L E O N I E

Mom was home when I came home from school that afternoon. She'd be pleased to know that the day was trouble free. Aside from getting into a heated debate with the tennis coach about the fact that she made the boys split into teams. Shirts and no shirts.

She insisted that it was a normal practice and I'd argued that she was a perv. The twenty nine year old woman was a former state tennis champion and she was adamant that her trophies were enough to have us all in awe. She had a banging bod and I'm sure some of the testosterone driven males in our class wouldn't have minded if things escalated with the Serena Williams wannabe. But it made me gag. She told me that I was incapable of getting through one class without starting an argument over nothing and I told her that I was going to get her fired.

It hadn't gone further. I half expected a call to Mom or a meeting with the principal. The fact that she didn't follow through just proved to me that she was as gross as I accused her of being. So apart from that minor dispute - pun intended - school had been a success.

Mom had called ahead and told me to grab some Chinese before I came home. So I wandered into the kitchen with boxes of wantons, noodles, dumplings and a side of fries. Because I could eat fries until I throw up. And then I would have some more.

It was unusual for Mom to be home before me. She was back around five or six most evenings. Unless there was something particularly pressing that kept her over time. She often brought her work home as well. Mom had some cold water on the table and she was dressed in her casual home clothes. We both sat down at our four person glass table and began unpacking the food.

"How did the suit go down at work, Mom?" I pulled the lid off of the sweet and sour sauce. "Meet my new Mommy?"

"Stop it," she scoffed, sliding the box of wantons across the table after she'd served herself some on a plate. She went first because I ate straight out of the box - pun not intended. - She couldn't bring herself to do it. For someone who was raised on a farm, she sure had embraced the upper class lifestyle. "How was school?"

"How should I answer that Mom?" I shrugged, leaning back in my seat with the a dumpling between my chopsticks. "I mean what do parents want to hear? Oh Mom, school was swell. I learned the square root of pi which is far more useful than understanding tax or mortgages or how to deal with workplace stress when I reach the real world and want to stab someone with a compass. No but rest assured, I can do complicated Math that I will never, ever need to refer to again."

She stared at me with puzzlement. "You learned the square root of pi?"

"No," I scoffed. "School isn't even that helpful."

"Oh," her shoulders fell.

I swallowed a mouthful of noodles and stared at Mom, who was pushing food around on her plate with a distant expression. "So Mother. What was so important that you needed me to come home straight after school? Did Gran cark it?"

"Leonie," she sighed and pinched the bridge of her nose. "You know that she took care of you when you were little? Don't be so crass."

"She's a witch. And not the good sort."

"There's a good sort?"

"Of course," I nodded. "There is definitely a good sort."

She nodded but didn't respond again. She did that when the conversation was too tiresome for her to deal with.

"So what is it Mom?" I popped another dumpling into the sauce and ate it, waiting expectantly for the news to be delivered. I doubt it was as thrilling as she was making it seem.

"I have to go to London," she said with a nervous wince. "A firm has requested me for a case after a report of the Hector and Son's case went out. That was a big one so it was in a newsletter that goes global. It would be from Thursday until Sunday but of course, there's always the chance that it could be extended as th-"

"Mom," I interrupted her rambling and she sucked in a deep breath. She seemed so concerned. "What is with the stress? It sounds cool."

She gave me a small smile and wiped her clean mouth with a napkin. "It's just that I haven't left you alone before. Well not for that long. And not that far."

She was right. She did travel but at most it was over night and it was within America. But I wasn't as worried as she seemed to be. In fact, this just gave me a whole lot of freedom and I wasn't going to complain about that.

"Mom, don't be ridiculous. I know how to feed myself and do the dishes. I'll be fine. This is a huge deal for your career. Don't even think about turning it down."

"I'm just worried. Because of- well-"

"Come on," I scoffed and averted my gaze. "I'm fine. I have been fine for a long time. Go and meet some hot Brit and have a good time."

She didn't even flinch at the suggestion of her potential romance. She was good at deflecting. She hadn't had a man in the entire time that I had existed. It was weird. But I was used to it. Now I just use it to tease her. "You're right," she nodded with a proud smile. "You are fine. This will be good. I would have brought you along but I don't think that missing two days of school in the first week back would be a good idea."

"Yeah," I nodded. "I'm good. I think that I'd prefer Australia. Save me a seat if you get a request to go there."

"Sure," she laughed and continued eating. "It goes without saying that I expect you to behave while I'm gone."

"Duh," I mumbled with a mouthful of food before I swallowed. "I'll have Jess over? We can play house for the weekend. It'll be good practice for when we get older, she leaves whoever she's married to and we grow old as lesbian lovers. It's a plan that we have. It ensures that we don't die alone."

Mom poured a few more noodles on to her plate. "I somehow doubt that Jess's parent's will let her spend the weekend here if I'm not in here as well."

A+ deflection for Mom. "So we won't tell them," I waved off her concern and began to flatten an empty Chinese box.

"I can't do that Leonie," she shook her head. "It'd be irresponsible. What if something happened and she was hurt or God forbid, killed? I could be done for negligence. Nope. Both of them will have to agree or she can't come over."

It can't be negligence if she doesn't know. "Ugh," I feigned defeat. "They'll never agree. Forget it. I'll go there."

"And I'll pretend that I believe you."

We shared a small smile and then I began the clean up. Mom loved Jess. She was like her second daughter. The entire group were familiar with each other's parents. But Jess was a unique case. We all avoided her home as often as we could. Peter and Jennifer were the worst.

I was sleeping over once and used my cell phone while we were watching a movie. The nutcase known as Jennifer pointed her bony finger at me and demanded that I hand the phone over for the duration of the movie. An actual mong. Whatever. We never spent time there now. Jess used whatever excuse she could to get out of the house as often as possible.

At school the next day, I walked into fourth after lunch with as much optimism for advance computer science that Blair Whaldorf had for her father's relationship with a male model.

This was our first class for the semester and when I entered the room of computers, I saw Bray sitting at the back with Ethan beside him. One could mistake their early arrival for enthusiasm. But I knew that he sat back there so that he could watch Netflix with his headphones in. I had no idea how he maintained an A average across all of his classes.

I sat beside him and said hello.

"Leonie," Ethan leaned across Bray with a hopeful expression. "Did you bring it?"

"Of course," I smiled and sat my backpack on top of the keyboard while I unzipped the front pocket. "One chicken and salad roll as per requested."

His mocha hand shot out and snatched the food from me so that he could eat it before the teacher arrived. Mr Frank was never here before the second bell. The six of us had just been at lunch together and while Ethan nibbled on crackers and rice with his girlfriend who made digs at the rest of us, he indulged his cravings once she was out of sight. No one ever gave Amy shit for her choices. But she had no issue making sure that we all knew we were the most abhorrent people on the planet.

Ethan didn't even need to ask now. I grabbed him an extra sandwich or whatever was on the menu before I sat with the rest of the table. If he didn't eat it, I did. Bray watched him with amusement as he scoffed it down at an unnatural speed. I was worried that he'd end up choking on it.

"You sure can eat," Bray winked and leaned back in his seat. "Hit me up sometime."

Ethan scoffed and showered the table with breadcrumbs, which he swept on to the carpet with a smothered chuckle. He gave Bray a shove and chewed down his last mouthful as he logged into his computer. We were given our new usernames and passwords with our logbooks in homeroom yesterday. The class was almost full and I greeted acquaintances who sat in the row in front of us.

Acquaintances was the word that I preferred. I had a small group of friends and I was sociable with our peers at parties and what not. But they weren't people that I would confide in or share secrets with. Therefore, I did not deem them friends. All love though. All of the time.

That was when I saw Harlin enter the room with her terrible tan and bleach blonde hair that had been fried to hell. She was neither a friend or acquaintance. She was the shit on the bottom of my shoe that was so smeared that it wasn't worth the bother and would go straight into the trash.

"Leonie," she looked down her nose at me with a faux smile as she sat down at a computer two rows in front of me. I could see her idiotic face between Mel and Lyle's computers. "Good summer? Spread any incurable diseases?"

The fact that she could keep a straight face when she said that was just another arrow pointing at how unstable she was. It was public knowledge that she gave half of the football team The Clap last April. Including Bray who was embarrassed to be reminded that he had gone there.

"Can someone translate?" I glanced around the room with confusion. "I don't speak mong."

"It's Mongolian Leonie," she looked at me as though I was an idiot. "Mongolians don't speak Mong. They speak Mongolian."

I pursed my lips in attempt not to laugh. I wasn't going to engage with this moron but she was too stupid for her own good. I mean, she wasn't wrong about the language. But she was still so slow that it amused me more than it should. "You're unfamiliar with my latest favorite insult. Don't stress. You'll hear it often enough."

She stared at me with a narrow glare for such a long time that I was starting to think that she was casting some sort of curse. But then her gaze darted up to my head and she pointed. "Heard of highlights? You look like a gothic dwarf."

"Heard of a refund? Because you should consider asking for one from the Salon that turned you into a walking mandarin peel."

She flicked her hair behind her shoulder. "I'll have you know that the salon that I go to is renowned."

"Going to a salon eighteen times a week doesn't make them renowned, Harlin," I sighed with boredom. "It just makes you the colour of Garfields butthole."

She opened her mouth to respond, but the teacher walked in and dropped a stack of textbooks on his desk with a loud thud that demanded attention. Harlin gave me one last glare and then turned around. I remained unfazed. She had it out for me and no matter how little I responded, she found some way to make a nuisance of herself.

I'd come to believe that it was a status thing. Harlin strived for the top spot. She could have it, I didn't care. But as hard as she tried, I remained in front. I hated to use the word popular. It felt so middle school. But I was well known among our peers. People liked me and it was because I was nice. Most of the time.

Harlin was a brat, she was mean and manipulative and she used her Dad's cash to get what she wanted. No one gave a shit about that sort of thing at Everglades. Most people that attended the school came from a well off background. And somehow most of us managed to keep our shit together. That wasn't to say that Harlin didn't have her pack of minions and followers. She did. Also irrelevant.

Bray and Ethan watched me with amusement as the teacher called on a student to hand out our new textbooks. "What happened to not responding?" Bray teased.

I shrugged. "Where's that Trump meme when I need it. Sounds good, doesn't work."

The rest of the period was tolerable. Bray gave me one of his headphones and we watched an episode of Pretty Little Liars. Which I didn't usually watch but Bray had developed an obsession. It was a good episode but I spent most of it confused since it was the middle of season four and I had no idea who the fuck was what and when what happened and how it worked.

Yep, confusing.

And just for extra points, I managed to outline the assignment that we were given to create a new homepage for the school website. It wouldn't be used. It was just a warm up assignment to get back into the swing of things. However, it did count towards our final grade. Logic.

We began packing up a few minutes before the bell rung and Bray gave me a shove in the shoulder. "Jade said we could hang at her place again this weekend. Her roommate is moving out. She's celebrating."

"Which roommate?"

"Alexis."

"Ohhhh," I nodded with understanding.

Alexis was out the fucking gate. Jade caught her with a cauldron in the back garden, stirring herbs and murmuring chants at the moon. That wasn't even the worst of it. She also found her in the bathroom, pulling strands of their other roommates hair out of her comb. The other three roommates started labeling the bottled water, 'Holy Water' and watched as she scowled whenever she opened the fridge. Lillian - a super sweet Christian girl that lives with Jade - started dating a youth pastor and whenever he was sitting in the living room, Alexis hissed under her breath. It was the fucking strangest thing that I have ever seen. She must have had enough and decided to join a coven instead.

"Yeah Jade said come over and bring some cash," Bray continued, pushing his new textbook into his backpack. It was a bit of a squeeze with his football in there. "She'll get the drinks. I won't bother inviting Ethan since he can't leave the house without his girl's permission."

Ethan sighed as he stood up and slung his bag over his shoulder. "She's not that bad."

We both stared at him, quite unconvinced. We did love Amy, she just needed to loosen the reins a little bit. "Come then?" Bray shrugged a shoulder.

He shook his head. "Can't. We're both going up to see Gran for a late Independence celebration. We were in Daytona at the beginning of August so we missed it. I promised Gran that I would come this weekend. She's big on tradition. I think she misses Jamaica."

"Fair enough," I smiled. That was one thing that I did admire about Amy. She was big into supporting Ethan's culture and traditions.

Ethan ducked out before the bell sounded. He said that he had a music lesson and his guitar could not wait. Bray and I swiveled in our seats for a moment longer. "Will you invite Jess?" I asked with a cunning grin.

Bray rolled his eyes with a grin. "Yeah of course," he nodded and I caught Harlin watching us with an expression that seemed almost wishful. She had a thing for Bray and had ever since the two of them had swallowed the entire contents of a straight Jack Daniels bottle and given each other cooties. "We could have a threesome?"

I recoiled and met his shit eating grin with disgust. "Bitch please," I scoffed. "I'll take Jess. You can sit on the sidelines."

He clapped his hands together and we both stood as the bell sounded. "As long as I get to watch."

He winced when I gave him a slap on the shoulder and then he told me that he'd see me in Biology for sixth. He weaved through the students in the corridor and disappeared. Harlin brushed past me with her cell phone in her hand and I ran forward to catch up with her.

"Harlin," she turned around with distaste in her expression. "I want to run something by you."

She scoffed and put her cell phone in her pocket. "What?"

"Bray is having a party at his sister's place this weekend. As you heard," I made a subtle dig at her obsessive eavesdropping. She didn't respond so I continued. "What if I played matchmaker. I bet I could hook the two of you up if you promised to stop being such a pain in the ass."

She stopped with a curious expression and we stood in the middle of the corridor while people passed us. There were a few students that seemed to go slow and watch, no doubt wondering if we were about to throw down. "Really?" She questioned with an arched brow. "You'd do that?"

"No," I snorted with laughter when her face fell. "I just wanted to get your hopes up so that I could crush them. Because you deserve that. Because you're a bad person."

I wiggled my fingers and left her standing in the same spot with steam coming out of her ears. It bothered me that I felt sort of bad. But whatever. I shrugged it off and went in the direction of English so that I could talk to Jess about our plans this weekend.