Chapter2

#Chapter2

I remember my first love, here. Every time I come here there seems to be a boy that catches my eye, or I catch theirs. But the first time, I was fifteen. His name was Hunter and he was a year older than me, so the fact that he liked me made me feel extra pretty. I didn't know much back then, nearly nothing about real romance and how much it sucks. The idea of having a boyfriend was simply exciting and fresh, and I just wanted to be his girlfriend. When you're fifteen, becoming someone's girlfriend isn't the hard part, it's the actual relationship that takes the life out of you.

It's the reality of teenage boys that make a girl want to give up on love altogether.

I met Hunter at the beach, got his name and age and useless information before seeing him again at the boulders. The boulders are at the end of the beach where the teenagers like to hang out and be delinquents. At fifteen, it was my first time venturing to the boulders, and I had only gone because he said he was going to be there. Like its name, the place is just full of boulders, and no one really knows how they got there, but kids like to spray paint them and the seawater eats away at the bottoms. Hunter was my first kiss and it happened on top of one of the boulders. Since we kissed, we were now dating. It was simple but dangerous.

I was known as Hunter's girlfriend that summer, and there's a lot that came with the title. A lot I didn't expect.

When we arrive at the house, my mother wakes me up, and I carry my suitcase to the front door, up the porch steps. My Aunt welcomes us in a rush—she always seems rushed for some reason—but I immediately head to my bedroom and forget about everyone. It smells the same. That salty, rustic, wooden smell that makes my heart feel light in my chest. I place my suitcase down by the door and wander in. There are the shells, of course. They line the chipped window sills and cover the top of the dresser. I pick up a few and feel them in my hands before sitting down on the bed with my favorite one to look out at the beach.

It's a conch shell. Broken, but not enough to make me hate it. The beach looks very welcoming as usual, and I have an urge to run into it. My parents and my Aunts voices play over and over again in the background as I walk to the window, getting a better look at my surroundings. I can see the tip of the neighbor's house. An elderly couple lives there. I remember that.

A memory pops into my head suddenly, and I ditch the window for the closet. I open the door and fall to my knees, scanning the bottom of the wall for my carvings. I find them by the corner. 'HJ.' 'MT.' 'KL.' All in a row. They're all here.

Hunter Jackson, Milo Talker, and Kaden Lane.

I would mutter 'good times,' but they weren't good at all. Teenage boys are terrible. They make you feel special, use you, then dump you. It's like they're born with the formula embedded in their brains. Girls are hopeless, though. It can't be all the boy's fault. It takes two to ruin a relationship, I think. The girls let themselves feel special and stay throughout the using because some of us fear we will never love again.

Nothing is used more casually and more seriously among girls than the phrase, 'forever alone.' Every girl has said it at least once, even if it was a joke or cried while sitting in their bathtub with mascara smeared underneath their eyes.

If a girl never fell in love before, she would be the luckiest one out of all of us. Once you're in, you crave the feelings. It's like a weird drug that we can't get enough of. It hurts us, it really hurts us, but we keep trying to get more. Girls have always been a generation of drug-addicts, and the drug is boys. The difference between girls and boys is that girls revolve their lives around one drug. They're completely satisfied with that drug. But boys, they want it all. They want to try everything at once. They want to binge on one then another then another, not becoming addicted at all, they just feel the sensations then move on.

I believe that three drugs have brought me to my lowest point and those are, Hunter, Milo, and Kaden.

A knock comes to my door and I scramble from the ground just in time. My mother peeks in and finds me standing awkwardly in the middle of the room. /"Oh, hi. I just wanted to remind you about Sally. Didn't she say that she’d have a job for you when you got here?/"

/"Yeah, I'll go to the shop now. Thanks./"

She smiles before leaving, giving me the same motherly smile that she always does. My mother believes I'm a good person deep down. She knows I've done stupid things, but only half of them. If she knew everything, I don't think she'd like me as much.

I make my way to the center of town, which only takes a few minutes. The beach house is only a couple blocks away from the t-shirt shop, and when I arrive, I take a minute to lean over the sea wall and look down. The tide is making its way back in, and by night the water will be covering most of the rocks. The afternoon is almost over, so most people at the beach are beginning to pack up for the day.

I wander into the shop and scan for any person at all. /"Sally?/" I call, heading to the back where the cash register is. There's a clear container sitting on the counter beside the cash register. It's full of small keychains. Some are surfboards, some are flip flops, and I spot only one turtle. I pick up the turtle and drop it back down for no reason at all. Mindless actions come with no warning.

/"Emma? Hey, I'm glad you're back./"

I glance up to see Sally coming out of the back room. /"Yeah, I just stopped by to find out about the job you had for me./"

Sally is a middle-aged woman who's permanently tanned and blonder than Barbie. She always wears this small necklace with a black stone on it, and it takes away from the sunspots on her chest. /"Of course. I've been saving you a position since you were fifteen and asked to work here, right? Well, it's finally time. I won't have you on the heat press, but you'll help people find a shirt or hoodie they like and the transfer design they want. Just walk around, greet people as they come in, ask if they need help, grab the transfers from the back when they're ready and hand it to whoever is working on the press. Usually, it'll be Brandon these days,/" her eyes drift then shoot back to me. /"But I'll make tomorrow your training day if you're ready? It's a Monday so it shouldn't be too busy./"

I nod. /"Okay. What time should I be here?/"

/"Uh, let's make it noon. We usually open later on weekdays. By noon we should be in full swing./"

I nod again, somewhat excited for this. It's true, I have wanted to work here since I was fifteen. I have a collection of clothes from this shop all with the same design on it. Sally thinks it's weird of me to only want the sunset design, but she began to like me for it. Even now when I look up at the wall—where all the designs are displayed—my eyes are immediately engrossed in the sunset transfer in the top right corner. It's simple. It's a large, warm colored sun slowly melting into nothing.

/"Okay, I'll be here at twelve then. See you tomorrow./"

/"Have a nice night,/" Sally calls as I exit the shop.