I jumped up and clapped as the third quarter ended. Warde was tied with Trinity at a score of 14-14. I shuffled through all the people with my friend to get to the snack bar. We hopped down the stairs and I was about to sprint right but my friend grabbed my arm and pulled me to the left. He took me to the dark lifeless woods behind the stadium. What was going on, I wondered, but I just followed along to see this adventure.
He saw some of his high school friends but I noticed something awkward about them. It flew to my senses that they were all smoking. My friend took the smoke from one of the high schoolers and took a couple puffs. He put his arm out for me to take it.

When I was in 6th grade, about the age of 11, I was cruising on my skateboard from my house to a friend’s who lives about a street over from me. The darkness started to fill the sky on this cloudy day. And as I slithered passed the corner of the street I saw a group of college aged kids bunched up smoking. As I skated passed the corner of the street one of the stuck their hand out and whispered “you want a smoke?”

There I was sitting in the woods with my friend asking me to take a smoke. I really didn’t know what to do. I shut my eyes, hard. Part of my mind was telling me to not do it and the other part was telling me to give in to peer pressure and just try it. It was like what you always see on TV, with the angel on one shoulder and the devil on the other. The angel kept saying “don’t do it, it will ruin you.” The devil on the other hand was saying “common, just try it out be a man.” I couldn’t think straight, I was being mentally pulled apart. I knew I shouldn’t do it yet it’s like peer pressure pulls you right in. I made my decision. I opened my eyes and saw a bunch of losers sitting in the woods smoking. I knew I didn’t want to become one of them. I lifted up my arm and reached for my friend’s hand, I took his arm and placed it on the leafy ground.

I got up and staggered out of the woods. I had a little grin on my face, quite satisfied with my choices but sadly not with my friend’s. I went back to bleachers and my other friend asked, “What were you doing?” I replied, “I went to find out how weak my friends can be.” Everyone around me looked confused but forgot about it the second later because Warde just scored the winning touchdown of the game.

Life is a complex thing and moments like these will not be forgotten. Some strange things just happen to normal people with normal lives but only you can choose the way your life will turn out.