Jen's POV
*BEEP BEEP BEEP*
"Crap," I mutter under my breath as I hit snooze on my alarm clock. After a summer of sleeping in and doing all I want I definitely didn't miss this, but it's senior year, might as well make the best of it.
Just as I was getting up, in comes my sister freaking out. Lana has quite the colorful past. She got pregnant by her boyfriend at the age of 19, she gave birth at 20, but he ended up leaving her saying it was "too much" for him to handle. Now she's 24 and her daughter, Alma, is 4. Yes they live with us because Lana is trying to balance school, work, and a daughter all at the same time so we help her until she gets a good grip on this.
"Jen, look they called me into work today. I was suppose to have the day off, but not anymore. Can you please please please get Alma ready for daycare?" She said looking like I was her last resort.
Our family is very close so we live around as much family as we have in the U.S., we try to keep each other close. For example, we live in a very small neighborhood, with only about seven houses in it. Those houses all belong to my family, they decided they wanted us to grow around family as much as we could so that's exactly how we were brought up. Therefore, my sister has a lot more family to ask, but she doesn't ask because they would judge her for it, which is why she comes to me because she know I won't judge and I love Alma so much.
"Yeah sure, I'll get her ready. Pero en serio ve antes de llegar tarde" I said to her. She has an issue with time management. {Translation: But seriously go before you're late."}
"Thank you, thank you, thank you. You're the best sister ever! Okay bye mamas I love you. Be good for your Tia." She said to Alma while kissing her forehead. "Pick her up for me too, thanks, bye." She said before running out the door. She's a nurse so when they call her in for work it's usually an all day shift.
"Okay mamas we have to leave soon because we have to take your cousins to day care too, so can you pick out your own clothes?" She was still in her pajamas, all I would have to do is make sure her hair is nice.
"Yay!" She said running off into her room. She loves picking out her clothes because she feels like a "big girl".
"Esta bien, tenemos que irnos ahora!" I yelled making sure that she heard me while I went to the bathroom to quickly get ready. {Translation: Okay, we have to go now!}
I brushed my teeth, changed into a burgundy shirt, black cropped jeans, and my black vans. I left my hair alone, which reached my lower back, it looked nice natural. I did my eyebrows and my mascara, I didn't exactly try because after attending this school for the past four years you kinda lose interest in trying to impress the same exact people.
I went to go check up on Alma to see how everything was going, as I entered her room I saw she was ready.
"Okay mamas are you ready for your hair?" She nodded her head and I started brushing her hair while she decided what she wanted her hair to be like today.
"Tia. Tia. Tia. Tia Jen!" She kept calling, which meant she knew what she wanted.
" Yes Mama?" Mama and mamas are her nicknames that we usually call her, she doesn't seem to mind them.
" Can you give me the two trenzas please?" She said stretching out the 'e'.
"Yeah, but hold still please." I started on the braids when we were interrupted by my Tita handing me the phone.
"Hello?" I speak into the phone.
"Jen! It's finally senior year yes bitch!" Says my cousin Jess. Jess has been excited about senior year since junior year. Her and her boyfriend, Noah, have been waiting for senior year since forever. They've been together since sophomore year and are basically the power couple, the football player with the cheerleader.
"Yeah Jess, we get it you're excited."
"Okay okay enough of that. Are you giving me a ride to school today?"
"Yeah but we have to pick up Natalie and Josie for daycare. Alma is going with them and Tia wants me to drop them off to save her a trip."
"I thought Lana had an off day today?"
"She did, but they called her in."
"Oh wow again? Jesus when does she get a break?"
"That's what I said!"
"Okay well what time are you coming around or you want me to walk to your house real quick?" I check the time seeing it was 6:48, which meant we had to hurry up. School started at 7:45, but we still had to get our schedules and I don't want to be late on the first day.
"Just walk here. It's not like it's a far walk." I laugh knowing that she lives like two houses down.
"Alright bye! Ya voy m-" She yelled before I hung up on her. Her and her mom are on thin ice ever since her grades went down. They blame Noah, but I think she just got tired of trying to please her mom, I mean our family is very hard to please.
I hung up the phone and finished up Alma's hair and went downstairs to see about half of my family waiting there talking and all.
"Hola Familia!" I yell. They all begin to come and hug me while Alma goes with my mom and the other kids to get their breakfast. They begin hitting me with question after question. However, the one my Tita asks me is the one everyone wants to know.
"Y el novia?" She asks me, they've been asking me about this since Jess introduced Noah to the family. {Translation: And the boyfriend?}
"Aye Tita te digo que no tengo novio." I say loud enough for everyone to hear and stop asking the same question. {Translation: I tell you Tita I don't have a boyfriend.}
"I'm telling you she's lesbian." Says my Tio George. You see my family thinks I don't know, but they have a bet that I'm gonna come out as lesbian, but I'm gonna burst their bubble now.
"Okay I'm gonna say this once and for all. I am STRAIGHT! You guys know I have nothing against gay people, but I'm simply not gay." I say and they all start pulling money out of their pockets and wallets putting things like "shit" or "fuck".
I see they hand it all to my Tita while I just stand there confused, there was easily over two hundred dollars. I feel happy for my Tita, but then again offended that they had so much money riding on this. I want to at least get half.
"I told you guys. There's no way she's lesbian with that ass." I rolled my eyes walking away.
"I'm here familia!" Yells Jess as she walks in.
"Thank god we need to leave it's" I pause to look at my phone, "7:03. Plus we still need to leave these kids at day care."
"I don't go to day care remember I'm in eighth grade?" said Julie. She likes to think that just because she's 13 she's grown, but she's not. I'll embarrass her anyway.
"Oh calm down honey, I'll take you with the kids. Adios Familia!" I yelled as I grabbed Alma. I suppose Nati and Josie are going with their other grandmother.
I unlock my jeep while they get in and I put Alma in her car seat. People thinks it's weird when they see the car seat in my car thinking I'm a mom, but I don't mind they can think what they want, I don't care anymore at this point.
We pull up to New Vista Middle School to drop off Julie. We decided not to embarrass her considering we were in a hurry. Then we made in to Sunny Side day care and quickly left, trying to get to school on time.
We received our schedules and raced to class with our backpacks, I barely made it to class in time. First class of the day was English, I always loved English ever since I first arrived in the U.S. Just in case you didn't know I'm not exactly from here, I'm only a resident. I was born in Jalisco, Mexico, but the only people who know that are my family because people will make fun of me for it.
I enter the class and quickly find a seat in the back as the bell rang.
"Okay class let's get started. My name is Mrs. Smith and welcome to English 12 AP!" Many people around me groaned or were just on their phones while I paid close attention, that is until the door opened and everyone looked towards it.
"Ah nice enough for you to join us Mr. Mendes." Said Mrs. Smith. There stood probably the most handsome guy I've ever seen. He was wearing black jeans, black button up shirt, black boots, and a black leather jacket while he was holding his black motorcycle helmet. Guessing his favorite color is black. Shawn Mendes was the school's bad boy, he moved here from Canada when we were in seventh grade, but high school came around and he started gaining popularity for his looks, but he ignored everyone and kept to himself. I've seen him around, but I don't speak to him, it's not like anyone else does.
"Yeah... whatever." He mumbled while looking around until he saw me and looked away when I gave him a small smile.
"Right, well you can sit next to Miss..." She paused waiting for me to announce my name while pointing at me.
"Jennifer, Jennifer Martinez" I said quietly, not wanting to draw too much attention to myself.
"Correct. Take a seat next to Miss Martinez." She said and with that he walked over taking a seat, but not saying another word for the rest of the period. Oh crap! I haven't introduced myself.
Well I'm Jennifer Martinez, a Senior attending Eastside High. Not exactly popular, but also not unknown, I'm only known through sports and Jess, which I don't mind because I don't like attention. That's about it, yeah I know pretty boring.
Mrs. Smith handed out our reading list and syllabus for the year and I passed the sheet to Shawn, hoping we could at least acknowledge each other, but no because he was just staring straight ahead without a care in the world... this is gonna be a long year.
Shawn's POV
There she was looking as beautiful as the last time I saw her. I thought I got over her this summer, but I walked in and saw her smile at me and it made me wanna smile.
I didn't though, I looked at her so coldly, making it seem like she had no affect on me. I've never actually talked to her all I know about her is that she's Latina, into sports, her cousin is Jessica cheer captain, and her name is Jennifer.
The teacher sat me next to her which I didn't mind, but I knew she wouldn't want to be associated with someone like me. The ' bad boy' of the school who had no heart and was always alone, that's all she knew me as and she doesn't want to know more.
She handed me my paper, I saw her smile at me, but I kept looking straight with my straight face... this is gonna be a long year.