[hr][center][h1][color=SpringGreen]H E L E N[/color][/h1][/center][hr]

Helen jumped as Willow's ghostly-pale face appeared through the car door. All these years of friendship and that still freaked her out sometimes. Helen laughed it off and put on her seat belt as Willow got situated. It took a minute to get Doug going, but after several key turns and the sound of a smoker coughing into a megaphone, the car sprung to life. WLEE, the local radio station, was playing Superbass Nicki Minaj. Helen turned the song up and wound down the windows. Slowly, she waited her turn in the line of cars that mobbed their way out of the parking lot: a Honda, two Toyotas, Chad Charles’ obnoxiously yellow BMW. Eventually, Doug groaned its way out of the parking space and into line. 

“How are you doing love?” Helen asked Willow as they sat in the traffic. B.O.B’s musical stylings still floated through the air from the back of a Jeep Wrangler that no less than seven members of the soccer team had packed into. 

As Helen drove out of the parking lot, she felt a warm breeze flow in through the window, despite the autumn chill. She saw the source up ahead: standing by the side of the road was Evelyn Noblezada. [i]’That bitch,[/i] Helen thought, afraid that if she said it out loud Evelyn would hear. Nobody needed a primer on reasons to dislike Evelyn- she had made Helen cry a minimum of three times just in the sixth grade, and this was actually a little below average for tween girls at Moore Middle School. Poor Kelly ended up spending lunch in the bathroom every day out of fear of running into Evelyn at the lunch table. 

The worst part about Evelyn Noblezada, though, was that Helen couldn’t stop looking at her. She was just so...hot: stupid perfect makeup, stupid smooth caramel skin, stupid pretty eyes, stupid toned soccer legs that Helen would love nothing more than to... 

There was a shout. Helen instinctually slammed on the brakes. Her eyes shot up to see that she had come within inches of hitting Letitia Green. Doug’s bumper was hanging over the edge of the sidewalk and a conga line of traffic was piling up behind it. Helen’s eyes opened wide as dinner plates. 

“Ohmygod ohmygod ohmygod I’m [i]so[/i] sorry Tish!” she yelled through the open window. 

“Dude, fucking look where you’re going!” the surprisingly tall and muscular Letitia said. Her face was more shock and fear than anger. Her green skin was covered in a sheen of cold sweat and her chest heaved with adrenaline. As Letitia grabbed her backpack (which she’d dropped in the panic), she kicked out at Doug, striking the bumper and leaving a Size 13 dent. Then she stomped past and off into the parking lot. Helen blinked hard. She slowly reversed the car and then drove off down the bus loop and onto Gaiman Street, her skin even paler than normal and her eyes wide open and glued to the road. 

“Uh...sorry about that,” she said to Willow.