A Series Of Firsts

Sixteen★ morning after.

There was a whole lot of tension still present the next morning when Annie woke up. Somehow, she had managed to ruin the start of everyone's year and she did not like it one bit.

Elle had crashed with Skylar and she'd shared 'Jack's room' with him, but when she opened her eyes, waking up in an unfamiliar room, the memories came back slowly, as she realized Jack was out of bed already.

Annie presumed Jack was still mad at her because they'd ended up getting into an argument the night prior about whether it not to tell it to her brothers. She didn't want her brothers finding out and getting overcome with rage, enough to do something stupid or even illegal but Jack thought otherwise.

"How long has it been going on?" He'd asked the minute he locked the door behind them and they were finally alone.

"It doesn't matter."

"Damn it, Ann. Talk to me." She could see that he was frustrated, but also trying to rein in his emotions.

"Since the start of this year-well, last year and it's just name-calling and trivial pranks."

"Do your brothers know about this?" He'd been met with silence and found his answer in it. He'd started pacing around, poking the inside of his cheek in silent anger. "That's probably the reason they continued. Because you didn't tell anyone about it. Hell, why'd you even let them do it?"

And that's when Annie had snapped. "Oh, I don't know because maybe, the first rule of bullying is that fighting back makes it absolutely worse?" She didn't know if the others in the house could hear them but she couldn't care less at the moment. "You think I like being called names? Do you think I like my lockers being swarmed with bugs? You think I wouldn't stop it if I had a choice?"

"You have a choice, Annie. We always do. You can stop it. But then again, I'm choosing to tell your folks about what happened back there."

"You will do no such thing." She'd hissed but Jack hadn't bothered replying to her. He'd only gone to his side of the bed, laying down and blindly staring at the ceiling. "Jack." Silence. "I'm talking to you." She'd gotten out with gritted teeth and he'd just faced the other way, so it was safe to say they'd been mad at each other when they went to bed.

Annie tried the handle of the door to the adjoined bathroom, but it didn't budge, so she suspected it was already occupied with Javy. She was still in her clothes from last night as her pride didn't allow her to ask Jack for a change of clothes but thank heavens, she was putting on a palazzo because it would've been so uncomfortable sleeping with jeans on.

Annie debated on whether to just go downstairs, no doubt looking like a zombie, but thought against it. She wasn't wearing make-up last night, so her worry wasn't about smudged makeup nor was it about her hair as it was in braids. She just needed to take care of her morning breath before she left the confines of the room.

She decided on using her phone to pass time until Javy was done. She saw that it was only a few minutes to ten but Annie still felt like shit, having had trouble sleeping because she argued with Jack. She also got messages from her family members. The twins asked her when she was getting home so they could plan something. Matt told her he'd gone to check up on their mom's restaurant as it would be a busy day and would text back later. And her parents texted to wish her a happy new year and ask how she was doing.

Annie replied to them accordingly before checking her YouTube. Prior to meeting Jack, Annie had only fourteen subscribers, and just within a week, she'd gotten a thousand more. To her, it was a big deal, but that wasn't even a tenth of Elle's YouTube subscribers. Next, she checked her TikTok and saw she already had two thousand followers there. She hadn't even posted anything yet!