"Taren!"
"Ugh." Brown eyes blinked open. "What time is it?" half lidded eyes searched the room for a clock to tell her what time it was. She felt tired as if she had gotten no sleep at all last night.
"It's time to get up. We're going to be late."
Oh yes. School. She was remembering now. Today was the first day of classes. After a wonderful summer of doing absolutely nothing but sitting on the couch, watching tv, and stuffing her face full of pizza and jelly beans, her favorite candy by the way, it was all coming to an end. And another year full of papers, exams, and petty high school drama had to start again. Oh the joy.
"Crap. I don't wanna go…" She whined and buried herself further into the covers, hoping she would just disappear and her best friend wouldn't know where she went and she could continue to lounge in the tiny dorm room and pretend her summer wasn't over after all.
Her roommate wasn't having it. "Get up! You take forever to get ready." and with a flick of her wrists, she snatched the covers off Taren.
Cold air hit her and she snatched the covers back with a glare. "I don't want to go! Can't you just leave me? Pretty please, Aryn? With cherries on top." She snapped her fingers as if a wonderful idea had occurred to her. "I'll do your homework for the next month."
Aryn's face scrunched up. "Yeah if I want to be held back a grade I'll let you know."
She wasn't going to win this one was she? "Fine." She huffed and began to get dressed.
Whoever designed these uniforms should get shot. Taren scratched at the offending skirt and stockings for the zillionth time that day. She was sure her skin was red by now.
"Screw it all." She muttered to herself before stepping out of her shoes and pulling down those damned knee high stockings and tossing them in her locker.
Her head rolled back and she let out a sigh. "That is so much better."
She heard a chuckle at her side as she closed her locker door.
"You know you don't have to wear those. The girls aren't required to wear the stockings."
"No I didn't know that. My roommate insisted that I had to wear them. But thank you. You saved me tons of scratching." She smiled sweetly at the girl who decided to inform her of the not required stockings. She looked to be around her age with brown skin and gorgeous long dark hair. She suddenly felt a little inferior standing with the girl; she ran a hand through her hair trying to smooth down the hair that she knew was sticking up.
She smiled back at her and stretched out his hand. "I'm Kate."
"Taren," She said and reached for her hand, "Nice to meet you."
"So are you new here? Or have I just not been paying much attention."
"No. I'm new. First day and all."
Kate giggled. Her giggle was even gorgeous. How was that possible? "Yeah, been there done that. So do you know anyone here yet?"
Taren shrugged, feeling more self conscious by the minute. "Just my best friend. We both transferred in."
"Oh, really? Where from?"
"Kent."
"Awesome. Well, you're welcome to come and spend lunch with me and a couple of friends if you'd like. That way I can fill you in on all the dirty details on who's who in Spenser Academy." She said with a smile.
Taren nodded. Why not? "Ok."
"Cool. I'll meet by your locker," she pointed to the locker Taren stood in front of, "I'll see you later. Bring your friend." She turned and walked away.
Well at least she made one friend. The school year was off to a good start.
Taren waved down Aryn in the hallway.
"Hey. Why aren't you in lunch?" Aryn asked. She was on her way to the cafeteria to meet her but instead saw her standing by her locker.
Taren smiled. "Yeah about that, I met some girl earlier today. She invited us to lunch."
"Oh," Aryn looked a bit uncomfortable before smoothing a piece of her red hair behind her ear. "Well, that's great. You're making friends."
Taren, oblivious to her friend's sudden discomfort, smiled. "Yeah, she should be here in a sec." her eyes scanning over the many students in the hall. She finally saw a familiar flash of brown skin. "Oh, here she comes."
"Taren!" Kate smiled as she approached the two girls. She held out her hand to Aryn. "You must be the best friend. I'm Kate."
Aryn accepted the offered hand. "Aryn. Nice to meet you."
"My friends are already in the cafeteria. We saved a couple of seats for you guys." She waved her hand for them to follow.
All the way she talked about her friends and how close they were to each other. Something about how they had all been through a lot together. She had a boyfriend named Pogue. Weird name if you asked Taren. And Pogue had three other best friends. The four of them had built up quite a reputation in the school and had even earned the nickname the Sons of Ipswich.
Kate waved to a table as they approached it. "Hey guys." She took her seat next to, who they assumed was the boyfriend, Pogue, that she talked about while they were walking to the cafeteria. She gestured to the two girls to have a seat.
"This is the girl I was telling you guys about, Taren, and her best friend, Aryn."
Taren took a seat across from Kate and she felt Aryn take a seat next to her. Her eyes quickly went around the table as Kate began introducing everyone.
"This is Reid…" A blonde that looked as if he was undressing Aryn with his eyes. Aryn noticed and folded her arms over her chest.
"Tyler…" a brunette with the most gorgeous blue eyes Taren had ever seen.
"Pogue," she gestured to her boyfriend. Who, to Taren at least, needed a haircut.
"Caleb."
Taren had just met her future husband. He smiled at her and her mouth went dry. He was absolutely gorgeous with his dark hair, and brown eyes, and perfect teeth, and perfect smile, and perfect body, and oh! Was that a dimple?
"And his girlfriend Sarah."
Her world just crashed down around her.
Dammit.
