Chapter 1
I dropped my head back looking at the ceiling as the teacher continued on about a story I studied years ago. Frankenstein. I’m not usually one to brag but I basically taught myself how to read. I’ve always been in advanced reader so it wasn’t surprising for me to pic literature for my studies only I’m far ahead of where I am. I surpassed Frankenstein at ten…but no one here can know that. I can’t use my full potential academically. I kept myself in a a place of not being smart enough to have all eyes on me but smart enough to still be smart. I did it all through high school, now I’m doing it in college. Enough to be smart and make honor role but not win the awards that get my face and name on a paper or online.
I make do though. I have my own private studies. Things I study to keep my mind busy.
“Okay, please complete the homework by Friday. I swear if one of you asks for an extension day of I will deny and fail you just for fun. Extensions in 24 hours-Actually 29 hours, before last submission will be the only ones approved.” Professor Dawsey said as he walked back to his desk.
Like many others I stood and started gathering my things. “Were you listening at all?” I looked down and over to Tate as he shoved his textbook in his bag. I wish I understood why he chose literature to give him an easy A this semester seemed funny but I let it be. He’s more concerned with soccer than school even though from what Shea tells me he’s actually really good in engineering.
“Of course not,” I said. I zipped the bag “I don’t listen to things I already know. What are you trying to do? Get me to do the work for you?” Swinging the bag over my shoulder I gave him a teasing smile. “Sorry, even if I liked you I wouldn’t help you.” I gave him a wave with my fingers before turning away watching as he just held himself back from saying anything at all. Almost seven years knowing Tate Ellsworth I know that just from this exchange alone he’ll find some way to get back at me later. I made it out of the lecture hall when I heard my best friends voice.
“Bex!” I turned watching as Shea jogged up to me. Hardly out of breath by the time she reached me. “Ready for the competition this weekend?”
“Am I? You just got back from a two week long vacation. We have two months before states and your vacationing instead of training.”
“I can’t say no to the beach. I ran in the morning anyway. We’ll be fine. I’m asking because after the competition Carlos is throwing a party at his house and I have a blind date for you.”
“Not one of Tate’s friends again, right? Your cousin has the worse taste in friends.”
“Markus wasn’t bad he just...talked a lot about himself but no, this is a guy I met at the new coffee shop downtown and he goes to Hawthorn.” I stayed quiet as we made our way to the girl’s locker room to prepare for practice. I hadn’t been on a date since the beginning of the school year but the relationship quickly fizzled out after I caught him cheating on me. I could have gone crazy and trashed his cars, yes more than one, as Maisy Philips did a year later. I could have let it destroy my world until I picked myself back up. He wasn’t really worth it and I didn’t like either of those options so I listened to the advice my grandmother gave me as she laid on her deathbed her hand in mine.
“It’s in your moments of decision that shape your future. Don't waste it on useless people.”
Then again it’s the same woman who fit a dirty joke anywhere she could and gave me my first thong at twelve. It’s also rumored through the family to have nearly killed her ex-husband and kept him quiet through blackmail. Grams was not one to mess with and definitely one too listen to.
“I’ll think about it. For Grams.” Shea held up her fist allowing me to tap a fist of my own on Shea’s. Together we walked into the locker room heading for our assigned lockers.
“That woman is the only reason you have fun.” Shea laughed as she walked over to her locker a few down from mine. We did our usual pre workout in the women’s weigh room then had out team meeting before going out to the field.
The team gathered listening to the coach for the schedule we have for practice and as usual. After warmup up then we’d start with the Hurdles meaning I’d just do some simple workouts to keep her blood flowing. Then they’d do the long-distance and middle-distance stopping were needed. Then were sprints and relays.
I loved running. I've been on school teams every chance I could. My life before Goldwall Creek and meeting Shea…well is relatively mysterious. I just showed up and instantly became the genius girl a year younger than everyone else. Scholarship student since the beginning and didn’t mind being one of ten kids. But joining the track team was the only thing on my mind the first day. Running allowed me to forget about my past and think more clearly.
Shea joined the relay and sprint group while I joined the long and middle distance. Blending easily with the others I noticed as some of the girl’s view was taken as the boy’s soccer team joined on the field. Tate being a part of it. “I love me some football players but soccer boys…,” I smiled at London's comment before slapping her upper arm with laughs before London turned back to focus. My eyes lingered on the group of boys until Tate noticed and turned to me with a salute. Rolling my eyes I returned my focus to the group joining warmup. Tate’s been the one thorn in my side since I arrived at Goldwall Creek. Through high school He picked on me for being quiet and I instantly called him a baboon. When I found out he was Shea's cousin we both really started to go at one another. Shea’s the only we can agree on. Keeping her safe.
He was easy to ignore the rest of practice but every now and then I still couldn’t help but sneak a peek.
Once practice was over and we changed into our normal clothes, we walked to my old Toyota, Tate right behind us still in his soccer gear but cleats tied together and thrown over his shoulder and back in his vans.
“I’m going with Bex tonight,” Shea told him.
“Whatever. Just don’t let her do anything to you.” Tate warned as if I was the questionable friend in the relationship. I’m to busy trying to keep myself off social media and out of the public eye, if anything, I’m who’s holding Shea back.
“You do remember who Shea is right? Or did you get hit in the head with a soccer ball again?” I watched as he smiled in annoyance. I bask in the enjoyment for just a second longer having gotten him twice in one day.
“Home before midnight, please.” Tate walked over to his black jeep a few cars down leaving Shea and I to sit down in the car.
There’s perks to living in the next town over from university. I didn’t really have to worry about boarding. Shea opted to stay with Tate’s parents, her aunt and uncle. I stayed with my mom. I have a small part time job to help with some bills
Due to the route I even pass our old private school the Willow Creek Institute and held most of the city’s rich kids in a tri-city area. A school is known to accept offers to keep their troubled kids in school. My experience was it was more know as a school that held more trouble and secrets than the fact Jimmy’s father paid the principal to get new laptops for the students in exchange for forgetting Jimmy put a kid in the hospital. A school consisting of just over five hundred students for K-12 it was a fairly generous offer. Tate’s parent’s are lawyers and very good ones. Like the kind Jimmy's father uses when he gets caught one day but they be on the other side because they have better morals.
In fact they’re so good that they took Shea in and pay for her school since her Mother, her aunts sister, was arrested for selling drugs when she was a child. They stopped her from going to jail but they took Shea in not wanting her to go into the system and lose her, they took her in. She’s lived with them since she was six and sees her mother only a few days a year but talks on the phone whenever they can. Her mother could never get herself clean, she always relapsed for something. It was clear Shea gave up a couple years ago. Her mother has chosen addiction over and over and Shea can only not be chosen so many times.
Despite everything Shea loves her. It wasn’t always bad. They had real moments of their own even if it was questionable for being appropriate for Shea’s presence. Her Aunt, Della, has become her mom. She even calls her that. Her uncle is her father, she never knew the biological one and her mother couldn’t tell her even if she tried.
My father has never been a topic of conversation and never will be.
Of course I found myself envious sometimes. As my classmates had high-end cars or personal drivers. They had the latest technology and most went home to houses bigger than they needed. It didn’t take me long to remember that everything they had was materialistic. I had a mother who, when she could, spent every chance she could with her. Movie nights. Curling up on their beat-up sofa watching a nineties or early two thousand romantic comedy. She remembered while the other kids got their drinks brought to them by a butler she actually had a relationship with her mother. Most of those kids don’t see their parents but once a month.
“I can’t hold it any more,” I turned to her as I turned on my car. She crossed her arms. “It's been years, You and Tate have so much sexual tension, it's killing me.” My mouth dropped but Shea quickly continued talking. A chill ran down my spine. “What do you say to some pizza tonight? On me.” Shea pulled out her phone making the call so it wouldn’t be too long after they got to her house the pizza would arrive. “And She’s All That.”
Shea’s special. I don’t know what I would do without her. But she has her moments where the most uncalled for thing is said and then pretending like it was never said. If only she didn’t come with an annoying cousin who was undeniably handsome. Why did I have to know that he’s not show
