Peas and Carrots
by Andrea (a_mravlja@yahoo.com)

Chapter 3

I headed downstairs to show my mom the CD. She'd recognize Nick. After all, she's the one who introduced us when we first moved here.

"Mom, come look at this! You'll never believe it unless I show you!"

"In a minute, honey, I'm watching the Rockies," she hollered from the living room.

Mom was born and raised in Wyoming, so she's a fan of all these weird teams. Oh well, at least I don't have to watch it.

An hour or so later, Mom came out and asked me what I wanted. I picked up the CD off the counter and handed it to her. "Look really closely at the blond one and tell me what you see," I said, pointing at Nick.

As she held the CD, she walked around the kitchen and hummed something. She opened the CD and started to look at the names.

"No!" I shouted, and grabbed it away from her. "You have to guess who it is," I told her.

"I give up, who is it?" she asked, obviously not caring.

"It's Nick Carter, my best friend when I was little. Don't you remember introducing us soon after we moved here?" I asked, astonished that she didn't know.

"I remember a Nick, but that's not really him, is it?" she said.

"Of course it's him!" I shouted. "Look closer at his face and eyes. Remember his family moved to Florida after he started taking his singing more serious?" I said.

"Nick never sang, he just played basketball all the time," my mom said, a bit confused.

"Mom, when he was 10, he wrote a song for me. I think I even have the words to it in my room," I said as I rushed upstairs to my room.

I remember him telling me he had something to show me, and he pulled out a slip of paper with some messy writing on it.

I had no idea what it was until he started to sing. It was one of the most beautiful songs I had ever heard.

"I know it's in here somewhere," I said as I looked about my once clean room.

"Hmmm, I looked in all of my dresser drawers. Found my old favourite sweatshrit, but no song. Looked under the mattress of my bed, found a 5 dollar bill and some pennies, but no song. I looked on my bookshelf, in between each and every book. That was a challenge! I did find that cool bookmark with Calvin and Hobbes on it, though, but still no song," I thought to myself, mentally checking off each of these places.

"Hmmm, where haven't I cleaned for years?" I thought, scanning about my room. "Ah Ha!" I shouted. Under my bed. Oh, that just made me think of the funniest thing: when Nick and I were 7, he spent the night at my house a lot. I always told him that there were gremlins under my bed, and if he stuck his toes over the edge, they'd get bitten off.

Well, at first, he didn't believe me, but one night, Puppy, my very playful cat was sleeping under my bed. Nick and I came in from the hallway and plopped down on the bed. I told Nick to be careful of the gremlins, but he just laughed and stuck his feet over the edge of the bed, wiggling his toes to show me that he wasn't afraid.

Well, Puppy picked that very moment to emerge from under the bed, but we couldn't see him because we were talking. Puppy must've thought that Nick's little toes looked prettry tastey, because he jumped up and clawed them and then bit them.

Nick screamed and jerked his feet back up onto the bed while Puppy ran from the room, probably scared that he was going to get kicked.

While Nick was examining his 'goblin' wounds, I saw a flash of grey bolt out the door.

I knew right away that it was Puppy, but I never told Nick that.

I teased him for the longest time about that, and he still tries to convince me that I had a goblin under my bed.

I told him I'd be careful, 'cause I didn't want to end up missing a toe or 2, but I was laughing so hard on the inside.

I got down on my hands and knees to see what treasures may lie under my bed.

Old batteries, a couple socks, "Hmmm, I was wondering where these had run off to," I said to myself.

Some markers, the letters to my old junior high, some Legos, a mechanical pencil, and a shoe box.

"Hmmm, well, I guess I should throw some of this stuff away," I said, picking up the shoebox and the batteries.

I opened the shoe box to put the batteries in, and when I did, I saw a flded up peice of paper with lots of wrinkles in it.

I reached into the box to pull it out. Just as I had picked it up and was unfolding it, Mom called for dinner.

"Well, now I can show this to her," I said as I was reading the words to the song that had been scrawled in big sloppy letters onto the already yellowing page.

"Mom, I found the song that I was telling you about." I yelled from the stairs as I headed to the kitchen.

"Okay, let's see this song," Mom said as she was putting the carrots on the table.

I set the song on the table where she usually sits. She picked up the sheet of paper and started reading it. "Oh how cute!" she exclaimed after she was done reading it. "And this song was written by this one?" she asked, pointing to Kevin. "No! The one right next to him!" I practically yelled. "The blond one. The good looking one!" I said. "Well, I guess they're all pretty good looking," I said, correcting myself.

"And you're sure about this?" my mom asked.

"Of coures I'm sure! I've never been more sure of anything in my life!" I said, flopping down on the chair next to me, exasperated.
Next: Chapter 4

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