Ever since she could remember, she always had trouble making friends, and here she was at the start of her junior year and the most popular guy in school was talking to her. Emmaleigh couldn’t believe that this was happening to her, today of all days when she didn’t bother with make up or fixing her hair. She probably had bags under her eyes the size of Texas from staying up all night studying for her history exam and knew she would fail anyway.

     “So what do you say, Em, you want to go?” Samuel Roberts asked her casually.

     “Go where?” asked Emmaleigh. She was so transfixed by what was happening she forgot to listen to him.

     “To the homecoming game? With me?”

     “Uhm, sure, sounds great.” Emmaleigh said trying to play it cool considering the circumstances.

     “Cool. I’ll pick up, say, six-ish?” he asked with a grin that could make Brad Pitt’s look like it belonged to one of those homeless characters from an old Charles Dickens’ novel.

     Emmaleigh nodded with a shy little smile, like that of a child hiding behind their parent when it came to Santa Claus. Samuel walked away and caught up with some of his friends and all poor Emmaleigh could do was rest her head on the cool metal of her locker.

     “So what was Samuel ‘I’m-Too-Cool-For-That’ Roberts talking to you about?” a female voice said in great distaste.

     Emmaleigh opened her eyes to see Shannon standing next to her watching Samuel wrestle with his friends further down the hall. “He asked me to the homecoming game.”

     Shannon raised an eyebrow and then felt Emmaleigh’s head for a fever. “Are you hot, do you feel sick?”

     Emmaleigh swiped her friend’s hand away and clutched her books to her chest. “I wish I were imagining this Shan, but I’m not. He really did ask me.”

     “Well, are you going?”

     “Yes.” Emmaleigh squealed.

     Her friend raised her eyebrow once more, shook her head, and walked away.

     In fourth period, all Emmaleigh could do was think about tonight and watch the clock wishing it were 2:45 already. When the bell rang, she ran out of class, tossed her books in her locker, and ran home. She went through outfit after outfit trying to decide what to wear that night and finally settled on a teal cardigan and brown denim mini. It was five-thirty, that gave her about twenty-minutes to do her hair, make up, and brush her teeth.