Bad Decisions Make Good Stories

- 1 -

One

“Go away,” I muttered angrily, rolling over and burying myself under my pillows.

My mom threw something at me. It was solid and it hurt so I let out a painful yelp. She didn’t care. “Maranette Odessa Cartwright if you are not down in the kitchen in fifteen minutes, you’ll be walking to school. Now get up!”

I cringed at the use of my full name. It sounded horrible. No scratch that, it was horrible. Why couldn’t my parents have given me a normal name, like Emily or something?

I heard mom banging around in the kitchen downstairs so dragging myself out of bed, I started to get ready for school. As I rubbed the sleep from my eyes, I grabbed a pair of denim shorts and a wrinkled tank top from my bedroom floor. I smelled them to see if they were clean and they seemed fine enough so I put them on. Although I did give myself a spritz of my favourite Vanilla spray for good measure. I slipped on my black Havianas and raked my unruly brown hair into a top knot before snatching up my backpack and making my way downstairs.

As I entered the kitchen, mom looked as if she was just about to shout. Probably at me no doubt. I cut her off before she could do any damage. “Chill mom, I’m here alright.”

“Good,” she said and placed a plate of bacon and eggs on the breakfast bar for me. She then threw up her hands as my brother walked into the kitchen. “And oh look the other one has emerged too. What time does your shift start, Jethro?”

“Morning Jet,” I added.

“Morning Marnie,” he answered as he stifled back a yawn. “Morning mom. And I don’t start ‘til 10 then I don’t finish until 7 so I’ll be late for dinner.”

Mom gave him a plate of food. “That’s fine. I’m working late anyway and so is your father so that means you’re on dinner Marnie.” I opened my mouth to say something but she beat me to it. “No, ordering pizza does not count as cooking dinner. Make something.”

“Do I have to?” I moaned. “It takes so much effort.”

“Don’t be so bloody lazy and while you’re at it, you can clean your room when you get home from school,” she growled. "It's as if a bomb went off in there."

“You’d think being a senior now, I wouldn’t get in trouble for having a messy room,” I mumbled under my breath.

Mom heard and gave me a flick to the head. “As long as you’re living under this roof, you go by my rules.”

I sighed. “Yes mom.”

“Good,” she grinned. “Now, eat up so you aren’t late for school. I’ll be in the car in twenty minutes but right now, I need to get dressed.”

She disappeared in a flurry of flower perfume and muttered words. Jet widened his eyes and raised his eyebrows. "She's as insane as always. Just order pizza tonight because I’ll probably grab a bite out and you know mom and dad won't eat when they get home if they're working late."

"Great, that settles it then," I said unattractively with a mouthful of food. "Large pepperoni pizza it is."

He shook his head. "You're such a fat shit. You need to come down to the tower and get fit."

"I go running thank you very much. And I will only come down to the tower if you need me which is never so life is good."

Jet just rolled his eyes at me and went back to eating.

The 'tower' we were talking about was the surf lifesaving tower at the beach down the road from our house. Jet was a Senior Lifeguard there that patrolled the beach and kept everyone safe. I'd passed my life saving test when I was 16 but I didn't enjoy it too much. The public were shitty and never listened so I got frustrated easily. I only did it because dad was a lifeguard before he went into business and so were my three older brothers until two of them moved away. Jet was the only one that stayed but he was only 19 so there was still time. They never scheduled me on, only if they were short staffed and in dire need of my presence. I only got away with that because Hendo, the guy who ran the show was like family and all the old boys knew me ... so I got away with being completely useless and unhelpful.

After I finished eating, I quickly brushed my teeth and packed my bag because I just knew that mom was going to start yelling at me any minute. I made sure I was in her BMW before her as to not start WWIII. 

The drive to school didn't take long, it never did thankfully. Mom rattled off something about her work but I wasn't listening. I'm sorry, but both my parents were lawyers and they had the most boring work stories because 97% of the time they weren't allowed to disclose any of the important information on their cases which meant it was a whole load of big blank gaps. 

When she pulled into the gates and came to a stop, I quickly gave her a kiss on the cheek and a fleeting, "Love you see you tonight," before she could nag at me about my messy room. It was Monday morning; I so could not deal with that right now. 

As I walked to my locker, I stuck some gum in my mouth and started to chew it. Just as expected, my best friend Ava was waiting for me. "'Sup dork," I greeted her warmly.

"Hey loser," she said back, not missing a beat. "How was your weekend?"

"It was alright. Mom dragged me along to this dinner on Saturday night but it was so boring I wanted to claw my eyes out. Other than that, I just slept and watched TV."

Ava shook her head in disbelief. "Of course. I just worked and stuff. You're going to Jake's party on Saturday with me, right?"

"Yeah, I guess if the new Grey’s Anatomy episode hasn’t come online though."

"Don’t be lame,” she moaned before looking past me.

Someone specific must've walked passed me because she made an unf sound before sighing. "Do you think Noah Trent and all his friends will be there?"

I turned around and saw him walk past, talking to Kyle yet still surrounded by girls.

"Maybe," I answered. "Jake usually throws big parties."

"He is so hot," she swooned.

I shrugged in reply. He was exceptionally good looking and his accent was to die for but our paths never crossed so I didn't like to dwell on the fact I would never get someone so untouchable. 

The bell rung overhead so I grabbed the last of my books then started to make my way to first period Maths. As soon as we walked in, grouchy old Ms. Dunn made me spit out my gum then gave me a small lecture on how proper girls shouldn't be chewing gum like that. Behind me, someone chuckled. I turned around to see it was Noah. Of course he was right behind me to witness that.

I went ahead to my seat and Noah passed me to his place at the back. Ms. Dunn asked me first for the homework I never did. She threatened to put me on detention but I said I'd do it at lunch so she refrained from doing so. After that she gave me yet another lecture on the importance of homework.

I sighed to myself; it was going to be one long day.

 *   *   *   *

Short but to the point. More to come. Although I keep forgetting to say, I found it really hard to update during the weekend that just passed, in general it's hard for me to update in the weekend so what I'm going to do is write short chapters during the week then on Friday, do a long one to make up for nothing in the weekend. That way, everyone kind of gets.

Pic on the side is of someone who I think could be Marnie. That's how I imagined her hair, it's thick and wavy and can get super messy at times. Also, she's quite short and isn't thigh-gap thin. We'll see how it goes though - I really want someone with super curly, unruly hair so if anycould find that for meh that'll be perf.

Outfit in the external link.

Stay ballin' yo xo