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"The Government of Brazil refuses to take responsibility for-"
"What a dimwit," I mutter and take a bite out of my proudly-self-made sandwich. I chew the sandwich inside my mouth and let the taste linger for a while. This is life.
Unfortunately, my appreciation for life was short-lived.
"Kiara Olive Leery-White!" I hear my name just as the tv screen turns black.
"Hey!" I complain, getting a bit annoyed for the interruption. But that's until I turn around and see who's standing behind me. Mom is standing behind me with the remote in one hand. Her nostrils flare as she glares down at me.
"You young lady," she points a finger at me. "Do you have any idea what time it is?" I angle my head to look at the grandfather clock behind her. It's seven twenty, less than an hour left before school.
Oh, school, right. It almost slipped my mind.
My dearest mother, Agnes Leery, is usually a super cool mom. She doesn't put her nose in her daughters' business. As a Professor of State University, she never even pressured us about our school. But there are a few things she can't tolerate. And one of them is tardiness, which I, her eldest daughter, is doing more than often these days.
I raise a hand in the air in defense before walking back to the kitchen. I find my sister and dad halfway through their breakfast there.
My sister, Kat, sticks her tongue out when she sees me entering the kitchen with a frown on my face. I wanted to smack her, but I can't afford witnesses. So I flip her the finger and hop on a stool with a huff.
Dad doesn't notice the exchange between us and continues reading the morning paper while eating his breakfast. He's a surgeon in City Hospital and is very popular in his profession. The reason we were able to afford a house on this street.
It's not much compared to the mansions a few streets down, but mom made sure it looks elegant and sophisticated. My parents installed a pool in the backyard. Though it doesn't come much use to me since I can't swim, unlike my sister, who won silver in the National Junior Olympics last year.
Grisbee, my white Persian munchkin meows eagerly from the floor when she sees me. I don't know what was going on in my nine-year-old mind when I named her Grisbee.
She comes to my feet and rubs her furry cheeks against my leg so that I will pet her.
"Not now girl," I tell her. "I've to go to school."
Grisbee's ears flatten. She turns her back to me and continues eating her cat-food. I swear this cat's ego is bigger than Russia.
Mom walks into the kitchen and goes over to the stove to make her breakfast. The moment she steps into the kitchen, she starts complaining about me to dad.
As the wise person I am, I don't try to defend myself. Not that I have that right anymore, not after what I have done all morning.
But to my defense, this all happened because today is the first day of school after the long summer. But Katherine, my younger sister-Kat for short-doesn't agree with me.
Today is her first day of high school and she can't wait to go. She even woke up before six and spent half an hour trying to wake me up. Me- who can't wait for the week to finish already.
180 days only, 1260 hours, I tell myself. I can do it.
Yes, I did the math.
I look at dad from the corner of my eyes. He half listens to mom and keeps nodding his head and comments a few 'yes honey, I agree with you' here and there.
However, it doesn't go unnoticed by Mom. Kat accidentally snickers loudly which draws her attention to her husband.
"William Johnathon White!" Mom shouts and turns around.
Dad, too engrossed in the newspaper, didn't have it coming and almost catches a seizure. He throws the paper away- as a result, the spoon he was holding also flies across the room.
This time, even I can't help myself and join Kat in the laughing fest.
"You two aren't helping," Dad grumbles under his breath.
"Sorry dad, but you're on your own here," Kat manages to say between her laughter.
"Like father like daughter," mom mutters, glaring at us. She pushes back a stool with all her energy as she sits down beside me.
Welcome to another ordinary day at the White residence.
After taking a bite of her pancake, mom looks at dad. "Weren't you supposed to be at the hospital before eight?"
Dad freezes.
I check the time and find it's 7:39 already.
Dad lets out a curse word.
"Will!" Mom shouts but dad ignores her and finishes his breakfast quickly.
Well, what else can I say? Punctuality runs in our blood.
Dad hurriedly grabs his coat and sprints out of the kitchen, not before pecking mom on the lips, making both Kat and I groan.
We still can't figure how come they were still so lovesick and the age of mid-forties all the time.
Except when-
I shake my head. Better avoid the talk as long as I can.
Mom sighs once he's gone and looks at us. "Are you two finished?" We nod in unison.
"Let me fetch my bag," I tell Kat and go to the living room where I left my backpack.
I hear Kat groaning. "Why can't I have my own car?"
"Don't even start with that," I hear mom saying. "First, you just got your learner's permit. Moreover, Kiara got her car in her sophomore year and the rules aren't going to change for you."
I bet Kat rolled her eyes at this.
I enter the kitchen and grab my water bottle, something I always carry to avoid unwanted germs.
"Be grateful that you don't have to drive with your sister's insane friends or boyfriend," I tell her referring to her two best friends, Melissa and Leigh. Melissa has to drive school with her sister and her boyfriend. And Leigh will have to drive school with her brother's friends.
"Yeah, I forgot. You're too self-respectful to ride with your boyfriend." Kat mocks, implying to my almost two years boyfriend, Derek.
"Enough!" Mom finally loses her patience before I can.
"Take a chill pill mom, we're leaving anyway," she says and kisses her on the cheek.
I do the same before we leave the house.
"Here goes another year," I hear mom sighing from the kitchen.
* * * *
"Mom was quite mad this morning," Kat says once I drive out of our neighborhood.
"What's new?" I say. "It's the same every year."
"And it was the last time too since you're graduating next June," she snorts, earning a glare from me. "Don't give me the look."
I roll my eyes. My phone buzzes on the cupholder. This must be Miles, my best friend. Brunette hair styled in a perfect mess, wearing baggy clothes, and getting rejected by hot cheerleaders, Miles Stewards is your typical laidback guy-next-door best friend. He's not serious about anything. Like anything. According to him, he doesn't care what he'll do tomorrow as long as he gets to live today.
I met Miles in the middle of Freshman year when I was having the worst time of my school life and my old best friends kind of ditched me, assuming I was changing for bed.
They were not to judge, I tell myself.
I try not to think of that day. Bad memories will only bring the worst out of me.
It was Miles who found me in the bleachers when he came to look for something. But instead, he found me. He thought I lost my mind and stayed for my aid. But then when he figured my situation was hopeless he started telling his bad jokes trying to make me laugh.
In the end, he suggested that I might be the ghost he dreamt about the previous night and said that he should leave before I carve his heart out. That made me laugh so badly that I fell from the stairs.
Later he helped me to my house. Then I got to know he was my boy next door for fifteen years and our parents and siblings are practically best friends.
From the next day, Miles and his friends are attached to my hips to the date.
That was the very same day I made my High School Survival Theory, something that's still reducing from having a breakdown. I wrote thirteen rules in the beginning, others were added later at various times. Miles thought it was stupidity in the beginning, but when he noticed it was helping me to stay sane, he stopped complaining about it.
Soon, Grace became my other best friend. She's also your typical very daring (but secretly very shy) type of best friend. But I love both of them to death and vise versa.
Miles's other friends,-' Jason, Luca, and Payton- also befriended me and never made me feel like an intruder or outsider in their group. I couldn't ask for better friends. They always made me feel like I was always a part of their group even though I wasn't. They're the reason I joined the newspaper committee they had started in our freshman year.
That and because my favorite teacher, Mrs. Roth who teaches are English is in charge of the committee. She's the first teacher who approved the idea when Jason went to her for help and helped them to open the newspaper committee. She also volunteered to be the supervisor of it.
Our committee is small but cozy and active. And the students love our paper, unlike some other schools, where the school papers are used to make paper-planes.
The committee along with my new friends and the Survival theory changed my life. For better.
And Miles was the reason these all happened to me, the reason I devoted myself to make sure he graduates high school in one piece, regardless of how hopeless his case is.
My phone buzz again. He must be texting to make sure I'm not going to miss the first day of my senior year.
Senior year. The year of freedom and free for bullying for everyone. But for me, it's the year of changing my life. Another year and I'm out of this town. Gone forever to chase my dreams.
I drive the car in our school's parking lot, ready to start the year. Thankfully it doesn't take forever to find an empty spot.
Kat doesn't wait for me and walks off to her friends who were waiting for her.
Kids these days. I take my phone from the cup holder. I lock the car and barely turn around when an arm snakes around my waist from behind.
For a moment, my breathing stopped.
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