Affirmative and Negative

A simple workday, with a stranger that might not seem so important...but will he be?

“Grease, how you been?” Kaylee exclaimed.

 

Shock clouded over his face, “Grease? Wait, Kaylee? Amanda?”

 

I nodded because I was still trying to catch my breath. “What are you doing around here? I thought you went to BYU?”

 

“I did…I did, but I came home for the summer.”

 

Kaylee laughed, “Have you been living up to your potential, ladies man?”

 

He looked confused for a second, furrowing his brows. “Didn’t…didn’t Lyndsey tell you?”

 

My brows copied his, as I crossed my arms. “Lyndsey? I haven’t heard from her recently. Have you?” I asked, turning to face Kaylee.

 

She looked just as confused as me. “I talked to her two days ago. She said she might be coming down for a visit, but that’s it.”

 

Our friend Lyndsey had gone onto Tufts University. She ended up moving closer so the commute wouldn’t cost as much. I don’t talk to her a lot anymore, but Kaylee and she are best friends. When we were younger, they planned to be roommates. And they were, for about six months.

 

“Well, I ran into her and she set me up with her friend, Jenna. Apparently, they’re going to Tufts together?” He informed us. I wondered if the shock was plain on my face. I never thought Lyndsey would set up anybody with Dave, Kaylee and I’s greasiest player.

 

I laughed at the memory.

 

“Jenna?” Kaylee asked uncertainly. I hadn’t heard of her either.

 

“Yeah. Jenna Malkins.” The situation had turned awkward quickly. “Well, it was good to see you guys. I’ll tell Jared I saw you guys. See ya,” he waved as walked out of the shop.

 

I shrugged off the awkward and went to help another customer. It was kind of busy until around eleven-thirty. Kaylee was cleaning up some of the props from one of her sessions that had just ended. I sighed as I looked around Picture Perfect Moments.

 

The walls were painted a light blue and the carpet was stormy gray. There were two shelves one either side of the store with picture frames and various photography related items. Some of our photos were even hanging on the wall, among other things.

 

“Hey,” Kaylee said, emerging from the back room. “I think we should call Lyndsey.”

 

“Are you still on that whole Jenna thing?” I asked, only half-joking. Ever since Dave had come in, I’d had a bad feeling, but I didn’t know about what.

 

“Kind of. I just want to know why we didn’t know about her. I mean, we’re her best friends, aren’t we?” I remembered something I’d said to Sophie freshman year. OWSRALL to the end.

 

OWSRALL was a group I’d created so we could contact each other during the summer, since two of us hadn’t had phones. It stood for ‘Of Watermelons, Snot Rockets, and Lyndsey’s Lunchbox.’ That’s a story for another time.

 

“Don’t worry about it, dude. We’ll wait until Sophie gets here, then we’ll call Lyndsey.”

 

She just nodded and we only had to wait fifteen minutes until Sophie arrived. I smiled as I thought about how we’d changed. I’d shed about twenty pounds, got my tongue pierced and a tattoo. Sophie had a growth spurt, a major confidence boost and was on her way to publishing her first book. Kaylee had gotten her nose fixed…well actually, once her mom had moved back to New England and she’d been freed from Linda, Kaylee had started going to the doctor’s and everything that had been neglected in the years before. Her mom had taken us to get our tattoos, in fact.

 

“Alright, I brought Burger King for you guys!” She called, since we were in the back.

 

I laughed as we unpacked the food, and Sophie grimaced as I sipped my soda. For some crazy reason, she did not like soda. As we settled around the counter, Kaylee began the talk. “So Sophie…”

 

“ So Kaylee…” she mocked, sipping her milkshake.

 

“Have you talked to Lyndsey lately?” I asked, eating my fries.

 

“No, why? Is she in some kind of trouble?” I loved how that was the first conclusion Sophie came to.

 

“Nah, she’s living large, last I heard. We’re only asking because we ran into Grease today.” I  informed her.

 

“Grease?” She asked, confused.

 

“David Auclair,” Kaylee said with a wave of her hand. “He was one of Jared’s friends.”

 

“Oh…okay, so what does that have to do with Lyndsey?” Sophie asked, stabbing her salad.

 

“Well, she set Dave up with one of her friends. We’ve never heard of her, and Kaylee was just wondering if you had,” I shrugged. “Her name’s Jenna.”

 

 

Sophie frowned and told us that she hadn’t and we decided to call Lyndsey. She picked up after five rings, “Hello?”

 

Kaylee put her on speaker. “Hey,”

 

“Guys? What’s up?” Lyndsey sounded surprised.

 

“Nothing…we ran into Dave today,” Kaylee said nonchalantly. I love that word, by the way. You can say it so many different ways. Noooon-chalant-leee…

 

“Really? How’s he doing?”

 

“He said you set him up with one of your friends. How come we never met her?” Sophie cut to the chase, brandishing her fork, even though we were speaking to Lyndsey over the phone.

 

“Um…cause she doesn’t live close to you guys.”

 

“Well, bring her down next time you come down. Speaking of you visiting, me and Sophie are going out tonight, you in?” I asked, deciding to stop this before it could turn into a fight. That was usually my job.

 

“Ah…no, I don’t think I’ll be able to make it.” I frowned.

 

“Well, okay…I have to go, talk to you later Lyndsey.” I said, getting up and throwing my trash away. Because it was in the back room, I called out, “Are you coming, Kaylee?”

 

“Why the hell not?” She shrugged…or I think she did, I still wasn’t in the room.

 

“Okay, meet up at Wrigley’s at nine?” Sophie offered. I called out my affirmative and she left soon after. We were still pretty slow and Cassie was tidying up, so I decided to plug in my ear buds and listen to some music.

 

I was really getting into “Me Against The World” by Simple Plan when someone tapped my shoulder. Which really scared the s**t out of me, mind you. It was a guy who’d apparently been waiting and I hadn’t noticed.

 

“Holy Jesus! Dude, you scared the fu-” I caught Kaylee eyeing me from across the room. She was laughing. I glared. “-fudge out of me!”

 

“Sorry,” he laughed. “I was just wondering if I could make an appointment?”

 

I sighed, my heart still beating fast. I opened our records book and asked when a preferable time was. “Can you do next Wednesday? Any time’s fine.”

 

“Ah, we’re free at eleven.” He nodded and I wrote the information on one of our cards.

 

“See you then,” I smiled, glancing at the clock. When he left, I waved Kaylee over.

 

“Today’s been as weird for you as it has for me, right?” she asked, leaning against the counter next to me.

 

“No weirder than normal,” I sighed, twirling my hair.

I could only imagine what awaited us tonight.

Author's Note

I was really hanging loose on inspiration for this, I promise the next few chapters will get better...or at least I hope they will. Let's just say expect the best, but prepare for the worst! I guess that works...kind of...just review and tell me what you think! :P

Reviews

[Abbie]

Hey amanda, just wanna say, this is really, really good! I really wanna read more! and I will! :D fantastic chapter!

[Sophie]

I never received a RR for this!
I love this sooo much!