Love At First Bite

The Most Embarrassing Thing

"Honey.... Wake up, Vanessa." I open my eyes slowly. "Don't want to be late, do you?" My mom says.

"Huh?" I mutter, my eyes closing again.

"She asked if you want to be late." My dad said.

"No need to be harsh, Albert." Mom smiles.

"What? She asked what you said, I answered."

I groan at my parents both sitting on my bed, my dad behind my mom crunching on an apple. Mom turns back to me.

"Late for what?" I ask.

"First day of school, idiot." My brother CJ pops in the room.

"Cooper James Hickinson, what did we talk about?"

Oo, full name! He's in trouble! I love it!

"Don't call Vanessa names." CJ mutters.

Mom smiles. "That's right."

But that's when I fully grasp what CJ had said. School. Ugh. That meant summer was over. No!

I roll out of bed once everyone cleared out of my room. "What to wear?" I mutter to myself. "How about..pink shirt with blue shorts. No, that's too...gym class. Yellow shirt, black shorts? No, too bee." I go on like this for about three more minutes until CJ passes by my door.

"Oh my gosh! Just do the damn pink shirt with the black shorts!" He yells, and grabs his car keys.

I look at what he recommended, imagining them together. "Oo, that's cute! Why hadn't I thought of that?" I call after him.

Once upfront, I start heading out the door. "Hey, CJ, you're driving Vanessa to school." Dad calls before I make it outside.

"What?!" We both shout in unison.

"I will not do that." CJ says.

"Yes, you will do that. You know Vanessa doesn't have her driving license yet."

I cringe at that sentence. It's the most embarrassing thing about me. I'm seventeen, and I still don't have my license. I know how to drive...if Mario Kart counts. It's always the dang left hand turns that get me. In real life, not Mario Kart. I'm a master in Mario Kart.

"This is so humiliating!" CJ complains some more. "Do you have any idea how ridiculous I'll look driving my baby sister to and from school?" He turns to me. "I'm making you walk once we're out of their sight!" He hisses.

"Do you know how ridiculous it is that I don't have my license? I'll be the embarrassed one, you'll look like the nice guy who took a sacrifice to drive me."

I won him over. "Fine, I'll drive you to the school. But not everyday. I'll make you walk tomorrow."

I shrug. "Fine by me. I'm embarrassed anytime I'm around you, anyway. Walking is a step-up." We glare at each other.

"Ok, are the cat and dog ready to go? Because you'll be late if you don't hit the road now." Dad always referred to CJ and I as a cat and a dog. Of course, I'm the cat. Intelligent, independent and light on her feet. CJ's the dog. Not all there all the time, sloppy, and dependent. Very dependent.

"Get in the car." CJ orders harshly.

"Get in the car." I say mockingly.

His car is gorgeous, I'll give him that. It's a black Ford Mustang. I just want to run my hands on it every time I see it, but I try to play it cool. And inside it, it's just as wonderful. He's kept it very clean, surprisingly. Absolutely no eating in the car, that's his number one rule. Gotta hurl, get the hell out or he will go insane. Learned that one the hard way. Last, but certainly not least, never put anything that could spill and stain in that car. Thankfully, that's just one rule he had told me. If I spilled something, I wouldn't be alive today.

"Don't put your feet on the dashboard." CJ says. This has become a routine. Anytime I'm in a car, I've got to put my feet up. But no. CJ will freak if you do so I slowly take them off, really wanting to tell CJ to go to hell, but I keep it in. I really don't want him to kick me out before we've even left the driveway.

"Can I turn on some music?" I ask, reaching for the knob.

"I'll do it." He says, beating me.

I roll my eyes and let out huff. "Do I get to open the door when we get there or will you do that for me, too?" I ask. He doesn't answer, just squints as we head up the road. I recognize houses and other buildings on our way up there, including an old mansion that gave me goosebumps just thinking about it. I turn away when I recognize a song on the radio. "Oh I love this song!" I start to sing along.

"Stop singing." CJ said.

I turn to him. "You don't own me." I gripe.

"I'm older."

"By one year!"

"That's older."

"Ugh! You're unbelievable!" I cross my arms in my chest as CJ laughs.

"I'm unbelievable? Sorry Miss Pouty." He laughs some more as I roll my eyes once again.

We finally pull into the parking lot of the school. I open the door and hop out. "Alright, remember our deal?" CJ asks.

"I don't know you, you don't know me." I say.

"Adda girl." He smirks and walks quickly away from me to his friends.

If we're pretending we don't know each other, why drive me here? I ask myself but dismiss it. Boys are weird. Or should I say, CJ is weird.

As soon as I open the door to the school, I hear a familiar high pitched voice above all. "Vanessa!" My best friend Carli squeals.

"Hey, Carli!" I call as soon as I spot her.

"It's been so long!" She said.

I laugh. "Carli, I just had a sleepover with you a week ago."

"That's too long!" She says again, and laughs.

Carli and I look different from each other. I have dark chocolate hair and Carli has the blondest hair imaginable. My eyes are brown, hers are green. My skin is pale, hers is tanner, but still more average than me.

"I was hoping you could come over this weekend so we could watch a movie. I was thinking something romantic!" Carli says as we walk to our first hour. We had almost all of the same hours but lunch and sixth hour gym.

"Romantic? I don't know... Maybe if there's some action in it."

She frowns. "What romance has action?"

"The best kind of romance." I say like it's obvious. Because it is.

"Ok, I'll see if I can find something I know."

At that point CJ comes walking down the hall with his buds Jordan and Rolando. Carli and I sigh at the same time. I'm swooning over Jordan. She's swooning over CJ. Yuck! CJ looks exactly like me, something has to be wrong with Carli for having a crush on someone who looks like her bestie. Especially if that person looks like them because it's their brother! Let alone having a crush on CJ to begin with.

Anyway, CJ glares at me, Rolando smiles, and Jordan winks. I feel my face get hot and I smile at him. Carli just watches silently as they go by, her eyes glued to my brother. "I'm going to tell you what I told my brother earlier." I say to Carli, snapping her out of her trance. "You're unbelievable!" We laugh as we walk through the door of our History class.