After my giving Emerald my number, I left Blossom's and started to walk back to Mimi's- er, our house. 

Huh, Emerald was right. This place just always smells faintly of sea salt and fish. Plus, the humidity here is ridiculous. I can kiss my perfectly coiffed hair goodbye for the rest of this summer. There are a lot of things I had to kiss goodbye this summer. 

My house. My parents. My dignity. Just look at me. My armpits are the sweatiest they ever have been in my entire life, my hair has gotten out of my ponytail and hangs in tendrils around my face, and my feet are aching from these shoes. My thighs are chafing, my lipstick is fading, and my phone battery is dying. I have a job in a convenience store that I'm almost positive is a money laundering scam and my co-worker wears way too much eyeliner. And to top it all off, I meet the one cute guy in this entire town and he has a clingy, overprotective girlfriend who's beginning to really rub me the wrong way. 

I just need to get home and talk this over with Mimi. Talking to her always seemed to make things better. Then I can go right back to dazzling this town with my-

OOF!

This is the second time I have ended up on the floor today and quite frankly I'm over it. I use my hands to prop myself up and turn to see what the hell it was I tripped over. 

There was a giant crack in the sidewalk right next to my right foot. My peeptoe wedge had wedged itself right into the crack.

I sit up and yank my shoe out of the hole and put it back onto my foot. Christ on a cracker, that's a big crack. How bizarre. Usually every part of this town is perfectly maintained. I doubt these tropical suburbans would just allow this crater to just exist in their town, right next to their perfectly manicured lawns. 

Actually, the lawn next to this crack isn't so manicured at all. It's overrun with weeds and those weird little dandelions. You know the ones. They're all yellow and there's always a million of them everywhere. The lawn is all dead and it looks like it hasn't been watered in months. The paved path leading up to the house was cracked and falling apart, weeds were growing in between the stones. 

The house at the end of the little path was just gross. It was one of those really old wooden houses, plantation style with a big wraparound porch that was decaying. The paint, which at some point must have been purple, was peeling off. Paint chips were littered across the porch. The windows were boarded up and the tiles on the roof were practically blown off. 

This place is creeping me the fuck out. Why haven't I ever noticed it? I looked around. This place wasn't that far from our house. 

I scurried to my feet and booked it to Mimi. Every second I spend in this town makes me regret my decision to come here more and more.