Really Good Friends



  really good friends

  the 1st spin the bottle novel

  a series of prequels to Everything Happens for a Reason... by

  Daisy Jordan

  copyright 2011 Daisy Jordan

  This book is available in print at most online retailers.

  To all the bad boys but also the really sweet boys,

  and all the girls who can’t get enough of them

  “spin the bottle”

  (part 1)

  a pact to always stick together in high school

  the first party at the lake

  “hey, we should play spin the bottle,” she said

  and so it all began

  the beautiful girls, so sure of themselves

  they could get anything they wanted

  the gorgeous boys, so funny and tan

  one look, one smile, they totally had you

  losing old friends, making new ones

  love at first sight, the boy of my dreams

  everyone called us “really good friends”

  he didn’t know i wanted so much more…

  summer

  1997

  hey, we should play spin the bottle…

  chapter 1) to forever friendship

  “I can’t believe we start cheerleading practice tomorrow already!” Jill said on Sunday afternoon. She was lying on her stomach on a bright pink inflatable raft in the middle of her pool. She swished her fingers through the water. “It’s, like, totally crazy!”

  “What do you think it’ll be like?” Hillary asked in an excited voice. “And high school? Oh my gosh, I hope there’s tons of hot guys! I can’t wait!”

  Jill’s raft drifted in a half circle so she was facing Hillary. “Me neither! I hope the other cheerleaders are nice. I’m gonna feel so stupid ‘cause I’m a freshman.” She made an uncertain face.

  “Yeah, I know. Do you know who all the other cheerleaders are?”

  “I know some of the sophomores; that’s mostly who we’ll be cheering with on JV. It’s like Lindy Brooks, Brooke Carlson, Ashley Cassleman, Stacy Braden, Tiffany Miller...that’s all I can think of.”

  “Yeah, they’re all from BJ,” Hillary said, referring to Brinkley Junior High School, where she and Jill had just finished eighth grade in May. For years students had referred to it as “BJ,” since that was also the abbreviation for blow job. “Except for Ashley. I don’t know her. She must be from Caldwell.”

  Caldwell and BJ were the two junior high schools feeding into Brinkley-Caldwell High School. Brinkley and Caldwell were small towns about five miles apart from each other, but despite the closeness of the two towns, Caldwell seemed like another world to Jill and Hillary. They didn’t know any of the kids from there very well, and they were equally nervous and excited about going to school with the Caldwell students this year.

  “Yeah, Brooke and Lindy are cool, but Tiffany and Stacy are so stuck-up,” Jill said.

  “I know.” Hillary made a face. “I hope Brooke and Lindy will hang out with us. They’re really popular. I bet they know all the hot guys.” Hillary grinned, and Jill giggled.

  “So who are the other freshmen besides us and Lorylyn and Sam?” Jill asked. “Who made it from Caldwell?”

  “I heard Hilton Joliet made it. I don’t remember the other ones. Who were the other eighth-grade cheerleaders at Caldwell?”

  “Um...Kelly Simmons and Cassidy Nichols…oh, and Blake Bishop. I heard Blake is, like, a complete bitch. I hope she didn’t make it. They had six eighth-grade cheerleaders though; I can’t remember who the other ones were.”

  “Blake did make it!” Hillary remembered. “At least I heard that anyways. Man, that’s gonna suck so bad!”

  “Well I heard Hilton is like, really, really popular. She’s friends with Brooke and Lindy ‘cause her and Lindy took tennis lessons together at the Logan Academy. So I bet they’ll hang out all the time.”

  “They’re all so pretty!” Hillary cried, flipping off her raft into the water. “They’re so gonna get all the guys!”

  “I know!” Jill climbed off her raft and stood in the shallow end. “I’m so nervous about practice tomorrow. I hope they don’t all think we’re dorks!”

  “Well, at least we have each other!” Hillary said as she leaned against the side of the pool. “And Lorylyn and Sam.”

  “Yeah, true,” Jill said. She slipped underwater and pushed up into a handstand. No matter what Hillary said, she still felt really nervous.

  ***

  Hillary spent the night at Jill’s house, and the next morning Jill’s mom dropped them off for their ten o’clock practice at the football field.

  “Thanks, Mrs. Sherer!” Hillary said as she slammed the car door. “Hey look, there’s Lorylyn!”

  Lorylyn Porter, one of Jill and Hillary’s best friends since elementary school, climbed out of her mom’s Dodge Stratus and ran up to Hillary and Jill with her short black ponytail bobbing behind her.

  “You look so cute!” Jill said. Lorylyn had a big white ribbon tied in her hair on top of her head and was wearing blue boxers with big smiley faces on them and a wife-beater tank top. She had the boxers rolled down to make them shorter. Jill suddenly felt like a huge dork in her baggy T-shirt and shorts.

  “Thanks!” Lorylyn said. “Can you guys believe this? We’re starting high school cheerleading!” She giggled and bounced a little as they walked toward the entrance to the track.

  “I know!” Hillary exclaimed.

  Jill was glad Hillary had on baggy clothes too, but she made a mental note to herself to get a cute, sexy outfit like Lorylyn’s to wear tomorrow.

  As they walked onto the track, Jill saw several cheerleaders gathered farther down near the center of the football field. She could hear their loud laughter and felt intimidated. She was so glad she hadn’t shown up by herself.

  As they drew nearer, Jill saw that most of the girls were dressed like Lorylyn, and some had on even skimpier tank tops. She quickly rolled the sleeves on her T-shirt up and under to make it look sort of sleeveless and rolled her shorts down so they would be shorter. She wished they were boxers instead of nylon shorts. She felt like a boy. A couple other girls were wearing T-shirts, but they were fitted and the sleeves were tied up with cute little ribbons.

  “We look so dumb!” Hillary whispered to Jill. “I feel so junior high!” She imitated Jill by rolling her sleeves up and her shorts down.

  “At least your hair looks cute!” Jill said. Hillary’s long straight blonde hair was tied in a ponytail on top of her head. She had a blue bow in it and the ponytail hung halfway down her back. Jill’s dark brown hair, which reached just below her shoulders, was held back by a plain black hair band at the base of her neck. She suddenly wished her hair were longer, or that she had it in a high, perky ponytail like Lorylyn’s. She felt like she hadn’t gotten anything about her appearance right. She wished she could go home and change.

  As the three of them neared the other girls, Hillary nudged Jill. “Look, there’s Hilton and Lindy and Brooke and some other girl.”

  “That’s Ashley Cassleman. From Caldwell.” Jill looked at the group of four girls. Hilton and Lindy were sitting on a bench on the edge of the football field, and Brooke and Ashley were standing in front of them. They all had on boxers that were rolled down at the waist. Ashley was wearing a wife-beater that said Fort Myers Beach on it, and her hair was in pigtails. Brooke and Lindy were both wearing tight spaghetti-strap tank tops, and Hilton had on a plain black wife-beater. Jill noticed their socks weren’t visible and looked down at her own footies that stuck up an inch above her shoes. There was something else she needed to put on her shopping list.

  “Ewww, look, there’s Blake Bishop!” Lorylyn whispered, wrinkl
ing her nose. “I didn’t know she made it!”

  Blake was standing off to one side, talking to Susan Kruger, one of the eighth-grade cheerleaders from Caldwell whom Jill hadn’t been able to remember the day before. Jill wondered if Susan was mean too, like she and Hillary had heard Blake was.

  “Look, there’s all the varsity cheerleaders. I don’t even know any of them,” Hillary said quietly. The varsity cheerleaders were a little farther down the track in a separate group. Lorylyn and Jill and Hillary were now standing near the rest of the JV cheerleaders in their own little circle.

  “Hey, there’s Sam!” Lorylyn pointed back down the track in the direction from which they’d come. “Isn’t that Cassidy Nichols with her?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Hey, girls!” Sam cried. She ran up to Lorylyn and hugged her. Sam was another best friend from way back in elementary school. She was short and a little plump with wavy, chin-length brown hair.

  “Hey, Cass!” Hilton said from the bench. “What’s up?”

  Cassidy went over to join Hilton and the other girls, and Susan and Blake joined them too.

  “Okay, we’re so left out!” Hillary said.

  Three more girls Jill didn’t know arrived, and she figured they were the other sophomore cheerleaders. Just then the coach stopped conversing with a couple of the varsity cheerleaders and stepped onto the track.

  “Hi, girls!” she called, and everyone turned toward her. She was young, probably mid-twenties, and short with boyishly-cut blonde hair. She was really cute. Jill had seen her only once before, at tryouts last spring. “I’m Trish, your coach, in case you didn’t know!” A few of the girls laughed.

  Just then two more girls entered the track and walked slowly toward the rest of them. They were both wearing tight tank tops and boxers rolled low enough that their stomachs showed. They looked irritated at having to be there.

  Jill looked at Hillary and groaned silently. “It’s Tiffany and Stacy.”

  Trish had stopped to wait for the latecomers, and as they joined the group she said in an annoyed voice, “This is not a good way to start the season, girls. Be on time tomorrow.”

  As Trish turned back to the rest of them, Jill saw Tiffany roll her eyes at Stacy and mouth, “Please.”

  Jill and Hillary shared a small smile and then turned back to Trish.

  ***

  Practice went pretty well. Trish introduced the varsity captain, Madeline, and then Madeline and two other varsity cheerleaders led everyone in learning the new dance to the school fight song. It was pretty easy, and Jill liked the choreography. They worked on that for about an hour, and then, after a short break, Madeline went over some basic chants that both varsity and JV needed to know.

  When practice ended at noon, Trish told all the cheerleaders they would be working on the same things again tomorrow before splitting up into separate squads on Wednesday.

  That afternoon, Jill’s mom took her shopping at the mall and bought her five wife-beaters of various colors, three spaghetti-strap tank tops, six pairs of boxers with cool designs, and three packs of no-show footies. Jill was so glad her mom was a real-estate agent who could basically make her own hours; she didn’t know what she would’ve done if she had to wear her dorky baggy clothes to practice another day.

  She told her mom how much fun practice had been and how stylish and pretty the sophomore girls and Hilton and Cassidy had looked. Her mom was glad she was enjoying it and didn’t mind buying the new clothes; Jill often saw someone else wearing a certain piece of clothing or dressing a certain way and had to imitate the look immediately. She felt a need to be in style, but it seemed other people always figured out what was cool before she did.

  That night Hillary and Lorylyn and Sam all came over to Jill’s, and they went swimming and talked about the girls on the squad. They were all glad they’d decided to do cheerleading, and they thought it would be a lot of fun, but they hoped they’d be able to make friends with some of the other girls.

  “No matter what though, we have to stick together,” Hillary said. “Let’s all make a pact right now. Not just in cheerleading, but in high school.”

  “Ooohh, good idea!” Lorylyn said with a grin. “Let’s do it!” She held out her hand, palm down, and the other girls piled their hands on top of hers.

  “To forever friendship!” Hillary proclaimed, and they all lifted their hands in the air triumphantly, smiling at each other.

  “So when are we gonna get to see the football team practice?” Lorylyn asked with a giggle.

  “I hope soon!” Hillary said. “I’m glad we didn’t see them today though! I wanna look hot when we see them!”

  The next day Jill wore a bright purple wife-beater and pink boxers with purple stars on them. She pulled her hair up in a ponytail on top of her head, like Hillary’s and Lorylyn’s the day before, and tied it with a white bow. She felt at least somewhat cute and was much more confident at practice.

  ***

  On Wednesday when they split up into varsity and JV, Trish worked with the JV and asked who could tumble. Jill and Lorylyn were the only freshmen who could do back tucks, and Jill was excited to have the chance to show off in front of the sophomores. Lindy and Tiffany and another sophomore, Amy, could tumble too. Jill was glad Tiffany did basketball cheerleading as well as football so she couldn’t be on the gymnastics team this winter. Jill had been doing gymnastics ever since she was six and couldn’t wait for the high school season. It was her favorite sport. But it wouldn’t be as fun if somebody mean like Tiffany were on the team.

  On the way out of practice that day, Lindy and Hilton came up to Jill, Hillary, Lorylyn, and Sam.

  “Hey, guys, good job tumbling today,” Lindy said to Jill and Lorylyn. “Are you guys gonna do gymnastics?”

  “Yeah!” Jill and Lorylyn said. “Definitely.”

  “Awesome! Well, see you guys tomorrow.” Lindy and Hilton started off.

  “Hey!” Hilton called back. “There’s a party Saturday night, at Landon Kessler’s lake cottage. We’re all going. You guys should come! Cassidy’s mom is dropping off me and Cassidy and our friend Kat if you wanna ride along. She has a minivan, so we can all fit.”

  “Sure, that’d be great!” Jill blurted, hardly able to believe it. “Thanks.”

  “Okay, well, can you guys find rides to Cassidy’s house, then? Like be there around seven.”

  “Yeah, okay!” Jill agreed eagerly.

  “Okay!” Hilton said with a smile. “We can talk about it more at practice tomorrow!” Then she and Lindy hurried off ahead of them.

  “Oh my gosh!” Lorylyn cried. “Landon Kessler?! He’s, like, one of the hottest sophomore guys! Oh my gosh, I can’t wait!”

  “I can’t believe they invited us!” Jill giggled. “This is gonna be so fun!”

  ***

  “Mom, guess what?!” Jill gushed as she jumped into the front seat of the car a couple minutes later. “Hilton invited me and Hillary and Lorylyn and Sam to a party Saturday!” Her mom knew who Hilton was because Jill had been talking about the other cheerleaders all week, especially Hilton, Lindy, and Brooke, who seemed the nicest and coolest.

  “Really?” Her mom sounded excited for her. “Is it at Hilton’s house? Is it just for cheerleaders, or are her other friends coming too?”

  Jill hesitated. She knew her mom was going to be a little skeptical when she heard where the party was. But Jill had to go...she’d die if she didn’t! “It’s actually at Landon Kessler’s. You know, he went to Caldwell? Do you remember him from when I cheered in junior high? He’s like a really good football and basketball player. Hilton said he’s really nice.” Hilton had said no such thing, but Jill was trying to play him up as much as she could before her mom had a chance to react negatively.

  Her mom glanced at her with a wary look. “And Hilton invited you? Does Landon know that?”

  “Oh, I’m sure she okayed it with him first.”

  “Do you even know Landon?”

&n
bsp; “Um, yeah, kinda, I mean I know who he is and stuff. Come on, Mom, please. Hillary’s going too, and Cassidy’s mom is gonna give us a ride. And she’ll come pick us up too. Cassidy and Hilton go, like, all the time. Their parents don’t care.”

  “Where does Landon live?”

  “Um...I don’t know where his actual house is, but the party’s at his parents’ cottage on Lake Caldwell. So that we can go out on the boat and stuff.” Jill cringed inwardly; she knew the location wouldn’t help her mom feel great about letting her go.

  “Oh, so it’s during the afternoon?”

  “Well...not really...we’re supposed to be at Cassidy’s at seven.”

  “So you’re going to be out on the lake after dark?”

  “No, I’m sure they just go on the boat for like an hour or something and then come in and, you know, grill food. I think his parents cook hamburgers and stuff for everybody.” Jill threw in the last sentence to stress the presence of Landon’s parents, even though she had no idea if they would be there.

  Her mom gave her an uncertain look. “All right, well, I’ll talk to Dad about it and we’ll see what he says. I don’t know about this though....I worry about you being there with a lot of older kids.”

  “Mom! Hillary and Lorylyn and Sam will be there! And Cassidy and Hilton too!”

  “Well, I don’t know Cassidy and Hilton, and it worries me that they hang out with these older boys all the time. But we’ll see. Maybe I’ll call Hillary’s mom and talk to her about it.”

  “Okay, please! I really wanna go so bad!”

  “I know, I know.”

  ***

  That night at dinner Jill’s mom told her dad about the party, and Jill reiterated that she was sure Landon’s parents would be there and that Cassidy’s mom always gave Cassidy a ride and was fine with the parties. Jill’s mom had also called Hillary’s mom earlier, and they had decided it would probably be okay as long as Jill and Hillary went together.

  “All right,” Jill’s dad said now. “You can go. But if there’s any drinking or anything like that, call us right away and we’ll come get you. And you need to be home by midnight.”