I crossed my arms feeling the chill of the air hit me as I left Marc’s car. He had stepped out with Sidney behind him and we walked to the front door of the café. As soon as we entered the smell of coffee wafted my nose putting a smile on my face.

“Finally!” Max called out throwing his hands in the air. “We’ve been waiting forever!”

“No we haven’t. We just got here a few minutes ago,” Jordan corrected.

“Okay, we’re here now. Let’s go order.” Marc went to the counter as everyone shuffled behind him.

I made my way to the end of the line as Kris appeared behind Jordan. He stopped in his tracks and had a serious expression. He looked at me, and without a smile nodded to me. “Hi.”

I forced a smile. “Hey.” I stood awkwardly not knowing what to do next.

He looked down at the floor with his hands in his pockets. I cleared my throat, which caused Sidney to look back and look between both of us. “Brooke do you want to go in front of me?”

I smiled. “No, I’m fine Sidney, really.”

Kris exchanged glances with both of us pausing to think for a moment. He let out a small breathe of slight disbelief and nodded to himself seeming to understand everything in that moment.

“No, really it’s okay. I don’t mind.” He smiled and stepped aside to let me pass. I reluctantly took a step forward and thanked him.
Shoot me now, was all I could think.

Once we all got what we wanted, Jordan pushed a few tables together as we sat down. Everyone immediately sat down and started eating in silence.

“So Brooke,” Max said drinking his water. “Are you excited about tonight’s game against the Rangers?”

I looked up from my plate shrugging slightly. “Yeah, pretty excited. I don’t know too much about the Rangers to be honest but I do like them. I mean Lundqvist is great in net and he does not like to come out of it so that’ll probably be hard throughout the night, but I think you guys can manage. I think Biron being a back up could be good for the team, and Frolov is really going to be good for the team as well and have a fantastic season, and Del Zotto was one of my favorite prospects, so he'll probably just keep being amazing. Girardi is super intense and has been improving his power play and offensive skills so you may have to watch out for that. It should be a good intense game if they’re on their best tonight,” I shrugged taking a bite out of my salad. In that instance heard several forks drop and a few coughs before the table went silent and I looked up. I could only describe what I saw through hysterical laughter. A table full of grown men twice my size all leaning in towards me. I had managed to surpress the laughter and wait for them to compose themselves again.

The guys were staring at me in awe with their mouths open, eyebrows raised, and wide eyes. I cleared my throat and smiled slightly. Next to Max, Peyton smirked giggling to herself.

“What?” I asked.

She shook her head smiling. “I think they’re just amazed that you can know so much about hockey, which is so wrong if they knew you."

“Oh.” I said.

“Wow! Girl knows her players,” Max grinned eating again.
Jordan nudged me. “Do you really know that much about hockey?”

“Well, I mean I guess you can say I know more about hockey than most, but that’s probably because I’ve been watching it ever since I was a child,” I explained.

“Nice.” Tyler smiled at me.

I smiled sheepishly returning back to my plate of food.

“I’m hoping to get into a fight.” Jordan said. “I haven’t been in one in a while.”

“Wuss.” Max scoffed, then muttering something about kicking someone’s ass.

“Brooke have you ever been in a fight?” Tyler asked.

Marc shook his head. “No she’s way too nice for that.”

Peyton scoffed across the table. “Ha!”

I gave Peyton a look, knowing exactly what she was thinking about. “Uhm, Peyton?”

She looked up at me and smiled innocently. “Yes?”

I gave her another look and shook my head slightly, hoping she got my telepathic message. She didn’t. Or she did but chose to ignore it.

She stared at me blankly for a moment before shrugging. “You guys are just lucky you didn’t know her back in high school.”

“Why?” Jordan asked.

“Peyton.” I said, barely audible.

She looked around the table before putting down her fork and sitting up straighter, preparing herself. “Do you guys want to hear a story about Brooke?”

“Always,” Max answered.

“Peyton.” I said more sternly.

“Well, you see, in high school and pretty much in her entire life, Brooke has always been the nice, sweet, innocent girl. You’d be an idiot to hate her. But there was one incident that ended up becoming legendary in our school,” she explained.

“Peyton,” I protested louder.

“What happened?” Marc asked leaning in to hear.

Peyton continued. “Okay, she had just become friends with this new guy in school really fast. He would always hang around her and be really sweet to her. This guy was straight out of a GQ magazine. Only problem was that one of the provocative and less moral girls in school had her eye on him, as did every girl because he was extremely gorgeous. No one liked her and everyone wanted to punch her at least once in their lives, even the jocks. Brooke was no exception.”

“Peyton.” I yelled a little.

“Brooke paid no attention but one day, this chick came up to her and yelled at Brooke to back off her man and that he wasn't interested in her. But, before she walked away,” she paused for effect before finishing, “She slapped her across the face."

Gasps were heard through the entire table.

"And then out of nowhere,” she paused again. She threw her hands in the air out of excitement and spewed the last part of the story so fast the guys almost missed it. It wouldn't have been a shame if they did. “Brooke tackled her onto the lunch table, rolled over her, pinned her down and punched her in the nose, which she ended up breaking for a whole month!”

“Peyton!” I screamed.

The whole table gasped again and started to laugh hysterically. Jordan and Max were the loudest and, within seconds, started to imitate the punch, Jordan knocking Max out who collapsed onto the table. Marc and Tyler laughed even harder. I even saw out of the corner of my eye that Sidney and Kris were laughing as well, trying to cover it with their hands.

They weren't fooling anyone.

I covered my face in my hands as I felt my face start to heat up. “Well I know never to slap Brooke now.” Max joked.

I removed my hands from my face to glare at him. He looked straight down. “Wow Brooke I didn’t know you could be so aggressive. We could use you on our team.” Jordan grinned.

“Why did you get so mad?” Tyler asked. "Anger issues?"

I shrugged. “I just didn’t like her accusing me of stealing ‘her man’” I said using air quotes. "Besides, she terrorized practically every girl in our school."

“Did you really break her nose?” Sidney asked from the end of the tables.

I nodded slowly, embarrassed. “I’m not proud of it.”

Kris interrupted. “Impressive.” He was still looking down at his plate.

Sidney nodded in agreement. “Yeah, considering your size.”

At that comment everyone laughed. I frowned. “What’s wrong with my size?”

Max laughed. “Come on. You’re really tiny. How tall are you like five feet?”

I sat up straighter. “I’ll have you know I’m five two,” I argued.

“Big difference. Why couldn’t you be Peyton? She’s five seven.” This earned him a hard elbow in the ribs from Peyton. “Ow! What was that for?” She gave him a look which he didn’t understand at first. After a few seconds he blurted out. “Oh!” he nodded looking at us again, nervously. “I mean it seems like she’s five seven to me. It’s not like I know that for a fact or anything. Definitely not because she told me.”

Peyton merely sighed digging her face into her right hand.

The whole table exchanged looks and chose to ignore him for now. “Well, let’s go.” Marc said getting up to throw his food out. Everyone followed him starting their own conversations.

As I got up to throw my food out Sidney came behind me. He threw his food out and then bent down. “I didn’t mean to offend you or anything. I’m sorry.”

I looked up at him smiling at how sincerely apologetic he seemed. “It’s okay. Really, don’t worry about it.”

He smiled. “Thanks. And by the way, I don’t mind that you’re small,” he finished and walked ahead of me.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I laughed shaking my head at Max and Jordan who were battling each other on Guitar Hero. We had gone over back to Max’s place since he wanted everyone to go over his house so he’d feel cool and we all obliged. Tyler had left somewhere while Kris left about five minutes later. I felt horrible but I understood that being around me wasn't high on his priority list anymore.

Peyton and Marc were on the floor discussing something while I was on the couch with Sidney. I sat on the edge while he sat about three feet away from me.

“Can someone else please battle me? I’m tired of Jordan!” Max whined.

“You’re just mad because you keep losing to Jordan,” Sidney replied.

He gave him a look. “You couldn’t win even if you tried. Baby.”

Sidney laughed even though I could see he clearly didn’t find it funny at all.

“You know no one thinks you’re a baby right?” I asked Sidney looking at his serious face.

He shrugged. “Max probably does, but that’s okay,” he let out a small laugh. He tilted his head thinking before looking at me. “I was really shocked to find out you did that in high school, you know.”

I looked at him. “Really? Well I’m not exactly proud of that. It wasn’t my finest moment.” I smiled sheepishly.

“Maybe, but I didn’t expect that from you. You seem so,” he paused trying to think of the right word.

“Afraid?” I said. “It’s okay you can say it.”

“I don’t think you’re afraid.” He corrected. “You’re actually brave.”

I smiled softly looking away from him, feeling my stomach turn into knots.

“You’re bave too. No matter what anyone else tells you,” I explained.

He shook his head. “People think I'm afraid as if I couldn’t hurt a fly.”

I laughed. “Then you should prove them wrong. Steal some kid’s candy or something.”

He nodded. “I should. Only if it’s healthy though.”

We both laughed simultaneously, silencing out any other noises in the room.

Notes

I had to update this ENTIRE chapter from my blackberry. I am not joking when I say it took me over TWO HOURS- esp. because the spacing took forever to fix.

Okay, guys my laptop is officially broken and it'd basically cost me as much for a new computer just to fix it and all my files would still be gone. I am so sad, you have no idea. I hate Apple now. I have the worse luck. My fingers are officially sore.

You guys should donate some money to me to buy a new one or just donate an old one if you want me to keep updating. Please? I'll pay you back in chapters and cookies until I find another job, pay off my mom's medical bills and my phone bill- this is the only way I can update.

On the other hand, my reader number is up to 3,000. What?! That's crazy!

Let's get it up to 10, no? Spread the word! (about the laptop and readers)