Chapter 1 Part 1

I woke up to the smell of coffee and an assortment of breakfast foods. My stomach growled and tried to leap out of my body to run down to the kitchen in search of the glorious smell.
I ungracefully tried to kick my way out of the cocoon of blankets and sheets, but I was failing. Flailing until my feet were out, I began to wonder why my mom was making breakfast. She never makes me breakfast on a school morning. I thumped my feet on the floor and did a zombie like shuffle towards the door, stubbing my toes on at least three things in the process.
“Has hell finally frozen over and you’re celebrating by making me breakfast?” I asked groggily when I walked into the kitchen, not even looking at my mom, just at the coffee pot by the sink.
“Look… I’m making eggs. There’s no deeper meaning to anything I’m doing here. It’s breakfast, plain and simple.” My mom turned back around to face the stove where she was cooking me eggs and French toast. I knew she was lying.
Normally I wouldn’t have a problem with her making me breakfast, but I knew she wanted to know where I was last night considering the fact that I didn’t get in until one in the morning on a school night. And I would love to tell her, but there was a slight problem. If I told her, she would kill me before I even got out the whole story.
“Look mom, I was out working.” I sat down at the table with my cup of steaming coffee and grabbed the newspaper sitting on the table.
“I never asked where you were or what you were doing,” she brought over two plates of breakfast and gave one to me and sat down across from me, “Why were you working so late, I don’t like where ever you were, working a 16 year old until one in the morning is obscene! You need to quit as soon as you can.”
I rolled my eyes, it didn’t surprise me that she wouldn’t understand and demand things from me, “Mom, I can’t quit, they need me and I enjoy it. Anyways, it’s not like they’re forcing me to work that late. I decided to.”
“Glenna I don’t feel like you’re safe there.” she looked up at me, her eyes pleading.
“Mom,” I sighed, “You don’t understand, this is the best job for me, and I am perfectly safe. Plus, I am working my way up very fast; I am so close to getting a promotion!” I silently added that the only thing stopping me was a simple birthday.
Mom looked defeated, “I still don’t like it, but if it makes you happy then I guess I’ll deal.”
I smiled and picked up my now empty plate, “Thanks mom, one day I’ll be able to tell you all about my job.”
“Don’t forget that tonight you have to make dinner!”
I smiled and nodded as I walked back to my bedroom to quickly get ready for the day. I mindlessly tossed on whatever clothes I grabbed, and threw them on rapidity. I ran into the bathroom next to my room and quickly brushed my teeth while I grabbed out my makeup. Now I may not be a super girly-girl, but I sure did love make up, I had an extensive collection of just about every type of makeup you could imagine. I did my makeup in yet another new way that highlighted the gold flecks in my dark brown eyes and put my bag of goodies away.
I grabbed my brush and ran it through my long, straight black hair, not really paying attention to anything. After my hair was brushed, I tossed it up in a messy bun and pinned back the bangs I was slowly growing out.
When I was all done, I went back to my bedroom and gathered my school stuff in my backpack and grabbed my phone to tell Blake that I was ready whenever he was. I sat down at my computer desk thinking about when I should tell my mom about my job, and when I should tell Blake that whole truth.
I was so lost in thought that I didn’t hear Blake honk the horn on his car until he was holding it down so it was a continuous noise. I muttered some very unkind things under my breath about him as I grabbed my backpack and walked down the stairs.
“Bye Mom! I’ll see you later!” I yelled as I walked out the door.
Her reply was lost in the slamming of the door and the yells from Blake as soon as he saw me.
“Hurry up Lena! We have things to see, people to do!”
“You know, I thought that you’d be above that saying, but apparently they say it in Ireland too…” I quickly slid into his dark blue, 2011 Camaro. I know, I know, really a brand new Camaro for a 16 year old? Really? Well that’s what I thought when I first saw him pull into the school parking lot the first day of school. But it turns out that he was new here and his parents wanted him to fit in so they bought him whatever car he wanted. Well Blake isn’t an idiot. He knew all about American cars and knew his parents didn’t know a thing about any type of cars. So along came the Camaro.
“Just ‘cause I am from a different country doesn’t mean I am any different from other guys!” Blake said as he drove down the street, his thick Irish accent was hard to understand if you weren’t used to it.
“A girl can hope can she not?” I reached over and turned on Blake’s stereo knowing I would like whatever he had in.
“You can, but you’ll only be disappointed,” Blake pointed out as he slowed to stop at the stop light. Blake turned and looked at me, smiling, “So how is the beautiful Lena today?”
“Well I don’t know what type of stuff you’ve been doing to think I was beautiful, but I guess other than that I a fine, but tired.”
Blake looked at me, piercing me with his grey-green eyes, “I am going to ignore the fact that you said you weren’t beautiful and not start that fight this morning. Why are you so tired all the time?”
I took a deep breath and wished for the best of luck, “I need to tell you something about me before you can understand my job.”
Blake accelerated, “Well go ahead and say it now, we don’t have all day.”
“Before I tell you, you need to promise not to tell anyone about this,” I looked over at Blake to make sure he nodded, “Ok, here goes nothing. Since the beginning of this year, I have somehow been able to read peoples’ minds…” I looked away then, finding sudden interest in the world zooming by outside.
“Right and I am the Queen of England. Really Lena what does that have to do with anything, and why do you expect me to believe it?”
“Because it’s true, and I wouldn’t ever lie to you. Plus if you don’t believe it then you can’t understand my job and why I am always so tried. I am trying to tell you something nobody knows about me, and you don’t believe me.”
“If you can read minds, then why don’t you tell me what I am thinking at this very moment?”
Sadly this didn’t surprise me, I knew that whoever I told would ask this sooner or later, “You don’t believe that I am telling the truth and you are trying to remember whether or not you had breakfast.”
Blake sat in silence for a few seconds. Great, he probably thinks I am some messed up crazy person and now he’s not going to talk to me.
“That is so cool!” Blake turned to smile at me quickly, and then paled a little “Wait, have you been listening to everything I think about?”
I laughed, I knew that this one would be said too, “No, not anymore. When I first started hearing peoples thoughts I couldn’t control it, but now I have it under control enough to only hear when I want to.”
Blake turned into the school parking lot and grabbed the first spot he saw, “That’s good; it would have been a little weird if you knew every single thing I thought about.”
I smiled, “Why Blake, are you thinking about bad stuff?”
Blake laughed and combed his fingers through his slightly curly brown hair, “Funny funny Lena, I just wanted to make sure I still had my privacy.”
I unbuckled my seat belt and stepped out of the car, the noises of high school students loud and clear. I sighed and walked with Blake to the doors of the school, ignoring all the things shouted at us. I had to feel bad for Blake because even though he didn’t look like the stereotypical Irish, he still got quite a few taunts about him being a leprechaun or always drunk off his ass. I don’t know how he handled it, but he never gave them the reaction they were looking for, let alone any reaction. I admired him for that; I don’t know that I would be able to do that if I were in his position.
“How do you do it Blake?” I asked as we passed another group of assholes who thought it would be funny to try and put a sparkly, green top hat on him.
“Do what? Ignore them?” I nodded when he looked at me, “I guess I just don’t pay any attention to them. I know all that they want is for me to fit into their close-minded stereotypes of Irish people, so I don’t do anything about it and let them do what they want, because for the most part they don’t know a thing they are talking about.”
“You are amazing. I think you are the coolest person here.” I gave Blake one of those awkward side hugs as we walked down the crowded hallway to our first class.
“Well I’m glad you’re finally seeing the truth about me. I’d hate to have to hide things from you, especially my amazing-ness.” Blake smiled, wrapping his arm around my shoulder.
I wasn’t paying attention and accidently heard one of Blake’s thoughts, she told me her secret, now when should I tell her mine?
Blake looked over at me and looked worried, “Are you okay Lena?”
It took a minute to realize that he had been trying to say something to me, “Yeah, just heard something and it took me off guard, ‘cause I thought that I had it under control.”
“Okay, just don’t do that again, I thought you were starting to listen to all those things people are saying about me.” Blake tightened the arm around my shoulder, and helped navigate the way through the crowded hallway.
“I would never listen to the things they are saying about you, let alone leave you all alone in hell hole of a high school, seriously, what kind of evil do you think I am?” I ignored the snide comments coming from the people that had overheard what I had just said and walked through the door to first period English.
Normally I did not mind English as a subject, but the teacher I had this year made it absolutely unbearable. I swear she didn’t know a single thing she was teaching us, she was one of the new teachers that got hired without having her experience looked at. I am pretty sure that I could teach the class better then she could ever dream of. The only thing that made it slightly bearable was the fact that Blake was in my class. In fact, he was the only thing that made any of my classes bearable.
“Okay class, sit down and take out the light green language books,” I did not see how Mrs. Rayle could be so happy when she knows that the class is just going to act up and piss her off with their incessant talking and teasing, “Today we are going to be talking about nouns and pronouns!”
I rolled my eyes and looked on the board to see what the assignment was so that I could finish it and read a book of my choice where I was not constantly pointing out the parts of speech in each sentence. Call me crazy, but I actually read for enjoyment.
I was just finishing the first problem when I hear Mrs. Rayle call my name, “Lena, would you like to tell us what you are doing instead of listening to how to complete the assignment?”
I laughed in my head about how uppity she sounded, “Well Mrs. Rayle, I was doing the assignment, I figured that since I knew how to do it, that I would go ahead and start in on it.”
Mrs. Rayle looked at me in astonishment, “You are doing the assignment? Well then, go ahead and finish up. Thank you for showing some initiative and doing something on your own.”
Ignoring the snarky comments from the people sitting around me, I got back to work on the assignment. Not a minute later, I felt a piece of paper hitting my arm, repeatedly. I looked down to my elbow and saw that it was a note with my name on the front in Blake’s handwriting. I picked it up and unfolded it, trying not to let Mrs. Rayle see it for fear of her taking it to put it in her drawer never to be seen again, or worse, to read it to the class. Knowing Blake, it probably wasn’t something either one of us wanted the class to hear.

I need to tell you something at lunch, so we can either go somewhere for lunch, or we can to find a place to be by ourselves. Either way it can only be you and me.

I looked back at Blake and mouthed my response back to him, but I was getting the evil eye from Mrs. Rayle, so I wrote back to him, all the while thinking that this seemed very much like something a fourth grader would do. Passing notes behind the teachers back, tsk-tsk.

I don’t know if I feel safe being alone with you… Just kidding, I trust you with my life. I guess we can go out to lunch, where do you want to go?

I looked back towards Mrs. Rayle’s desk to make sure that she was preoccupied with whatever she always looked at during class. There were bets going around on what she looked at, and about every ten minutes a student would go to her desk to take a look at what it was, but no one was ever successful. Seeing that she was busy, I passed the note back to Blake.
While I waited for his reply, I quickly finished the assignment and turned it in. When I got back to my desk, the note was tucked into my binder, positioned so that you would not see it if you weren’t looking for it, but if you were, it stuck out like a sore thumb. I am not sure how Blake managed that, but I applaud his creativeness. I grabbed the note and read it.

Um, preferably somewhere there isn’t bound to be people we know. I just do not want this conversation overheard.

To say I was confused was an understatement, what could Blake have to say that he wouldn’t want other people to hear? My mind was racing with the possibilities of where this could go, none of them looked too bright.

Well there is coffee shop that is really out of the way, I am sure we could go there. The only problem with that is we would either have to be late for fourth, or we’d just have to skip it all together.

I passed the note back to Blake and pulled out my book, enjoying listening to everyone complain about how hard the assignment was, and how Mrs. Rayle gives us way too much homework. I rolled my eyes and began reading my book. I was quickly lost in the mini world sitting in front of me that I practically jumped out of my seat when Blake sat down in the seat next to mine and started to talk.
“So the diner that you mentioned is just fine with me, but I need your help on this assignment! The assignment is just busy work so I have a hard time convincing myself to finish it. Help me please.”
I laughed and closed my book, “Sure, what number are you on?”
“Well about that, I kind of haven’t really started.” Blake sheepishly rubbed the back of his neck, grinning innocently.
“Okay then, first you need to open your book to page 414 and get out a piece of paper.”
The rest of the classes up until lunch went about the same, except for in our Auto class, I was the one asking Blake to help me finish. It wasn’t that I did not want to do the work; it was just that I needed help finding some of the stuff to work on. Luckily, Blake knew quite a bit about cars so he was always able to help me and do his own work.
Math, our last class before lunch, seemed to go on forever. Seriously when will we ever use this stuff in real life? I sat at my desk and attempted to do my math assignment, but unfortunately math was not my strong subject. I moved over to sit by Blake, knowing that I wouldn’t get in trouble for two reasons. One, this teacher didn’t care where you sat, after she went over the new stuff, so long as you made it look like you were doing your homework. Two, this teacher never really paid attention to what was going on in her class, she would occasionally ask if we were working, but none of us was stupid enough to tell her that we were actually just talking to our friends with our assignment in front of us. There was one person, who made that mistake the first week of school, and the whole class hated her for it, needless to say she sits silently in the front of the room with her friends.
“Please tell me you understand this, because it you don’t I may have to scream…” I sighed and plopped my books down on the desk next to Blake, wincing when they made an ear shattering noise.
“I do get it, but we don’t have long enough for me to explain it in a way that would actually make sense to you, so I will explain it to you after school.”
“Oh thank God we became friends, if it weren’t for you I would probably be on my way to the principal’s office to then be taken away to some padded cell.” I quickly hugged Blake and positioned my assignment and my body just right so that if our teacher looked over it looked like I was really doing my assignment.
Blake laughed, “Well that is bound to happen someday, and I am just making sure that it doesn’t happen prematurely.”
“You’re so funny,” sarcasm seeped through my words, “You’ve only known me for what, three months now and you are already cracking those jokes? Those are more like five month material. It’s the same concept as dating, there are some things that you just don’t do on the first date, and cracking those jokes is one of them.”
“There are times when you confuse me Lena, and right now is one of them. You should have come with an instruction booklet. Had you come with one of those, it would save me from many a headache.”
“Keep this up Madigan, and…. Damn, I can’t say what I wanted to cause you are the one with the car today.”
“Why do you think I only push your buttons when I am the one driving?”
“Good point. Why do you have to be so right all the time?”
“Because one of us has to be, and you don’t seem to be too consistent so I decided to let that responsibility fall to me. It will save you some exertion.”
“You keep this up and you will be walking to school tomorrow, because I get to drive and choose who gets in my car and who does not!”
“Wow Lena, did it really take you that long to realize that you could use that as a threat?”
“So what if it did, at least I said it now and not when we are eating or tomorrow morning like you know I probably would have. I just don’t know what got into me to make me think of a comeback like that so quickly!”
Blake laughed half heartedly, “I don’t know Lena, maybe being so tired is making you more able to say things you normally wouldn’t.”
“I doubt that, if anything would result from my tiredness, it would not be something like that. More realistically it would be something stupid like an inability to walk without tripping or not being able to talk in full, coherent sentences.”
“But you already do both of those, so why would a lack of sleep do that to you?”
Blake ducked down before my half-assed slap actually hit him, “You had best be glad I like you, otherwise you would not have gotten off so easily!”
Blake was about to say something back to me, but the bell rang, excusing us to lunch. Blake and I hung back in the class room awhile waiting for the halls to clear out enough for us to at least walk through them. While we were waiting, I put my books, pencils and folders back into my backpack, organizing the backpack slightly as I went. When the halls were finally clear enough to walk in, I followed Blake out into the parking lot to his car.
“Since you know where we are going, do you want to drive?” Blake was holding the keys out to me as we stood by his car.
My jaw dropped a little, a guy was actually going to let me drive his brand spanking new car without even questioning it, “Are you sure you want to let me drive your baby?”
“Why not, I trust you not to kill her, and I will be right next to you in the passenger seat. What do we have to worry about?”
“Well if you trust me I guess I can, but what type of transmission does it have?” I looked at the car like it could eat me up, “I only know how to drive automatic.”
“In that case, it looks like I am driving, but when we get home today I am teaching you how to drive a stick.” Blake opened my door for me and then walked around to his door and started the car.
“You can teach me, but I have to make dinner tonight, so the time space will be limited.” I was a little nervous. I was going to be taught how to drive a stick by my best friend in his brand new car.
“That’s fine; we can take however long you need. I just want you to know how to drive a stick in case of an emergency. Better to be prepared and never need a skill then not know what to do when something depends on it,” Blake backed out of the spot and looked at me, “So where to?”
“Okay, when we go to leave the parking lot, turn right.”
“Ha-ha! You are like my own GPS, except you don’t have the same accent as the voices do.”
“Very funny, now, when you get to the intersection, turn left then keep going straight.”
The rest of the drive to the coffee shop was spent in Blake giving me tips about driving a stick. I do not think that I actually understood any of what he was saying, but I acted like I did. Most of what he said went in one ear and out the other. I knew he was just trying to be nice and teach me something new, but I did not understand the majority of what he was trying to tell me. But I made sure to make it look like I was paying perfect attention to every word he was saying. He would be none the wiser to my lack of attention.
“Is this the place where we are supposed to be going for lunch?” Blake asked as he pulled into a small parking lot next to a row of equally small stores.
“Yeah, it is the one that says Java the Hut,” I pointed to the store with the sign that matched the name I just spouted out, “Just so you know before you go in, the whole store isn’t themed around Star Wars, but some of the drinks and foods are. Also the owner of the store is really into Star Wars so I’d watch what you say around him if he is in today.”
Blake looked up at the sign, which was a green blob that was supposed to look like Jabba the Hut, but whoever made the sign obviously was not on their A game when they made it, “I think I am a little worried.”
“What are you worried about, this place is perfectly normal, and all the workers except for the owner act like normal people, they hardly ever dress up in Star Wars garb. I have only ever seen then dressed like that twice, and one of the two times was during Halloween, so they had an excuse.”
Blake shook his head vehemently, “No, I’m not worried about everyone being freaks; I am more concerned about the fact that I didn’t know about this place! Seriously, they mixed my two favorite things together: coffee and Star Wars!”
Blake parked the car and practically jumped out of the car and ran halfway to the doors of the store, then remembered about me, “Hurry up Lena! We need to get in there!”
“Blake, calm down, it is not going anywhere. Just take a deep breath and relax,” I closed my car door and walked up to where Blake was standing in the middle of the road, “Please tell me that you aren’t always this excited about Star Wars…”
“I’m not, it’s just that I am surprised that this is the first time I have ever heard about this, and that it was not mentioned anywhere when I was looking online at the stuff to do when I finally got here. If this were on the list of attractions, I most definitely would not have been so bitter about coming here.”
I rolled my eyes and grabbed his arm, “Come on my little Star Wars geek, let’s go get us some food, I am starved, and the only thing that will fix my grumbling tummy would be a great big croissant with honey butter, and a great big cup of coffee. Maybe even a piece of pumpkin bread for dessert.”
As soon as I opened the door, the intruding noise of the coffee grinder filled my ears, relaxing me instantly. The further in we walked, the better the shop smelled. When you first got in, you could only smell the bitter sweet smell of the coffee, but as you got in further, you could pick out more smells. First it was the sweet smell of the home-made chocolate chip cookies sitting on top of the display case with a sign sitting on the plate behind all the cookies that read ‘Free with a purchase of anything on the menu.’