there every day. I sat back on Kelly's bed and listened
and watched as they played music, smoked, drank
some more rum and Coke, always filling my cup as well. We devoured the pizza when it was delivered. I laughed a lot and for a while, I felt so happy and good. I especially enjoyed the girls' conversation when they made fun of the sisters and our life in the parochial school. For me this was like being in another country. I was shocked by some of the things
said, of course, but I tried not to show it.
"I didn't want to smoke, but they were all doing
it and it seemed impossible not to do something
everyone else was doing. Vaguely, I thought, my
mother was right about peer pressure. It is the
strongest thing, but I shook that idea out of my head
or to be more honest, the rum drowned it.
"Something happened in that confused brain of
mine. Suddenly, everyone looked so silly to me. I
started to laugh at the way Michael rolled his eyes
after sipping his drink and puffing his cigarette, taking
such care to look cool and sophisticated about it. He
raised his eyebrows into question marks and looked at
me, and then I laughed again and it felt like a dam had
broken. I couldn't stop giggling. That struck them
funny and they laughed too, which only made me
laugh harder until tears began to stream down my
face.
"Frankie suddenly sat beside me and slipped his
arm around my shoulders.
"'I better hold her before she breaks apart. She's
jiggling too much!' he cried and they all roared. It
seemed no one could stop the roller coaster. He held
me tighter and tighter and soon I could see the faces
of the other two boys change a little. They stopped
laughing and suddenly looked intensely interested in
me. Kelly, Talia, and Jill drew closer to each other