"Hey Paige." JC walked into the Psychology classroom on Monday morning.
"Hi." JC sat down next to her. "You probably don't know, but at lunch we have to sit with someone else."
"We can't sit with Justin?"
"No, we can't, actually we are avoiding Justin, Joey, Chris, Haley, and Kristen."
"Why not?"
"Oh you are so lost I don't want to explain it to you." Paige sighed as the bell rung.
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"Hey," JC jogged up to Haley, the first person he saw.
"What?"
"OK, I didn't really do anything with you guys this weekend so I have no clue what's going on with Paige. I can't talk to Justin?"
"Oh no, it's perfectly alright for you to talk to Justin, you can't talk to Paige." He thought for a minute. "I hope that clears everything up for you."
"No."
"Now what? It's not that hard of a concept to follow."
"Why are we doing this?"
"Cause Paige is a conceded little brat."
"Oh I see, OK that makes it clear now."
"Glad to hear it."
"This was fun we never really hang out."
"Yeah we should do it again some time."
"We could rent a car and run over some puppies." Haley stopped walking.
"I don't want to do that."
"I was just kidding."
"Oh good I thought you were serious for a minute." They walked a little longer. "Sooo."
"A needle pulling thread."
"Yeah OK. Oh how was the test?"
"It was easy I wasted my weekend studying for no reason."
"Maybe it was easy because you study."
"Sure."
"Oh I just got that!"
"What?"
"A needle pulling thread. You are too funny."
"Thanks."
"You just crack me up sometimes."
"OK, I gotta get to class now." JC wanted to get out of there.
"OK I'll see you later."
"Yeah." He quickly walked in and found his seat with Chris and Kristen. "I just had the weirdest conversation with Haley. Have you guys ever noticed that she's kind of a ditz?"
"Well sure she's a little flakey, but she's not a ditz."
"That's my girl you're talking about and she's extremely bright."
"Yeah OK, how smart could she be?" JC rolled his eyes at the thought that there could actually be a brain in Haley's head.
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"Hey man let's sit over here." Justin and JC walked over to a table on the completely other side of the cafeteria from Paige.
"OK." They sat down at the table. "Ya know I haven't gotten the full story of what's going on."
"Oh well, Paige wanted everyone come see her new boyfriend play football, and Joey, Kristen, Chris, and Haley skipped out on her. Then she found out where they were and she yelled at them so they were avoiding her. Then she was making Jenny, Lance, and Amy avoid them too and they didn't like that so now everyone is avoiding Paige."
"Oh thanks."
"Hey, ya know what?"
"What?"
"I was talking with Haley..."
"Now there's a challenge."
"Anyway, she was telling me that Joey's parent's are like out of town for the whole weekend so we were thinking, party."
"Is this OK with him?"
"Well, he doesn't really know what we got planned, but we're just going to spring it on him."
"OK whatever."
"So you'll be there?"
"How could I miss it."
"Great next Friday."
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The eight of them walked up to Joey's door with bags in their hands and crowds of people behind them.
"OK Hal, ring the bell." She pushed the doorbell and in a couple of seconds Joey came to the door.
"Hey gu..." He was knocked over by the herd of people rushing into his house. "What's going on?" He asked Haley who was standing nearby.
"Oh this, we figured since you're all by yourself we would give you company. And plus no parents, party."
"I'm not suppo..." She placed her finger over his mouth.
"Shh, no they will never find out, and if they do I will take all the blame."
"OK fine they can stay, but you are helping me clean this up when it's over."
"Fine. Now let's party." She grabbed his hand and pulled him towards the group.
At about 9:00 the doorbell rang and Joey went to answer it. He opened the door and saw a very mad Paige.
"Hey Paige." He greeted. "Hey Dusty."
"It's Dustin, and why wasn't I invited to this party?"
"I thought you weren't suppose to socialize with us."
"You know what? You are mean, come on Dustin. I'm driving us home." He gave her his keys and she stormed off. Joey walked back to the others.
"Hey that lady from next door called and she said she's gonna call the police if you don't settle this party down." Justin informed.
"Why can't everyone just go home?"
"You want everyone to leave?"
"Yes please."
"Fine why didn't you just say so." Haley stood up on a chair. "Hey!" The music stopped. "Everyone out now!!" She pointed towards the door and everyone started filing out of the house.
"Thank you. Now you can all help me clean up right?"
"Of course." The mumbled unwillingly. They all went into the living room and started cleaning up. An hour went by and they had finally finished the living room.
"Now, start on the kitchen." Joey ordered.
"Can we just take a break? The news is gonna be on soon." JC whined.
"I guess we can watch the news, and nothing else." He knew they didn't really want to watch the news it was just a lame excuse. They all sat down at various spots around the tv.
"Tonight on the News at 10. A car accident leaves two people hanging on for life. A new baby chimp joins the zoo, and tonight on consumer news, infomercials."
The tv cut to the two anchor people sitting at the desk.
"Tonight's top story, a two car collision on the intersection of 34th and Vine, has left two people in critical condition at the Memorial Hospital and one has already been declared dead on the scene. 17 year old Paige Tyler was pronounced dead by the time the EMT's reached the wreckage." Everyone in the room mouths dropped. They listened for more of the story. "18 year old Dustin Michaels and 25 year old Racheal Young have been taken to the City Memorial Hospital and remain in critical condition." Justin went up and turned off the tv.
"Tell me you all didn't just hear that Paige is dead."
"Justin, we did."
"That's what I thought." He walked around the room.
"Are you gonna be OK?"
"Yeah, I'll be fine, I.. I just can't believe it." He sat down on the couch between Haley and Kristen. He put his head in his hands and started to gently sob.
"It'll be OK." Haley rubbed his back.
"No, my girlfriend is dead, and she died mad at me!"
"She died mad at all of us." JC pointed out.
"We'll be all right we just have to stick together that's all."
"I can't believe this I mean, why? She wasn't a bad person, maybe a little bratty, but that's no reason to take her away from me!" Justin cried harder.
"Why don't we all just stay here tonight? Is that OK Joey?" Haley asked.
"Yeah that's fine. We'll have to work out the sleeping arrangments though."
"OK so how many rooms this joint got?"
"4."
"How perfect." Haley took charge she assigned everyone to their rooms.
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"Listen Hal, I love you and everything, but I wanted to share a room with Kristen." Joey complained setting up his bed on the floor.
"Well, that would have left me with Chris and I'm mad at him."
"What did he do?"
"Nothing." She climbed into his bed.
"No, it's always something."
"Well if you must know, he was talking to Melanie tonight."
"So?"
"His ex-girlfriend Melanie and he didn't even act like I was there."
"So he's not allowed to talk to her?"
"He wasn't just talking to her, they were on the couch, talking."
"Oh my gosh, what a jerk!" Joey said sarcastically.
"Don't you know what this means?"
"No."
"He's gonna leave me and forget about me. He just gonna runaway with that Melanie girl. You know what if he's gonna break up with me that's fine I don't need him."
"I think you're blowing this way out of proportion."
"No, I'm finely thinking straight. I'm gonna get dumped."
"You're not gonna get dumped. Chris doesn't even know he did anything wrong."
"Well he should, I mean talking all night, what could she possibly say?"
"I don't know, but let's just go to sleep, cause so much has happened tonight and I need to rest."
"OK fine goodnight."
"Goodnight."
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"Justin sweetie are you gonna be able to sleep?" Amy asked.
"I don't know I'm trying not to think about it, but I'm never going to see Paige again."
"None of us are." She knelt down beside him. "I know we were all mad at Paige, but try not to think about that. She was one of the sweetest girl I ever knew and you know what?"
"What?"
"She wouldn't want you to act like this. She doesn't want you to be upset about her death. She wouldn't want you crying here like a baby, that's not her. So for her sake try and put on a happy face."
"OK." JC walked into the room.
"Are we ready for bed?"
"No not yet I won't be able to get to sleep."
"Oh sure, we'll stay up with you if it makes you feel better."
"That would be nice."next
