbed her bag and headed out the door, I followed. A few yards behind. When the door was closed, I could hear melodious laughter.
Alice was grumbling something about Madeline needing to “get a life and some friends” and I kind of had to agree.
I loved Madeline and I still do to this day its just that Madeline is much much older than she looks or behaves.
In fact, she has the maturity of a 7 year old. She likes potty humor more than anyone else I know and is constantly making references to it.

A few minutes later, when Alice was back in good humor, I asked, “So where are we going?” It seemed to me that Alice was mindlessly wandering around, maybe walking off her anger. But it also seemed to me that we were lost.