𝘮𝘺 𝘣𝘳𝘰𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘳𝘴 𝘣𝘦𝘴𝘵 𝘧𝘳𝘪𝘦𝘯𝘥

𝘰𝘯𝘦

𝘵𝘪𝘧𝘧𝘢𝘯𝘺

I think it all started July 5th, the day after July 4th. Of course it was the most important-well it was one of the best days of the year. Fireworks, carnivals, food, music, friends. Im telling you this is when summer is at its peak-or I thought so of course.
The first five years of my beautiful life were spent with my older brother, Mason. Him being a ten year old didn't benefit me, he always did what the big kids did. That included sometimes ignoring their little sister, especially when she wanted to spend time with her big brother. Our age gap was quite a stretch sometimes.

        But, he wasn't always ignoring me. He was with me most of the time, except July 5th. When the new family from California moved in. I never cared when new people moved into the neighborhood but these people weren't just normal people.

       The house in front of mine had been torn down then rebuilt, there was so much land around it that a bush fence was set up. It was gated to the public. The only thing you saw when looking at the actual house was the drive way and the front door.  

         I didn't understand why these people were so private until I heard the gossip between my mom and her friends saying that it was a Beverly Hills family. At the time, me being six years old, never understood why that was so impacting, it was just a place to me.

          Looking back at it. It's insane.

        Mason and I were playing ball outside in the front yard, my bare feet were in the moist grass that tickled the bottom of my toes, and the sun was shining so bright that I felt the heat begin to burn my skin.

         I never believed how fast my life could change in just 5 minutes but it did. Mason looked at me and waved his hand signaling me to come towards him.

        His words soft and eager "should we ask the new kid to play ball?" Slowly my head turns towards the direction where Mason was staring at. There was a boy looked about Mason's age, he was sitting on curb playing some sort of game with a stick and ball.

        His hair seemed dark brown and he was wearing black shorts and a plain white t-shirt. I couldn't see his appearance well enough but I didn't care. I didn't want him to join our brother and sister friendship.

           I looked up at Mason shaking my head, "no" Mason squinted his eyes and like I said before, boys his age ignored their little sisters. He left me there standing with the bouncy ball in my hands on the front yard. 

        It annoyed me, made me mad. Mason walked over to the boy and started to talk to him. I saw the way the boy laughed and nodded. It didn't take long for the both of them to begin walking towards me.

        "Brandon this is my little sister Tiffany. She's six." I looked up at the tall boy looking into his eyes. Wow. His eyes were light blue, so light that it seemed like glass. I've never seen someone with those eyes.

          "No wonder you wanna have a new friend, she must be a drag to have around sometimes" He really done did it, my first impression of Brandon was absolutely terrible. 

          Sadly my situation never got better. Mason and Brandon spent practically every breathing moment together. Every time I was around Brandon would annoy me and pull random pranks on me. Mason participated in half of them but he never got in between the feud between us. 

         When ever I tried to join in on conversation or games Brandon would say something rude and hurt my feelings. He always found away to grab my poor little heart and throw it on the floor. He made me feel so unworthy and uninteresting. My brother obviously would just say Brandon was joking and that he's never serious about what he says but it's hard to believe that sometimes.

           Especially growing up in junior high. We lived in a small town where junior high and high school was all in one school. Mason and Brandon were the popular jocks. Always were, women kissed the floor they walked on. I never understood why. Why in the world would someone like Brandon Hunter? It just doesn't make sense.

          Brandon was so rude and would embarrass me in front of everyone. In my eyes there is absolutely nothing attractive about the man, his blue eyes were the only thing that I can see being the thing that attracted girls but even then that was the only good thing about him.

          I remember once when I was picking something up from my locker, I saw Brandon making out with a girl, his hands under her shirt and her hand over his chest. All I thought about was, how in the world is that girl letting him invade her like that. He was invading her mouth and body. 

         Everyone loved Brandon, especially my family. Once Mason and him began doing absolutely everything together my family just accepted him into the family and treated him like if he was part of the family. Brandon went on family vacations with us, he slept over multiple times, I wasn't lying when I said Mason and him were inseparable.

            Gladly when the time came Brandon graduated high school and went away to UCLA for college. As you can imagine Mason went with him. They both had the same stupid dreams. Usually Mason came back during the summer and holidays to spend time with us- without Brandon.

           Since then, I haven't seen the man nor do I want to see him. I lived my teenage life without a single drop of the pits of hell in my life. Everything had been going absolutely perfect.

          I graduated high school and stayed at home for community college. I wasn't fully ready to leave home. I'm twenty now, living at home, it's not a bad thing free rent, free food. I mean sometimes I do wish I would leave this small town.

            I've always had big dreams, leaving my hometown to go to New York and study there was honestly one of my biggest dreams of all but it was too much money. I wanted to be a writer...well I am writer, but it's hard being a writer. There is so much competition with writers now a days that I don't even know where to start.

         Plus sometimes it's hard escaping home. My parents were always the conservative type, especially in this town. I bet if you lived in LA or some sort of big city and came to my hometown in Texas, you would be judged and gossiped about. It's a town close to Dallas but it's small...extremely small, everybody knows everybody, and everyone knows everyone's business. Well the locals of course.

          Gladly in a week summertime would officially begin. I was out of school and Mason was coming. Meaning free booze and quality sibling time. Weirdly Mason and I never really had that type of sibling rivalry, our ages were a bit spaced out to the point where I barely saw him or when I was with him it was genuinely a good time.

         This summer was definitely going to be the best of them all, hopefully. Summers never disappoint. The sun, late nights, parties, hangouts, lakes, everything about summer was just perfect to me and it will always be.