[center][b]Mario[/b][/center]
Nova Roma was the best pizza place in Bradbury, although that would not be too difficult to claim because Nova Roma was the [i]only[/i] pizza joint in town. Mario’s Great Grandfather had established Nova Roma and it had run in the family ever since. Now, both his Grandfather and his father ran the business. While Mario’s father always wanted one of his sons to follow his own footsteps into the pizza business, he knew that Mario had his mind set elsewhere. Mario would be the first person in his immediate family to attend and complete a bachelor’s degree.

Every Friday, after the last track practice of the week, Mario and some of his friends on the track team would grab a bite at Nova Roma. Along with Mario were four other friends, two guys and two girls. There was once pair of twins, whose name was Jack and Jill (they almost get as much flax for their parents’ naming choices as Mario did). The other guy’s name was Matthew. He was the class clown to an extent, although he knew how to make jokes about Mario (and the twins) without pushing the wrong buttons.

The last person in the group was Melissa. She had blue eyes and light brown hair. Mario felt like he was in limbo with her: they were good friends (although nowhere near BFF’s), but Mario wanted more out of the relationship, or rather, he wanted to have a relationship with her, as boyfriend and girlfriend. However, he just did not want to make a mess within his friends on the track team if they would have some sort of a fall-out if the relationship goes sour. Therefore, Mario was in constant indecision about whether to pursue such a relationship.

They would always get the house special, the New York-style pizza with everyone on it, except for mushrooms. And whenever they would get that type of pizza, Matthew would always interject a joke about mushrooms and Mario. It was not always the same joke, but it had the same intended meaning. In the Nintendo games staring Mario, mushrooms would increase Mario’s size and allow him to be able to take one additional hit from enemies. If you could have thought of a joke involving this situation, Matthew probably already had said it before.

After the five friends finished their meal at Nova Roma, they crossed Main Street and entered the Bradbury mall, just so they could walk off all the fattening foods they had just eaten. The mall was [i]infested[/i] with people wearing yellow tee-shirts, who apparently were associated with an organization called the ‘Sharing’.

Once Mario pushed his way through a pack of yellow-clad mall-goers, he realized that his friends were nowhere in sight. And soon he would realize why.

[b]"Jason! Iikka! Wait up! It's Max! From school! Where we all go together!"[/b]

It was not that they did not like Max; she was actually a pretty nice girl. However, she had a reputation for getting hyper and absent-minded. Mario feared what would happen if she was on a sugar high. She probably would be bouncing off the walls if she could.

[b]”Wait guys! Mario is over there! Let’s invite him, too!” [/b]

Mario sighed. He was hoping that she would somehow overlook him, but that was not the case. Suddenly, his cell phone started to vibrate. He had just received a text message and it was from Melissa.

[b]“Did you get caught by Max?”[/b] The text message read. Mario gave another sigh and replied “Yes” to the text message.