Fast Times at West Hills High.

“Hey, Chelly!” My mom greeted me, excitedly as I came through the door, throwing her arms over her head as a way of asking for a hug, “How was your first day of school?” This would be an interesting shock for her. In my past life time I’d never actually made very many friends. I was always afraid to get attached to someone because I knew I’d be leaving them soon anyway. The people always came to me, though, inviting me to parties, or to go out drinking with them. That is, until in New York it was my birthday so one of the girls threw me this huge party. A kegger. That night I may have had a little bit too much to drink and ended up getting alcohol poisoning and not a few weeks later did my mom pit me into an Alcoholics Anonymous class. That was fun. One of the guys and I ended up being friends with benefits on the outside of class.

But shortly after we started to move down the coast and around North Carolina I lost track of him. He stopped calling me, I stopped texting him. We fell apart,

“It was good! I made friends, by the way. And they invited me to a bonfire tonight.” She stared at me with that kind of deer-in-headlights look. Like she had no idea what to do. I took a quick whiff of the air in the house and smelled something that meant good times for all who join; My mom’s homemade margherita pizza! “Mom! Are you making pizza?”

She shrugged and gave me that ‘sorry honey’ look as she turned back to the kitchen, “It’s your fault for going out on such a wonderful night!” I groaned and started to walk toward my room to get changed for the bonfire, “Can you save me some?!” I shouted this back to her as I trudged up the stairs. “Only if we can watch movies tonight!” My mom really does know how to celebrate. Margherita pizza and classic movies. Perfect.

I got to my room and started to look around. It was a plain, white room, with a closet to the right of the door and my bed against the back wall. There was an armoire in the corner that I’d gotten from Virginia at a garage sale. There was a small desk next to the door that desperately needed to be painted. Having been hit and scratched and scribbled on till the wood underneath the baby blue paint started to show through in some places. I sighed and looked at the few boxes I had yet to unpack laying, scattered around my room. One was marked ‘Posters’ another ‘Notebooks’. I put my hands on my hips and my mind started to run through when I would be able to put them up. ‘After you repaint and redecorate the place.’ I always repainted my rooms. And they all turned out black or a lighter color with christmas lights going around the window and over my bed’s headboard. And my old mason jar candles would be scattered wherever I felt they were needed. None of that had been done though. It was still the beginning phases of being ‘My Room’.

I sighed and went to my closet, rummaging through the various clothes hanging up inside. I was looking for my favorite tank top to wear over the only bathing suit I’d ever come to own. As my hands felt around the cloth for a familiar fabric I found my favorite pair of worn out, jean shorts. Complete with bleach stains and a terribly frayed hemline. They were so perfectly comfortable and I loved them to death and back. After tossing the article of clothing onto my black bed I went back to looking for the tank top. It was white and kind of wrinkled but it looked good all the same, with a design on it in the shape of a turtle standing on it’s legs, sticking it’s chest out with various tattoos in red on his neck and face going down onto the front of his shell. It was one of my more comfortable tank tops and something I held very dear. My mother had given it to me when we were living in Florida after the first year or so. I would never be able to let it go. After finding the tank top I tossed it next to the shorts and went to look through my shoes until I found this pair of spiked Zigisoho’s I’d gotten earlier that year. Well, they weren’t really spiked, they had small, round studs that were a little pokey all over them.

After I got my outfit laid out on the bed I went back to rummaging through my closet for the bathing suit. ‘Where did I put it?’ I couldn’t think of where the dang thing had gone. I’d been here for a week and I still hadn’t gotten it out of my closet and gone swimming. Well, I guess it’s time to show it the icy waters of the Pacific. I went to a set of shelves that were next to where I hung my jeans up and started to go through the clothes that had piled on top of them. It took only a moment to find the little white bikini in the mess of fabric before I tossed it onto the bed along with the rest of my clothes.

I went to the bathroom for a quick shower and so I could at least try to brush my tangled mass of fiery red hair.