Chapter Two

"Man, how much stuff do we own?" I grumbled as I unloaded yet another box from the truck.
        "Quite a lot I suppose." My dad said cheerfully.

        I continued to grumble and brought the box inside the house. Mom is unable to help us unpack because of the fact that she's pregnant. She was feeling a little sick, so she went to go rest. So it's just dad, me, and Chelsi to unpack. The truck drivers decided to take a coffee break (which sounded great to me) but dad said that he wanted this finished today, so Chelsi and myself had to continue working.

        As I headed back outside, I noticed someone looking at us through a window next door. He looked about my age, but I couldn't really tell. He moved out of site as soon as he noticed that I had spotted him.

        We finished unpacking the trucks about an hour later, and it was around dinnertime. Since we had nothing to cook with and my dad was busy taking care of my mom, I was assigned the job of going out and getting whatever I could find for dinner.

        I put on my roller blades, which I luckily found, and headed out. I could have drove but since I didn't really know where I was going, I decided to roller blade instead.

        This was my first real view of the town. It basically looked like a town from TV or something. Actually, it looked a lot like were the Camdens live in 7th Heaven. There were stores everywhere and people walking up and down the street. It wasn't as small an old western as I thought it would be. But that doesn't change the fact that it is in the middle of nowhere.

        I finally decided on getting subway, because by the time I got back to the house, the hot food would be cold. I didn't bother to take off my roller blades and just strolled right in. I noticed a group of kids in the corner. They were all laughing hard and something someone said and looked like they were having a great time. I suddenly remembered the tearful farewell my own friends gave me before I left.

        Flash back

"You can't go Al!! We will miss you to much." Carrie sobbed. She ran up to me and hugged me tight.

Silent tears were streaming down my own face as I looked around at the group. Carrie, Megan, Tera, and Melony were all sobbing and holding their faces in their hands, and Tim, Greg, and Jeff were standing there with sorrow on their face like they didn't really believe that this was happening.

"I have to Car. You know I don't have a choice." Time came up and gently pulled his girlfriend off of me. I went around and hugged everybody until I came to Jeff.

"Jeff." I stared but he interrupted me by putting is fingers on my mouth. I took then and gently kissed them. "I don't want to leave you guys."

"I know sweetie, but everything will work out for the best. You can e-mail and call. We won't lose touch. I won't let us." He said gently.

I nodded. "I don't want to do this, but I think we should see other people." I said quickly. "It would be to hard to keep it going and we would both be deprived of having a real relationship."

"Okay. I guess I can't disagree. But don't ever forget me okay?"

I smiled. "I could never." I hugged everybody once more and got into the car. I turned around and watched my friends slowly disappear from view altogether.

Present

        I jumped slightly as I heard a sudden burst of laughter. I shook my head slightly as if to clear my thoughts and strolled up to the counter were a teenage girl was standing looking bored. She had fiery red hair that was pulled back into a high ponytail and light green eyes. You could say that she was very pretty. The name on the nametag on her uniform said Carmen.

        "Hi my names Carmen, what would you like today?" she asked.

        "I'm Al." I gave her my order and she quickly set to work. "So are you new here?" She asked trying to make small talk.

        I just raised an eyebrow. "How'd you know?"

        She laughed. "Well I haven't ever seen you around before. Where you from?"

        "Chicago."

        She whistled. "Wow. That's mighty far from here."

        I noticed she has a slight accent as she spoke. "Tell me about it. My dad got transferred here, so here I am."

        "Where are you gonna go to school?" She asked completely forgetting about the food.

        "Oh.um. I keep forgetting the name. Some president I think." I said trying to recall what my mom said earlier.

        "How about Kennedy?" She suggested.

        I snapped my fingers. "Yeah that's it!"

        She grinned. "Cool that's where I go." She set back to work on the sandwiches. "Well here's your food. That'll be $24.80."

        "I handed her the money. "Thanks."

        "No problem. Oh, would you like me to show you around school on Monday. Ya know. Give you the 411?"

        Now I was the one grinning. "Sure, that would be great. Thanks!"

        "Sure. I will also introduce you to my friends too. See ya Monday!"

        I quickly glided out of the store and headed back to the house. I wasn't really paying attention to were I was going and I suddenly rammed into someone and fell back onto the sidewalk taking my breath away. "Oh my gosh! I am really sorry. I wasn't paying any attention to where I was going." I looked up and whatever breath I had gained back was quickly gone again.

        Standing before me was a really good looking guy. And really tall I might add. He looked to be about 5'9 at the least. He had brown hair that fell gently onto his face and gorgeous brown eyes that I had a feeling, showed his emotion just like mine. He extended his arm out and helped me up.

        "Are you okay? Sorry, I wasn't paying any attention either." I noticed that his voice was also soft but deep. A nice combination.

        "Yeah, im fine. Thanks you for helping me up. I'm Allie Jacobs, but I prefer Al."

        "Nice to meet you to Al. I'm Ryan Johnson." He smiled.

        I blushed slightly. "Hi Ryan, it's nice to meet you, but I have to go. I'm really sorry for running into you. Maybe I'll see you again."

        "He grinned (which looked really cute by the way). "I hope so."

        I blushed and smiled again and skated off. I was only about a minute away from the house. I skated up into the driveway, took of my shoes and the front door, and hurried inside. "I'm back you guys. Come get dinner." I yelled and walked into the kitchen. We sat down and started to eat.

        "I met a guy on the way back." I said. "His name is Ryan Johnson.

        "Ryan Johnson." Dad repeated. "That's one of our neighbors! The Johnson's. I met the father a little while ago. His name is David. His wife's name is Paige, and they have a 16 year old son named Ryan and a 14 year old daughter named Emily."

        "That's great dear!" Mom said enthusiastically. "They sound wonderful and it will be great having neighbors so close to the kid's age."

        "Can I be excused?" I asked interrupting them. I didn't think I could last another minute in their cheerfulness. "I want to set up some things before I go to bed."

        "Sure honey. Just don't forget that we are going shopping tomorrow!"

        I groaned and hurried up the stairs. I decided to put my bed, dresser, boom box, and a few other things in my room. My five-disk CD player would go in the basement along with my computer, TV, and drum set.

        I went to my backpack that I had with me in the car and pulled out my Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix book and started reading. I got to the part where Sirius, Lupid, and Mr. Weasley are explaining everything to Harry when my dad called up the stairs and told me to go to bed. My sister went to sleep about half an hour ago. I leaned over and turned off the light. Tomorrow is going to bring a whole new adventure and I wanted to be ready.