Grayson (Completed)

Eighteen

Hi.  *Waves*   You should totally check out the video.  It's totes amazeballs.  (I'm a dork.  What else is new?)

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I ended up driving into town with Kennedy and my mom. Three Tylers in the same car is probably not the best idea, but we found a way to get there without blood being drawn.

It's happened before. I was seven and Kennedy was eight. We had been fighting over which movie to watch. I think I was still missing a chunk of hair.

I made them park and we got out to walk in the bright sunlight. I led them to the park area where Grayson and I had danced, stopping to get ice cream from a vendor cart on the way.

I sat down on a bench with them, me in the middle, Kennedy on my left, and Mom on my right. Taking a large bite of the cookie dough-flavored dessert, I felt the sun being blocked by a shadow in front of me. Hesitantly looking up, I found myself looking at Ashleigh, the girl who had hit on Grayson that one night. And to think I had almost forgotten.

"Hey, Jonah," she said with a smile that didn't come close to reaching her eyes. "How are you?"

"Good," I responded. "How are you, Ashlynn?" I got her name wrong on purpose, just to annoy her.

She hit on my man. I didn't like her. Sue me.

"It's Ashleigh," she told me, her smile even more fake now. "I'm doing great, thanks for asking. How are you and Grayson working out?"

I smiled as big as I could while still making it look genuine. "Amazing, seriously." I wrapped an arm around my confused mother's shoulder. "I've never been happier that my mother made me do it."

"I was wondering about that," Ashleigh said. She turned to my mother. "Why did you decide to make Jonah a mail order bride? It certainly isn't what most parents would do."

For a split second, my mother turned to look at me like I was the crazy one in the family. Her eyes were wide, but using that special mother-daughter bond of ours, I was able to convey my message.

Just go with it.

She turned back to Ashleigh with a smile, making her golden-tanned skin glow. "Well, at first I wasn't sure, but we needed the money too much."

"I can see that," Ashleigh mumbled so low I was probably to only one who could hear it. The sarcasm was evident though, as she looked up and down my mother's figure, from the high-end shoes to the jeans and shirt that probably cost more than most of my wardrobe combined. My mother had inherited quite a bit of money when her parents had died. Enough that she could put all three of us through college and still have enough to buy the (expensive) clothing she adored.

"And when Grayson contacted us, well," my mother fanned herself a little bit, "I thought it just might be too good to be true. He's such a handsome man, don't you think?"

My mother might have been a little too good at this.

Ashleigh forced a smile onto her face. "Yeah, he is."

My mother continued. "And we got so much more than we were expecting! Really, it was almost too much, but, well, we weren't going to turn it down."

Almost too much? Was she insulting me in a made-up story?

"I'm sure." Ashleigh's reply was shivering with barely contained anger, and I knew she just wanted to leave. Sure enough, another phony smile was plastered on her face before she said, "Well, it was nice to see you again, Jonah. It was nice to meet you too." Then she walked off. I could hear her mumbling not so nice things under her breath, but I let it go.