The Resistance

Chapter One

My name is Garritt; I am a teenage nothing. I am fifteen but my birthday is tomorrow so I might as well say I am sixteen. I am average for a teenage guy, kind of skinny with tiny muscles; I have light blondish red hair with blue gray eyes. Well maybe I am not completely normal; my eyes are a bit unusual they change colors with my mood.

In my mind, I keep thinking summer break is almost here. School will be out and I can hang at home with friends, actually, I only have one friend so I will be hanging out with her. I might even go to the beach once a week; which is the best part of living in Florida, you can hit up a beach any time. However, before I get to have my summer vacation I have to endure the last day of school.

“What do I need for school?” Talking to myself aloud normally helps me focus more.

“Get a shower Lawsen!” My Mom yelled up at me.

Now you all know whenever your mom yells your middle name or even just whisper your middle name, you are in deep, deep trouble. I turned to look at the clock, 7:40am.

I’M LATE!

Great, now I have to hurry, I rush to the bathroom, turn the knob to get the water going for a shower. I strip out of my pajamas and jump in the water without even checking the water first. That was my first mistake for the day and was surely not the last.

The water felt as if it was meant for penguins. Baylee, my twin sister, who is five minutes younger by the way, she must have used all the hot water again. She is always doing this to me.

Like I said, Baylee is my younger twin sister; she has had all the good luck anyone can possibly have. She can be late to the bus and yet still end up getting to school before me when I found an early ride to school. She and I are twins, so why can she get dates as if she is the most beautiful girl in school? Me, hell, I cannot get a girl to look at me even if I had a credit card with no spending limit to give them.

I push myself to hurry before I miss the bus, again. I jump out of the shower I did not even dry myself! I quickly jam my clothes on which then stick to me as if I was made of some kind of sticky toffee. I know, I am not going to win any awards for how I dress so this will not bother me.

I reach the bus just as it was pulling up.

I climbed the steps and moved down the tiny aisle to my seat; however, someone was there in my seat. As I reached my seat, I noticed it was just Emma.

Emma is my best friend, my only friend. She and I have known each other since we were in diapers. She is a year older than I am, but the way we are together you could never know that she is older, but, I’m not sure if that makes me mature or her immature. She never lets our age bother her; she has never treated me as if I was a baby or that I could not be her friend because of our ages, which makes life so much easier with a friend.

Emma is pretty, scratch that, Emma is the most beautiful girl in the school, at lease to me she is. With her flowing fire, red hair, bright blue eyes, and a smile that could light my day to perfection. Every guy in school wants to date her, yet I am the only person she lets close to her.

“It is not worth putting in the time or drama if I cannot be his forever and he can’t be mine forever.” Emma would say to me when I ask why she doesn’t date.

“Hey Garritt, umm I need to tell you something,” Emma whispered.

Cool another secret from my Emma, I mean from Emma. I don’t know why I keep thinking my Emma; she is just my friend.

“I am not going to be here for your birthday, I am terribly sorry I know I promised, but I have to move. My family is moving, and I am not going to be here next year. I am really, really sorry Garritt! I do not want to leave you without any friends. I know it hasn’t been easy for you to have just me,” wonderful Emma was at the point of crying.

“It’s okay Spider Monkey, we will keep in touch and this summer you and I can get together, meet in the middle, something. Moving won’t stop us; we haven’t gotten rid of each other over the years so I don’t think we could get rid of the other by moving away.” I said trying to soothe her.

I tried to hug her but she shrugged me off. I have only seen her hurt like this when we were little, her hamster, Whiskers, died. I tried to soothe her as much as I could; we arrived at school moments after she finally stopped crying.

Starting with my shower, then the ride to school, my day just did not get any better. My classes were pretty much the same as always. Everyone was going crazy because school is almost out and teachers were ready to pull their hair out to get rid of us.

My whole day was nothing but a sleep wasted. Lunch, however, was not like a normal day.

I walked into the courtyard, where kids were coming from everywhere. When you come from the main building, our lunchroom and surrounding eating areas are like walking into a new era. The main building was recreated to match Spanish architecture; across from it are the new buildings three and four. Creative name for them isn’t it. Buildings three and four were made just to be long buildings that get in your way of seeing the only area that could get you out of school, the parking lot. The lunchroom was to my left, the football field was to my right, we were allowed to eat on the bleachers during lunch since our school is so overcrowded.

Emma and I always go get lunch together, somehow we did have enough luck to get the same lunch, none of the same classes but lunch was enough for us, we always got an egg roll and ranch dressing. Then we go to the stadium, pick a good spot to eat, hopefully one not covered with sea gulls or their droppings. I do not know which idiot decided to feed them but now they will not go away. The non-normal part of lunch was that Emma never showed up. I waited by the stadium for her but no Emma. I had to rush to get my egg roll and then rush back to my last class.

I wonder where Emma was.

Class seemed so long, since it was the last day of school. That dang wall clock ticked at the slowest pace possible. I swear a snail lapped it twenty times before a minute passed.

DIIIINNG! DIIINNG!

“YEEEEESSSSS!” I swear the whole school screamed together.

School was out for the summer. I rushed to get my backpack together and slung it over my shoulder. Racing out the door and down the side stairwell, I knew I could make it to the bus early, however a hand reached out to grab me.

“Freaking figures,” I moaned.

Baylee’s hand was gripping my shirt almost to the point of ripping; I heard the tension on the fabric as she dragged me to her. Baylee was pretty strong for a girl her size.

“Baylee what’s your damage?” I demanded.

“Garritt, Mom and Dad are outside in the car rider line,” Baylee whispered in my ear.

“What did you do Baylee?”

“I honestly don’t remember if I did anything.”

“Fine Bay, this is easy we just go to the the buses and ignore them.”

“Not that simple Granda and Grandma Burkes are here from Ireland. They must have flown in for our birthday.” Baylee answered.

“Wonderful,” I said sarcastically.

We only see mom’s parents on really special occasions; normally birthday isn’t one of those important occasions. Something is going on. As we walked to the car rider line, I could see my family talking. My mom spotted us, and then suddenly hushed everyone. Without a word, the six of us got into my mom’s SUV and drove home. For those not born into Irish families, silence is never good, if there is a quiet Irish person near you, beware.

When we got home, my eyes started tearing up, my nose tried closing it’s nostrils, there was a horrible smell in our house. Before I could ask what wreaked Baylee spoke up for me.

“Gross! What is that horrible rotten egg and dying flesh smell?” hollered Baylee.

“Baylee Alyzabeth,” Mom choked out. My guess is the smell was killing her too.

“That is a traditional meal for our coming of age Irish man Garritt.” Grandma said.

Baylee looked stunned, maybe even hurt, but definitely angry.

“So you made a meal just for Garritt, for his birthday? Therefore, the fact that we have the same birthday means nothing to you. I mean nothing to you.” Baylee started crying. She turned and stormed off to her room. No one saw her; they were all staring at me.

“Umm no offense Gram but ah, I don’t think I am hungry tonight” I said as politely as I could. I then turned, jogging up the stairs before anyone could say anything to stop me.

Honestly, I was starving but there was no way in hell I was going to eat something I could not put past my nose. Therefore, I went to bed starving, tomorrow is my birthday and better food would come… I know it will come, it better come.

I lay in bed thinking about Baylee. Who knew she would be so upset over such a gross smelling dinner? Baylee always gets what she wants, so why can I not have something special for just me? I know it hurt her feelings but not everything is about Baylee.