Driver's Ed

Mitch turns sixteen at the end of the summer. Its an amazing thing, but only in the way where she wakes up one morning and has suddenly has a figure. She's a little pissed to be honest, because now all her t-shirts stretch tight across her chest. Even her favorite shirt, a T-rex being chased by the Marshmallow Puff Man, is just that one bit too tight now.

"When did this happen?" she asks, slightly hysterically, cupping both of the irritating things and glaring into a mirror.

Kate and Heaven laugh openly at their friend, who glares. They're currently all shoved into a dressing room while Mitch shops for new bras. She turns away from them and shrugs another bra on, clips it behind her back and turns.

"That's the right size," Heaven says, pointing, and Mitch twists trying to see the size.

Kate takes pity on her friend and checks for her, "It's a 34 C."

"Great," Mitch mutters, "I went up a cup and a half."

"There are half cups?" Heaven asks, gaining a glare, "What? Come on, did you really wear an A and a half? Or was it called half a B?"

"I'm going to punch you," Mitch moans miserbly. This can not get anymore embarrassing.

"Mitchie!" her mom calls, banging on the door, "Did you find the right size? Do you need me to come in and measure them. There's a lady out front who's got a tape measure!"

Mitch smacks her hand over her face and groans. "No, thanks mom!" she answers, "I'm good!"

"Do you need any help picking anything out?" her mom is still shouting, and Mitch is going to die of embarassment.

"No mom, I'm fine!"

"Okay honey," she calls, "I'm going to go get a Coke. Don't buy anything black, it means you're easy!"

As soon as her mom's feet disappear Heaven and Kate burst out laughing, grabbing their sides. Mitch is flushed seven shades of red and she's breathing heavily. Heaven and Kate look at each other seriously, "Do you think she's going to pass out?"

"Nope," Heaven says, "She's fine."

"I hate you both," Mitch says, picking out three bras in the right size off a rack, tossing them on the counter and paying quickly. Kate skips happily next to her, while Heaven walks a few steps behind them. She's like that alot so Mitch isn't worried per se. She stops and waits for her friend to catch up anyway, while Heaven spins slowly in circles taking every thing in.

"Knock it off," Mitch says, but she doesn't mean it. Heaven grins and starts walking normally.

"Some times," she says after a minute, "I like to remember that the world spins on its own, and it's not just me."

Kate laughs.

[//]

"Mitch!" her mom calls up the stairs, "The guest are starting to arrive!"

"I hope Aunt Edith isn't coming," Mitch says, smoothing down the dress her mom is making her wear, "She pinches my cheeks and calls me by my mom's name."

Heaven sort of wonders what Mitch's mom's name is. Kate stands and stretches her hands over her head. They're there to help relieve the boredom of family birthday parties. Mitch's mom believes that things such as birthdays and holidays should be a private affair.

"Okay," Heaven mutters, "The sooner we shmooze your family the quicker we can walk on water." She shuffles out the door.

Mitch and Kate follow her, "She's not high is she?"

"No?" Kate says uncertainly.

"I can hear you both," Heaven says grumpily from two stairs away.

Mitch is bored. Really bored. But on the bright side, she hadn't seen her crazy great Aunt Edith yet, even though she knew she was there. On the bad side, she'd lost both Kate and Heaven some where in the sea of her family. And she really didn't want to take the chance to go find them. She's sitting on the "birthday throne" and she is not allowed to leave.

Kate comes rushing over with a piece of cake on a pony plate and sits next to Mitch. She hurriedly looks busy with her piece by shoving a huge chunk in her mouth and chewing slowly. Mitch's cousin, Michael, who is fourteen and wears braces, comes and stands in front of her. His face falls when he sees her eating.

"Oh," he says sadly, "I wanted to know if you wanted to dance."

Mitch tries really hard not to laugh. Her uncle had turned on something that was most definately from before 1960 a few hours ago, and it works as background noise, but there was no way Kate was dancing to it. Kate waves at her plate of cake and ice cream and shrugs. Michael's shoulders fall and he sighs sadly and walks away.

Kate swallows and looks at Mitch with wide eyes, "That is the creepiest kid I have ever met. He followed me to the bathroom. The bathroom, Mitch! And he waited outside the door for me!"

They both look over at him, and he's staring at Kate with a glowey, mooney eyed look on his face. He waves spastically, and Kate looks down and shoves more cake in her mouth. Mitch doesn't laugh, because Michael is creepy. Stalker creepy.

"Where's Heaven?" she asks after a few beats and Kate turns to look at her and grins. Silently she points at a corner, and Mitch follows her finger and laughs. She really can't help it. Heaven is in a corner with her Aunt Edith, who has a hold of her wrist, tugging her into a sitting position. She pinches Heaven's already pink cheeks and smiles happily.

"Oh Mitch!" her eighty year old Great Aunt says happily, "You've grown so well. Stand up so I can see you."

She tugs Heaven up in front of her and makes her give a twirl, "You're so adorable dear. And look at that. You've got a ghet-to boo-ty."

Mitch chokes when she hears her great aunt say ghetto booty, her eyes get wide and she laughs out loud. Her aunt catches sight of her and waves her over.

"Susan, Susan!" she yells and Mitch waves at her, "You've raised a lovely girl. Look at her pretty hazel eyes. Are you sure David is her father?" Mitch's dad's name is not David.

The night goes from there.

[//]

"When can I start driving?" Mitch asks her mom, on her way to the first day of school. She's a junior this year and the only good thing that happened when she turned 16 was becoming driving age.

"When you pass driver's ed," her mom says candidly.

"Mom!" Mitch protests, but she knows there's no point, because if her mom has made up her mind already there's not changing it.

"You're already registered," her mom continues, "I called the school."

"Alright," Mitch sighs unhappily, sliding out of the car when they reach her school, "Bye."

"What, no kiss?" her mom asks, but Mitch just shuts the door and starts walking away with an eyeroll.

Her mom rolls her window down, honks the horn a few time and yells, "Bye honey I love you!"

Mitch pretends she doesn't know her.

[//]

"People keep staring at my chest," Mitch hisses at lunch.

Heaven looks up from her pizza and snorts, "By people you mean boys."

"Yes," Mitch says, "Well, and that one girl that looks like a man."

"Rachael?" Kate asks, "She's really nice."

"Yeah," Heaven says smartly, "To you, because you're hott! She just glares at me a lot."

"Maybe she's glaring because you're hott," Kate says back, meanly.

"Yeah," Heaven agrees, "She wants my body. Or, you know, she doesn't like me because I once spilled a tin of paint down her back on accident."

Kate snorts, looking up and catching sight of Cash Colligan entering the cafeteria. She nudges Heaven who looks up and grins, "Look Mitch, it's your boyfriend."

Mitch looks up and snorts, "Shut up, I already admittted I was an idiot last year, there's no reason to continue teasing me about it."

Kate mimics Mitch, "But look at him, he's so cute. And he's got a tattoo."

"He's such a bad boy," Heaven continues in a high pitched voice, "Look at him picking on that kid."

"Shut up," Mitch says, throwing a tater tot at her friend."

Cash walks by their table, stops, and looks Mitch up and down. "Well," he says, "The summer was good to you."

"Hi Cash," Mitch says, "My face is up here." Cash does look up from her chest at that and grins.

Shrugging he steals a tot, popping it into his mouth. "What can I say, I'm a guy." He shuffles off with a wave and Kate and Heaven laugh.

[//]

In driver's ed Mitch sits down next to Heaven and looks at her with a grin, "How many times have you flunked driver's ed?"

"Two," Heaven says, her eyes following Gerard Way, this kid with greasy hair dressed in a black hoodie, as he walked in to the room and sits down. He glances at her and she looks away and smiles at Mitch.

"I like this class, the teacher loves me."

Mr. Beckett walks in to the room sees Gerard and stops, "Jesus Way, back again."

Gerard just shrugs, his little brother sliding into the seat next to him right before the bell rings. Then Mr. Beckett catches sight of Heaven and rolls his eyes, "You too? Who did I kill in a past life?"

"I've no idea," Heaven says, "But whoever it was must have been Ghost Buster famous."

"Well," Mr. Beckett says, "My year is ruined."

"I was thinking," Heaven says, "And this year I should just skip the theory parts and skip straight to the practice."

"Yeah," Mr. Beckett says, "Hell no." The class laughs, Heaven smiles, and then she tunes him out when he starts talking about the class syllabus.

Mitch listens to the best of her ability, but Heaven humming under her breath next to her is really distracting. So she looks around the room to see who else is present and her eyes stop and linger on the group of Alexes. Her eyes linger on Alex DeLeon, and he's totally hot, but sort of an ass. Not that she'd expect anything less from someone who hung out with Cash Colligan.

"Okay," Mr. Beckett says, "Now, we're going to partner up for the class. You're partner is yours for the rest of the year. No, you may not pick, change, or kill the partner I give you. You will learn theory with your partner, and when we do the practice part we will do it in pairs. Be nice to your partner, because you will be sitting in the backseat while they drive. You're life, their hands."

Mr. Beckett starts reading names out loud, and Mitch zones out, until he gets to hers, "Mitch Jones and Alex DeLeon."

Mitch turns to look at Alex and he's looking back at her. His eyes glance over her chest, and she turns away and looks at Heaven, who's grinning ear to ear.

"Lastly," Mr. Beckett says, "Heaven and Gerard. Now, stop flunking my class so you can stare at each other and take Home Ec or something next semester."

"Captain," Heaven says with a salute, while Gerard glows red and rounds his shoulders, hunching into them. Mr. Beckett is kind of a dick, but Mitch totally understands why Heaven seems to love him.

[//]

Mitch hates english. Or, well, she likes the subject, she just really hates Mr. Bennett, the teacher. He's short and fat, with noticeable hair plugs, and an irritable demeanor. Its the second week of school and she has driver's ed next hour, but right now she's just trying to get through this hour with out kicking Mr. Bennett in his balls.

"You are all idiots," Mr. Bennett says for the fortieth times, stops, peers over Mitch's shoulder to read what she has written, scoffs and walks away.

Mitch's face glows red in anger and and she clenches her hands in her lap. DeLeon leans over her shoulder from the next row back and says, "Ignore him, he's high."

"He's an ass," Mitch hisses and wishes Alex would get out of her personal space. He's been invading her space since they were partnered up in driver's ed and it drives her insane because half the time he's staring at her chest.

"Wait," Alex says, "Watch, he's about to yell at Cash."

Sure enough Mr. Bennett stops over Cash's shoulder to peer down at his paper. "And what do you think you're doing?" he bellows, "That is inappropriate!" He snatches the paper away and looks at the class, "Mr. Colligan thinks its funny to draw rude pictures of people in this class while I am teaching. He thinks it's cool to act like an asshole in my class room. GET OUT!"

Cash sends an evil grin to Alex and skips out of the room. Alex leans up and whispers in Mitch's ear, "He's going to meet Tarra Bratton at his car. They've been sneaking off to have sex all week long."

"That's disgusting," Mitch says, turning to look at him.

"Turn around in your seat!" Mr. Bennett yells.

Mitch turns quickly, and as soon as he's not looking Alex leans up and whispers, "That's high school. He'll probably get tired of her in another week."

"I am losing any respect I ever had for Cash," Mitch says, leaning back in her seat a little to continue the conversation. There's no use trying to ignore Alex.

"Oh come on," Alex says, "Every one does it."

"No," Mitch says, "Every one does not do it."