A quiet atmosphere surrounds the sleek leather of the car. Combined with the quietness and softness of the seat that molds around her back, Natalie dozes off in no time.
“Hey, hey, wake up,” an incessant hand shakes her but she refuses to wake up from her dream of clouds.
“No, mom, it's too early,” she mumbles, still heavy with sleep.
A surprised laugh breaks out, “Nope, it’s just Jace.”
Huh.
Her groggy mind couldn't process what had just happened.
…
Oh.
She shakes off any remnants of her pleasant dream and struggles to remember where she was as she drifts back to face reality. The harsh, unforgiving mistress that doesn’t let you move on from your dumb habits. Like instinctively calling out your mom when you’re being woken up.
“Uhh, hey, man,” she awkwardly greets him.
“Don’t you mean, mom?” Jace teases her to which Natalie pulls a face at.
Jace grins back at her, flashing white teeth and all, and asks, “Nice nap?”
Natalie, unable to get over her awkwardness, simply laughs.
“We’re here, by the way,” Jace’s eyebrows flick towards her house.
How did he kno—
Her train of thought paused, completely disrupted by the sound of a door slam. Before she’d even noticed, Jace was already at her side of the car, opening the door for her.
Well, that was an invitation to get out as any.
“Thanks again for the drive and for the thing earlier,” she says.
“No problem,” he replies.
She smiles at him briefly before exiting the car.
Before she sets foot in her house, she waves goodbye to Jace, who honks and promptly speeds off.
“So…whose nice car was that?” her mom bombards her with a question before she could even close the door. “I thought you were with your friends.”
Oh crap.
To a normal person, that would seem like an innocent question—especially coming from a parent. But to Natalie, it was a trap. An attempt to catch her on a lie and find out if she had a boyfriend or something worth hiding that her parents thought would distract her from school. She didn’t realize her mom was back so soon, but she didn’t need her overprotective parents to start thinking she had a boyfriend.
“He is a friend, just a new one,” she responds. When her mom doesn’t reply, Natalie decides to elaborate, “he saw me walking alone and offered to drive me home.”
Her mom simply hums.
While Natalie preferred her mom to say something, at least she wasn’t being lectured. So she takes that as a cue to go upstairs to her room.
“Wait,” her mom sharply utters, “invite him here for dinner sometime. I want to meet your rich, gentleman friend like I have of your other friends.’’
Oh, that wasn’t too bad.
Natalie let out a relieved sigh and answers her. “Sure, mom.”
“What did you buy?”
Oh, fuck, c’mon.
She had let her guard down too easily; she should’ve shoved that bag in her pockets.
“Just some donuts,’’ she tries her best to sound casual and attempts to take another step towards the stairs.
“Dinner’s in an hour or so,’’ her mom announces.
“Ok, mom, by the way, can I stay over at Min’s house tonight?”
Her mom nods. Usually, she didn’t like Natalie staying over during school days, but this was her last year of high school and her mom trusted Min’s family.
If only she knew.
But Natalie wasn’t going to question her luck and rushes up the stairs before her mom changed her fickle mind.
~~
As she enters her school, she’s pushed forward by a rushing figure.
Geez, why the rush? Must be a freshman.
After several minutes, she finds her locker and stuffs some books in her backpack. The bell rings, but like most seniors she couldn’t find it in herself to care and leisurely strolls to her first period class. Luckily, she had a friend in this class.
She walks towards an empty seat by Min, who loudly greets her with a, “sup bitch!”
“Language!” The teacher, a thin balding man of middle age, barks out without any real heat.
“Did you buy the thing?” Min asks, this time, much quieter.
Natalie nods and pats a small pouch of her backpack.
Min says, “cool, we’ll try it out at my house?”
Natalie responds with a “yep.”
“Alright, settle down folks,” the teacher hushes the class.
Huhghh, This is so boring.
English, despite being only an hour, takes forever to pass. It is a lifetime before the 4th bell rings.
Finally, lunch time.
Having skipped breakfast, Natalie had nothing on her mind except food.
She weaves through the dense hallway of countless of students all trying to go to different destinations. She manages to squeeze through groups of people, mumbling excuse me’s and sorries before she spots her friends. At times like this, she is grateful to be a short and small person.
Natalie plops down on the hard bench by a depressed-looking Min picking through her food with her plastic spork. Min, too lazy to make her own food, had the bland school lunch, which consisted of overly steamed beans and cardboard pizza. Kelly, who had the fortune of having a chef mom, always had mouth-watering meals that she, understandably, struggled to share.
Natalie nudges Min, who grumpily cursed at her.
“Oh c’mon, I made extra food today,” Natalie opens her lunch bag and takes out several containers and three plastic bowls.
The night before, she cooked beef bulgogi and assembled several Korean side dishes including cucumber salad and sweet fish cake and of course, rice. Though, she did forget to buy kimchi. Between Natalie, who loved to cook, and Kelly’s mom, the trio occasionally enjoyed feasts such as this during lunch.
Bringgg!!! The school bell loudly chimes.
They simultaneously groaned, making complaints.
“I can’t even get up after this feast,” Kelly complains.
But they begin cleaning up. As people pass their table, Natalie suddenly makes eye contact with Jace, who walks towards them with a group in tow. He nods ‘hello’ to her as he passes her.
“Whoa, what was that?” Min, surprisingly perceptive, notices the brief greeting between Jace and Natalie. “Since when were you buddy-buddy when the most popular dude in school?”
“Ohhh yeah…I forgot to tell you guys about what happened when I tried to buy weed,” Natalie replies.
“What?!” Min, natural gossiper she was, exclaims, “What happened? And how the heck could you forget to tell us?”
“Ugh, I’ll tell you guys later on the walk to Min’s house.”
Desperate for gossip and nothing to feed her thirst, Min is upset, “Nooo, you can’t just drop a bombshell and leave us to guess what it is.”
“I know, I know. But I swear, I’ll tell you later.”
This time, Kelly is the one to respond, “fine, we gotta go anyways.”
~~
The final bell rings and Natalie can’t get out of the class soon enough. She rushes out before she could get stuff in the traffic of every other student trying to leave. She waits in the school’s field for her friends. Then, they begin to walk to Min’s house.
“So, what was the thing that happened between you and the football guy,” Min, as per usual, doesn’t bother with greetings.
Natalie dramatically regales them of the thrilling affair that occurred between her and Jace.
“You got to sit in that fancy car?!” Kelly cried out.
Smug, Natalie nodded and bragged, ‘’it was nice as fuck.”
“If you ever get with him, don’t forget to hook us up with his friends,” Min reminds her. “But in the meantime, let’s just get high as shit.
They enter Min's house and head straight to her large room. They sit down together and Natalie begins rifling through her bag before she feels the brown bag.
“Alright, here it is.”
And she dumps its contents.
“1 gram of weed—don’t worry, Kell, I already looked through them and got rid of any stems and seeds,” Natalie quickly explains, knowing her overly anxious friend researched anything and everything about weed.
She continued describing what she brought, “paper for rolling and a lighter. We should be able to roll at least one joint for each of us.”
They took turns scooping some marijuanna and rolling a joint.
Natalie hands Kelly the only lighter, “Kell, you have the honors of lighting our first ever joint together since this was your idea.”
Kelly nervously accepts the lighter and ignites it and holds it to one end of her joint for several seconds. She passes the lighter to Min, who does the same to Natalie.
Terrified and anxious, the trio refuse to be first to smoke and just stare at one another.
“Ahh, fuck it,” Min exclaims before putting her joint to her lips and taking a deep breath. “Woah.”
“What!” Kelly cries out, scared for her friend.
“I don’t know, I think I feel better,” Min tries to explain her first experience.
Natalie, emboldened by her friend, begins to smoke and Kelly follows soon after.
“Ahhh, yeah, I feel…higher, more relaxed,” Natalie comments and the other two hum in agreement.
Out of nowhere, they simultaneously erupt in laughter.
One begins snorting, and the other two tip their heads back while laughing and fall down.
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