Sori asked me to and I wouldn’t tell her no. Not for anything in the world. And anyway, anything with her is fun, much more fun than with my mother and pesky younger sisters

The shrill singing of my phone abruptly jolted me out of dreamland.

“Hey, wanna come shopping with me for the new season?”

It was my BFF, Sori, the only neighbor my age. Well, delete that. To be completely honest, Sori is not the only neighbor my age. In fact, she’s actually not my age at all. The only neighbor my age, Baila, is awkwardly shy, our every encounter leaving me with a burning throat after attempting to keep far from any and all awkward silences. Whatever. To put it mildly, I do not enjoy Baila’s company.

So that leaves me no one. Well, no one until Sori became super into me. She loves DMCing with me until the wee hours of the morning, talking about things that make me feel two heads taller and three years older. You see, Sori is in the 11th grade and I’m in the eighth. I find it funny how she seems to forget that I’m so much younger. When I questioned her on that, she explained that I’m super mature, even for her age. I blushed.

Being neighbors with such a fun person is, well, fun. School kind of feels like one period melds into the next, one hour into the next, until all you’re left with is a messy puddle of thoughts — and a shooting migraine. So I count the hours, impatiently, every single day, for school to sluggishly go by. Then the wait begins again, the wait for Sori to come home from high school. And once she comes home, if you want to reach me, just give her a ring. (I don’t have a phone. My parents say I’m too young!)

And so, that freezing winter day found me browsing in a mall I’d never been to, for I hate malls. And I’ll repeat that for emphasis. I H-A-T-E malls!! Why then did I go, you ask? Sori asked me to and I wouldn’t tell her no. Not for anything in the world. And anyway, anything with her is fun, much more fun than with my mother and pesky younger sisters.