Chapter Twenty-Five•She’s A Beauty

It was the first day of my Senior Year, I was surprised enough that I managed to get out of my bed and get ready and this song that has seemed good enough to catch my attention was With or Without You, I was brushing my teeth and brushing my hair. I put on Jeans with some Converse and a Jacket, I walked downstairs and saw my own Mother passed out drunk on the couch, the bottle was spilled, the cigarette had already burned a hole in the couch. I sighed in annoyance for her being irresponsible, I just walked out and put my headsets on and started walking around the Neighborhood, it was early still, I just needed to get out of there and now lately music has been the only escape for when I'm not fucked up. I looked around me and still walking on the grassy side that can pass off as a sidewalk and I saw my girls pulling around,"Dude get your ass in here!" My face lit up and I opened the door to throw my bag in first and slide right in,"We stopped by your house and your Mom said,'I don't care where she's at, she's in hell for all that I care' what happened now?" I groaned and shook my head,"It's just her being drunk as usual, she was passed out when I left, I just didn't want to stay in there any longer"

"I know how you feel, my mom and dad keep pressing on me about going to college, thinking that I'm gonna be some kind of Teacher or Doctor or some shit like that" Gretchen said and Yvonne joined in on the parent bashing club,"My parents don't even give a shit, as long as I make enough money to keep myself alive"

"And then there's my mom who doesn't care if I live or die" I joined back in and Juliet patted my head,"We care" We eventually showed up to school and saw a bunch of Underclassmen, it did not feel like I belonged here, it felt, I don't know off, but I still walked with my friends,"Here we are girls" Gretchen closed the driver side as we all got out,"Senior Year" I said to them,"Yeah, 9 more months until we get the hell out of this place" Yvonne said to all of us and Juliet replied,"Until then, let's make the best of it"

We went to grab our schedules and lockers, I only had 2 classes with Juliet, 1 class with Yvonne and 3 classes with Gretchen. We found our boys, Frankie and Reggie,"Hey, what's up? What's on your schedules?" We all exchanged each other's schedules and we have at least 1 or 2 classes with both of them,"Not even one period and I'm already begging for my stupid diploma" Juliet says to me when we all went our separate ways to go to our classes,"Me too, I just want to ditch all these classes and call it good"

"Now my parents are riding on me to go to class, apparently I wasn't as sneaky than I thought for the past couple years" Juliet rolled her eyes as she said it and then there was me, thanks to Dani,"You know maybe I'll try to look for someone special" She says to me and I raise an eyebrow,"Uh I don't think you can find someone in this school, like Dani said, all boys in High School only think with their penis, so the closest thing we'll ever get to is having fun"

"Maybe for you, but I want to be with someone who I can buckle down with, like…...Rick" I scoffed and crossed my arms across my chest,"Rick Gorodetzsky? Are you insane? Did he like, have an orgy with 3 of the girls during the 4th of July?"

"Could give it a try, what's wrong with rolling the dice?" She turned around and gestured as she walked into a classroom. I sighed and smiled as I continued my way to my class and there he was….the boy who broke my heart that was already broken, he was walking towards my way,"Hey, can we-"

"No" I walked away from him and he yelled in the hall,"C'mon you can't walk away from me! You'll always want me" It was awkward for the others to hear him say that and I completely ignored him as I continued walking to...Mr.Wilkinson Room 207. I set my books down and a boy was trying to get my attention, I looked slowly over at him,"I'm Greg. Greg Addison" I nodded and introduced myself to this boy again, I didn't want to depict his memory, so I just left it at that,"So how was summer?" Flashbacks to one night stands with boys, getting fucked up, snorting cocaine, did Acid one time, that was a weird ass trip, smoking weed and drinking almost any alcohol I can get my hands on, then came back to Earth,"It was okay, got to spend time with friends"

"Oh yeah Juliet, I know you two hang out" I wrinkled my eyebrows,"That's a little creepy, don't you think?" He began stuttering,"H-Her and I talk from time to time and I asked her about you" I was hesistant and looked away from him for a bit and back,"I actually do recall her telling me about you, why wait until now go bring it up?" 

"You kinda scare me, in a good way, I don't know" I scoffed lightly,"Well that has been the plan, so thank you" He was about to say something but the teacher came in, taking roll and that was pretty much it.

Next period, I had no class so I assumed that maybe I have a free period and so I walked to the main office and Mrs. Doris came over with her big frame glasses and super curly hair,"Why hello dear? May I help you?" I put my schedule on the counter and slid to her as she looked at it,"I don't have a period, so I think it might be a mistake?"

"No, no, no mistake. We have Seniors decide which class they want to assist, actually we don't have any Seniors helping us here this period, so if you would like to…" I thought about it for a few seconds and gave her a polite smile,"Sure why not?"

"Good, we just need you to sharpen these pencils, get some clean paper for the fax and printer, I'll walk you through it so you can get used to it" Oh god kill me, sharpening these pencils wasn't really time consuming like I thought it'd be, but she did teach me and I started working on it, I needed music in this joint. So I asked Mrs. Doris for a radio or CD Player,"Here's the radio"

"Thank you" She smiled again and went back to work, I tuned it to a Pop Station, this song was called Smuggler's Blues. After finishing up that, I went to go use the bathroom, I washed my face to wake myself up because I was about to lose my fucking mind in that room. I walked out and heard my name, I looked behind me and I rolled my eyes as I turned the other way,"Leave me alone Danford" He ran to catch up with me and I leaned on the lockers crossing my arms,"I miss you"

"Danford, we were together in Sophomore, what? Now all the girls that you've been fucking haven't been enough for you, so now you're trying to get back together with an ex girlfriend?" I groaned in disgust and walked away from him,"One day you'll realize where all the nice guys went then you'll realize that you pushed one out of your life" I rolled my eyes again but deep inside, I was holding in my tears. Maybe I do miss him, but I also need to know that he hurt me, physically and mentally. I took a deep breath that staggered a bit and I know that I need to get over it.

Later on in the day, Reggie, Gretchen and I walked together and he announced,"I'm gonna throw a party again. Homecoming Party, only Juniors and Seniors. Fuck the underclassmen. This party is going to be off the hook" Gretchen looked over at him and said,"I swear you have been throwing these parties since Freshman year, you're gonna get caught eventually"

"Yeah what if your parents catch you in the act this time?" I scoffed at that and put his arm around both of us,"Oh little Angels, we're not gonna have a house party, a pool party, but empty"

"Then why call it a pool party when there's no water involved?" I asked him the most obvious question and he answered,"It's an empty pool party, we'll have a Keg, weed and more shit. It's happening, this month, the 12th at 7pm. I know the perfect spot for it"

"I can't believe we're gonna be graduating this year, what if someone tries to top your parties" He sputtered and laughed sarcastically,"Believe me when I say this, no one will ever top Reggie's parties" I rolled my eyes, but it was nice to know that he likes to hold that record.

The school week went by, September 12th came along and we brought the keg down to the deep end. Reggie couldn't get the drugs, so it just turned into a Keg Party. Yvonne, Juliet, Gretchen, Frankie, Reggie and I brought it down and had all red solo cups,"We may all be graduating this year, but that's not gonna stop us from partying and this time, it'll be legal for us, but tonight, I say fuck it. Here's to Class of '88"

"Class of '88" We all said it as we all clinged cups and downed it then crushed it to throw it down,"So who's gonna be here?" We looked at the shallow empty end,"No clue, I told enough people to spread it around and have this boombox to play music" Minutes later, there was group after group who came to join and as the music was getting louder, everyone got more drunk and crazy. Reggie got up on the ladder and yelled out,"Here's to Homecoming!" We all screamed and cheered as Juliet, Yvonne and I were laughing at him being shitfaced then he started kissing a random girl as he pushed her 

up against the wall,"Damn Reggie has got it going"

"Look at him go, are you sure he's kissing her or eating her face? Think he might be hungry and she's a meal that he can't have" Yvonne said and we chuckled, I saw Greg dancing and he came over to me,"Hey Greg" Him and I actually have been getting along were well, he's bit of a nerd, he likes Chicago and Star Wars, Star Trek, but he's sweet. "Heyyy, crazy party huh?"

"Yeah, very crazy" He got droopy eyes from the alcohol and I waved my hand in front of him,"Are you drunk?"

"No I'm not, I'm just seeing 3 of you, why didn't you tell me you were a triplet?" I chuckled lightly and grabbed the cup,"Okay you're really drunk and might need to go home" I dumped it out and he grabbed my waist to kiss me. Not going to lie, I really like it, he pushed me onto the table and I groaned,"Greg, no" He started kissing my neck then started unzipping his pants,"Greg please no" He was panting, ignoring my nonconsensual response, he still kept going, he slid his fingers down and started to finger me, I whimpered as the others were ignoring because they thought we were about to have sex,"Please stop" I started whimpering and it seemed like it was turning him on more and he tried to unzip my pants and I kicked him away and yelled,"No! Get off of me!" We were close to the wall, so his body hit the concrete,he didn't have to say anything, the music stopped and everyone looked at us, he was about to come back and Juliet came to the rescue,"She said no Gregory, you promised you wouldn't do anything, leave her alone" He adjusted himself as I tried to get up without thinking of him touching, but it was too hard. My breathing pattern changed to quivering, then he walked out of the pool without saying a word,"You let the nice guy go and that ain't him" Danford walked by as he smirked, I walked over and punched on his back, he turned around when everyone circled around us. 

My hands were shaking and I couldn't believe what I did, but what I didn't believe was what happened next, he grabbed me by my shirt and punched me across my face and I went down like a ton of bricks, then Frankie and Reggie ganged up on him,"We told you to leave her and the others alone!" Kicking him, punching him to the point that he's bleeding, my heart was beating so fast that Juliet, Gretchen and Yvonne picked me up then next thing and looked at the mark you know, a neighbor called a noise complaint and the police end up finding 7 kids left in the pool under the influence so we had to spend a night in Jail. "We're fucked" Frankie said as his hands were on his head and he lightly hit the wall,"My parents are gonna know about this, my life is finished it" Reggie buried his face in his hands, I had ice for my face, I glared at Jonathan for giving me this mark while Gretchen, Yvonne and Juliet were sitting by me, Frankie and Reggie were just sitting in separate spots,"Hey when is my father getting here?" Jonathan leaned up against the bars and the officer said,"In the morning now sit down" He scoffed and walked by then I said,"Nice guy huh?" He turned and punched me, what a dumbass move,"Back off!" Gretchen yelled at him and the police officer ran over,"What's the problem now?"

"This girl called me a name" Yvonne scoffed and defended me,"That's not true, all she said was nice guy"

"Pull that shit again, I'm gonna let you sit in there another night" He was directing at Danford, he turned around slowly because of his injuries, but he wasn't injured enough to punch me again, Yvonne asked me,"Why would you say that?"

"Bastard had it coming"