Muse: Red Hot Chili Peppers, Kings of Leon, John Mayer, and Pearl Jam (Celeste's favorite bands)

I walked into the eighty-something year old building thinking the same thing I always do, "Can't wait to leave". Our middle school was one of the most craptastic schools in all of the state. Three stories tall it stood, tan bricks on the outside and plain walls indoors. The classrooms were small, and the hardwood floor was creaky, the windows drafty, but this was just one stage in my life. Three years isn't that long in the big picture—I guess.

Even though I was anxious to leave the building the second I set foot inside, I was slightly relieved. Winter had come and it was very cold and windy. Don't get me wrong, I love the snow and the cold but I had been unprepared for the below freezing temperature after stepping out of my mothers warm car. My friends—actually every one—thought me strange for loving winter, especially living in Ohio.

Ohio, wow. Just recently I realized how much of a hillbilly state it really was. I guess I shouldn't have been so surprised, after all most of the state population spoke with a southern accent and showed cattle, while listening to Reba. Not the most happening place either, we have some great roller coasters though—that an upside of living in 'The Heart of it All' state. Roller coasters are fun for me, although every time we go to an amusement park for our summer band trip people always joke that I'm not tall enough to get on all of the rides. It's not my fault I'm fun-sized; I blame genetics. Is it bad that I'm fourteen, barely five feet and still taller than my mom?

I walked into the cafeteria where all four hundred students waited until the bell rang. I made my way to the table my friends and I sat at. The conversation I walked into was…strange. But most of my friends were weird too, but not me….no. I'm completely normal; nothing weird 'bout me.

"…hate my hair! It needs to be taken behind an alley and beat to death!" That would be Morgan, she was different I guess; if different is an unnatural redhead who threatens to beat her hair to a bloody pulp. I mean it's all good—I'm not judging.

"What the hell?" Kristy was different too I guess, "Why are you hitting your hair?" I sat there silently, absorbing everything that was going around me. Noting how weird—I mean awesome!—my friends are. Morgan was now hitting her hair, and in the process hitting her head. No wonder I have to re-explain everything to her twenty times in math class.

I looked at my finger nails as everyone talked loudly around me. They were tiny, but shiny. Actually everything about me was. Not shiny, tiny. That would be weird though, shining like plastic. Focus! I'm like a tiny pack of tiny M&M's (not the regular size of M&M in smaller portions but the tiny ones), man I loved those. They were small like me! And they had chocolate on the inside! I don't have chocolate inside of me, that'd be kind of weird… But no! I keep getting off subject; M&M's are all of those different colors, right? Well, when you pick one out of the wrapper/bag/thingy you never know what you're going to get—like me! Unless, you look at the one you want beforehand but that would cheating and I don't believe cheating is right. The only exception is when Jimmy Fallon and Taylor Lautner had that min-motorbike race and Taylor picked his up and ran the rest of the race, but Taylor Lautner is awesome unlike all of the people who choose which color M&M they want instead of letting fate decide.

I guess it's going to be a blonde day today, and I am blonde by the way. But I'm not dumb—stereotypes are dumb, not me. Before the only blondes in the group were me and Morgan, but we befriended Dallas months ago and so it was us three blondes with three brunettes. But then Morgan had to ruin it and dye her hair, now we have a red head.

Well we already had a red head but she wasn't in the group. What group might you ask? The fan-freaking-tabulous group! It consisted of Me, Kristy, Annie, Ashley, Morgan and Dallas. Ashley and Morgan were best friends, and Annie and Dallas were best friends. Our group dynamic was really kind of confusing. Ashley and Morgan have been homies—yes, I said 'homies', I'm going gangsta on ya'll, all I need is some gold chains and a pimp hat—since the fourth grade; I became friends with them in fifth. In the sixth grade Kristy moved here from the closest city, she became friends with Morgan and became part of the group. Annie became friends with all of us, and so did Dallas. We were friends with other people too. Shannon was the red-head this started with, she and Morgan have been friends since they were in diapers. And five or six others, I'm not too close to.

Anyway, the fan-freaking-tabulous group is too fantabulous for words, leave it at that.

Annie and Morgan turned to me and asked me about the list. The List. It was the ultimate compilation head-banger approved music recommendations ever written by three eighth grade girls. The paper was extremely worn from being written on a bazillion times, and being folded and refolded an uncountable number of times. They had thought that what I listened to was 'too soft'. So far the last few weeks I've been listening to Tool, Nirvana, Disturbed, and Pearl Jam. I actually did like Pearl Jam a lot.

"Whoa… when did you get here?" Kristy was always the observant one. She was too far off in la-la land to notice me arriving. Granted, I hadn't spoken but still. We had this never-ending bickering thing going on, it'd been going on since August and I doubt it will ever stop. Kristy is much too easy a target to tease and obviously she feels the same about me.

"Kristy, you fag. She's been here." That crude comment came out of the mouth of none other than the hair beater herself. Morgan's humor was dry, and mostly came out as insults; if you didn't pay close enough attention you would miss the joke.

"Oh, and Celeste…" Ashley said to me.

"Yeah?"

"You think out loud." I laughed at that, I had been told once or twice my inner monologue isn't very "inner" and it often makes me appear like I'm some schizophrenic freak.

The day progressed fairly slowly from there, band was fun though. We didn't have to play and we got to talk to our friends. That was a rarity. Band might be somewhat nerdy to most schools but here it was actually pretty cool, nearly half of the students were apart of band and my third period class alone had sixty some people.

In band, Ashley, Morgan, and I planned a skit that would be making fun of 'Baby Got Back'. Kristy would be Sir Mix-A-Lot, because she has this puff daddy hood that makes her look like a pimp. Morgan and I were going to be the back-up dancers/hoes. Not that we were doing anything scandalous just that we were partners in crime with a pimp. Annie and Dallas were going to be the snobs that say, 'Ohmigod, Becky! Look. At. Her. Butt'. It will be epic.

"Just Fabulous." I say after Morgan tells me the plan.

"Why do you say that?" It was my saying; it was a 'Celeste-thing'.

"Why do you say 'True to the word'?" I swear that was one of the most retarded sayings anyone could come up with, it's worse than, 'fo sho' or even the very famous, 'Shizzle my nizzle'. What does that mean anyway?

"Is fantabulous a word?"

"Are you retarded or something?" I huffed when her expression showed a cross between shock and amusement.

"Dude, you totally just sounded like Napoleon Dynamite," Then she did that weird laugh thing, she does. It's really dumb; she makes this weird face and makes a sound this kind of a snort but it's not.

The rest of my week was all in all pretty good. I sang the Tyson Tiger song about a million times and yodeled because apparently yodeling is just so freaking awesome in a squeaky voice. I can't help my voice though…

"You sound like a chipmunk." Morgan told me quite a few times, I thought it was funny she'd say such things but awesomely enough she is writing me into a story as a talking chipmunk named Pee-Wee.

But maybe being a talking chipmunk was my destiny—would take me somewhere. Or maybe it was just something stupid, oh well. I guess we'll see if I'm still the girl with the squeaky voice, obsessed with The Hangover by the time freshman year comes around. Or perhaps I will upgrade to the girl with the squeaky voice who's obsessed with The Hangover and is insanely awesome.

"Celeste…" Ashley said.

"Yeah?"

"You are not ever going to be insanely awesome."

"Well maybe that's just your personal—" I paused, turning on my brain filter and thought about what she'd just said. "How did you know I called myself 'insanely awesome'?"

"You're doing that thinking aloud thing again."

"Oh…" Well perhaps Ashley doesn't think I'm insanely awesome but I know for a fact I am and I'm going to show the world—

"Celeste!"

"Sorry!"