Turn It Off

I lay in bed that night, thinking about how nice it was to have at least one friend now. Cassadee was real sweet, I feel kinda bad for giving her first taste of drugs and alcohol, but whatever, we had a nice chat and that's all that matters. I also decided that the whole wierd hand holding and eye-contact thing was due to intoxication. There's no way I have feelings for her, I don't fall in 'love', it's not worth the heartbreak. I'm pretty content with lonliness. But having a friend is, well, nice.

"Hayley." My dad says, tapping the door lightly.

"Yeah?" I pull the blanket up incase he comes in and sees I'm dressed, it's 8am, and it's Tuesday still.

"There's a visitor here for you." He says, visitor? What is this, a hospital?

"Who?" I grunt.

"A little girl from next door." Oh, must be Cassadee. Why's she over here?

"Let her in." I say, sitting up and not even bothering to fix my bed hair. She comes in and I take in her appearance properly for the first time, she lightly shuts the door behind her. She's in a black fitted t-shirt, a little cute yellow waist coat, and VERY tight jeans, and scruffy black converse. There is bleached blonde hair in her fringe and bangs. She's wearing a huge smile.

"You look rough." She chuckles, standing awkwardly by the door.

"Come in and sit, I don't bite too hard." I wink, rubbing my sore head with one hand and motioning her to sit on my computer seat with the other hand. She shuffles over and takes a seat, slouching forwards a little, her arms on the arm rests and her hands linked together. "So, what's up?" I ask.

"Felt like popping by to say hey." She shrugs.

"At 8am, don't you have school little one?" I say sarcastically, giving her the over-the-glasses look.

"Nope, home tutored, when I feel like it. I wanna start a band, anyway." She shrugs casually, "We move around too much to get a decent education."

"Oh, will you be moving on soon?" I frown, suddenly sad with the feeling I'm gunna lose my new, only friend.

"I think we might be settling for quite a while." She gives a reassuring smile. I smile back.

"So, got any plans for today?" I ask, stretching.

"That's why I'm here, I haven't, but do you wanna go do something?" She sits up a little straighter.

"Not much to do around here but sure." I say loosely, getting out of bed and walking over to my wardrobe.

"Let's go wonder off somewhere?" She suggests, watching me grab a pear of black skinnies and a baggy band shirt.

"I forgot to mention, you're from Florida?" I say casually as I pull my shirt off and put the clean one on.

"Yeah." She gives me a big grin,

"What you doing over here in the UK, then?" I ask as I pull off my fishnets and dirty undies in one go, I look up to see she's looked away awkwardly.

"Uh, fancied a change I guess." She says quietly.

"Ohh." I say, pulling on clean knickers then pulling off my skirt and on with the jeans.

"You sound very.. I'm not sure, Southern-y?" She says, looking back up at me once I'm dressed.

"Franklin, Tennessee." I smile at her.

"What are you doing over here?" She tilts her head, interested, I pull on some old red nike sneakers.

"My mum run off from me and my daddy when I was 12, my dad went through a rough patch. So we decided, well he decided, we should move far away from there and we saved up. We've been in Wales for about 2 or so years." I say, I don't like talking about this.

"Sorry to hear about that." She gives a sympathetic look.

"Hey, it's not your fault." I smile. "Been on a train over here yet?" I ask, grabbing a hoody and pulling it on. She shakes her head. I smirk, "Then let's go, what money do you have?"

"10 pounds." She gets to her feet excitedly.

"Let's go to the castle." I give a nod and she follows me out of the house. "I need to go to a party tonight." I inform her, "Wanna come hang?" I turn to look at her through my orange hair.

"What time?" She asks, interested.

"Probably about 10pm until gone midnight." I shrug, that's a guess.

"My mum wouldn't allow it." She frowns.

"Stay over my place! It's right next door, she can't say no then." I raise my eyebrows.

"You're a genius, Hayley." She smiles, then we stop walking and she rings her mum up. She's allowed.

We get to the little traing station and go in, walking to the machines, I enter all my details, getting a child (under 15's) ticket, per usual, it's almost half the price, and I always get away with it. I put my money in and take the ticket and change,

"Want me to get yours?" I turn to Cassadee, she nods shyly, I take her money and press all the buttons, she takes her money and change and we head for the gates that lead to the trains. "Our train's waiting in it's platform now." I notice outloud. "Watch me." I give her a small smile. I put my ticket into the slot on the gate, then it pops out of the top and I take it back, the gate opens and I walk through. It shuts again behind me and I turn to watch Cassadee do hers in awe. "Never been on any trains." I laugh lightly, she shakes her head.

"Which one's ours?" She asks, looking at the two that can be seen, I point at the second one and we go get on, grabbing two seats, I let her get the window one. She stares out the whole time, and I watch the back of her head with a small smile on my lips. I remember the first time I got a train. The guy comes and checks our tickets, stamping them, not even asking to check we're under 15, which is worrying.

"Our stop." I nudge her and we get to our feet, waiting for the light to come on to say it's safe to open our doors, then I open it and let her out, we walk across the near empty train station, headed for the exit. We spend a few hours sat in the ruins of an old castle, chatting about our childhood, our old friends, our favorite music. It's nice, it's calm, and for once I'm sober yet relaxed. Her tummy growls hungrily. I smile, amused. "Hungry?" I mock.

"Yeah." She blushes lightly.

"Let's get fish n' chips." I say, getting to my feet, "there's a real nice place just on the edge of the village near here." I give her a knowing smile and we head on our way. We manage to scrape our left over money together to get her a large cod and chips, I pinch a few chips but not many. Partying tonight. We head back to the train station.