Up In Flames

Chapter 1: Average

My entire existence could be summed up in one word: Typical. I had an average childhood: a little brother who adored me but liked to fight his own battles, a love-hate relationship with my parents, and a small group of friends. I sighed and picked at the food in front of me as I realized just how dull my life was.

"You okay Alina?"

I jumped in my seat, startled by the sudden disturbance. After calming my heart rate, I glanced up at the worried expression on my best friend's face. I forced a smile and nodded my head.

"I'm fine Marj. I was thinking about how boring life is, you know?."

I scooted back in my chair when I noticed the not-so-innocent gleam in Marjorie's dark brown eyes. I've seen that look a million times in the three years we've been best friends and it was not a good sign.

"Well," Marj began, "There's a rumor going around that Carter is throwing a going away party for his brother before he leaves for the military. It's an open invite and I think we should go."

I looked at her like she was crazy. Marj was always pushing me to do "normal" high school activities. This included going to parties and being "young and free." I wasn't really into any of that and for good reasons. People were always getting in trouble or getting drunk and getting other people in trouble.

"Uh. No thanks Marj. I'd rather not get stuck between a bunch of drunken hormonal teenagers in a living room turned danced floor."

She rolled her eyes and twirled her curly blonde hair around her fingers. It was a habit she had that signaled when she was deep in thought.

"Alina, you're seventeen years old and you've never been to a party! Birthday parties from when you were thirteen don't count," she added quickly before I had the chance to speak. "This is unacceptable. Junior year is almost over. You need to go."

Her eyes were pleading with me to go but I just didn't want to. Sure, my life was boring but I didn't think a party would fix that. I opened my mouth to explain my reasoning, but thankfully the bell rang signaling the end of lunch, and the start of calculus class. I smirked and threw a quick goodbye over my shoulder as I dumped my tray and scrambled out the cafeteria doors.

Calculus went by relatively quickly. Mr. Finley, my teacher, announced we would be working on a project that involved using the solutions from problems we created to make a picture on a grid.

"You have the option to work in pairs," automatically the class perked up, "however," he continued, " the project will be due one week earlier since there will be two of you."

There were a few murmurs of disagreement, but it seemed pretty fair to me. My eyes scanned the room looking for who I knew my partner would be.

"Alina! Over here!"

I turned to my left and saw my friend, Lycia, frantically waving her arms in the air to get my attention. I chuckled as I made my way over towards her. Instead of talking about what we would be doing for our project, she made a comment about my hair.

"What's wrong with my hair?" I asked, immediately becoming defensive.

"Nothing, nothing... It's just so...dull. You should dye it or something."

I pulled at my dark, chestnut brown hair. Lycia was right, it was pretty dull. In fact, my whole appearance was dull. I had green eyes; no, I had swamp green eyes the color of dirt mixed with algae. My skin was tan but not like Marj's natural caramel complexion. Nor was it the soft golden brown that Lycia had. In all honesty, it was one shade away from being ghostly pale.