A/N: Please leave a review and enjoy

A/N: Please leave a review and enjoy!

Chapter 1

You know, most girls have guy friends and boyfriends. And then they have their girlfriends, their best friends.

As for me, Alexandria Reynolds, my best friends are my guy friends. And because of that, I have no boyfriends.

My seven best friends are more protective of me than a mother bear of her cubs. It was tolerable in middle school, but ever since we started high school, they’ve taken it to a really ridiculous level. And things were about to get worse.

OTGOTGOTGOTGOTG

“Alex, do you want my pizza?”

Looking up from my bag of cheese puffs, I saw Austin pushing his plate of pizza toward me, his black bangs falling into his hazel eyes. “No thanks, Austin,” I replied, licking cheese dust off of my fingers before grabbing more puffs. “These cheese puffs are about all I can handle after my gargantuan sandwich.”

Laughing slightly, Austin nodded and stood, moving toward the trash can to dispose of his unwanted pizza.

I sat staring blankly into space as I listened to the noise of my best friends around me, knowing that the friendly atmosphere wasn’t going to last for long.

“…holy shit, shut up, Derek!” That was Kasey. Always the pottymouth.

“…have you heard anything by The Spill Canvas? They’re awesome!” Jacob. The boy permanently attached to his iPod headphones.

“…I was playing Call of Duty 4…” Austin, the video game freak. Of course.

“…dude, I played Guitar Hero for, like, three hours last night!” Chris. The “Guitar Hero.”

“…so I realized the motherboard wasn’t functioning properly…” Sepp. The computer geek.

“…my dad made me conjugate Latin verbs last night…” Derek, whose dad was a teacher.

“…then I said, well, why can’t I have a monkey hanging off of a traffic light?” Harry. Don’t ask. You really don’t want to know.

Trust me.

Finally, as I’d been waiting for him to do all of lunch period, Michael made his way over to our table.

You see, I’d heard a rumor that Michael was planning to ask me to homecoming today.

“Hey, Alex,” Michael said, smiling at me broadly and raising a single hand in greeting. Not one of them even acknowledged his presence, but merely continued talking amongst themselves. I sighed. This was not going to be pretty.

“Hi,” I said simply, putting my bag of cheese puffs on the table.

“I was wondering if I could talk to you…” he said, “alone.”

It was almost as if Michael had dropped the f-bomb or something, I swear. Simultaneously, Kasey, Jake, Chris, Austin, Sepp, Derek, and Harry all fell silent and turned to stare at Michael. Or rather, glare at Michael. “Anything you have to say to Alex you can damn well say in front of us,” Kasey told him coldly, anger flashing in his blue eyes.

“Oh. Okay,” Michael said, fiddling with his hands and looking uncomfortable with the whole situation. Turning to me, he said, “Alex, will you go to homecoming with me?”

I opened my mouth to let him off easily, because I had already promised to go with Kasey, Jake, Chris, Austin, Sepp, Derek, and Harry in a huge mosh pit group, and we had all agreed not to get dates. However, before I could say anything, Harry spat out, “She can’t. She’s taken.”

“Oh,” Michael said, looking let down. “May I ask by whom?”

“All of us,” Chris put in, staring at Michael as if he wanted his face to disintegrate. “We’re going as a group, and she’s not allowed to get a date. So piss off.”

Frowning, Michael turned and left.

Glaring at all of them, especially Harry, Kasey, and Chris, I hissed, “What the hell is wrong with you people?”

“What?” Harry said, looking startled. “We just told him the truth.”

“You didn’t have to be such assholes about it,” I retorted. “I mean, God. I was going to say ‘no,’ that I couldn’t, because I’m going in a group with you all. But no, being the little meddlers that you are, you had to jump in before I could even reply. If you recall, he was asking me out, not you.”

“You’re our best friend,” Austin said. “If someone asks you out, they’re asking us out.”

“I don’t even want to think about the ramifications of that statement,” I told him, wrinkling my nose. He snorted in laughter. Turning to Harry, Kasey, and Chris, I added, “I’m still not happy with the three of you.”

“Glad I’m not involved in this,” Sepp said to Derek. “Aren’t you?”

Derek nodded his head vigorously. “Guys,” he said, addressing Harry, Kasey, and Chris, “she’s going to kill you.”

“Sorry, Alex,” Harry sighed. “We shouldn’t have jumped in like we did. We should’ve let you answer Michael on your own.”

“Yes, we should have,” Chris muttered. “He’s a dick.” Seeing my glare aimed carefully at him, he said, “That is to say… sorry.”

“Yeah, me too,” Kasey said grudgingly. “Maybe we are a bit too protective.”

“Maybe?” I said skeptically, raising an eyebrow.

“We just don’t want you to get hurt, Alex,” Derek explained to me. “You’re our best friend. We don’t want anyone screwing you over.”

“I’m fifteen,” I said in exasperation. “I’m a big girl; I can take care of myself. Did you ever think about that?”

None of them replied. Sighing, I said, “You know what? Never mind, guys. You’re forgiven.”

“Really?” Harry asked, looking up hopefully. Obviously none of them had expected me to forgive them so easily.

“Really,” I nodded. “I don’t wanna worry about this right now.” Looking around the table at each of them, I said, “Are we still on for movies tonight?”

“On like Austin’s laptop,” Sepp replied. Austin reached over and slapped him on the back of the head, while I merely raised an eyebrow at him.

“I’ll take that as a ‘yes’?” I said.

“God, Sepp, sometimes I worry about you,” Harry groaned, slapping his forehead and letting his hand slide down his face slowly.

“Sometimes? How about all the time?” Derek snorted, earning him a glare from Sepp.

“What is this? ‘Pick on Sepp Day’?” Sepp asked, throwing his hands up in the air in frustration.

“Please, every day is ‘Pick on Sepp Day,’” Austin replied, attempting to stifle his laughter and failing miserably as he snorted.

“Hey,” Derek said brightly, “maybe we’ll be luckier this time than we were last time and some candy counter guy won’t ask Alex out.”

“Oh, yeah,” I said, remembering the last time we had all gone to the movies together. “But if he does, hopefully Harry won’t punch him in the face.” I glared pointedly at Harry.

“Hey,” he said defensively. “He didn’t press charges.”

I snorted and rolled my eyes, choosing to say nothing to that, and I let my glare do all the talking.

See? I told you they were ridiculous.