The Life and Times of Abigail Sherman (and Other Such Adventures)

Chapter 3: The Disagreement

Charlotte was sitting at a large wood table chatting with her younger cousin, Riley, when Drew came in the store with one of the prettiest girls she had ever seen. Her dark hair was pulled up neatly, exposing her hazel eyes and delicate features. She had a kind of natural elegance to her, even wearing overalls and sneakers. She had a strange fashion sense, Charlotte thought. Every hair on her head was in place and she wore a necklace with a small golden star on it, and her feet were covered up by pretty pink sneakers. Yet she also wore overalls over a plain white shirt and carried a purse that looked like it had been made from a bunch of old t-shirts. What a strange girl, Charlotte thought, very strange.

"Charlotte!" Drew shouted as he saw his friend. "Charlotte, how was Texas?"

"Eh, you know how it is. Lots of fun, but lots of arguing."

"Oh, was it your mom's side of the family?"

"Yeah...I don't know why she keeps making us go to those things if she hates them so much, but whatever." Charlotte shook her head as if to clear it of all the unpleasant memories of her trip.

"Well, at least you're home now! Is Abby going to be here soon?"

"Drew Delgado!" Charlotte cried, "Are you really going to ask me all these questions before you introduce your girlfriend?"Alani and Drew both turned quite red and looked as if they had just eaten something very sour. Pleased that her teasing was so effective, she continued. "Alani, right? Drew told me all about you. Honestly, I'm glad that you agreed to go out with him or I never would've heard the end of it. That's practically all he talks about anymore..."

"Char, come on," Drew said uncomfortably. Charlotte had a habit of not knowing when her teasing had gone too far until it was too late. Still, despite all that, she knew Drew well enough to know he was getting annoyed, so she switched tactics.

"I'm Charlotte," she said, stretching out her hand to shake Alani's. "This is my cousin, Riley," she gestured to the short girl sitting at the table next to her, "she's a little quiet sometimes, but she's a good kid." Everyone except Alani grinned, for they knew Riley was anything but quiet.

"Oh, um, hello," Alani said, not sure how to respond to all that. "I'm Alani, but I suppose you already knew that."

"Well, don't just stand there! Come on, we've got plenty of seats here for everyone!" Charlotte pushed out two chairs for them and Drew and Alani took their seats.

"Hey, Clara! We've got two more! We need a single scoop of chocolate in a cone and, uh," she paused, glancing over at Alani, "what would you like, Alani?"

"Oh, um, strawberry, please," she said, "in a cup."

Charlotte made a face, but simply said, "and a scoop of strawberry in a cup!" A woman on the other side of the shop gave her a thumbs up and headed for the counter.

"God, stop ordering for everyone," Riley complained.

"Oh shush, Ri, I can do what I want." Riley and Charlotte exchanged dirty looks for a few minutes and then burst out laughing, leaving poor Alani very confused.

"Okay, so, I'll wait until Abigail gets her before I question you guys, but just know it's going to happen," Charlotte said.

"Char, you need to calm down, you're not questioning my girlfriend, you're going to scare her away. I swear, you need to lay off the sugar, it only makes you more intolerable," Drew threw a crumpled up napkin at Charlotte's head playfully and then turned to reassure Alani. "She's not always like this, I promise."

"Okay..." Alani said, not totally convinced.

They all had very different opinions of each other at the moment, but there was one thing they could agree on: This was going to be a very long night.

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As Nora walked down the narrow street towards Kingston's, she could see Abigail slip inside just before she herself got to the door. The amazing smell of freshly made waffle cones greeted her as she stepped inside. She smiled slightly in anticipation of the ice cream to come and waved to her friends as she approached the table.

"Hey, Nora," Abigail said, patting the seat next to her, "come sit down!"

"No," Charlotte whined, "you get to see her all the time, she should sit next to me."

"Uh, here, I'll sit between you," Nora said. She was considered the rational one in her friend group and was used to settling silly disputes between her friends. After Abigail and Nora had been introduced to Alani and Charlotte had yelled out their orders, the real fun began.

"So, we've all got a lot to talk about," Abigail said suddenly, "where should we start?"

"Why don't you guys tell us how your first day of high school went," Drew suggested. Drew and Alani went to school in the next town over, and Charlotte went to school online, so they often talked about what was going on at the others' schools.

"It was alright..." Abigail said slowly, "I mean, it was pretty much what I expected." Abigail bit her lip, and Nora had the distinct feeling she wasn't telling them something. Still, not one to pry, she stayed silent.

"Well I, for one, had a fantastic day," Nora chimed in. Since she was the only one in her friend group who actively enjoyed school, so she occasionally liked to overemphasize just how much she liked it.

"But there's not much worth talking about," Abigail said, "we want to hear about you, anyway. Alani probably doesn't want to hear about how our school days went, she barely knows us."

"Yeah, I mean, usually it's just us, so it's probably hard to just join a group of people who've all known each other for so long," Charlotte added.

"It's probably easier to just talk about Drew and Alani for now and save the rest of the conversations for when we don't have company," Abigail said this in such a way that implied she would rather not have said company in their presence at all. After she said this, there was silence for a moment. Alani looked at Drew pleadingly, but Drew didn't seem to see her because he was busy throwing Abigail and Charlotte dirty looks. Abigail and Charlotte were looking right back at him, with the same angry expressions on their faces. Meanwhile, Riley and Nora sat by uncomfortably and watched the scene unfold.

"Ice cream is ready!" The silence was broken by Clara shouting at them. Almost simultaneously, Nora and Alani jumped to get it.

"Oh," said Alani, "I can get it if you want to stay here."

"Let's go together," she said cheerfully, trying to make the best of an awful situation. So they got up together and walked over to get the ice cream. As they were walking to the counter, Nora could tell they were whispering back at the table, but couldn't make out exactly what they were saying.

"They're just a little jealous," Nora tried to explain. "Not in a wanting-your-boyfriend sort of way...the three of them are just really good friends and have been through a lot of shit together."

"I understand," Alani said quietly, "I'm not trying to take over whatever you guys have got going here. I mean, Drew invited me, he said you'd be happy to meet me...I guess he was wrong." She let out a bitter laugh and collected a few of the ice cream dishes from the counter as Nora grabbed the others.

"I still feel left out sometimes," Nora admitted, "and I've been friends with Abigail since middle school. But it'll get better, I promise."

"Thanks, Nora," she said with a smile. "I have a feeling we're going to get along very well."

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A/N: Thanks for reading! Don't forget to comment and vote!