Together Forever- Chapters 1 & 2

"Hellz no!" I shouted when Daisy invited me to go ride with her and the others on the Sea Dragon.

"Why not, Rosa?" she asked. I just shrugged and stared at the huge ride.

I was at Playland with some of my friends, Daisy, Alice, Acyuta, and my older sister, Kimberly. Daisy's 18, Alice, Acyuta, and I are 17, and Kimberly's 20, also the "babysitter" of the group. She had borrowed our parents car that afternoon and took us to Playland in NY.

"Yo, Rosa!" Acyuta said, waving her hand in front of my face.

"Wh-wha?" I asked, dazed.

"You're not coming right?" she asked.

"I'm too scared," I replied weakly. Looking around, my gaze fell upon a hot-dog stand near the ride. "Hey-" I started, "those guys over there are kinda cute."

"Cute? Where?" Alice jumped up jokingly.

"Seriously, where?" Daisy asked, suddenly interested.

"Over there," I said, pointing at two guys at the stand. They were both wearing caps, but I noticed one had blond hair. They both wore sunglasses, and were laughing at something. Another guy with blond hair joined them, with a popcorn bag in his hand.

"Yeah, they're cute, alright," Kimberly sighed, "Real cute." When we looked back at them, there were four guys. The forth one had a Superman T-shirt on. The five of us looked at each other with suspicious looks in our eyes. A fifth one had joined them, some dude with his dreads tied up. We looked at each other. Then Alice whispered, "Um...Isn't that 'Fountain Head'?"

"Yeah," Acyuta answered, followed by silence.

Then suddenly and simultaneously, we all jumped up, screaming, "OMG! *N Sync! Omigosh!"

Daisy stopped smiling abruptly, then calmly said, "Um, guys? I think they noticed us." We all turned around, and saw the guys approaching us. I swallowed hard.

"Here they come," Alice muttered under her breath.

"Hi girls," Joey was the first to speak when they got to us.

"Hi" we replied in unison, practically squeaking.

"What's up?" JC asked.

That was my cue, "The sky's up, but then, Chicken Little told me it was falling, so to tell you the truth, I have no clue."

"Shutup," Kimberly said, then looking at Chris, "Hi, um, uh, I'm Kimberly."

"OMG," Chris said, surprised, "Are you serious? I mean, that is so cool! I'm Kimberly too!" Everyone looked at Chris in a funny way.

"What?" he whined, "Oh! Oh, I meant, um, my name is Chris. Yeah, that's it, I think. Yo, Joey, my name's Chris right?"

"Yeah, man," Joey replied, noticing that Daisy was staring at him, "Hi, I'm Joey."

Daisy blushed, "Hi. My name's Daisy." Joey extended his arm and they shook hands.

Alice was lost in her own world, probably thinking about JC, when he walked up to her.

"H-hi," Alice stuttered, obviously startled, "I'm Alice."

"I'm JC," JC said, "Pleased to meet you."

Lance walked up behind Acyuta and tapped her shoulder.

"Wha - huh?" she said, turning around, "Oh, hi."

"Hi," Lance mumbled, "I'm Lance, uh, Lansten, um, James, er, wutever."

"Well then, hi Lance Lansten James Whatever," Acyuta joked, "That's quite a name you got there. Hehe. Anyways, I'm Acyuta."

I looked around at the "couples" happily chatting with each other. Then I noticed that Justin was missing. "Darn," I thought.

Suddenly, someone whispered in my ear, scaring the hell out of me, "Guess it's just you and me."

"What the fu-Oh, hi Justin!" I turned around to see Justin with a triumphant grin on his face, telling that he was glad to scare me like that.

"Hi," he replied.

About ten minutes later, we were telling each other a bit about ourselves. Then, Joey asked, "So what ride do you guys wanna go on?"

"The Sea Dragon!" Daisy answered quickly.

"No way!" I said. Alice reluctantly agreed to go, while everyone else shouted out "Yes!" enthusiastically.

"C'mon!" Alice said, "I said yes, why not you?"

"Maybe because I'm too chicken to go." I mumbled.

"Gee whiz, Rosa, please say yes" Daisy said, then joked, "If you don't go, Justin won't have anyone to sit with!" All heads turned toward Justin, who immediately turned bright red. I was blushing, too, but nobody noticed, thank goodness.

Actually, when everyone was looking at Justin, I noticed Alice staring at JC.

"Yo, Al!" I said.

"Huh? What?" she asked.

"You're drooling," Daisy joked.

"Very funny," she said sarcastically.

"Hey, wait," I protested, "Aren't you supposed to say that to me when I'm staring at Justin?" I immediately blushed at my little comment, then turned to see Justin grinning and everyone else laughing.

"What?" I whined, "Was it something I said?"

"So y'all wanna go on the Sea Dragon, right?" JC asked, a while after they had convinced me to go on the ride and bribed me to go sit with Justin.

"Yeah," Alice hesitated. The ten of us got on the line and waited for the next ride. About two minutes later, it was our turn to get on the ride. We gave in our tickets and were seated. Justin and I sat behind JC and Alice, who were right behind Lance and Acyuta. Behind us were Joey and Daisy, followed by Chris and Kimberly.

The ride hadn't even started and I was already holding onto the safety bar as tight as I could with my eyes shut tight.

"Whoa, calm down, girl!" Justin put his arm around me.

"Huh?" I opened one eye.

"The ride didn't even start yet," he said. The ride suddenly jolted to a start.

"Okay, now it did," he said.

"Oh, god," I mumbled.

About three minutes later the ride ended. I thought I was going to die. I couldn't even budge. Justin had to get out first to help me out. After a while, I was able to move my legs, and fell on Justin on my way off the ride. He gave me a mischevious grin, making me smile. Everyone else but me enjoyed the ride. Even Aliced admitted that she kinda liked it.

"I guess it was okay."I commented, then joked, "Other than the Sea Dragon being freaky, scary, and the worst ride I've ever been on, it was okay.

We went on a couple more rides with the guys. At about 10pm, we told the guys that we had to go home. "So, um, you guys need a lift or something?" JC offered.

"Well," Kimberly started, "not really. I mean, I'm driving us home, so, um, you know."

"Oh, okay," he said, "So, uh, you're going now, aren't ya?"

"Damn," Alice said, "I mean, yeah, we are." The guys walked us out to the parking lot, where we saw that Justin's Mercedes was parked right across from my parent's car.

"Drive safely," Lance said. We waved goodbye and drove off home.

"That was fun," Alice commented.

"Yeah, and interesting," Acyuta added.

"Oh, and, uh, guys?" Daisy said.

"Yeah?" Kimberly called from the driver's seat.

"I gave Joey all our numbers," Daisy continued, "and um, I think the other guys have them by now, so be expecting a call tonight or tomorrow."

"Um, okay." I said.

We dropped off Daisy first, then Acyuta, and finally Alice. Then Kimberly and I headed home.

"So..." I said as I unlocked the back door.

"What?" Kimberly asked.

"You really like Chris, don't you?" I asked, "I mean, when you saw him, besides what you thought of him before today."

"Yeah of course," she replied, looking thoughtful, "He's great." We went into the kitchen.

"He asked me out," she continued, pouring herself a glass of milk, "I said 'yes'."

"Um hmm," I frowned. I felt sorry for her. Kimberly had been having "guy problems." She had gone out with three guys in just one week. She just couldn't find the right guy. I poured myself a glass of water, and leaned against the counter.

We finished off our drinks in silence, and put our empty glasses in the sink. Then we went to take our baths. Kimberly used the upstairs bathroom, while I went down to the one in the basement. Kimberly finished first and went to bed. After I finished my bath, I went to the living room to see if anything was on TV. Nothing. I headed into the kitchen for a late night snack. I took out some pudding and ate, thinking about the great day I had. I finished up and threw away the empty plastic container and put the spoon in the sink with the dirty dishes. "I guess nobody's home besides Kimberly and me," I thought out loud. I glanced at the clock. 11:46 pm. I started walking out of the kitchen. As I passed the phone, it began to ring. "Who the heck could be calling at this time?" I wondered aloud. I checked the Caller ID box.

"Alice," I muttered, "Who else?"

"Sup?" I said, picking up the phone.

"Ahh!!!" I could hear her screaming on the other line.

"What?" I asked, not surprised at her screaming. I was used to it.

"Ahh!!!" I heard another scream, "OMG!!! Rosa, OMG!!! JC called me! Ahh!!!!!"

"Uh huh? And?" I asked, "What happened?"

"Um, er..." Alice mumbled, "Well, he - Shit! Mom's coming. I have to go now. Bye!" She hung up before I could say bye.

I clicked the phone off. Just then it rang again.

"Alice, it's kinda late now, so I-" I was cut short.

"This isn't Alice," a hoarse whisper came from the other line. I looked at the Caller ID. Anonymous call. "Damn," I said out loud, "Well, then, who is this?"

"Haha," a familiar voice laughed, "It's me, Justin. I'm sorry, haha. Did I scare you?"

"Yes you did," I replied with a little chuckle.

He continued, "I know it's kinda late, but, um, I kinda figured you were awake, considering that you -"

"Justin, remember how I freaked out in front of the Sea Dragon?" I interrupted.

"Um, yeah," he answered. "Well, I'm about freak out unless you tell me what you meant by 'you figured'" I said.

"Well, um, I, uh," he stuttered, "The lights are on inside the house, so um-"

"And how do you know that they are?" I asked impatiently.

"Er...can you open the door so I can tell you this face to face?" he asked.

"What?!?" I practically screamed. I ran to the front door and yanked it open. There stood Justin, with his cell phone in his hand. I sighed with relief and clicked my phone up.

I looked up again at him and noticed it was starting to rain, "Justin, hi, um, uh, come in."

"Thanks," he said, stepping inside, "Nice place."

"Thanks. Um, have a seat," I led him to the living room, pointing out the couch. He sat down. I sat next to him and smiled. I noticed it had started raining hard as I looked out the window past Justin. A bolt of lightning split across the sky, streaking it with light.

"Uh-oh," I muttered, "So, Justi-" Thunder boomed outside, causing me to jump.

"It's okay," Justin put his arm around me, then joked "Hmm...cozy."

"Heehee," I giggled.

But my mood quickly changed. I looked at Justin, eying him suspiciously, "How did you know where I lived?"

"Oh, um," he blushed, "Did Kimberly tell you that Chris asked her out?"

"Uh huh," I answered.

"Well," he continued, "she gave him the address and I asked him for it so I could come over and surprise you."

"Ohhh," I said, feeling stupid. Another bolt of lightning struck. I glanced at the clock. 12:13 am.

I sighed, "Um, Justin, it was really nice of you to come over, but it's kinda late and I have to go to be-"

The phone rang again.

"Now who could that be?" I asked myself. I got up to go to the kitchen, with Justin right behind me. I checked the Caller ID. Anonymous call again. I sighed. As my hand went up to get the phone, thunder boomed again and the lights went out. I gasped. The phone was still ringing despite the fact that everything else was out. I glanced at Justin, and when lightning stuck for the third time, I noticed concern in his eyes. He put his arm around my shoulders.

I picked up the phone on it's fifth ring, "Hello?" I paused, swallowed hard, then repeated, "Hello?" A gasp managed to escape my throat as I looked up, "Um, Justin?"

"Yeah?" he asked, "Who is it?"

"Uh, um," I gulped, "Nobody. The phone's dead."