Free Boy Shopping by Nia Stephens

didn’t know why they were so surprised. She loved her girlfriends, and she always wanted to hear their opinions, but she would never let them tell her who she should go out with.
    â€œWe IMed during study hall.” The looks on their faces were so funny, Kiki had to bite her tongue to keep from laughing. “What’s the big deal? Everybody plays around on computers during study hall.”
    â€œThey check their e-mail and do research. They don’t IM guys they’ve never met!” Jasmine said severely.
    â€œThat’s because most people are at school. But I knew he wouldn’t be, so I logged into HelloHello. It said that he was online, so we talked.”
    â€œWhat did you talk about?” Sasha asked.
    â€œNothing really. How tired I was, how bored he was. I was only online for thirty minutes.”
    â€œDid you ask him out?” Jasmine asked.
    â€œHe said, ‘Busy Friday at seven?’ I said, ‘No,’ and that was that.”
    Of course, it was a little more complicated than that. Kiki didn’t mention that she had IMed him because she was afraid to call him, or that her hands were shaking as she typed. It wasn’t just that she was weirded out by this whole boy-shopping thing, though she still thought it was pretty strange. Kiki felt, for reasons she couldn’t explain, even to herself, that going out with Lyman meant that she had given up on Mark for real. She didn’t know why this was so different from Jason Wrightman, Luke Sheppherd, or any of the other boys she had dated, but somehow it was.
    â€œDon’t you have a show?” Jasmine asked.
    â€œWe’ve already headlined the Exit/In and City Hall, and we opened at the Ryman twice this fall. RGB wouldn’t book us in a smaller venue here in town. The contract won’t let us travel more than one weekend a month, and we’re playing three shows in New Orleans Halloween weekend.” Kiki had already explained this two hundred times, but Jasmine could never remember their schedule. Kiki couldn’t blame her—she had a hard time keeping track of it herself. Even Mark, who had asked his parents for a PalmPilot for his thirteenth birthday, needed all the help he could get.
    â€œSo where’re you guys going for your first date?” Sasha asked.
    â€œI don’t know.”
    â€œYou haven’t decided?” Jasmine asked.
    â€œHe won’t tell me.”
    â€œWhat?” Camille sounded confused.
    â€œIt’s a surprise.” Kiki wasn’t sure how she felt about that. Lyman seemed pretty harmless, but what did she know? He could be a serial killer, planning to drag her into the woods and butcher her. But if he thought she was a pushover because she was a girl, he was in for a surprise. Her parents had forced her to take karate classes before hitting the road for the first time, and she still sparred with her sensei a couple of times a month.
    â€œSo what are you going to wear?”
    â€œI don’t know. He said to dress up.”
    â€œOooh. Isn’t there some sort of costume ball this weekend?” Camille’s parents went to every black-tie event Nashville had to offer and were in the paper every other week. Kiki wondered if that had something to do with Camille’s hatred of dressing up, but she had never asked.
    â€œI don’t think he’s taking me to a charity ball for our first date. He didn’t say anything about a costume, for one thing, just a dressy dress.”
    â€œWell, you’ve got plenty of those. You’ll be fine.”
    â€œOf course I will.” Kiki tipped the take-out carton and slurped the last few bits of vegetable. “It’s just a date.”
    â€œOh, yeah?” Jasmine grinned. “We’ll see how you feel on Friday night.”
    Â 
    Sasha talked Jasmine and Camille into attending the Wentworth-Carroll football match with her, Thomas, and a couple of his friends after school