I tapped my thigh to the beat of a Kings of Leon song that I was listening to on my iPod. I was staring out the window, watching my new home from 1200 feet up. We were descending quickly, landing in England. I sighed and felt someone tap my arm. I turned to my brother, Jake, who was motioning me to pull out an ear bud. A sickly sweet voice that belonged to one of the flight attendants had come over the intercom and was reporting the weather and amount of time left before our plane landed.
It only took us an hour to get off the plane, find our luggage, and step outside the airport. I was wearing dark washed rolled up jeans shorts that stopped well above my mid-thigh, fishnet tights and my combat boots. I pulled the hood of my gray sweatshirt up over my head and yelped, "It's beginning of June and I'm freezing. What the hell is this place?" I groaned to Jake. He rolled his eyes, "just find the driver, and let's get going." We soon spotted a tall man holding a sign that read LANDON is black marker. Our parents had told Jake and me that we would be packing up our lives and switching time zones from the City of Chicago in American to England. So, in their attempt to win us back, because we weren't so happy with this plan, they let us fly out alone two weeks early to familiarize ourselves with the city and make some friends on our own.
Moving at the beginning of the summer is either a really good thing, or a really bad thing. It could be good because I could meet some really cool people, and have an amazing summer, or I could not meet any friends and be alone all summer. It could really go either way.
After our driver dropped us off at our new house, and we had explored and put away our luggage, we decided to go check out the city. I pulled on leg warmers over my tights and a bulky scarf. I put on minimal makeup and my dirty blond hair was blow-dried straight and into a side pony tail with some strings hanging out. As we walked around the city I felt right at home. I stopped at a corner Starbucks and bought Jake a large coffee to try and lessen his moping. "On the bright side, British guys are so hot." I said falling into step with him, "which means British girls are so hot! You could meet the hottest girl ever here." I grinned at him.
"Oh, all British guys are so hot? What about that guy?" He motioned to a passing man in a large trench coat with a handle bar mustache and uni-brow. I narrowed my eyes at my brother and spun around, so I was walking backwards. "Maybe not him… but I can spot three cuties right now and none of them are even walking together." I caught the eye of one particularly cute guy who looked around my age, and he winked at me. I grinned back and twisted around so I was faced forward again. Over the course of the next three hours, Jake and I had walked all over and ended up in a quirky little music store. I had five C.D.s in my hand and was reaching over the table to grab another when someone bumped into me. I immediately fell over, knocking several boxes of C.D.s over along the way. Suddenly, two hands grabbed my waist and stopped me from dropping to the floor completely.
"Oh, I'm so sorry! Are you alright?" A thick British accent asked me. I bent down to pick up the fallen C.D.s and responded "Yeah, I'm fine, thanks." The stranger bent down to help me and only then did I notice that he was the particularly cute guy I had seen earlier. "Oh!" Was all I could say.
"Oh hey! It's you!" he said, and started to smile. He pulled me up and stuck his hand out. "My names Harry and you are?"
"Hello! Um, I'm Bella." I smiled and shook his hand lightly. I looked down and noticed one of the C.D.s had snapped in two. He must have noticed my frown because he took the two pieces from my hand and said "Don't worry about it, I'll pay, and because I knocked into you, I should pay for your other purchases!" I started to protest but he cut me off. "Wow, these are pretty good, you have great taste in music."
"Those are for my brother, I was buying them to cheer him up." I saw his questioning look and I continued, "We just moved here, this morning actually, from Chicago, and he's not really sure if he likes it that much. That's him over there" I pointed to Jake who was across the store, talking to the owner about some guitar on the wall.
"I knew I heard an American accent, cute." Harry turned and walked up to the cash register, pulling out his wallet and handing over a few bills, "So, you guys should let me show you around, it's really not that bad. I promise. And it just got a lot better." He added looking me up and down. "Here, give me your number and I'll give you mine and we'll meet up, sound good?" I nodded and handed him my purple iPhone out of my purse and he plugged in his digits, and sent himself a quick text.
After saying goodbye to Harry I turned around quickly and rammed right into another person, luckily he grabbed my arms to catch me from falling. "Seriously Bella? Two times in like twenty minutes, these people must think your drunk.." I thought and rolled my eyes to myself. "So sorry!" I giggled and looked up into the deep brown eyes of a equally cute guy as Harry who was wearing a striped tee, and gray Toms. "I was so right about the guys here.."
"Its all good, babe. You alright?" I smiled and nodded and walked back over to Jake. He snorted. "You just completely embarrassed yourself in front of the first two people we meet here, way to go." He laughed as I shoved him out the door and we continued around the block.