So here is the first chapter!!! The song is How You Like Me Now. Remember to vote and comment. When I reach ten views I will post the next chapter!!!! Here we go! - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Chapter 1: Coffee and Lizard
Low
What the hell is that noise?
I let one eye open and find myself staring at the 7:00 flashing in front of me. The stupid, beep, beep, beep is going off. My eyes raise to the Hello Kitty smiling at me from the top of the clock.
Damn cat. What does it have to be so happy about? Especially this early in the morning. I swear the producers of the clock only made it so that they can piss me off.
I slam my palm down on the cat’s head and the thing shuts up, thank god. I pull the comforter back over my head and try to go back to sleep. I feel warm and relaxed covered in my blankets. I let out several deep breaths and my whole body relaxes.
Thirty seconds later, my bedroom door slams open and an extra fifty pounds lands on my stomach. The weight disappears and reappears over and over again as the fifty pounds bounces on my stomach.
“First day of school! First day of school! Come on Low, wake up!” a little high pitched voice yells. God she has seen Finding Nemo one too many times. My cover disappears from over my head. Blonde waves and honey brown eyes cloud my vision. “Come on Low! Mommy said to get you up!” Lexie whines.
My little sister could be my twin if she is not eleven years younger than me. We have the same eyes, same pale skin, same button nose, and same hair. The only difference are the new turquoise streaks that I have in my hair while hers remains purely golden.
Lexie, or Lizard as I call her, is what my parents call an “accidental miracle.” After complications when I was born, my mom was told that she would not to be able to have any more kids. Then seven years ago my mom was getting sick all the time, so she went to the doctor. My dad was worried that she had something extremely serious. Let’s just say that when my mom came home and told him that she was pregnant, he was ecstatic. I was so happy because I had always wanted a little sibling, but now, I just want to go back to sleep.
“Lizard, why are you waking me up so early?” I moan. “Go back to sleep. I don’t have enough energy for you yet.”
“It’s the first day of school, remember? Mommy said to wake you up that she could take pictures of her new first grader and senord.”
“It’s senior Lizard.”
“Seeeniooorrrr,” she sounds out.
Shit.
I totally forgot that today is the first day of senior year. That fact is enough to scare the crap out of me and make me want to bury myself in my covers. Don’t get me wrong, school is fine and I have friends, but why does it have to be so damn early in the morning.
“Come on! Get up, get up, get up!” she sings.
“Okay, fine. Tell Mom I’ll be down in a minute, okay?”
She jumps off of me and races down the stairs without another word. screaming “Just keep swimming! Just keep swimming!” at the top of her lungs. Okay, definitely going to have to ban that movie for a while.
I swing my legs over the edge of my twin sized bed and get up to walk toward the bathroom when I jam my toe on something.
“Oh my god!” I hiss. I sit on the edge of the bed and put pressure on my toe to try and make it stop throbbing. Flipping Barbie dream house almost broke my toe. Ah, the joys of sharing a room with a six year old. I hobble over to the bathroom and shower, brush my hair, brush my teeth, and apply a little mascara before heading over to my closet.
After searching through the mixture of both Lizard and my clothes, I finally decide on my light blue peasant top, some jean shorts, and my everyday chucks.
I grab my backpack and rush down the stairs.
“Morning Mom,” I call out as I step foot in the kitchen.
My mom is rushing around the kitchen frantically in her scrubs, trying to organize everything for the day. She’s an ER nurse, and you think that fact might make her super organized and focused, but it doesn’t. Every morning she runs around like a chicken with her head cut off. It’s funny just to watch her sometimes until she yells at me for not helping her.
“Morning Low. Catch.” She tosses me an energy bar while spreading the peanut butter on Lizard’s lunch for school. Lizard takes her last bite of frozen waffles seconds before Mom shoves us out the door. “Okay, stop you guys.” We stand in front of the yellow rose bush outside of our front door while she snaps a couple of pictures on her phone.
“Bye Mommy!” Lizard squeals as she runs to the car, her Barbie backpack bouncing as she goes.
“Bye Mom,” I kiss her on the cheek. She takes my face in her hands and smiles at me with tears in her eyes.
“I can’t believe my baby is a senior.” She smiles when I groan. “I just wish that you would wash out these turquoise streaks,” she teases. I smile at her. I know how much she hates the color in my hair, but I can’t bring myself to wash the color out. My mom is cool enough to let me do my own thing and I absolutely love her for that. She always says, “As long as you don’t do drugs and don’t have a baby before twenty-two, I have done a good job.”
She lets go of me and goes back into the house. I start up Betsy and head down the road.
Betsy is my red jeep that I got for my sixteenth birthday. She is beyond ancient, but besides the two times that she has broken down in the least year, she is great.
After ten minutes I pull up to Lizard’s school. We get out and she holds my hand as we walk through the entrance gate. When we find her classroom, I stay with her as her new teacher, Mrs. Blake, introduces herself. Lizard gives me one last hug goodbye before going to sit on the carpet with the other kids.
Last year when I dropped Lizard off in the morning, I would practically have to pry her off of my leg. As the year went on, it got a little easier to drop her off. I am so relieved that she seems to be over her clingy faze by now.
I leave Lizard’s school and drive down the street to the high school. Beaumont High is a bunch of old brick buildings combined together by small walkways. Trees cover almost every inch of the campus. A small football stadium sits behind the gym on the far side of the campus. Basically the whole population of Beaumont passes through these halls at one point or another because there is not another high school for miles.
I pull into the first open parking space that I see and sit in the car. Senior year is starting. I am so excited, but nervous at the same time. I have lived in Beaumont my entire life, so the idea of living anywhere else is strange to me, but I am definitely excited for college and the chance to get out of the small town and experience new things.
A knock on my window makes me jump and I jab my knee into the steering wheel.
“Ow!” I look over to my window and see Vi smiling at me. Vi’s real name is Viola. Her mom has a thing for Shakespeare.
I unlock my door and she flings it open right before pulling me into an almost suffocating hug. Her bright pink hair is in my face and I have a hard time seeing anything. Because she is such an amazing hair guru, she was the only one who I trusted to dye my hair for me.
“I missed you!” she squeals. I can’t help but laugh at her enthusiasm.
“I saw you two days ago!”
“I know but I was so wasted at the bonfire that I probably thought that you were Drew Carry.” I chuckle at my friend’s quirky sense of humor. She loves to watch old reruns of Whose Line is it Anyway and loves Drew Carry.
“But seriously, can you believe it?” she squeals. “We’re seniors! and guess who is going to tutor me in English this year!” She smiles at me and bats her eyelashes.
“I am not tutoring you again!”
“Oh well, that’s a shame,” she sighs and holds up a cup, “because I only brought coffee for my tutor. Oh well.” She turns around and bounces away.
Damn her. I may have a slight, almost nonexistent, addiction to caffeine and my favorite source of it is coffee. Okay, fine, the stuff is my life support. Because my mom had to take pictures this morning, I didn’t have time to make any for myself. I grab my backpack and sprint after my best friend. I grab the cup from her hand.
“Fine bitch, I’ll tutor you.”
Vi laughs at my desperation and links her arm through mine as we walk through the front gates of the school. Some people call out hi as we walk by and I smile and wave back. The freshmen are scrambling, trying to find their way to their classes without getting trampled by the rest of the school. I pull out my schedule and look for the same locker number on my sheet. Vi heads down the hallway looking for her own. I turn in my combination, 31- 13- 41, and yank on the latch, but the locker doesn’t open. I try it again ad again, but still nothing works.
“God, you stupid son of a bitch,” I whisper to my locker door and try spinning the combination again.
“Now is there really any need to be insulting me this early in the morning?”
My whole body freezes up at the sound of this voice. I turn around and am met by mint green eyes that have made my life a living hell for the last twelve years.
“Seth,” I mumble.
“Marlow Riley, long time no see,” he says and leans against the locker next to mine.
Seth Ryker is the school’s bad boy and every girls walking fantasy. Every girl besides me that is. He is about six feet tall, or maybe more. . . I dunno. His dark brown, slightly curly hair falls just below his eyebrows. The small amount of scruff on his chin along with his messy hair give him the ‘I just rolled out of bed look,’ which I think he is going for. His tanned skin shows off the muscles in his jaw and arms. Right now he is wearing a black, fitted, short sleeved t-shirt that shows the tribal tattoo that I know goes from the back of his left shoulder clear down to his bicep. His worn jeans and shoes give off the relaxed style that he has.
“Thank god for that huh?” I try to drawl smoothly. He chuckles at my jab which only irritates me more. Seth suddenly lurches forward and almost hits me in the face. I almost start to yell at him, but I see the pink hair- that caused him to move- appear over his shoulder.
“Hey Vi,” He says as she puts him in a chokehold from the piggyback position that she is in on his back.
“Don’t you dare ‘Hey Vi’ me! Why the hell didn’t you come to dinner that night?” she asks. “Mom was upset.”
“I’m sorry, had to work, but tell Aunt Kay that I will be there next week, okay?”
Yeah, so this is the best part about my and Seth’s rivalry. His cousin is my best friend. Note the sarcasm.
Seth’s dad abandoned his family when he was only ten. His mom is Vi’s mom’s sister, and so after he left, Vi’s mom and dad helped take care of Seth’s mom and the boys. Seth and his brothers are more like siblings than cousins to Vi. Unfortunately for me that means that I get to spend a lot of extra time with Seth, which believe me is not a good thing. We hate each other and even though I know it is hard on Vi, it is almost like Seth and I cannot stop arguing. Vi climbs off of him and turns to stop beside me.
“So did you do that?” he asks Vi.
“Do what?”
“The streaks in her hair?” His eyes run over my hair and I have to resist the urge to stick my tongue out at him.
“Yep, she looks hot huh?” My mouth drops open at the words that have just came out of my friend’s mouth.
Seth smirks and I know that he just asked Vi about my hair to get a reaction out of me. He probably hates the color and just did it to annoy me. Vi on the other hand notices nothing about what just happened.
“Ready to go?” she asks me.
“No,” I pout, “I can’t get my stupid locker to open.”
As soon as the words come out of my mouth, Seth snatches the paper from my hand.
“Hey!” I make a grab for it and miss. He dials the number into the lock and yanks the damn thing open. I stand there, blubbering like a stupid fish. He smirks and hands the paper back. I snap my mouth shut and take the paper from him before turning to put some books in my locker and grab the ones that I need for my next class.
“Do I get a thank you?” Seth asks.
I stare at the books inside my locker and work myself up to apologize to the one person that I hate more than anyone. I stick my head inside the locker and lock my eyes shut.
“Thank you,” I mumble.
“I’m sorry, I couldn’t hear you. What did you say?”
That jerk.
I pull my head out of my locker and spin around to face a smirking Seth.
“Thank you Seth for being an asshole who take my paper without asking.”
That stupid smug disappears from his face and he frowns at me. He reaches out and takes my coffee cup. With his eyes on me the entire time he licks around the who edge of the cup and then hands it back to me.
EEEEEW!!! I cannot believe he just did that! What is he, five?
If what he did made him seem like a five year old, then what I did must make me seem like I’m three. I take the cup from his hand and drink from it with my middle finger raised instead of a pinky.
Cheers to you buddy.
He rolls his eyes before stomping away. Like I said, the dude is five. While I am smirking at him as he walks away, Vi groans beside me.
“Do you guys always have to be like this? Can you just try to get along?”
I know that it is hard on her to see Seth and I not get along. I mean after all he’s her cousin that is more like a brother and I am her best friend, but the thing is, we have never gotten along. In kindergarten, he dumped sand on my head on the first day of school. I stuck sand down his pants after and we both were forced to sit on the curb. Middle school he put a frog in my lunchbox, so I put earthworms in his sandwich. Freshman year, somehow he got one of my bras and pinned it to the bulletin board. In retaliation, I stole his underwear and managed to get it up the flag pole in front of the school. We have always picked on each other, and truthfully, I don’t see that changing anytime soon.
I ignore Vi’s question and link our arms before dragging her down the hallway.
“Where are you going?” I ask her.
“I have Chemistry. God, just kill me and hell will be over before it even starts.” I chuckle at her. “You?”
“I have home ec.”
“Wanna switch?”
“Uh, no, I am not going through an entire year with Tonkin.” Tonkin is the chemistry teacher that is extremely strict and smells like cheese. The man needs to take a shower . . . with extra soap.
We separate and I head off to the home ec. room. I pull open the door and go inside right before I stop in my tracks.
Oh, for the love of all that is good and holy.