Julia
Sometimes, Ace Kelly is the most annoying best friend in the whole wide world.
I don’t care if he gave me the last purple popsicle yesterday or told everyone at school that I’m the bravest girl in the second grade because I touched a worm on the playground. None of that matters right now because I amsomad at him. He just made his stupid Hulk action figure rip the hair out of my favorite Barbie’s head.
“She didn’t even do anything!” I yell, holding my partially hairless Barbie up in the air. “She was trying to do some yoga, Ace!”
“I’m sorry, Lia!” Ace exclaims. “But the Hulk gets mad sometimes! He can’t help it!”
“Well, the Hulk has anger issues,” I snap, scooting to the edge of the rug in his bedroom and turning my back to him. “And so do you. I’m mad at you, Ace Kelly. Really,reallymad.”
Instantly, he goes quiet because he knows the only thing he can do when I’m upset with him is to wait it out.
We have a rule called the fifteen-minute rule. It’s not, like, a law or anything. We made it up. But between us, it’s nonnegotiable.
Ace wanted to choose sixty-nine minutes because he says his dad tells his mom he likes that number all the time, but I told Ace that sixty-nine minutes is a really long time. Like, I’m pretty sure that’s more than a whole hour, which is, like, forever long.
I guess we could’ve chosen the five-minute rule or ten-minute rule, but we both think fifteen is a cool number, so it won two to nothing when we took a vote. Now, we’re not allowed to stay mad at each other for longer than fifteen minutes, and it all started over my sidewalk chalk drawing last summer.
Ace added a gross stream of boogers and snot to the pretty girl I drew on my parents’ driveway,ruiningall my hard work. One minute, she had beautiful long purple hair and big pink eyes and a yellow dress, and the next, she had a face covered in green slime because boys are gross.
The only problem with our rule is that Ace isn’t very good at telling time yet, so I’m the one who always has to say when the fifteen minutes are up.
“Is it time yet?” Ace asks, scooting a little closer to me.
See?
I huff out a breath, but I don’t answer him, concentrating on brushing my Barbie’s blond hair in a way that will hide her new bald spot instead.
“Lia?” he tries again, quieter this time. “Has it been fifteen minutes?”
I sigh and glance down at my pink Hello Kitty watch. Only three minutes have passed, but when I look up, Ace is sitting there with big brown sorry eyes. He’s not even playing with his action figures anymore, and his resemblance to Puss in Boots is growing by the second.
I cross my arms tighter and look away, determined to hold out until the time runs out or my Barbie grows her hair back—whichever is shorter—but when I glance back at Ace again, he looks even more pitiful. I crumble.
“Yeah,” I lie. “It’s been fifteen minutes.”
“Really?” he perks up.
I nod. “I forgive you.”
“Thank goodness, Lia. Fifteen minutes is so freaking long.” His face breaks into a giant smile as he scoots right next to me again. “Wanna play action figures?”
“No,” I say and quickly move my Barbie away from his angry Hulk and rise to my feet. “Thanks. You can play action figures. I’m going to play dress-up.”
“You can borrow my Batman costume,” he offers. “It’s in my closet.”
That might not seem like a big deal, but that Batman costume is Ace’s favorite. He never lets his little brother Gunnar wear it. And one time, Ace had Kyle Collins over at his house to play with us and Kyle wanted to wear his Batman costumeso bad, but Ace said no.
It’s basically an honor. It’s also one of the reasons why Ace Kelly is my best friend. He’s always doing nice things for me that he would never do for anyone else.
I rummage through his closet, but instead of a superhero costume, I snag one of Ace’s favorite T-shirts.
With the white fabric draped over the back of my head, I swing side to side in front of the mirror on his door and imagine myself in a big, fancy church with a handsome groom standing across from me. I’m more grown, of course, like a full-fledged woman with boobs like my mom’s and lipstick and eye shadow and all the makeup my dad tells me I’m not allowed to wear.
I also have a big smile on my face because it’s the happiest day of my life.
I don’t know why wedding days are so happy for girls, but I’ve seen enough movies to know it’s supposed to be the happiest.
