Any copyrighted material such as brand names that I did not make up do not belong to me!
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Chapter One
I have to be very careful I thought to myself. Just a little longer, almost perfect...
I was feeling nervous now, but I just couldn't wait till I was done.
"HEY ANGELINA!"
"AH!" I yelled, dropping the clay in my hand. I turned around to see my older sister standing in the door way to my room.
"Wow, it's so sad how easily you get scared," she said.
I glared at her, but turned back around to face my ruined masterpiece. I had always loved working with clay, and my friend Sasha had asked me if I could make her a clay figure. She said it could be of anything, and I had been in the process of making her a clay cat. I had been fixing it's legs when my EXTREMELY rude sister had come barging into my room without knocking like she should have.
"What do you want?" I asked her with obvious annoyance as I tried to fix the now smushed head of the cat. If only I hadn't put so much water on the clay; then it wouldn't have been so movable.
"Lend me ten dollars." It was a command, and I was horrible at disobeying people.
"A-and what if I say no?" I turned around to look at her again.
"Then I'll steal twenty dollars from mom and blame it on you." She smirked. If there was one thing that my sister was good at, it was lieing. She could get away with anything and whoever she blamed had no chance at proving themselves innocent.
"But, Samantha!" I whined.
"No buts now hand it over."
I looked at the ground in defeat, then got up from where I had been sitting at my table and walked over to my bedside table and opened the drawer on it. Inside was my sunglasses, my cell phone, and my walet.
"Here," I reluctantly said, taking out my only ten.
She walked forward and took it from me. "I'm going to meet up with Tyler now, good luck on your...clay...thing." She laughed to herself then walked out of my room without bothering to shut my door.
I glared at the doorway, despite the fact that she wasn't there anymore. I sighed, then shut my door and sat down again at my table and continued to work.
Samantha was my seventeen year old sister, and Tyler was her boyfriend. I'm only fourteen, but I can't wait till I'm old enough to move out of this house. I can't stand living with her! She is so rude to me! She promised me that she won't move out till I do, and I hope that's not true. Knowing my sister, though, she'll probably move out but visit frequently just to annoy me.
I worked on the cat until it was finished, then set it down to dry up. The clay I used was the kind that could harden on it's own without the need of a kilm.
When the sculpture was done, I washed my hands and took my long, staight, black hair from the ponytail it had been in. I then sat on my bed and looked out the window. It was still daytime, and the sky was cloudless. I loved the summer.
I glanced at the clock. It was only three-thirty, and since today was so beautiful outside, I decided to walk down to the park and lay down on the grass.
I jumped up, but when I landed I lost balance and fell over. Oh yeah, gravity, my worst enemy. Being as clumsy as myself, I tend to fall over a lot.
"Geez, do you know how many times I've seen you in that position?" I heard a voice say.
I picked myself up, but nearly fell back over when I saw who it was.
"YOU AGAIN?" I pointed at his floating figure. It was a boy about my age with short, wavy, light brown hair. I had seen him many times before, and that fact that I could see him was never a pleasant one to me.
"Me again!" He threw his extemely pale arms into the air.
"Shut up! Didn't I tell you to leave me alone! You're always popping in and startling me!"
"Sorry," he apologized. "but it's so boring! I mean, how would you feel if you were a ghost with no one to talk to but other ghosts?"
"That's the thing that scares me! Why is it that I'm the only human that can see ghosts like you?"
He shrugged. "Ask Amanda, she knows everything."
I shivered at the thought of speaking to her. Amanda was a ghost like him, but she had been dead for so long, that she has learned a lot of things that many humans don't even dream of learning. She is also a very powerful ghost. She is able to do anything with people's minds, and she is the one in charge of the dead.
He laughed and said, "Yeah, maybe we should avoid her."
"Listen here, Fez!-" he held out a hand to stop me.
"Wait, Fez?"
"Yeah, Fez. Since you never told me your name, I have been forced to make one for you. Now, as I was saying-"
"But where did you get Fez from?"
"From three things that represent you: Failure, end, and sleep."
His expression changed from confused to sad. "What do you mean by that?"
"Well, you failed to live, your life ended, and now it's like you're in an endless dream."
His expression lit up again. "Oh, that's what you mean."
I waited for him to say something, but he just floated there, smiling at me. He better not interupt me again.
"As I was saying, just because-"
"Why couldn't you have just thought up a real name for me?"
My anger was rising, and slapped his solid body. "STOP INTERUPTING ME!" I yelled at him.
"Haha, sorry."
He placed a hand where I had slapped him. Ghosts are apparently solid, but can still make their bodies transparent, which allows any object to move through them.
"Can I finish?"
"Oh, yeah."
"Thank you," I continued. " As I was saying, just because I can see you doesn't mean we're friends so don't think we are. I HATE being able to see ghosts; they freak me out. I wish I wasn't able to see you and the rest, and if it were up to me I wouldn't chose to see you. I don't know who made it this way, but it doesn't look like they thought about my opinion on the matter."
I stared at him, waiting for him to respond.
Just then, my phone rang. I picked it up to see that it was Sasha."
"Hello?" I answered.
"Hey hey Angie! Do you wanna meet me at the park?" Sasha replied.
"Of course! I'll see you in ten minutes."
"Mkay, bye!"
"Bye!"
We both hung up.
I grabbed my purse and threw my phone in it, then flung the purse over my shoulder. I walked out the door and down the staircase towards the front door.
"Mom, I'm going to the park," I told my mom who was sitting on the couch in the living room to my right.
"Okay, but don't stay out too late," she instructed me.
"Of course."
I ran out the front door and started my way down towards the park. Fez, to my annoyance, followed me.
"Is Sasha that girl with the wavy brown hair?" Fez asked me. That's right, I had been with Sasha the first time I had met Fez.
"Yeah," I answered.
It was peacefully silent, but then Fez broke it by humming to himself. I tried to put up with it, and it would look weird if I told him to stop, since to others it would look like I was talking to either myself or the air.
He started humming louder, and louder, and louder, and-
"Stop it!" I tried to whisper, but I ended up saying it much louder then I had intended to. Luckily though, no one was around to watch my go crazy.
"Hehe, sorry. I just wanted to see how long your patience would last."
I grinded my teeth together, but didn't say anything.
The rest of the walk was thankfully silent, and Sasha was already at the park when I got there.
"Hi hi!" She yelled out, grinning and waving to me as I made my way towards her.
"Hey Sasha," I greeted her, also waving. When I got closer, I added "How's life?"
"Good!" Both of her hands gave me a thumbs-up.
"Same here. I'm almost finished with your clay sculpture you asked me to make for you. It just needs to dry out and then I need to paint it."
Her smile got even bigger. "Really? Already? Thanks a bunch Angie!"
We started walking over to the large field in the center of the park, and then sat down on the grass.
"Hey, Angie, are you glad that we'll be in high school once summer's over?" Sasha asked me.
"Hmm, I guess so. I'm not a big fan of teachers telling us all what to do all day though."
"Oh yeah, you hate people ordering you around."
I nodded. It was true. I had always had a problem with saying no to people if they ordered me to do something. If they asked me, it was like I had a choice, but when they ordered me, it was like they were saying 'this is what I want now do it.' I like to make others feel happy, even if I don't want to do what they told me to.
"Well, what about you? Are you excited for high school?" I asked her, poking her arm.
"No! I don't want summer to end! Once school starts I won't be able to have as much fun as I am now. Plus, it'll start getting colder as they days reach winter." She pretended to shiver.
"True."
I lay back and stared at the sky. I wish it could stay this way everyday here in Indiana, but that would never happen.
Just then, a frisbee landed on my face. I picked it up and sat up.
"Hey! David!" Sasha yelled out, standing up to wave at someone. I followed her gaze to see our friend, David. David had short black hair and was taller than both of us.
I threw the frisbee back to him and he caught it. David had always been good at most sports.
"Hey Sasha, Angie," David greeted us.
"Hi there David," I returned the greeting.
"Do you guys want to play?" He cocked an eyebrow and held the red frisbee in the air.
"Sure!" Sasha agreed and I nodded.
We passed it back and forth for a long time, so long that I had even forgot about Fez. Knowing my bad luck, it probably wasn't a good thing to look away during our game, but even so I still turned my head to see where he had wandered off to. The consequence for my action was the frisbee smacking into my head.
"Ow," I said, rubbing it.
"Are you alright?" Sasha asked, giving me a worried look.
"I'm fine, don't worry."
We continued to play, but had to stop when it started getting late. I got a call from my mom telling me to come home for dinner. I bade the others good-bye and started making my way home.
I paused at a busy street and waited for an opportunity to cross. I got bored waiting, so I started rocking back and forth on my feet, humming the same tune Fez had been humming. Leave it to him to get it stuck in my head.
Apparently, it wasn't a good idea to rock back in forth. My clumsiness plus rocking back in forth equals me losing my balance and falling forward. It would have been okay, but I stumbled a bit trying to prevent myself from falling and ended up tripping on my feet and sending myself falling out into the street.
I heard a honk from a white van as I closed my eyes and sheilded my face.