Celeste took over driving responsibilities to the Midwest Wireless Civic Center in Mankato, MN; she was up for doing anything that didn't involve her thinking of the tiff she had with Chris. She didn't know why she felt a microscopic hint of regret about hurting his feelings, why she was so angry towards him. Compassion, it's a bitch. A yawn bubbled up from her throat, forcing her eyes shut for a few millaseconds. Chris invaded her sleep, her dreams, the only place she could find true and unhinging serenity. Celeste wondered if it was just Celeste; the girl kept locked inside of a cage because of her militant father. She never experienced the fruits and joys of the true teenage world; house parties, all-night sleepovers with friends and manicures, sneaking out for rendevuous with boys in the dead of night. Like her "twin" Jessa, she would never admit that she is to blame, but maybe she befuddled her and Chris's potential at friendship, a friendship that would be unique. She felt inclined, inadequate, not normal. She felt like Taryn, isn't that a thought.

"Are we going to the guys' show tonight?" Ashley questioned from the table, placing the doubles of her pictures in a Piglet photo album, her small, pudgy fingers diligently working around the flimsy material of the photo holders.

"If you want," Jessa responded, rolling off the white and teal bench and placing her brother Derrick's CD with mixed songs in Ashley's Panasonic CD Boom Box, "We can get tickets at the box office, I'm sure they aren't sold out. We have plently of money, a few thousand, as long as we don't eat out all the time."

"We haven't ate out once since this trip started," Taryn informed Jessa with slight annoyance, Taryn back firmly on the brown floor and her legs hoisted up on her and Ashley's bed, scribbling down aimlessly in her notebook. "I miss McDonald's. Their salad McShakers are my lifeline."

"Good point...So how about it, girls?" Jessa smiled, running to the blue plush passanger's seat and sliding it, grabbing her turtle sunglasses from her short lime green tube top and shoving them onto her face. "Mickey D's for lunch?"

"Sure," Celeste responded unenthustiastically, the golden arch standing tall in the murky distance, her wolf eyes dull with thought.

"Something's wrong," Jessa whispered, reaching over and lightly rustling her fingers through Celeste's brown curls.

Celeste looked over at her, her eyes enlarging into the eyes of a melancholy puppy dog, her straight line of a mouth hooking down into a frown. "I didn't mean to hurt Chris's feelings."

"Yes you did," Jessa retorted, not letting Celeste fall into self-doubt become of some guy's saddened eyes and bitter words, glancing up at her flawless face in the rear-view mirror and smiling. "You did what any girl with respect for herself would have done."

"I suppose you're right," Celeste agreed, a little doubt still crawling around like a bug in her brain, her drifting mind almost steering them past the entrance ramp, Celeste taking a sharp, wide turn into McDonald's, cars encompassing Celeste honking at her to scold her, her impaired judgement shaking everything in the RV. "Sorry, girls," Celeste apologiesed, the old RV slowly chugging into the drive-in like a heavy train.......

The Civic Center came into the distance from thin air as the girls finished up their high-cholesral lunch. Ashley's eyes glimmered in excitement as she chucked the box holding her Chicken Selects into the white garbage pail next to her and carried the remains of her shake with her toward Taryn. Her and Taryn joined Jessa and Celeste at the wheel, Jessa's feet planted firmly against the dashboard, Celeste munching on the fries spilling onto the ground like sand from a child's bucket, taking a chance with death as she reached down with her hands and eyes. Their faces began to gleam like they were Dorothy and her amicable friends, off on the yellow brick road toward the Emerald City, their dreams closer toward their eager grasps. Jessa's CD bopped to the next track, track 6, an early 90's hair-band favorite, and Jessa instantly began to jive in her seat with the music, her eyes closed as if to picture the lead singer screaming into the mic, thousands of fans screaming the words back to him.

"What's this?" Ashley asked, her face perpexled by these foreign beats.

"It's a classic, youngin'," Taryn shouted with glee, tapping her fingers on the back of Celeste and Jessa's seat.

"Livin' on a Prayer by Bon Jovi," Celeste quietly told Ashley, wiping the sheepish look Taryn plastered on Ashley's face as if Taryn knew everything...like usual.

"She says," Jessa began to sing, her eyes darting to her friends and smiling, her unusual singing voice rough like her throat was thickly lined with gritty sandpaper, "'We've got to hold on to that we got."

"'Cause it doesn’t make a difference," Celeste continued, her songbird voice flickering out of the ajared window, fighting resiliently against the heavy air forcing it to the road, "if we make it or not."

"We’ve got each other and that’s a lot," Taryn took over, wrapping her arms around Ashley and thrusting her head forward as if being litterally pushed by the music.

"For Dream Street," Ashley chimed in quickly, her improve veering her 3 friends off the trail of singing with boisterious laughter.

"We'll give it a shot!" They all shouted, Celeste pounding her hand on the steering wheel like it was a drumstick.

"Oooh," they continued, their hair flying like crazy in the stifled air, portraying the exact movements of the cliche bands picked and flourished before they were out of diapers, the world-renouned 'Rock' symbol executed with their hands, Jessa stealing a guitar solo, her bashe platform sandals shaking wildly in the air like jumping beans, Ashley using her McDonald's Shake cup as a microphone, her mouth surrounding it like Steven Tyler's, Taryn just acting like Taryn, losing herself and her mind in the music, her arms reached to the sky and body moving with the batteries that keep going and going; the batteries of rejuvinated life free from common eye. "We’re half way there."

"Oooh Oooh!" They screamed, their shrill voices spiking out of the open windows and grabbing the heads of passing commuters, some smiling and some frowning in reply. Their smiles augmented from ear to ear, all four of them honestly encircled in bliss for the first time in the longest interval. "Livin’ on a prayer."

A large crowd fluent in screams and laughter began to file into the small arena like raucous children, their faces as bright as stars sparkling in the midnight sky outside the ceiling. Dim yellow light, like in school that made you feel sick, glowed down on the spectators as Ashley, Jessa, Celeste and Taryn climbed immeasurable steep steps to their seats, section 210, Row R, nosebleed seats but directly across from the stage, the people hustling around it small as ants.

"Nice crowd tonight," Taryn commented, plopping down hard in the blue chair, her butt stinging in her decision it was soft enought to fall into.

"Yep," Jessa agreed, her hands resting on her exposed stomach and her shins on the seat ahead of her, her eyes scanning across the arena, flashed of cameras and light disabling her vision.

"I hope they perform 'Jennifer Goodbye' tonight," Celeste stated, her lips curling into a sardonic smile as she kept her head pin-straight, her hand reaching under the seat for her bag of popcorn. "I wonder if she can measure up to you, Tar."

"If you like your teeth where they are," Taryn growled, her pleasent attitude flushing down into the crowd, her left hand curling into a tight fist as she swivled toward Celeste, crouching over Ashley perched in between them, "I suggest you keep your mouth shut."

"Guys!" Ashley shouted, spreading her arms apart to stay in the hazardous lane of fire, "No bloodshed, please."

Two murderous glares were exchanged before the lights blacked out as if on cue, Jessa expecting to her a blood-curdling scream and slashing of a knife through moist flesh. The fans' roar started as a rumble then aggrandized to a scream fest, the first act, Play, taking stage in their sparkly, taunt outfits.

The girls unwillingly listened to all the acts, the frenzy of fans rudely interrupting their attemps at conversation every 5 seconds, their eyes rolling and toes impatiently tapping against the slab of concret below their feet referred to as a floor. Then Dream Street seized the stage and the top of the arena blew off with a loud bang and the magnitude of the fans' voice of approval.

"Here we go..." Ashley shreiked, Celeste only reading her lips, the fans overwhelming her comparable puny voice.

The girls, especially Taryn, actually heard the words coming from the boys' mouths, not focusing on the odvious that they focused on at Jones Beach, their good looks and suggestive style of dance. Taryn's eyes began to fill with wetness without her approval as the song "Dream On" wafted from the stage up to her small ears. Taryn's face rendered a shocked look, her brain never fathoming a pop sound and song would melt her to tears. Frankie's deep voice took her down the road where the bricks were painted in rainbow colors, ice cream fell from trees, children ruled the roads, and bright hair dye was as common a household product as bread; where anything's possible......

The girls returned to their RV with ringing ears and inspired thoughts, the back lights of the arena illuminating the way for them safely. Taryn trudged in, her hand groping to the left to turn on the light switch. Celeste and Ashley winced at the bombardment of scortching light as Jessa plowed past them, the concert making her body and mind crumble and shutter from the inside out, one song stabbing at her heart with a pin like she was a voodoo doll as she crawled up into the overhang bed above the driver's and passenger's seats.

Jennifer Goodbye; a guitar-strung blues-like ballot that made her thinking crippling thoughts. She realized she'd never have a guy to fall back on, even if that was a bad thing. She truely wanted to explore what was out there in the ever-confusing realm of love, but that drive and determination possibly has been plowing her through decent and feasible chances at love. She was almost sure all of the boys in her past cared for her, maybe even loved her, easily displayed in letters and cards and other trinkets she'd saved in a locked red box, but how could she return that feeling if she didn't feel "it"? Love isn't one-sided, that truth unfair to both people, and she firmly stuck to that rule.

She realized, like a revelation was woven into that song that night, how wrong it is for her to stick to her 3 month max rule, how wrong it is for her and her guy of choice. She was utterly confused about how she felt about anything. She realized that soon, there wouldn't be enought men to go through, that she'd end up breathing but dead, here but gone, like her mother.

She grappled under her square denim pillow for her list. The list consisted of the boys she's dated and what she found wrong with them, how the 3 month rule fit perfectly in every situation like a piece in a jigsaw puzzle, names and problems neatly placed in 2 columns and etched in with pencil. Jessa always could crack a smile on the practical belief that maybe one of these boys would pull her out of her cycle of breakups, but none have availed...yet. The first on the list was Rob Garfinkle whom she went out with in the middle of her sophmore year. Besides the horrible last name, he was too involved with his guitar to be involved with her, only spending sparatic afternoons and a few hours of the weekend with her, the afternoons they did spent were used in sexual pleasure, empty, meaningless, and unbelieveably degrading. Next on the list was Mike Pardona, the senior. He was so cute with those mysterious hazel eyes and whispy sandy hair, but he'd rather toss around a pigskin and talk about his arrogant successes in the sport world than go to dinner with her. Then there was Tom Vanderbuilt, a proper, rich boy verging on manhood from the upper-side of town. He tried to buy her love with jewlery and clothes, but Jessa only wanted what couldn't be bought; a chance with his heart. She took a left turn in her thinking and dated Matt McPatrick, one of the smartest guys in her class, thinking intelligent conversation plus someone willing to listen would amount to love. His talks were useless and dribble to her. She briefly courted Danny Mitchel, but his irritating habit of biting his nails convulsively drove him to the boot. Then there was her last boy, Keith Rodgers, right-hand man to Heather Tobin and well-respected student, athlete, and mentor among the school. Keith was...Keith, too shy to make the first move and shyer to say what was on his mind.

6 guys and 6 deadends. Jessa scratched her forehead, wondering if she was too picky, too choosy when it came to love, wondering if it was her fault all relationships ended in her uncaring goodbyes. It wasn't normal for her to question her motives and she became scared. She layed back onto her dark blue sheets and her eyes plunged up into the lightless abyss of a sky, viewed through the skydone strategically placed above the overhead bed. Greg Raposo would be number 7, and he would be hers; Jessa Bellafore wasn't into losing. It's not like he was a meaningless trophy to her to place on the shelf. He was a person, Jessa understood that, with emotions and feelings. But to her, that didnt matter; he was a person she needed to conquere with her charm, sass, and eyes in order to prove something to Heather, that Heather didn't know anything and that Jessa could do anything, maybe even find love?

The column next to his name was empty. Subconciously, deep in the cavern of her hallow heart, she wished on the darkness that it would stay like that.