Chapter 2 - You Can't Even Spell Juvenile 

Later that same night, I’m lying down in my bed full of pizza and Sprite. Though Tanner and Drew did eat majority of the pizza, it doesn’t take much to get me full. I yawn and run my fingers through my hair, pulling it up in my hands. I put it in a messy ponytail, securing my red hair tie on it.

Tanner and Drew both decided that they wanted to stay the night, and they’re both in the basement on the futon’s down there. I’ve been lying in my bed for about twenty minutes, but I’m not actually all that tired. I was before Drew and Tanner got here, though. I guess it was all of the Sprite and pizza that went in me that woke me up a bit.

My phone rings and I wrinkle my forehead in confusion as I roll over in my bed and pick it up from the ground. “Hello?” I say my voice hoarse as if I’ve just woken up.

“Hi honey,” My mom says, greeting me cheerfully.

I pull my phone away from my ear, the sensor light activating and the light glowing. I see that it’s 10:39 p.m., why is my mother calling me all cheerfully? She’s usually sleep at this hour, though right now I don’t even think she’s home.

“Hey mom, what’s up?”

“I’m just finishing up with the last minute details of this case, and the trial is tomorrow, I’m on my way home right now.”

“Oh okay then.” I say, yawning inaudibly.

“What are you doing?” She asks curiously.

“I’m just about to try to go to sleep.”

“Arianna says that you have company?”

“Yeah, Tanner and Drew are staying the night.”    

“Oh that’s nice. How are the guys?” She asks, like she’s interested.

“They’re fine. Bradley’s grounded, Mikey has mono, and Walker is probably over at his girlfriends.”

“Oh poor Mikey. That’s just goes to show you, you can never be too careful.”

I laugh halfheartedly, “Mom it’s just mono, he doesn’t have an STD or anything.”

“Well you never know. Anyway, I have to get going, I’ll be home soon. I love you.”

“Love you too.” I say, hanging up the phone.

My mom and I don’t have the greatest relationship, but sometimes she’s pretty cool I guess.  I put my phone on my bed and turn my attention back to my television. Getting under my cover, I turn the TV volume down a bit. For some reason, whenever it’s late at night, the television always sounds louder than it otherwise would. I turn my bedside lamp off, yawning. After a while though, I fall asleep.

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The next morning I wake up to the sound of an air horn going off in my room. I jump up, nearly falling out of my bed, and narrow my eyes, looking around my room as the horn stops.

“Drew, you are such an ass!” I shout at him, throwing one of my pink fuzzy pillows at him.

“Aww, love you too Syd. Now get your lazy ass up.” He mimics, catching the pillow and tossing it back at me.

“What?” I snap, looking at my bedside clock. “6:41 in the morning. The goddamn sun isn’t even up, therefore I won’t be.”

“But Syd,” He groans, dragging out my name. “I’m hungry.”

“But Drew,” I reply, imitating his voice. “There’s a whole kitchen downstairs, why don’t you get something from it.”

“Because Tanner’s hungry too and we’ve taken a poll. We wanna go to IHOP.”

I nod, nuzzling into my pillow. “Cool story, bro. Have fun. Take a picture, text it to me.” I say sarcastically.

“Sydney Barker, get your ass up.”

I don’t reply, pulling my cover over my head, “Drew, go away. I want to sleep. We can go to IHOP when I wake up in about nine hours.”

“No, I wanna go now. So come on, or I’m gonna voluntarily pull you out of the bed.”

“Oh whatever,” I scoff.

“I’m going to, believe it or not,” He tells me, his voice getting closer.

I feel Drew’s hands snake under my comforter, wrapping around my ankles. I try to kick away from him, but he grasps tighter, and yanks me out of the bed. I fall to the floor, opening my eyes and narrowing them at the idiot.

He chuckles, and grabs my hand, pulling me up. “Okay, now get dressed so we can go.”

So despite my severe disregard of going to IHOP at six in the morning, twenty minutes later we’re in Drew’s car. I’m in the back, still sleepy, leaning my head against the tinted window of his car. Drew is driving and Tanner is in the front with him. My phone rings in my pocket - who the fuck is calling me at 6 in the morning?         

“What?” I ask irritably, answering my phone.

“Hey boo,” Bradley’s voice coos.

“Don’t call me ‘boo’, Bradley,” I say, laughing. “What do you want?”

“What are you guys doing?”

“Why do you assume I’m with the guys? Maybe I’m in my bed asleep.”

“Obviously you’re not the latter.”

I roll my eyes, “Well, Drew, Tanner and I are going to IHOP.”

He gasps, “And you didn’t invite me? You guys are horrible.”

“You’re grounded!”

“Who takes that seriously anymore?”

“You should, before your parents get even madder and extend your grounding….again.”

He sighs, “Yeah, I guess so.”       

“Bradley?”

“Hmm?”

“Why are you even awake?”

“Poncho woke me up. He jumped on my bed and started licking my face.”

Poncho is the Edward’s family little baby golden retriever puppy. He’s adorable. I’ve asked my mother repeatedly if I could have a puppy, but the answer always remains the same. No. I don’t understand why not, but I’ll keep asking them until I’m blue in the face.

“Poncho’s so cute, I’m gonna dognap him, just so you know.”

“I don’t think it’s considered dognapping if I know about it, but okay. You can have him. He’s like the dog from hell.”

I gasp, “Don’t talk about Poncho like that! He’s an angel.”

“He’s about as far from an angel as possible.” He corrects and I hear a knock on a door in his background.

“Bradley?” A voice calls. It sounds like his father. Mr. Edwards is a cardiologist at one of the town’s hospitals. He works on call, so his hours are pretty irregular.

“Gotta pretend to be asleep. I’ll call you later.” He says before he promptly hangs up.

Just minutes after, the three of us arrive at IHOP. Drew parks near the doors and we get out, going towards the entrance. I run towards a booth, and plop down in it before Tanner picks a table. He’s got this booth issue, like he doesn’t like sitting in them, but I like them more than tables. Our rule is that whenever we go to a restaurant, whichever of us sits down where we want, and then the other has to sit there as well.

Tanner groans as he sees me sitting in the booth and plops down beside me, making me move towards the inside of the booth. Drew shakes his head at us and then slides into the booth. “You two are so juvenile.”

“You can’t even spell juvenile, Drew.” I remind him.

“Hey! I can spell juvenile. I think you’re forgetting who the school Spelling Bee champion was in eighth grade.”

“Dude, your winning word was ‘horrific’. I can spell that in my sleep.” Tanner retorts, picking up his menu and looking in it.

“Shut up.” Drew says, picking up his own menu and doing as Tanner does and looking down in it.

“What, you already know what you want?” Tanner asks me.

I nod, “Yes. The usu.”

"Usu?”

“Usu. Short for usual.” I inform him, my eyebrows raised.

“Ah, that makes sense.” He says, nodding.

Not long after that, a hostess comes over to our table and takes our drink and food orders. My usual order is a stack of flapjacks. I love flapjacks. I love them so much. So good. The only good thing about my idiotic friends dragging me here so early in the morning is the flapjacks. When the hostess returns with our food and drinks, my eyes widen as they fall upon my stack of pancakes. I grab the syrup bottle, flip it open and let it ooze all over my flapjacks then pick up my knife and fork, beginning to eat them.

“Wow, way to go at it Syd,” Drew says, looking over at me.

“The girl can eat, no doubt.” Tanner agrees, nodding.

"You two act as if you’ve just met me and haven’t known this for like multiple years.”

“I just don’t see how a girl so small can eat so much.” Tanner says.

I shrug, picking up my water and sipping it from the straw. “Beats me.”

The bell above the door rings as someone comes in, and I look across the room at it. My eyes widen when I see that it’s Reese Logan. He’s so gorgeous. I swear. I’m not sure what he’s doing at IHOP at almost seven in the morning, but it’s irrelevant. I may, or may not have a crush on him.

Well I do. But I mean, he’s the hottest guy I’ve ever seen in my entire life. I’m not even over exaggerating. I’ve had this crush on him since like, junior year - which was just last year - when he moved to our town and started coming to our school. It’s not some crazy obsession or anything; I mean I’ve only spoken to him about ten times. Reese is ridiculously popular at our school, despite the fact he just came to our school last year in junior year.  

“Aww Syd, don’t tell me you still like Logan.” Tanner says, chuckling.

“How can I not?”  I retort. “I mean, look at him.”

“I’d rather not, he’s incredibly cocky.” Drew tells me.

“How would you know?” I argue.

“We’re on the basketball team together.” He reminds me.

“Oh yeah.” Reese leans against the counter at the front of the restaurant, talking to the cashier. She goes to school with us, but she’s a year younger than all of us, as a junior.  I avert my attention away from him and back to my stack of pancakes. My phone rings - yet again, so many people are calling me as of late - and I pull it out. I take it out and pull it to my ear, hitting the answer button.

“Hello?”

“Sydney?” My mother’s voice comes over the phone.

“Yeah mom?”

“Are you not home right now?”

“Uh no, I’m not actually.”

“It’s 7:00 in the morning, where are you?”

“Drew, Tanner and I are at IHOP.”

“IHOP? Why?”

“It’s the International House of Pancakes, mom. We’re eating pancakes.”

My mom scoffs, “You kids are certainly something else.”

"What about you? Are you home?”

“I am, that’s how I knew that you weren’t. My client’s court case is in half an hour and I have to be leaving soon.”

“Oh, okay, well we’ll be coming back shortly.”

“Alright, oh and your father called.”

“Yeah? What’d he say?”

“He wants you to go up and spend the weekend with him.”

I internally groan, “What’d you tell him?”

“I told him I’d talk to you and see what you wanted to do.” It’s not that I don’t love my dad, because I do. I really do. He’s a good dad, it’s just that there’s the party this weekend. And like I said, it’s Jake Rosenthal’s party. I cannot miss Jake Rosenthal’s party. His parties are pretty much the highlights of my years. Seriously.

“So I don’t have to go?”

“You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to do, but I think it would mean a lot to him if you went.”

I sigh, earning a look from both Drew and Tanner. “I’ll call him. There’s this party I’m going to this weekend, so I don’t know if I’ll be able to make it.”

“Okay, well he just asked me to run it by you.”

“Okay, thanks mom. I’ll call him later.”

“Alright, I’ll see you later.”

“Bye mom.” I tell her, hanging up the phone. I put my phone down on the table, and fork up another cut of pancake.

“What’s up?” Drew wonders.

I sigh, putting the fork down, “My dad wants me to come up to his house and spend the weekend there.”

“This weekend?” Tanner asks.

I nod, “Yeah, but I’m not gonna go. I can’t miss Jake’s party.”

“You know, I wish my parents were as mellow as yours after they got a divorce.” Tanner says.

Tanner’s parents got divorced when we were like fifteen, maybe fourteen. But anyway, they were really horrible about it. There was a huge custody battle for Tanner and his little sister Taylor. Mr. and Ms. Foster’s divorce got so bad that Tanner kinda just started rebelling and didn’t come to school for like a month. The battle has since been settled and his mom won custody of the two of them. His parents like hate each other so much, it’s kinda sad. I guess you could call my parents ‘mellow’ because after they got a divorce when last year when I was sixteen, there was no custody battle, my parents just very rationally decided that I’d live with my mom and go and visit my dad occasionally. He moved about thirty minutes north of us into a little house near the lake. Unfortunately it’s not that same lake that the guys and I are going to tomorrow for Jake’s party. If that was the case, I’d stop in and go see him.

I would be normal and says something like, ‘sorry’ or something to that effect to Tanner, but Tanner’s one of those people. He doesn’t like to accept other people pity and he hates it when he feels like people feel sorry for him. So instead I nod understandingly and pat his shoulder soothingly. 

Author's Note: I hope you guys are liking this story. Don't forget to vote and comment! Just so you know, I just put the guys names in alphabetical order by first name, not by like any other order. On the cast list, I mean. Sydney over there. ♥