A Girl Named Blush (SAMPLE)

one

~ Blaire ~

If I had to compare my life to a work of fiction, it would be Stephen King's Carrie. All you have to do is fast forward to the part where Carrie's tormentors pour pig's blood on her head in front of the entire school. That's what happened to me in the seventh grade. I've been trying to recover ever since.

Okay, so maybe that was a bit of an exaggeration.

Even though my seventh grade bullies didn't baptize me in literal pig's blood, what they really did felt just as gross and mortifying. If it wasn't for my mom, I wouldn't be here today. I would be a pancake.

Why a pancake?

Because that's the note I wanted to end it on. Just find some tall building, take the elevator to the roof and . . . walk off, I guess. You get it, now?

Don't worry, I don't think about doing those sorts of things anymore. Nowadays, pancakes are just pancakes, not a potential state of being.

On a lighter note, my mom made me pancakes the day I met Luca Brighton. They were the perfect comfort food right before walking into the wonderful disaster that is Luca. I was not prepared for his unnatural pink hair and that dangerous yet goofy grin – not even in the slightest.

I was even less prepared for the summer to come to an end. It meant that I had to return to Honeybrook High – aka Hell on Earth – and face the very same tormentors from middle school. These so-called queens and kings of our graduating class have been popular since birth. They don't get acne, they don't gain weight, and they don't stop being perfect. Not even a little. Every summer they come back to school somehow more attractive, smarter, and more flawless than before. It's enough to make anyone secretly hate them even if they weren't responsible for ruining my life.

But more on my evil overlords later. Let's get back to Luca.

On the last day of summer, the wild and downright sexy hot mess that was Luca Brighton interrupted my boring but peaceful shift at Yummy Joy Cafe.

In that moment, I wanted nothing more than to put as much distance as I could between us.

Little did I know, this was only the beginning. 

~ Luca ~

Luca stared out the window. Tall, robust magnolia trees passed him by. They waved their waxy leaves and creamy blossoms.

Luca blinked. He couldn't see the trees at all.

Perhaps he could register them if he wasn't bound to the backseat of his parents' practical Honda Civic. If he could walk the grounds that they grew out of and send out a hum on the breeze, then he could properly perceive the proof that there was something beautiful about the place he now had to call his home.

That there was something worth looking at.

For now, however, Luca looked at nothing. Because light didn't register in his eyes the same way as it did in his parents'. There was no such thing as total darkness for Luca, but for the most part, sound was a much more reliable way for him to see.

Luca made soft clicks in the back of his throat that ricocheted against the window barrier. They returned to him, reborn as echoes. He read them as one would words and signs. Each time the wave bounced, it said the same thing.

Flat. Glass. Window.

He wondered if he would ever have the chance to see the things he used to see. A different sort of light that had a way of bleeding from other places into his world. Most people were as blind to this offworld presence as he was to the visible light spectrum.

Over the years, Luca had met others who could see these knots of light. Everyone had their own name for it — star fog, earthshine, glow stick villages.

That's when Luca learned that you didn't have to be blind in order to see offworld. Or mute. Or deaf. Or different in any way, perceptible or discreet.

The only way Luca learned what certain colors looked like was slowly over time through many small, mostly indirect comparisons with what he heard in descriptions and what he saw offworld. So when his parents told him that he had always had pink hair, he didn't really know what that meant until he was much older.

The offworld wept very rarely, and only in sensitive locations. Back in his hometown, Luca was very familiar with these hot spots. When life got to be too much, he would retreat there and hide. He would stare at light and shapes from a world not of his own. Budding and bleeding out from a place where he would much rather be.

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Hi New Readers!

If you choose to continue with this story, please know that it won't shy away from issues pertaining to bullying, depression, and anxiety. It can get a little heavy at times, so pace yourself. 

With that being said, there are going to be a lot of cute, sweet moments to go around! Plus lot of steamy moments too!

In other words, lots of sugar + spice. I hope you're ready!

Stay true,

Coco