Cause a Scene.

It was broad daylight when I sat up in bed and looked around in confusion. Where was I? This neon, zebra covered room was not the stark white, photograph covered bedroom from Rolling Acres in Reno, Nevada. My brain began to wrack itself.

Where was I? How did I get here? And why did I feel so comfortable within the expanseful, stuffy room?

Raising the palm of my hand to my wet forehead, I looked sideways out a wide window to the left of my bed and spotted a dented gray car wheeling out of the driveway in the neighboring house, a man with a mane of wild black hair in the driver's seat. Something went off in my head, and yesterday came back in a blur.

Ronnie Radke, my new neighbor... and this was my new room in Grandma's garage.

Delight coursed my veins. What a huge difference the previous night had made with the quality time I spent with my siblings; I was happy to be in Las Vegas, back home where I did belong with my grandmother and my brother and my step-sister and Pom Pom and my new kitten.

That thought made me glance to the edge of my mattress, where the little white bundle was curled in a ball, its sleeping face barely visible through the untamed fur rimming its head and streaming over the rest of its body. Her name was Pixie, Ella having called her that while piling books on my shelf. She found it fitting. How, I couldn't imagine.

Tossing the quilted, indigo bedspread off my legs, I slipped out of the bed and scurried over to the window. I heaved it open; it creaked from disuse and was so stiff, I didn't have to hold it to keep it open. My hands clamped onto the still and I thrust my head out into the Nevada morning.

The sky was a gorgeous hue of blue and the sun hung high in the sky, settled among a group of fluffy, white clouds. IT was hot, very hot, to be near the end of the summer season. Stretching from our house to the end of the street was a stillness; not a single breeze rustled a tree, bush, flower, or blade of grass.

Across the grassy gap from mine and Ronnie's house, a window was open much like mine and behind two white curtains, a Marilyn Manson song blasted from a radio and there was distinctive movement inside the room. I glanced at the driveway; the Corvette was gone with Ronnie, but the Camaro sat in the same place, with a black Lexus at the curb.

Ronnie had roommates, apparently. And company.

I closed the window once more and looked around for the second time, sighing. I found it painful to admit it, but I did belong in Las Vegas. It still caused my heart to ache that the day after tomorrow, Monday, I would attend a normal high school without a music program, but I could deal.

Giving up music to be with my family seemed like a fair trade off. Much rather I would have people who loved me instead of being surrounded by stuck up people who thought they were better than me because I wasn't the rich one of my class.

Sure, Grandpa sent money to help our upkeep, but that wasn't my money. All of it belonged to Grandma and Grandpa, not Chad or Mom.

Hadsell had nothing on everything I gained from Vegas. And, how bad could this new school be? Ella would be there with me, in the tenth grade while I was in twelfth. Spotting her in the hallway would be able to get my through the day.

Though something made me wish Heath was still there. It was known that I wasn’t exactly the most popular person when it came to going to school. I never had any friends, no matter how hard I tried. Other teenagers thought I was strange, because I was usually gathered within my own things, writing lyrics and working on music instead of partying until the early hours of the morning and doing stupid things like climbing out of my window to go out.

Or doing illegal things. I had a record, and I didn’t want to be sent away for something as stupid as that. Also, Heath’s girlfriend would be in my grade, and might even be in some of my classes. I figured out her name was Tara Masan, and it made me nervous to think I might not enjoy the girl my twin brother was infatuated with.

Grandma and Ella didn’t. But I loved Heath and understood him more than they did; I would never forgive myself if I obtained Tara Masan as a hated object in my life. The prospect of me hating Heath’s girlfriend might even tear us apart, ruin our relationship as close siblings.

Eh, I would do my best if she truly was all that bad and it wasn’t just Grandma and Ella being protective.

I walked around to the other side of my bed to my closet and stripped my pajamas off. I pulled one blue jeans and a black v-neck shirt, slipped on my Vans, and, taking Pixie with me, I walked out to the living room where I sat her on the rug and stepped into the bathroom.

Flipping on the light, I moved inside and faced the mirror. I brushed my teeth quickly, cringing at the taste of the horrid cinnamon toothpaste Ella had given me the night before, and yanked a comb through my hair and arranged it in the way I wanted.

I pulled my hair over both of my shoulders and, assessing my looks for a final time, left the bathroom. I grabbed Pixie on my way by and left my apartment, hopping down the stairs into the side yard.

I circled the garage and hopped up onto the edge of the front porch. I leaned over the rail and placed Pixie on the porch before gripping the white, fragile feeling wooden railing and climbing over it to land expertly on my feet.

I opened the front door, and was immediately hit with the soft sound of a Marilyn Manson song, the same one that I heard playing in Ronnie’s house. The song was fuzzy and muddled, like it was coming through blown out speakers or a broken radio.

Ella?

Pixie still in my arms, I closed the door with my elbow and inched around the corner of the foyer, peering through the archway into the living room. Ella lay sprawled out on the couch, the television flickering silently in front of her. ‘Mute’ ran across the screen in purple letters.

In one hand was her open cell phone, where the song was coming from. In the other, a glass of what appeared to be water sloshed about as she thrust her arm around, moving to apparently get more comfortable among the masses of beach pillows ringing the couch.

“How long are you going to be home?” a sudden, loud male voice filtered through the extended cell phone, bouncing off the walls and echoing through the house.

“I’m leaving for the graveyard in a few minutes,” Ella answered. “Grandma’s taking Hanna Beth and me to see Grandpa’s grave at Woodlawn Cemetery. Why, babe?”

I pressed my lips together, stifling a gasp. Ella was talking to her boyfriend, the mysterious force whom I had yet to meet, and he was at Ronnie’s house, just across the yard.

I ducked back within the foyer and leaned my shoulders against the wall. The connections surrounding my family and the people they were friends with were… strange, to say the least, and I had a feeling it would take a while for me to get used to it all.

Heath had a best friend, who was friends with Ronnie Radke, neighbor and resident rock band front man. Said best friend had a brother who was also Ella’s boyfriend --

“Hanna Beth? Who’s Hanna Beth?”

I leaned further to the left, edging my ear toward the doorframe to hear the conversation now that it had changed in my direction.

“My step-sister,” Ella replied, taking a sip from her water. “She lives with us now. Grandma said she doesn’t leave the house and she doesn’t make friends easily, so our alone time won’t be alone anymore.” Ella leaned over and placed her glass on her the coffee table with a clink.

A sigh passed through the receiver. “Even less alone time than we already get? Why can’t this girl go out for a few nights and let us have time together?”

And inside the connection, I was the unwelcome intruder already. Ella’s boyfriend didn’t like me and we had never met. Consequently, my hopes of Tara Masan liking me were dashed, and it was awful. I had been on the earth for seventeen years, and I knew that if someone’s significant other did not like a certain person, then their partner would not like that person either.

“Hey, jackass, you’re talking about my twin sister!” Heath shouted from the background of the opposite receiver. “You are fucking stupid, Mike. Hanna Beth is not going to purposely hang around to screw up your dates with Ella. B, hit your brother for me.”

“No, no, don’t hit me!” The sounds of a scrambling erupted through the phone. A crash and a slam and the voice I recognized as Ella’s boyfriend, ‘Mike’, huffing. Evidently, he was running from his brother.

I glanced at the front door, the black paint covering the original wood darker than it seemed before. The rest of the small foyer, from the bench in the corner to the coat rack on the other side and all the paintings in between, looked as if the black paint was sucking the light from the room, despite the impeccable white covering the walls around me.

An attack of claustrophobia clutched my insides.

The door beckoned me to open it and run back to my safe house of the garage. I would ask Grandma the directions to the cemetery and drive myself; I had my permit from Reno. Or Heath could always drive me if I really wanted to go.

I bit down on the inside of my bottom lip, tearing shreds of the inner flesh clean off. Pixie nuzzled her furry head against the stomach of my shirt. I looked down and into her bright, deep, shining blue eyes. I forced a small smile.

“So what if you have no friends, Hanna Beth? You have everything else any girl your age and beyond could wish for,” Grandpa once told me after I’d been crying over my lack of companionship. “He’s right, dear,” Grandma had joined in. “You have a big family, you’re talented, and you are so beautiful. Everyone says so.”

I never asked who exactly ‘everyone’ was, but I wrote it off as their old timer friends to save myself the sanity of getting into a question game with my grandmother, the queen of being evasive.

“I’m going home!” Heath yelled. “Anything you don’t want me to see, hide it, Ella.”

A chorus of goodbyes echoed through the phone. Thinking fast, I opened the front door and slipped out onto the front porch. I very slowly clicked it closed and collapsed into the nearest rocking chair. Pixie curled into a fuzzy ball on my lap, burying her nose in the thigh of my jeans.

I petted her head, sliding my gaze to the apparently bustling white house next door. The lawn chairs were askew on the front lawn, unlike yesterday. One was on the furthest left side, almost spilling onto the neighboring yard, and had strange, multicolored designs covering the backs of them.

The second sat, overturned, nearest me. Written across the seat, in bright pink spray paint, were the words, “We eat pussy!”

I muted a laugh with the back of my hand. I admitted, I was in no mood to be happy or laugh, but the humor of Ronnie and his friends meshed with mind rather well, and I found the spray painted words hilarious. The elderly people on Dark Forest Avenue were all going to have simultaneous heart attacks if they spotted Ronnie’s chair.

The screen slapped against the siding and Heath, his trusty sketch pad locked in one arm, hopped out and down the two cement stairs. He vaulted himself out of Ronnie’s front yard and onto our driveway in three huge bounds.

Halfway off the drive, he froze mid-step and raised his head, meeting my direct stare head-on. A smile passed over his features, then a look of upset quickly replaced it. “Oh, no,” he mouthed. “Hanna, are you okay?”

I nodded, but Heath quickened his pace and ripped his way up onto the first step, hand placed on the railing. “You’re lying. What’s wrong, Hanna?” He walked the rest of the way on top of the porch and removed Pixie from my lap.

I glanced up at him and the look of pure knowing on his face. Being away for so long, it became easy to forget how strongly connected Heath and my twin telepathies were. One of the things he had always been the best at was knowing how I felt, my emotions, and, when we were younger, knowing what was wrong with me at any given time.

Our separation surely put a damper on such things, but I would give anything to now have to explain -- better yet, attempt to explain, why it upset me… and why I thought it smart to eavesdrop on anyone’s conversations, most of all loved ones.

I dropped my eyes. “Ella’s boyfriend doesn’t like me,” I explained, running my thumb along the curved edge of the rocking chair’s arm. The smooth, stained wood slid under my skin like rippling water; the stain a glittering, black color in the summer sun.

“No, he doesn’t!” Heath stretched his arm out and ruffled my hair with his fingertips. “Who told you that?”

I stood from the hard seat of the rocking chair and opened the front door noiselessly. Grabbing the sleeve of Heath’s t-shirt, I slipped into the foyer, lugging him along behind me, and left the door ajar. I ducked behind the wall adjacent to the archway, the corner I hid in minutes earlier.

Heath leveled an annoyed look directly at me. I waved my hand about dismissively and jabbed my thumb toward the silent living room.

“What does your step-sister look like?” Mike’s voice finally started up the conversation again. “If she’s Heath’s twin, she can’t be that hot. Are they identical?” A variety of voices laughed in the background, and I felt Heath’s gaze fall upon my face.

All at once, he understood how I knew of Mike’s apprehension to like me. The irritated disposition previously surrounding him from my pulling him into the house without an utter of explanation disappeared, replaced by a demeanor of comprehension.

Eavesdropping on Ella’s phone conversation with her boyfriend was not something I felt particularly proud of, not in the least. I believed everyone deserved an amount of privacy, but the knowledge I gathered from listening in proved to be valuable, thus the guilt should not have been there. I had every right to know I needed to look out for my relationship with Ella because of her boyfriend.

“She has brown hair and blue eyes. We’re almost the same height and she’s skinny as hell.” Ella scoffed loudly. “I’m jealous. She looks amazing, and it happened so freaking fast! Only two or three years pass, and then, wabam, she’s sexy.”

“If she’s in the Lucas family, she can’t be that sexy Ella!” Mike yelled, his voice rising to the point of cracking the phone’s sound quality. It faltered for a brief moment, silencing all sounds on the other side of the conversation, then soared back to life with a new gusto, the Marilyn Manson song blaring louder than before.

I looked at Heath, shocked and unhappy. Heath’s face conveyed astonishment with a hint of betrayal pooling in his eyes; a mirror of what I felt and the expression inevitably on my face. Everything about this favored a train wreck, and we couldn’t stop listening.

Maybe I leapt to the deduction that I belonged in Las Vegas, and not everyone welcomed me with open arms in 246 Dark Forest Avenue. Ella not wanting me here and being jealous of me and her boyfriend hating my friendless, introverted lifestyle took away an immense amount of the thrill of my second day home. Grandma and Heath loved me being home in spite of everything, but I loved Ella! And she seemed so happy yesterday in the garage.

The bland house in Reno returned to my thoughts for a fleeting moment. My heart ached deep in its depths for not the house or the town or even the private school themselves, but more for the feeling I had when I lived there. I may not have had a single friend to my name, but I responded better to being alone than to rejection by someone I thought loved me like a sister, not a step-sister.

“Mike, stop being an asshole!” a smooth, lighter voice yelled. “Heath and the Lucases did nothing to you, kid, and you haven’t met Hanna Beth. Do you really think you should be saying nasty things about her?”

“Hey, wait!” another voice joined in. “Did Ella say she was a brunette, and she looked like a model? I want to meet her!”

“No, Max!” Ella gasped. “I am not letting you near Hanna Beth, so stop dreaming about that. And, baby, why don’t you and Bryan come over and meet Hanna? Give a second opinion and see if those nasty things are true or not.”

“Fine. We’ll be over in a sec.” A mechanical screech ripped through the air as the other line hung up, after which silence fell inside the living room for only a moment. Ella snapped the cell phone closed, flipped the sound back on the television, and a music channel flared to life.

I met Heath’s gaze cautiously. He looked down at me, and for several tense seconds, we stood in silence inside the foyer, basking in the sunlight streaming in from the gaping front door. Waves and waves of anger rolled from Heath, nearly choking out every other emotion I kept cramming into my thoughts, pushing away everything I heard sheer seconds before.

He had every justification to be upset. Mike was his best friend’s brother and he was saying such awful things about his twin sister… and Heath himself! While Ella did not go out of her way to stick up for us toward her boyfriend, and a stranger to me did this instead.

It hurt me, in all honesty, but I was willing to bet my every belonging that the words exchanged between the occupants of Ronnie’s house and our own hurt Heath more than I could fathom.

Heath snapped out of his tension induced coma with a quick roll of his eyes and pushed Pixie into my arms. I reclaimed her, pulling her into the safety of my abdomen, and Heath craned around to slam the front door. The walls surrounding the frame shook with the force.

Twisting back around, he grabbed my shoulder and pushed me out of the foyer and into the bright living room. Ella was sitting upright on the couch, water on the table and remote placed in her lap. She turned her attention to us as we walked in, and a smile blossomed onto her face.

“Hey, you two,” she greeted cheerily. “Bryan and Mike are coming over, Heath. Are you going to stick around long enough to introduce Hanna Beth to your bromantic interest?” She flipped off the TV and tossed the remote onto the hard, dark wooden top of Grandma’s heirloom coffee table.

“Yeah.” Heath’s answer was directed at Ella, but he didn’t look at her; he kept his eyes on me. “Yell whenever they get here. I’m going to the kitchen to get something to eat,” he muttered gruffly. “Do you want anything? A drink… Hanna Beth?”

I peeked at Ella, but didn’t catch the open hostility in his voice. Not to mention the question was for me and only me, and she was not included in the offer of a drink or food or… anything of the like. I understood Heath was angry, but it wasn’t like Ella said anything bad about us.

She was jealous of me because I apparently transformed into a model in a short amount of time. Beyond that, nothing hostile, evil, nasty. Why take it out on her when she didn’t do anything wrong? Except dating an ignoramus who judged people before he met them?

“Give me… whatever’s in the fridge. I don’t care what it is.”

Heath pivoted and stalked through the glass door into the kitchen, letting it smack into the place behind him. I sighed and glanced at Ella.

She collapsed into the cushy back of the sofa, huffing with distaste. “What’s his problem?” She did notice the aggression, and she didn’t agree with it. “I don’t understand why he zigzags from emotion to emotion.” Her hand waved around in the air in a crisscross motion.

She tilted her head against the back, purely white cushion, her eyes falling on my face. “Maybe he’s a Bipolar. Has your mother ever had him checked for that?”

I carefully placed myself on the arm of the couch, my back turned to the back, my feet pressed against the cushion. I set Pixie down on the cushion beside Ella. She stumbled around on her tiny legs before collapsing between Ella and one of Grandma’s beach themed pillows.

I circled my arms around my knees and interlocked my fingers. “He’s not Bipolar,” I said. “He’s mad because we were… eavesdropping on your phone conversation with your boyfriend, Ella. We heard everything he said.”

Ella paled, her natural, happy glow dropping to the same color of the couch we were sitting on. “Seriously?” she whispered.

I held my breath and prepared myself for the fit Ella was about to throw in my direction. You should never eavesdrop on someone! That is an invasion of privacy! So was reading someone’s diary, but that didn’t stop either of us from reading my mother’s childhood journals when we were younger.

Hopefully she did not pull that move on me. Heath and I knew better than to believe she was innocent of poking herself into other people’s privacy. She wrote the book on getting involved in other’s lives, and eavesdropping held an entire chapter within the Ella Zarin novel.

“Mike didn’t mean what he said,” Ella said, running her fingertips along Pixie’s back. She smiled brightly at me, though her cheeks were still slightly pale. “He’ll change his mind when he meets you. I hope he likes you, and I hope you like him!”

I averted my gaze from Ella’s eye contact to the beach pillow. Black thread rimmed the bright blue patchwork ocean on the stuffed square of fabric. The sand stretched to the end of the other side, with three intricate palm trees stitched onto the beige expanse.

Grandma. She was the only person I knew whom spent weeks sewing something as odd as a monstrous beach scene.

“Hanna Beth, do you think you’ll like Mike?” Ella’s stroking motions on Pixie wavered, and her voice came out softly, hesitant. “Or the rest of Heath and my friends. Do you think you’ll like them? And forgive Mike for talking without thinking.”

“I don’t know, Ella,” I answered, shaking my head. I looked up at her. “I’m sure I will.” I lied, and immediately felt like I should not get her hopes up when, more likely than not, I wouldn’t get along with Mike or Tara or any other strange person across the yard.

For now, I had a small amount of faith in a future friendship with Ronnie Radke. Time, however, would reveal whether or not even that held any prospect of strengthening into something beyond an acquaintance.

The thought was nice. A friend after only one full day in Las Vegas, and a friend who had all the makings of someone whom I believed I could get along with. Cool, confident, a little seemingly outcast, and he was involved in music.

Music! My entire existence revolved around my songs and my guitar and my talent, and only someone who roamed in the same pool of a career as a musician would understand that… understand me.

How I longed for a mutual understanding of how my mind worked. But not an understanding like that of what Heath, Grandma, Grandpa, and Mom had regarding me. Relatives aside, a person from a separate family, somebody the opposite of every family friend within the Lucas clan, was the push I needed to make the life I wanted in Las Vegas, music career questionable for the moment.

Behind my back, the door opened and two sets of footsteps hustled inside the foyer. One of them hesitated in the archway, and Ella craned herself around me in order to see the two not standing within our house.

“Hey, Mike, Bryan, this is Hanna Beth, my step-sister,” Ella trilled, gesturing her hand toward me before standing from the couch.

I remained motionless on the couch arm. I detained no desire to meet them, despite how much Heath and Ella wanted me to. The feeling of guilt began rising in the pit of my stomach already, for the undoubted fact that I was about to hate Ella’s boyfriend and Heath’s best friend.

“Hanna Beth,” Ella hissed, nudging my shoulder with her elbow. “Stand up.”

Glancing up at her, she snapped her eyes toward the boys and jabbed her head into the same direction. I pursed my lips and swung my legs off the side of the couch, pushing myself up to join Ella in the small gap between the sofa and the coffee table.

And I turned my attention to the two strangers standing in front of the open doorway, the sunlight falling on the wooden floors around them, and, although my expectations weren’t very high in the least, the tanned duo before me were pleasantly surprising.

Both had several of the same attributes: darker, tanned skin and dark eyes. Passed those minute details, however, they were completely opposite of one another. The one on the left was the shorter of the two, by about two or so inches, with wild, bleached blonde hair sticking up in every possible way, a cute baby face, wearing a tight, quarter-sleeve Iron Maiden shirt, tight, black jeans, and black Vans. A tattoo on his hand was the only one I could spot.

The other, standing on the right, would be considered much more handsome, by someone other than me. He was most certainly not my type. Shaggy, black hair covered the same dark eyes and hung almost to his straight jaw. His face was slim, not as babyish as his brother, and wore baggy black clothes. I saw no tattoos or piercings, though.

The only downfall I saw of him was he seemed vastly disappointed over something, like he hadn’t cracked a smile in most of his life.

The blonde looked me up and down, inspecting, while the other did not try to hide anything. His mouth was open and his thing, dark eyebrows arched.

“Hanna Beth--” Ella laid her hand on my back and pushed me forward a few steps, closer to the pair. “--I would like you to meet Bryan, err, Monte Money--” she pointed to the blonde. That left the unhappy one as her boyfriend.

I was slightly shocked. He looked older than “Monte”, though I knew he couldn’t be older than seventeen. A fifteen-year-old and anyone over seventeen could not have a legal sexual relationship in Las Vegas. It was illegal within the statutory rape laws.

If Ella was sixteen, it would be fine. Otherwise, no. Mr. Mike Money would be going to jail for a rather lengthy amount of time.

--”and this is Mike, my boyfriend.”

My lips twisted to an almost teasing smirk. “Ella, so this is Mike.” I looked fleetingly at her aflame cheeks and my smirk flashed to a full-fledged grin of pure amusement. “The one who said I wasn’t going to be sexy, because I was in the Lucas family.”

The same look of shocked surprise that Ella had before flickered over Mike’s face. His dark skin paled and he stuttered out incoherent beginnings of three words, but gave up.

I giggled, lifting my hand to my mouth, and smiled at Ella. “He’s cute, but I’m sure if I can forgive him for what he said.” I winked at her, and she pressed her lips together. “Unless he takes it back. What do you think?”

Monte shoved his younger brother forward with a single hand, sending him toppling into the side of the couch. Ella and I took a tentative step backward to save ourselves from being taken down with him, while Pixie skittered to the opposite side of the sofa.

Ella lurched forth and snatched up the sleeve of his t-shirt. “Mike, what do you think about Hanna Beth? And be nice.”

Mike straightened up and pulled his sleeve away from Ella’s tight grip. “I was, uh… wrong.” His eyes went up and down my body. “Very fucking wrong. I am so sorry about what I said. I… didn’t know what I was talking about.”

“Good answer.” Scooping Pixie up in one hand, I nudged passed Mike and Ella and sauntered to the French door of the kitchen. I turned the knob and pushed it open, peering inside to see Heath staring into the open fridge, motionless, his sketch pad abandoned on the counter.

He didn’t hear the door, so I knocked on the doorframe parallel to my head and he snapped his attention to where I stood in the arch.

“What?” he asked, sounding slightly preoccupied.

“Monte and Mike are here.” I indicated toward the living room. “Do you want to talk to them, or what?”

Heath closed the fridge and yelled, “B, I’m in the kitchen! C’mere!” He pulled two chairs out from underneath the kitchen table, before returning to the refrigerator and yanking it open again. “Sit, Hanna Beth.”

I placed myself into the chair closest me, sitting Pixie on the tiled flooring beside it. “Mike apologized for what he said, by the way,” I told him, folding my arms over my chest and sighing. “In between drooling and eyeing my curves.”

A laugh occurred at the door, and I tossed my head over my shoulder. Monte was walking into the kitchen, amusement written on his features. Whether or not it was at his brother’s expense with my comment or not, I didn’t know.

I twisted around and stared at the tabletop. So far, I liked Monte and forgave Mike for the most part, nee the fact that he needed to smile more, but did either of them like me beyond thinking I was attractive? A part of me had hope for Monte. Mike, not so much.

I twisted back around and stared at the tabletop. So far, I liked Bryan and forgave Mike for the most part, but did either of them like me beyond thinking I was attractive? A part of me had hope for Monte. Mike, not so much.

My eyes shifted to the door. Mike and Ella were alone in the living room. I eavesdropped once today; a second time to see what they were discussing couldn’t do anymore harm. I glanced at Heath, then at Monte as he plopped down opposite me at the table.

Doing it stealthily may cost me whatever explanation I owed if I got caught.

I pushed my chair backward and stood. I nudged it underneath the table with my hip and walked to the cabinets placed directly beside the glass door, still open. I curled my fingers around the black knob and pulled it open, revealing a slew of cups and mugs and wine glasses.

As I reached up to snatch the first one my gaze fell on, I heard the hushed conversation and voices in the other room.

“Why didn’t you tell me she was gorgeous, Ella! I made an ass of myself, and you didn’t try to stop me, when you knew she looked like that!” Mike hissed.

“I didn’t think you would believe me!” Ella argued, keeping her voice lowered. “Who would consider a normal, every day girl to look like Hanna Beth? No one, not even you, Mike, so I wasn’t going to argue until you saw her for yourself.”

“Okay, but I feel like shit now! You don’t tell a model she’s not sexy! It’s a one-way ticket to hell, Ella.”

“So you really do take back what you said?” I felt a pang in my heart at the tone of Ella’s voice. Mike didn’t often tell her she was beautiful, I gathered. “You think Hanna Beth is beautiful?”

“Hell yes,” was Mike’s eloquent answer. “And we can’t let Max see her, ever. She’s his type, brunette and perfect, and he’ll be all over her. You know that, right? Is that why you told him he couldn’t meet her?” There was a pause of silence, in which I imagined Ella nodding her head. “I see why.”

Using the toe of my shoe, I closed the door discreetly, and, taking the cup from the cabinet, faced Bryan and Heath, both now sitting at the table, cans of Coca Cola sitting in front of them. Heath was laughing at something, his mood lifted.

I smiled and turned on the faucet, dripping my glass beneath the steady stream long enough to fill it halfway. “Who's Max?” I questioned, twisting the knob until the water ceased the flow from the silver faucet.

Heath slowly raised his head and met my inquisitive gaze. He raised his eyebrows, but didn't answer my question. Bryan looked at Heath, then twisted around in his chair and put his hands on the intricate wooden back. He gazed at me, appearing amused yet again.

“Why?” Heath asked slowly.

“Because.” I sipped a bit of my water, smiling. “Ella and Mike don’t want me to meet him, and I want to know why.” And something told me there was more to it than not wanting him to have a crush on me. The likelihood of me feeling anything toward him romantically were slim to none.

Heath, hand gripping the Coke can, stared at me without a word. I cocked my head and tugged my lips upward into a smile. I wasn't going to leave until he answered my question, and he knew I was fully capable of waiting for hours until he caved.

I leaned my lower back against the counter and crossed one arm over my chest, the other hovering, bent at the elbow, holding my glass tightly.

Bryan was the one to answer me. “Max is Ronnie’s best friend.” He flashed Heath a malicious smile. “And you’re the match of what he usually dates, that’s why Ella and Mike don’t want you to meet him… I don’t know why.”

Heath cradled his head in his hand and rolled his eyes. “They’re stupid, that’s why.”

Bryan sat back in his chair, and he and Heath launched into another conversation, but I didn’t listen. I looked out the glass door into the living room. Ella and Mike were now kissing, obviously having dropped any important discussion of any kind.

I grimaced. Witnessing my younger sister make out with someone disturbed my very core. Only a year separated me from her, but it still caused my stomach to roll with disgust, and hurt. Ella was too young to get so involved with a guy.

I was about to look away when I spotted Grandma barreling down the staircase, hair streaming out behind her, wearing white slacks, kitten heels, and a button-up silk blouse. Her purse flopped from her shoulder, and she held her cell phone against her ear, looking peeved.

She walked passed Mike and Ella without a second glance and veered around the couch, recliner, and coffee table, and straight for the closed door. I opened it quickly as Grandma moved inside, giving no greeting of any kind, just standing in silence, staring at the floor with the phone unmoving, glued to the side of her head.

“Lucy… Lucy… Lu -- L --Lucy! Just sign for the shipment! I ordered the owl pendants,” she said exasperatedly. “Sign for it, then phone Tabitha and tell her we’re still missing the sterling silver set, alright? Alright. Bye.” She flipped the cell phone closed.

Grandma owned a jewelry company called Le Paradis. She ran every aspect of the establishment and also designed several of the necklaces sold within the store located in North Las Vegas. Le Paradis had head designers now that it was more popular, but Grandma refused to give up everything she loved, and that included creating charms that people loved.

Her scatter-brained assistant was Lucy. The few times I had met her, I gathered she was not the most organized or resourceful person in the world. She was not the correct personality to be working as my grandmother’s right hand woman.

“How’s the jewelry thing going?” I asked, trying to hide my amusement.

“Fine,” Grandma muttered, and rolled her eyes. She dropped her phone with a clunk into the bottom of her purse. “Are you ready to go to Woodlawn?”

“Hey, you’re going to see Grandpa’s grave?” Heath called, pushing his chair backward with a screech. “Can I come?” As an afterthought, he turned and looked at Bryan. “You want to come with us to the cemetery?”

“I’m in.”

Grandma frowned and passed a look at the three of us. “Well, Hanna Beth, if you don’t mind, can Heath take you since he and Bryan want to go? I should check on Lucy at the store anyway.”

“I don’t mind.”

“Good.” Grandma kissed my cheek, bid me goodbye, and rushed out of the kitchen and out of the house, the door slamming behind her. Moments later, I listened to her Jaguar roar to life in the driveway and rip out into the street.

I looked at Heath. “Can we go now? Please?”

“’Kay.”

Heath and Bryan rose from their chairs, scooting them backward on the faux-stone tiles, and I, sitting my glass of water on the counter, led the way out into the living room, a bounce in my step. I approached the couch from behind, where Mike and Ella were kissing again.

Draping my arms over the back cushion, I leaned my face close to the two of them, cocking one leg out behind me. “Hey, lovebirds!” I shouted, and they vaulted apart.

Ella scrambled to the left side of the couch and cupped her hand over her mouth. Mike remained in his spot, but stared up at me like I lost all sanity. I smiled and patted him on the back before looking at Ella, watching me with wide eyes and red cheeks.

“Ella, we’re going to the cemetery, but Heath is driving.” I ran my hand through my hair, tucking the locks behind me ear. “Grandma had to go to work. Do you want to come or…” I eyed Mike, whose eyes were somewhere they did not belong “--finish what you two were doing on Grandma’s furniture.”

Ella shook her head, dropping her hand to her lap. “We’ll stay here. Right, ba -- Mike?”

“Mhm.” His eyes ventured from my chest, lower along my frame.

I stood to my full height and turned my back on his prying eyes. Heath, hands stuffed in his pockets, motioned for Bryan and myself to follow him. I strolled to the front door, Bryan at my heels. I dashed into the comfort of the hot sun onto the front porch.

Bryan closed the door, and Heath hopped down the stairs.

“Stay here!” he called over his shoulder, streaking toward the garage over the grass.

I stopped at the top stair and leaned my shoulder against the railing post. The garage door raised slowly, revealing a white Toyota Prius, Heath’s car. It was cleaner than I expected it to be, knowing Heath and his lack of cleaning ability. The inside was hopefully the mirror image of the outside, because I had no desire to sit in paper bags from fast food restaurants and dirt.

Bryan slid to my side and wrapped an arm around my shoulders. “Sorry about my brother,” he muttered. “Take it as a compliment though. He only stares at cute girls.”

“He told Ella he feels like an ass for what he said.” I tilted my head back, smiling at this new person who was suddenly acting like we had been friends for years, let alone hours. And it was rather nice. “Apparently you aren't supposed to tell a ‘model she's not sexy‘.”

I laughed, casting my eyes out at the bright blue sky, over the pointed roof of the house across the street. Two small children were playing out on the front lawn of the large, beautiful blue house. One was a small, blonde toddler girl, the other a dark haired little boy, and both played with a gigantic Golden Retriever. They laughed like maniacal dolls and it echoed up and down the neighborhood.

The mother, a blonde haired, slight woman, sat in a rocking chair, watching her children with proud eyes.

I tilted my head against the railing post. The picture was adorable, a scene ripped straight from a movie, strong enough to make my heart melt and twinge. It was nearly a sweet cliché of the perfect suburb life in any city.

Heath’s Prius backed up into the driveway, just as a gray Corvette roared into the drive next door, taking me from the scene across the street. I stepped out of Bryan’s arm and skipped onto the cement walkway.

Ronnie climbed out of his car. “Hey, Lucas. What are you doing?” His eyes flashed over the top of his shining car and met mine. He smirked. “Hanna Beth! Good to see you again. You look fucking great, by the way!”

“Thanks!” I walked to the awaiting Prius.

Heath exchanged a glance between me and Ronnie. “Radke, you met my sister? When?”

“Yesterday,” Ronnie answered, pocketing his keys and coming to join us in our side of the car. “Where are you kidnapping Monte to? And can I come?” He scoffed. “Can, hell! I’m coming anyway. Where you going?”

Heath folded his arms on the roof of the car. “We’re going to the cemetery so Hanna Beth can see Grandpa’s grave. You really want to come, Radke?”

“Yes, Lucas, now shut up and get in the car.” Ah, the best of friends they were. “Ladies up front! And, yes, that means you, Lucas, and Hanna Beth.” Ronnie dove into the backseat, and Bryan joined him on the opposite side.

Glancing at Heath and his amused expression, I circled the car and climbed into the passenger’s seat.

Five minutes later, music coursed from the speakers in front of me, a slow alternative song with a strong, female voice singing something about roses. I recognized it as Halestorm and mouthed the words and tapped my left hand in the beat of the guitar chords.

Elbow resting against the door handle, the palm of my hand supported my chin. I watched various buildings and stores placed on Las Vegas Boulevard pass by my open window, the wind tunneling through the open space whipping my hair around my face.

“Hey, Hanna.” Ronnie leaned between the passenger and driver’s seats and tapped my shoulder. “What school are you going to?”

I leaned my head against the headrest. “Arbor View High, the same school as Ella.” Yippee. Nothing could make me think Arbor View was going to be a fun experience for me. I didn’t want to go; I was going to hate it, as well as all the other teenagers there.

Ronnie blew out a hissing breath. “Arbor View? Damn, that school is the fucking ghetto.” He disappeared back into the rear of the car. “Bad things happen there.”

I twisted around in my seat. “What? It’s a bad place?” One more thing to look forward to. A dangerous school in the ghetto; the school I was doomed to attend on Monday.

“People get shanked there,” Bryan explained.

“That was once!” Heath cried. “Now stop worrying her, guys. She already doesn’t want to go. Besides, if anything bad happens, Radke and I are your bodyguards. Remember that, sis.” And the conversation was dropped, but my worry went into overdrive. I did not want to get shanked on my first day at a new high school.

I dropped out of the conversation following the "shanking" of Arbor View High School, but, thankfully, only a minute or so elapsed between then and when I spotted a sprawling cemetery behind a thick, black iron fence.

Heath turned the car up a small, slanted blacktop ramp and swerved around a bright green tree planted in the middle of the entrance. The car slowed to a leisurely crawl as the tires rolled over a slim, tree-lined, cement lane stretching the entire length of the cemetery.

I gripped the glass of the open window and leaned out, watching the beautiful black, white, beige, and marbled gravestones passing by our little car. Rows and rows sitting atop impeccably green grass, spotted with brown sections of dead plant life.

A cement lane identical to the one we drove on passed by the window, then another, and Heath pulled the car to a stop, pulling it into park and cutting the engine. I looked over my shoulder at him.

"Is this it?"

Heath nodded. I pushed open the car door and climbed out into the Las Vegas heat. The others followed suit, and Heath, having circled around the hood of his car at record speed, gripped my elbow and lead onto the grass and through the first row of gravestones, Ronnie and Bryan acting as our shadows.

We came to a stop in front of a purely white gravestone reading, “Husband, father, grandfather: James S. Lucas. May 9, 1945 - July 28, 2007. He shall be missed.”

I raised my hand to my collar. I had planned on telling him goodbye and saying I was sorry I wasn’t there for him when he died, or at his funeral. Instead, I broke down and sobbed, burying my face in my hands. This was too real, much too final for me. Without the proof of him being dead, without seeing his final resting place set in stone right before my eyes in Woodlawn, I could pretend things were alright.

I wanted to pretend James Schuyler Lucas was still alive! But he wasn’t, and this gravestone proved all of my fears, confirmed his death in my brain. I did not want to believe it. I wanted to deny it.

Before I knew what was going on, Heath, Ronnie, and Bryan were pulling me from the ground and gathering me into a disheveled group hug.

“We’re here for you,” Heath whispered.

And I realized he was right. Heath, as well as Ronnie Radke and Monte Money, two real friends, and after only two days in Las Vegas, Nevada.