Chapter One
"For the love of God, Riley get the hell up!" My mother shouted at me from outside my locked bedroom door.
I groaned and rolled over placing earbuds in my ears to drown out her incessant nagging. Doesn't she have any respect? I'm trying to sleep here. I had to be at school in an hour or so.
"Riley Jean! Get your ass up right now. You're supposed to be at school in twenty minutes!" She shouted again.
No, I had school in an hour. Why on Earth would I be on time?
"It's your first day of your senior year. Please get up and go to school." She pleaded.
"I'm up. Go away." I replied loudly hoping she'd leave me alone to get ten more minutes of sleep.
I heard her walk away, her heavy footsteps resonated all throughout the house. When I realized I was wide awake with no chance of going back to sleep, I rolled out of bed and padded over to the closet.
"What to wear?" I asked myself softly, pushing the clothes aside.
I settled on a pair of destroyed denim jeans and a black Angel Haze t-shirt that I had bleached and frayed the sleeves of. After a quick shower, I was dressed and had to tackle the feat of my hair. Every morning I went through the struggle of getting my purple hair into a decent hairstyle.
Being natural was a struggle.
"Riley you're late." My mother called through the door.
"I know mom." I responded.
I grabbed my trusty leather jacket and checked my appearance again. Satisfied that I looked good, I went downstairs and grabbed the banana and cup of orange juice my mom had set out for me before she hustled out the door herself for work.
I knew senior year would be amazing. It had to be.
And best of all, everyone would know my name.
*****
"Riley Jean, you're late." My homeroom teacher told me as soon as I entered the classroom.
"I'm well aware." I told her before flashing the cocky smirk that Justice had helped me perfect all summer. I slid into the only open seat which was in the back behind a girl I'd never seen before.
Had she gone here last year?
I tapped her shoulder. I knew how it felt to invisible. "I'm Riley. What's your name?"
She looked around confused. "Y-you're talking to me?"
I flashed her a charming smile. "Of course I am."
She blushed, the beet red color vibrant on pale cheeks. "I'm Jeanna."
"Nice to meet you, Jeanna."
Jeanna smiled at me again before turning around to face the teacher again. I knew how it felt to have no one take interest in you and it was the worst feeling ever.
I would make sure nobody felt that way on my watch.
The bell rung releasing us to our next period. The bell was shrill but barely audible in the densely packed hallways. If I cared about being late, I'd be pushing my way through the hallway quickly and jogging across campus to my next class.
Justice stood next to our lockers. He looked up from his manga when he saw me standing in front of him. His face lit up in a wide smile. "Riley."
"Justice."
He pulled me into a hug that I immediately pulled back from.
"You're going to ruin the cool kid image we spent the whole summer trying to build up!" I gushed.
He laughed. "Oh yeah,"
Justice had always been a bit more affectionate than other people our age. I led the way down the hallway to our next class which we had together.
"Where are we going?" He asked following me into the science department.
"Biology."
"Oh the joys of biology." He stated sarcastically following me into the classroom a second after the bell rung.
I observed the classroom and sat at the lab table furthest from the teacher. Justice took his seat beside me and went back to his manga since the teacher wasn't in the classroom yet. I looked over the students in the class, vaguely recognizing most of the students from last year.
I bet none of them even knew my name.
"Riley? You look different." A boy I remember as Chad said turning around to look at me.
I'm not sure if he meant the haircut, facial piercings, or my new wardrobe but nonetheless it didn't sound like a compliment.
So I didn't thank him.
"I also heard some things about you. Is it true?" He continued talking as if my straight face and knitted eyebrows weren't enough for him to realized I had no intentions of talking to him.
"Is what true?" I asked despite wanting to ignore him. Curiosity got the best of me.
"That you're a lesbo?" He asked.
My eyebrows shot up in surprise. I came out the closet when I was a sophomore by publicly dating another invisible person named Isabella, who moved away at the end of the school year. I hadn't realized that I was so invisible that nobody knew I was gay.
But why should that surprise me? Nobody even knew my name, why would they remember that I was gay?
"Yes it's true." I responded.
He smiled at me. "That's cool man."
I didn't respond to him. I bluntly turned my attention elsewhere and continued watching the other students. That was until my eyes landed on a girl whom I never saw before.
I was sure of it.
"Justice, who is that?" I asked rudely pointing to the girl but not meaning to be rude.
The teacher had began talking ages ago but I didn't care much for learning rules and hearing the things on the syllabus read aloud.
His eyes swept over the girl. "No clue."
"She's really pretty."
He smirked at me. "You already plotting, aren't you?"
I laughed at him softly. I didn't bother responding because we both knew the answer to that question.
The girl sat at the very front of the classroom and didn't turn around one time to see who was staring at her. I know she felt the hole I was burning in the back of her skull.
Her hair was in a short black pixie cut and she wore glasses although I couldn't see the type of frames they were. Her skin was a mixture of honey yellow and orange, not quite red but not quite brown.
The bell rung and the girl finally turned to grab her bag from behind her chair. She looked up at me and her eyes widen slightly when our eyes locked.
"Go get her tiger." Justice told me before clapping my shoulder with a grin.
"I'll get her alright." I smirked my cocky smirk at him before going up to the girl who was now walking from the class. "Hey." I greeted her in a very laid back manner.
She looked at me, scrutinizing me with her soft brown eyes that were hidden behind the thick bifocal frames on her face. "Hi."
"Where you going? I could walk you there. Are you new? I'm Riley." I introduced myself.
She frowned. "I've been going here since I was a freshman."
I instantly felt bad. I was in her exact position last year, nobody recognized me or knew my name.
I hated it.
"I'm sorry, I didn't know." I scrambled for the right words. "What's your name?"
"Ashleigh." She told me with a soft sigh that told me she was hurt but didn't want to dwell on it. "I like your shirt, Angel Haze is one of my favorites."
I grinned at her. "Same."
She flashed me a face full of metal that was decorated with pink. "Really? What's your favorite song?"
"Ah, that's a hard question. My all-time favorite? It's between Rose-tinted suicide and Gods."
"Really? Gods is definitely one of my favorites but it's not better than Wicked Moon." She told me.
I had to agree with her.
"This is my class. I'll see you later or something." Ashleigh told me before entering her English class.
How had I never noticed her before? She was beautiful, and we shared the same taste in music which didn't happen often.
*****
By the time lunch rolled around, it was rumored that we had gotten a new senior.
The new senior was apparently me.
Had I been that invisible that people didn't recognize me when I came back with confidence and a new look? The answer was clear as day.
Yes, yes I had been.
"So find out who the girl was?" Justice asked sliding onto the stool next to me.
"Yup. Her name is Ashleigh."
"She new?"
I shook my head no, biting into an apple. I watched people stare at me with curious eyes, it wasnt everyday they saw a girl with part of her hair shaved off and the rest a bright shade of purple that had a nose ring and an eyebrow bar.
"That girl is staring at you." Justice informed me watching the girl make her way to our table.
I knew exactly who she was. What I didn't know is why she wanted to strut her way to our table in what seemed like slow motion. Justice regarded us with little interest since he was submerged in a new manga and was stuffing his face.
"Riley right?" She smiled at me.
I looked at Tiffany with little interest. She was the bitchest bitch I had ever met and had the tendency to put people down for absolutely no reason.
Much like she did me last year, despite clearly not knowing my name.
"What do you want?" I asked openly hostile.
She reeled backwards as if I had smacked her. "Wow, why are you being so rude to me?"
"Because you're a bitch. Now either tell me what you want or get the fuck out of my face." I retorted taking another slow bite of my apple for effect.
She sneered at me. "You don't even know me. Why would you say that about someone you don't know?"
She just loved pushing my buttons, didn't she?
"On the contrary, Tiffany I do know you. The problem is you don't know me. You made unnecessarily rude comments about my appearance and intelligence last year. I'm not judging you before I know you. You're a bitch. It's that simple." I told her. "Now please get out of my face. Oh and yes my name is Riley."
Justice was smirking at me, not only had he heard my small outburst but I had gotten the attention of many of the tables close to ours. Tiffany didn't respond but instead turned on her heels and stormed back to her table.
"You showed her." Justice commented snapping his fingers in a Z formation before laughing and giving me a high five.
I laughed, "Should've punched her in the nose. No telling how many of us she's made feel like shit about something as trivial as the necklace we wore that day. Get justice for us all."
He snorted out a burst of laugher. "Should've. I never liked her." He looked at her and his eyebrows knitted together. "Looks like you got competition."
I looked over and frowned deeply. I'm sure my heart stopped beating for a few seconds.
Ashleigh was sitting next to Tiffany with a small smile on her face and her head resting on her shoulder.
"Maybe they're sisters." I reasoned with Justice with a look of desperation.
Ashleigh would be perfect, even with the short conversation we had had. I could tell she would be great with me.
"I doubt that." Justice said. "Unless they're kissing siblings."
I closed my eyes and thought about the goals I had set for this school year.
I would be remembered. I would be envied. I would be loved.
And most of all, I would get Ashleigh.