It was now Friday night and I was getting ready to leave for Rian’s ‘get together’. For someone with zero social skills, I’m actually coping quite well with the fact that I’m meeting a bunch of people who only one person from our group knows tonight. I haven’t been told anything about these people; I haven’t been told if it’s all boys, all girls or a mix, I haven’t even been told the names of these people.

I sighed and rolled myself across my room and over to my wardrobe, trying to find something that I’d look at least half decent in. After a long internal debate with myself I settled on black skinny jeans with a blue checked shirt. At least it was a step up from my usual band shirt.

“Alex, are you ready to go yet honey?” I heard my mom call for me from the hall.

“Two minutes mom, I just need to do my hair quickly!” I called back to her.

I heard her walk off down the hall again muttering something to herself about that meaning twenty minutes instead of two. I went over to where my hair straighter was plugged in next to my mirror and got to work on trying to tame the mess on my head. A few minutes later I made my way towards the lounge where my mom was waiting with her car keys in hand.

“Hmmmm, seven minutes, not bad, I expected longer.” She admitted as we made our way out to the car.

“Even I’m not that bad!” I defended myself, and it was true. “If you timed how long Jack took to do his hair it would be at least three times longer than I take.”.

My mom just laughed in response and waited for me to get myself into the car so she could put my chair in the back.

About fifteen minutes later my mom pulled up outside of Rian’s house and went round to my side of the car to get my chair ready for me to get into.

“Thanks mom, I’m good from here.” I told her with a smile.

“Okay sweetie, ring me if you need picking up later as long as it’s not past midnight, okay?” She said with a laugh.

“Okay, thanks mom!” I called back as I turned to face Rian’s house to see him stood at the door waiting for me. I’m lucky in the fact that Rian lives in one of those huge houses that have both stairs and a ramp up to the door. As I made my way up I threw the bag of Doritos that my mom had given me to bring at him, they narrowly missed his head and he somehow managed to catch them. When I went past into the house he jokingly smacked me on my head. I just laughed at him and went into Rian’s lounge.

There was a bunch of people sat around the room, from the look of things; I was the last to arrive. I recognised about half of the people, the other half I had no idea who they were. Before I could say anything Jordan came running over to me and pulled me over next to him.

“Thanks for the warning.” I said sarcastically, he just ignored me and started talking at a hundred miles per hour.

“So, now everyone is here, time for introduction!” he yelled excitedly. “In fact, let’s play a game!” At this everyone in the room groaned. Jordan was always one to be childish, sometimes he was more childish than Jack – and that’s saying something.

“Aw stop moaning! Right, we’re gonna go round the room clockwise, when it gets to you, you say your first and second name and one fact about you.” Jordan explained. “I’ll start! My name is Jordan Eckes and I’m the only person here who knows everyone as of now!” Jordan finished off with a smile.

Next it was the turn of a guy with a white streak down his hair, looks like Jack has someone to talk to about hair colours now.

“Hey, my name’s Rob Chianelli and I play the drums.” He said. At the mention of drums Rian’s head snapped up, most likely thinking of some nerdy questions that nobody but him will understand to ask Rob about his drumming. Next turn was a girl sat in the corner.

“Um hi, my name’s Tay Jardine and I’m the only girl in my group of friends.” The girl said with a laugh. I looked over at her and my breath caught, she was absolutely beautiful. She had a red beanie on, covering a lot of her long dark brown hair and the tips of her hair were dyed a blonde. She was dressed in a New Found Glory shirt and a pair of black skinny jeans. I spent ages sat there looking at her, so long that I completely missed the names of the other two guys and what everyone else had to say. I only realised when Jordan was shoving my shoulder telling me to say my name and fact.

“Oh right, my name’s Alex Gaskarth and I moved here from England...” I trailed off. As soon as I’d said that everyone started talking to each other and moving around the house. I decided to go and get a drink to start off with and made my way into Rian’s kitchen to find his step dad setting up some drinks for everyone. He smiled at me and waved but went straight back to setting up different bottles and plastic cups out for us. I took one of the drinks he’d already made for us and made my way back into the lounge where everyone was talking.

Everyone seemed to be in their separate conversations in groups, I didn’t want to make anything awkward so I sat against the wall playing with my hands until someone came over to me. I looked up to see Tay grabbing a chair and sitting next to me, she was with the two guys I missed the name of, who sat on the floor in front of us.

“Hey man, what you doing over here on your own?” The guy with glasses asked. “My name’s Mike in case you forgot or didn’t catch it, that’s Cameron and that’s Tay.” He explained, saving me the embarrassment of having to ask for their names again.

“I guess I just didn’t want to join a conversation half way through and make things awkward.” I explained with a small smile. Out of the corner of my eye I caught Tay looking at me, probably pitying the fact that I’m in a wheelchair I told myself, don’t get your hopes up Alex, a girl like her would never go for a guy like you, she could have anybody she wanted.

I sat talking to Mike, Cameron and Tay for a while until Mike and Cameron announced they were going to get a drink, which left me sat with Tay.

“So, you’re really nice, and I’d love to keep in contact with you after this night, so could we maybe swap numbers?” Tay asked with a hopeful smile on her face. A bit lost for words I just sat there nodding and passed her my phone while she did the same. When Tay gave me my phone back I went to look at what it was saved as and saw it read ‘Tayyyyy (((((((((:’, which made me feel slightly bad for just putting ‘Alex G (:’ in Tay’s phone.

“I’m gonna go get a drink, okay?” She said with a smile as she walked off to the kitchen.
This gave me a bit of time to sit and think about what just happened. The most stunning girl I’d ever laid eyes on just asked me for my number. Yes, me. Stop it Alex, she asked for it so you could stay in touch, remember, she’s a lot better looking than you are, it was completely friendly gesture. I sighed and tried to stop this internal debate with myself, but she really was amazing, I just hoped she’d text me sometime soon.

“Hey Alex, stop drooling!” Jack yelled from across the room. I flipped him off and went back to my thoughts, the same ones which would no doubt be filling my brain later on tonight too.