Always and Forever

Las Vegas, Nevada was different from New York in many ways. For starters, in Las Vegas even in mid to late August the temperature reaches the high nineties and unlike New York this temperature is reached at mid morning and stays consistent for the whole day until night where it drops down to the mid seventies. Holidays, are meant to be a time when you can sleep in until midday and lounge around in your room with your friends, giggling over that cute guy who lives next door who is walking around in his room with nothing but a towel on. In Vegas on the other hand, the heat wakes you up at quarter past eight in the morning, you have to go downstairs because the air circulation is better and the hot air in your room is almost suffocating. There is no hot guy living next door to you and if there was it’s not like you would know considering no one ever comes out of their houses and then to top it off the friends to pass the holidays with are nonexistent seeing as you are new.

“Holly...Holly” I felt the bed sink next to me my mom’s soft voice in my ear.

“Hmm” I called softly, my face stuffed into my pillow trying to stop the sun from filtering into view.

“Come on Holly, get up, it’s almost quarter past seven, you don’t want to get to school late.”
I groaned loudly, there was only one thing that was worse than a lonely summer; a lonely school year.

“Come on” mom warned “Up now Holly”

“I don’t wanna go” I whinnied pulling my throwover closer to me only to kick it off a few seconds later, it was way too hot to have a throw over on.

“Holly” mom sighed “You sound just like Jack and Molly, and they’re six. Just get up, remember you’ve only got one year left.”

I smiled at that thought, only one year left of high school, and then it was off to become a photographer, just don’t tell my parents that, they still think I’m going to become a lawyer.
I rolled out of bed “Fine fine fine, but I expect pancakes waiting for me when I get down stairs” I smiled.

Mom rolled her eyes and left the room muttering something which I couldn’t hear under her breath.

I was downstairs five minutes later, dressed in a pair of jean shorts and a t-shirt my long wavy dark blond hair tied up in a messy pony tail. Of course, on the kitchen table there was a plate with two pancakes drenched in maple syrup and topped with a scoop of ice cream on top. Because this was Vegas but, the ice cream had already melted. Did I mention how much I hate melted ice cream?

For my sixteenth birthday last year I got an old beat up... well, to be honest, I didn’t even know what car brand it was, all I knew was that is used to be blue but it was now turning a steel color and that the roof leaked when it rained. This is Vegas however so I seriously doubt that there will be a torrential downpour which will cause my car to fill up with water and drown me and all my possessions. It got me around, from a to b, wherever I needed to go and no matter how old it is, it’s been two years and it’s never broken down.

Did I also mention how crazy some of the drivers here in Vegas are? I tend to be an overly cautious person so navigating the peak hour streets of suburban Vegas were terrifying. I managed to arrive at school in one piece and surprisingly enough, with five minutes to spare.

I climbed out of my car, reaching back inside to grab out my tote bag before slamming the door so hard it almost fell off. Stares were to be expected the whispers on the other hand caught me off guard.

"What does she think she’s doing?"

"Shit, she’s gonna get herself killed."

"Should we go and tell her?"

"Nah, he might think we’ve got something to do with it."

A tall thin brunette came rushing from out of her black Audi sports car “You need to move, now” she said urgently as she glanced around.

“Why?”

“You just have to, it’s his spot, not even we park there” she said in a tone which told me that she obviously was part of the 'popular' group.

She quickly ushered me into my car and told me to move into a spot next to her. She smiled and got out of my car trying to cover up the repulsed look on her face after sitting in my rickety old car.

“I’m Anna by the way” she smiled as we began walking towards the school “Over there” she pointed to a large oak tree which had a number of girls scattered underneath it “Are my group, come on, I’ll introduce you, you’ll hang around with us today” she said in a voice that gave me no other option but to agree.

We sat down on the grass and she introduced the group. There was Kelsey, a tall red headed girl with freckles and a near perfect smile; there was Amanda who had dark brown hair, tanned skin and piercing blue eyes and two other girls, Deanna who was short with a black pixie hair cut and Jessica who was tall with peroxide blond hair and orange skin.

Anna smiled “Just finished saving little Holly’s ass here, she parked in his spot.”

Most of the group gasped before Jessica spoke up “I heard he spent half of summer vacation in juvenile detention, apparently he stabbed a guy who couldn’t pay him enough for some coke. He just snapped, in broad daylight and stabbed the guy three times in the stomach and chest. Hit a major artery apparently, the guy was in hospital for a few weeks.”

“Yeah" she continued "I can’t remember who told me, but some girl said that she saw him downtown and he was snorting like crazy, seriously I don’t think he should be allowed to come here, he’s dangerous.”

The bell rang and we got up to go to class Anna snatched my timetable out of my hand before I even had a chance to look at it. “Ooh, you’ve got first with me” she smiled; I’ll show you the way.

We walked down the corridor and I listened in to the snippets of conversation we passed.

"Apparently his Dad got arrested; he was planning this massive drug heist"

"I heard his father is in jail, he was in the mafia apparently."

I turned to Anna who was walking confidently next to me “Anna, who is... he?”

She sighed loudly “He, is dangerous, crazy, psychotic, he’s Brendon Urie”