Alexa had been my best friend since the eighth grade. I had just moved here with my mom after my parents divorced. I was the new kid and also pretty shy. Add that together and you don’t exactly head straight to the “cool kids” lunch table. Alexa was definitely a permanent fixture with the in-crowd. She was beautiful, especially for an eighth grader. She had stick straight, jet-black hair that she wore very long, all the way down to her waist. The boys practically drooled when she walked by, even the high school boys.
She sat at the table behind me in science class with a couple of jocks. One day, the guys were bored and decided to pass their time by harassing me. I think it was the fifth spitball I felt bounce off the back of my head when I heard Alexa pipe up.
“Jesus, guys, do you think you’ll ever grow up?” she scolded them.
I was thankful to her for saying something but didn’t turn around to acknowledge her.
“Relax, Alexa, we’re just goofing around,” one of them snorted back.
“Well, if you’re going to continue to act like immature assholes, I’m moving.”
I heard papers rustling, a book slammed and finally her chair scraped across the science lab floor.
I was dying to turn around and watch what was happening, but I didn’t dare. Not to mention, I was incredibly bummed that the girl who got them to stop was now switching seats. I just about jumped out of my skin when her large science book crashed onto the open table space next to me. I looked up just in time to catch the rest of her papers from sliding off the other side of the table.
“Hi New Girl, what’s your name?” she asked, smiling sweetly at me as she sat down. She oozed confidence, and I was instantly envious of that about her.
“Kacie. Kacie Jensen,” I replied, trying my hardest not to sound like a scared little mouse.
“I’m Alexa Campbell. Those two jerk-offs back there are Mark and Joey. Apparently they have yet to learn that the way to get a girl to notice you is to be nice to her, not pick on her as though we’re still in second grade.”
She glanced back at them and gave an over-exaggerated fake smile, batting her eyelashes. I finally felt confident enough to turn around and take a peek. Two giant football jerseys sat there with their shoulders hanging, looking down like scolded toddlers.
From that day on, Alexa and I were best friends. At first, I was pretty sure she was using me to cheat off of, but we were inseparable and everyone knew it. I wasn’t as openly self-confident as she was, but I was getting more comfortable in my own skin. I even ended up being pretty good friends with Mark and Joey. When Zach left and I moved home with the girls, Alexa told me they offered to find him and beat him up for me. The homecoming queen, Lauren Kolar, was also part of our group. She was innocent and always saw the good in everyone, pretty much the exact opposite of badass Alexa. The three of us evened each other out and were together constantly until Lauren moved away shortly after I had the girls. We were still close but only got to see each other when she came home to visit her parents.
“You guys ready for all this rain tomorrow?” Alexa handed the girls each a sucker.
“Eh, I’ll believe it when I see it,” I said, waving her off nonchalantly. “These weather people never know what the heck they’re talking about.”
“I don’t know, last I heard they were calling for over ten inches of rain just in the next twenty-four hours.” Her dark cobalt eyes were big and serious.
I sighed. “This is one of those times when living in the Land of 10,000 Lakes isn’t so wonderful. Nor is it great living on one, not with this much rain coming. We’ll be lucky if the gazebo doesn’t float away.”
“No shit.” She quickly looked down at Lucy and Piper and then back up at me and grimaced. “Sorry.”
I rolled my eyes at her. “Girls, ignore Auntie Alexa and her potty mouth.”
“Mommy, you say that word sometimes too!” Lucy said with a big grin.
“Okay, let’s not talk about that right now.” I laughed and turned to Alexa, promptly changing the conversation. “So are you closing the shop tomorrow?”
Alexa owned a cute little flower shop in town called The Twisted Petal. She had an amazing eye for detail and was magnificent at the designs she created. People called from all over the county to place orders with her.
“Yeah, but hopefully just for tomorrow. Wedding season is just around the corner and I have a million things to do to get ready. But, no work for tomorrow!”
She locked arms with Lucy and Piper and danced around the foyer. “Oh wait,” she stopped suddenly, “I did bring a bouquet for your mom, though.” She went over by the front door and took a beautiful bouquet of roses, tulips and lilies out of their paper cone.
“Suck-up.” I shoulder bumped her, taking the flowers. “I’ll give them to her when she gets back.”
“Oh, I just saw her. She was in the garage talking to Fred. Something about sand bags.”
Fred was our maintenance man who lived in the apartment above the garage. He helped my mom with most of the outside chores and various repairs around the property. He’d been there as long as we had. He and my mom worked well together, and I was ecstatic when the girls unofficially adopted him as their surrogate grandpa.