No Regrets by Kate L. Mary

still a teenager. I’ll be nineteen next month, and I haven’t done anything. I have one year.”
    I nodded and for some crazy reason that comedy about old men popped into my head. My brain was so clouded with thoughts of Julie and the accident that it took me a second to remember the name, but when I did a slow smile spread across my face. “Kind of like a bucket list for your teen years.”
    Annie smiled and nodded so fast her wet hair bounced around her shoulders. “Exactly!”
    I perked up. It was a pretty awesome idea.
    Yes! That’s a great idea, isn’t it, Julie? We could have done the same thing for you if we’d been smarter. We could have made it fun, turned it into a game. Then maybe things would have been different. I’ll make sure they’re different with Annie. I won’t let you down again.
    I hopped up and started pacing. A list would give us rules to follow, keep things from getting too out of hand. We could do this! “That I can help with. But we should start a list right now. Write it all down, so we can mark it off as we go.”
    â€œThat’s a great idea.” Annie was beaming.
    Her excitement made me even more excited. It also helped push the hurt down. Helped distract me from the guilt that had managed to swim to the surface when I told Annie about Julie. A list for Annie could help us both out. It would help her experience life, and give me something to focus on when I needed a distraction.
    I grabbed a notebook and flipped it open, then a pink Sharpie. At the top of the paper, I wrote Annie’s Bucket List . “Okay, what’s first?”
    â€œLet’s start small,” Annie said, chewing on her bottom lip. She looked like she was teetering between excitement and nervousness. “Buy makeup.”
    That was exactly what I’d wanted her to say. “And some new clothes and shoes,” I said as I wrote the first thing down. “Girly stuff.”
    Annie didn’t protest, so I wrote buy a dress and heels. Already I could imagine taking her shopping. Kind of like that scene from Pretty Woman .
    â€œGet highlights,” Annie said as the song from the movie floated through my head.
    I giggled, still picturing the fashion show. “With your hair, I’d get lowlights.”
    What’s next? I peered at Annie out of the corner of my eye. She needed a few holes in her body. Her ears at least. “Get your ears pierced?”
    â€œAnd something else too!” Annie bounced up and down in her chair like a cheerleader. “Like my nose or my belly button!”
    Now she was really into it, and I was getting there too! A belly ring sounded perfect.
    â€œA tattoo?” I asked.
    She chewed on her lip and shook her head slowly. “I don’t know . . .”
    I waved her off and moved on. Apparently she wasn’t ready for that one. I couldn’t blame her, though: I wasn’t sure if it was something I wanted to do either. “We’ll put that one on the shelf for now. What else? Just fire them off and I’ll write as fast as I can.”
    She inhaled slowly, then jumped in. “Go on a date, go to a formal, go skinny-dipping, get drunk, have a first kiss, stay up all night, take a road trip with a group of friends.” I was scribbling away when Annie hesitated. “Have sex . . .”
    She acted like I would be surprised, but of course I wasn’t. I would have written it down first thing if I wasn’t afraid she would die of embarrassment.
    â€œWhat else?” I asked when I had the last one down.
    â€œI don’t know. What else have you done?”
    I pressed my lips together and gave it some serious thought. We needed something a little more daring. Something I could benefit from too. “We could do something like get a guy’s number in a bar or get a fake ID?”
    â€œYes! And I want a guy to buy me a drink. Not a drunk one either, a sober one who