Dead by Tomorrow

Chapter 1 | Lost and Sound

"Mia, come and say hi to your mother!" - A high-pitched voice was cheerfully singing my name from my sister's glitter-covered laptop. I left my already cold cup of coffee on the kitchen counter and walked into the living room. Aubrey was sprawled across the beige couch while telling my parents every boring thing that had happened to her in the past few hours. She lives for the moments that mom and dad decide to call us on Skype, and I live for those when they don't do it. Nevertheless, being their daughter and all, I sometimes have to leave everything I am doing and sit down in an attempt to have a civil conversation.

"Hi mom," I said, not even trying to act interested in whatever she had to say.

"Hello sweetie, how have you been? Brie tells me that you are doing pretty well, huh?" With the interest in my life she had, most people would say that Mrs. DePrentiss was a great mother to her kids, but not a lot of those people knew the real story behind our dysfunctional family. With that in mind, I sat next to my sister and tried to make up a few words that wouldn't sound too harsh.

"Everything is cool." I grasped a remote from the table and turned on a TV. There was some sitcom on one of the programs, so I started watching it, totally zoning out on my mother.

My life in Prescott Valley was always ordinary. I have a twin sister, but we are nothing alike, we used to joke that we were switched at birth or something. While I have straight blond hair, Aubrey is more of a light brown curly hair owner. She is taller than I am, but I don't really consider myself a short person either. I'm more off somewhere in between. Aubrey, or Brie as we like to call her, loves glittery and pink things, and I am fond of everything that feels good and looks good, no matter what era it's actually from.

Mom and dad used to be around for both of our quirks and needs, and we actually were a really happy family at one point of the time.

If only life stayed that way, too.

You see, Prescott Valley is a suburbia in which people know things about their neighbors without ever even speaking with them. I pretty much always knew what Mrs. Murray and her son ate for lunch every day, and they probably knew the same about me. Okay, the fact that they lived right across the street might have helped a little bit. As Mrs. Murray lived right across the street from us, I was able to notice that her husband hasn't been in the picture at all, as far as I was aware of. She is a nice blond woman who works her butt off in order to support her only child.
He is my age, actually, and all I know is that mister bad boy is a rude guy with no fondness for authorities and that people call him Ace. I don't really mingle into new friendships, and my neighbor's son doesn't seem to enjoy making friends either. Apart from his two best friends in the school, Ace is a loner. I'm pretty sure that even Damian and the other guy only hang with him because they have known each other since they were kids. Speaking of Damien, I've met him one night in the pits and things turned out really bad for him and his crappy flirting skills, but after a few months of him apologizing and me enjoying his struggling- we've actually become somewhat good friends.

Speaking of the pits, I need to explain how it all happened before I continue with more interesting parts of the story.

Back in the summer of 2014, my dearest parents decided to expand their business in five major cities of Europe, and the only logical thing that followed was them moving away miles and miles away from their daughters.

At first, Aubrey and I were devastated, but we held our heads high and acted like everything was fine. Aunt Samara lived with us for the first two years, but she got married and moved to Arkansas. It's a perfect life that she leads. Her husband is a great person, and he supports her in everything she does. Both Brie and I were ecstatic that our aunt finally found her soulmate, but mom and dad were more worried about the fact that we would be on our own from that day on. Because neither one of us wanted to move to Europe or to any other place that isn't our current house, we made a deal with our parents. Dad got us into one of those self- defense classes for us to be prepared to defend ourselves from any possible danger that could be thrown our way, and we didn't mind learning to fight. Aubrey stopped going to the training about a year ago, and I actually started doing other things that are poorly connected to the original idea of my father.