I watched the blackish pavement roll by under my window and sighed. It was a land of nothing out here. Absolutely nothing, unless you counted rolling endless fields and skies that went on forever. And the cars passing us on the highway.
“Cheer up, Jamie,” Mom smiled, like this was the best thing everyone looks forward to. Moving across the entire country, away from everything I’d every grown up with. “It’s a grand adventure, like the ones you’ve read about in your Harry Potter books.”
“Except Harry Potter wanted to leave his home,” I said sarcastically. “I am taken against my will.”
“You’ll make more friends,” she said dismissively.
“Like Zoe? Like Katelynn? People who I can actually trust?” I snapped. “Those only come around once a lifetime. Thanks for ruining my friendship.”
Mom narrowed her eyes in the rearview mirror. “Jamie, stop.” “You always wanted me to speak my mind.” “Jamie!” I said nothing. I’d had enough. Mom just didn’t get it. Nobody understood, except Katelynn
and Zoe. The only people I’d any connection with ever. They understood my motives, actions and feelings. And soon I would be three thousand miles away from them. Lucky me.
Actually the only person who had any open feelings, other than Zoe and Katelynn, about how sucky this move was, was Kira, my older sister. She whined and complained the whole day before we drove off, even more than I had. She had a hissy fit actually.
“But the Winter Dance is like, in two more weeks! Dylan Leal just asked me! We cannot move! I’ll never love again!” she wailed dramatically. “I’ll be an old maid!”
“With lots of cats,” Mom said, waving a hand. “You’ll live.”
“You’re ruining my life!” she shrieked, storming off into her room where an air mattress lay instead of her bed, which was in the moving truck we had rented.
Kira, right now was slumped over in the passenger seat, texting, tears rolling down her cheeks. I rolled my eyes. She had cried off at least four pounds by now. Who knew a human could hold that much water? If Kira was human.
I turned my iPod to a song by Calvin Harris. “I feel so close to you right now...” I rolled my eyes. My sentimentality made Katelynn and Zoe laugh. “Your love pours down on me, surrounds me like a waterfall....” I turned off the music, sighed again, and pulled out the sixth Harry Potter book and turned
to my favorite part where Gryffindor wins the Quidditch game, then Harry and Ginny kiss. I don’t know why it was my favorite part. It might have been I had always dreamed of getting my first kiss, so again I’m kind of sentimental like that.
car.”
“Are we there yet?” Kira sniffed. “Not even close,” Mom smiled. “We have about four more hours.” Kira and I groaned simultaneously. “Seriously?” Kira sighed. “I can’t wait to get out of this
“Can we stop for lunch?” I sighed. Mom nodded. “Once we pass the next town.” It was at least an hour before that happened. After an hour of waiting and endless hunger,
and then we passed a town. Or at least somewhat of a town. After about another half an hour of debating on whether to eat at McDonalds, Burger King, or a Chevron gas station, which were the only places that didn’t have a health inspection against them three years in a row, we decided on McDonalds.
“I’m going to gain like seventy pounds,” Kira whined.
“Kira,” Mom snapped, “I have had enough of your complaining. I know you are tired, but will you quit it with your complaints? I am tired too, so shut it.”
Kira muttered something that didn’t sound friendly, but didn’t whine again. I leaned against the car door and stared at the car plates passing us.
“I see one from Texas,” I said irritably. “We’re in Texas, stupid,” Kira said, obviously annoyed. “Nuh uh! Mom said a few more hours! It doesn’t a few hours to get from Texas to
California!” “It does if we’re in a plane!”
“Which we’re not, smart one!” I hissed from behind her. “When are we going to get there anyway!” I whined, in a voice that sounded distressingly like Kira’s.
“About another three hours, until we stop.” Mom sighed. “ But it’s getting late. We’re going to stop at a Motel for the night.”
men.”
“No!” Kira said. “Motels are creepy. They have the weird carpets and beds that smell like
“How would you know what men smell like,” I smirked. “Ahem. Notavirgin,” I coughed. “Girls!” Mom yelled. “Not another word until we get to the house.”
We didn't stop at a Motel that night, for we arrived at the house around eight. It was then we saw the ocean. It actually wasn’t that big of a deal because we lived in St. Petersburg, Florida, where the ocean was my backyard all day, but after hours of endless fields of nothing, this was paradise.
“Oh my God!” Kira shrieked. “Please please please please, puh­leeze can we eat at Round Table. Please?”
“Call your father and tell him to get the pizza while we check out the house.”
Five minutes later, we pulled into a driveway in front of a baby blue, paint peeled house, with dead rose bushes outside.
“This,” Kira gaped, “is my home?”
Mom smiled. “Well yes. We’ll get it repainted, and then I can do some gardening! Oh, I can’t wait to check out the backyard!”
Mom opened the front door and breathed in the smell of the house. She turned to us with a broad grin. “Girls, get out the wet wipes so we can scrub this place to smell new!”
I pulled the disinfecting wipes out of a box from the car labeled ‘bathroom supplies’. Mom pulled one out with a flourish. “You girls tackle upstairs bathrooms, and I’ll get the kitchen and the guest bathroom!”
We sullenly pulled our bodies upstairs and looked at our options. Kira opened the door of a brown room, and shouted, “I call dibs!”
I looked inside a room with white walls, and then inside another with gray. I sighed. I
would have to beg mom to repaint either way, so I picked the gray, closest to the bathroom, which was an ugly pink. Might as well hope on getting to take a shower first. If Kira got it first, it would be at least two hours before she got out.
I scrubbed my wipe over the counter of the bathroom and wished I had a phone. Zoe and Katelynn had phones. I had begged Mom and Dad so much last year for one that they grounded me for a week and told me to bug off.
I imagined what phone case I would get if I got one. I would want mine to be in one with a fun print. Or maybe one that was in the shape of an animal, like Morgan’s. She had a phone case that was a bear. It had the ears sticking up, so it couldn’t fit in Mo’s skinny jean pockets. Or I wanted one that was green with little white dots.
I imagined myself texting Katelynn and Zoe right now. “I hate this place. I dont kno anyone here!!!!!” I would text. “Sux 4 u!” would be Katelynn's answer. She was definitely the most blunt person I had
every met. She said what she felt, wanted, and hoped, honestly and definitely in her own words. Sometimes I thought it was annoying. Like the time she told me her honest opinion of my shorts when I asked.
“They look like they belong on a two year old,” she said waving her hand. “I mean, look at the hearts! That’s kind of lame, Jamie.”
I had gotten so mad at her. I remember not talking to her for three days, then I couldn’t stand it. I had to talk to her because she was one of my best friends. And the feeling was mutual. That sealed the deal on our friendship.
Zoe’s answer would be way different. She would probably take on a sympathetic voice. She would say, “OMG I MISS U TONS!!!! IDK how im gonna get thru 7th w/out u! call me later, k????”
Zoe was nice, most of the time. She kept calm, calmed Katelynn down when her was mad off at a guy for calling her names, and helped me study for tests so I wouldn’t freak. On top of that, she was nice to everyone, even the people who called her a b**** and a freak. She just turned aside and said, “Whatever. Your opinions don’t matter to me, so go ahead.”
I remember when Zoe and Katelynn were fighting over something stupid. Zoe was crying. She was the most emotional out of the three of us. She cried when people died, even when it was just someone she had no relation to.
Katelynn, on the other hand, would shrug it off. “Whatever. It’s the circle of life. People are born, they live, they die. It’s gonna happen to everyone.”
Katelynn wasn’t afraid of death. She didn’t worship God, like Zoe. She believed people just became nothing more than a corpse. Nothing more than a lifeless being. She didn’t fear that she would one day die. “Whatever. Might as well live life to the fullest,” she said when I warned her against doing something. When I was having a breakdown before a big test she told me, “That doesn’t matter. That test is equivalent to crap in the end,” she shrugged.
I guess she was right in a way. I just couldn’t see her logic most of the time. It seemed like there was none most of the time. I felt like living life to the fullest was being successful, and to be successful, I needed good grades to get into Yale, my goal.
“Jamie!” Mom shouted. “Dad’s here!” “Does he have pizza?” I yelled.
“Help unload the van!” “What about the bathroom?” “Kira will do it!” That was good enough for me. I climbed my way down the creaky stairs and opened the
door to let Dad in. He shouted to me, “Jamie! I need your help getting out the table!” I groaned. I picked up an end of the wooden table and walked backward toward the wide
doorway that barely allowed the table to pass. We set it down behind the island between the stove and table, and then raced back outside to pick up chairs.
Suddenly there was a loud knock. Dad pulled his wallet out of his pocket. “It’s probably the delivery guy.”
It was. He was a teenager wearing a black shirt with a cartoon pizza on it. “Hello,” he said when Dad approached. “Are you new to the neighborhood?”
“Yep,” Dad said wearily. “Been a long day.” “That’ll be twenty three, ninety five,” the teenager said. “Where’d you move from?” “Florida,” Dad replied. The boy wolf whistled. “Quite a ways. What brings you to the Bay Area?” “Job in the city,” Dad shrugged. “My daughters aren’t pleased, let me tell you that.” “We definitely are not!” Kira said as she marched down the stairs. “Just give us the
pizza; we are starved.” Dad shot her a look. “Kira do you want pizza?” he snapped, but Kira was too busy staring
at the delivery guy. “Kira!” “Yeah, whatever,” she smiled. I snorted. She glared at me. “Oh shut up, Jamie.” I laughed
harder.
“Oh he totally wants to date a girl who’s a shrew twenty four seven!” I snorted. “Just take his picture so you can drool over it in your room ‘cause you are never gonna get this close to a guy again!”
“Jamie!” she shrieked. When I laughed even harder at the expression on the guy’s face, which was a mixture of amusement and confusion, she whirled around to face Dad. “Daddy, make her go away.”
“Kira, go sit down,” he snapped back. “Jamie, go with her.”
Kira smiled at the boy again. “I’m sorry you had to see that. But you must forgive my sister. She has the brain cells of a toilet plunger.”
“I’m sorry you have to look at her,” I said rolling my eyes. “Ahem, shesnotavirgin.”
“Jamie!” she screamed. “I swear to God I will kill you even if it’s the last thing I do!” she glanced back at the boy. “Do you deliver every night?” she asked like she was just being polite and asking a casual question.
“On Mondays, Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays. I get the weekend off because my boss says I can. The grownups work those days.”
“Cool,” she said. “Do you ever work at the restaurant itself?”
I groaned. Dad rolled his eyes. “Can you give me the pizza?” he asked the boy. He handed it over, but Kira and him kept talking.
“Jeez,” I said. “Stop saying your sister has had sex,” Dad said sternly. “You never know. Some people
may not get it’s a joke.” “Okay,” I muttered as I pulled a slice onto my paper plate. “Kira!” I shouted. “We’re going
to eat it all.” She didn’t answer but came back a few minutes later. “You ate everything!” she shrieked
when she saw only one slice left. “Snooze you lose,” I shrugged. “Maybe you should have ate instead of making googly
eyes at him. Besides, you barely know him.” “Whatever,” she waved a hand. “Are we on air mattresses again?” she asked Dad. He nodded. “I’m going to set those up now,” he tossed his plate into a garbage bag tied to
a chair. I sighed. I imagined my imaginary phone again. “An air mattress inches off the ground with a sleeping bag and no heat. Yay.” Zoe­ “OMG!!!!!! are u there? What does CA look like????” Katelynn­ “hahahaha. ROTF” My reply to Zoe­ “Its really green & foggy!!!! There is a beach! YAYA!! Surfing exists!!!
House is ugly!!!! I miss u SOOOO much!! Tell Kate 2” My reply to Katelynn­ “Shut up!!!! Who did u fight 2day? Bet it was jarhead again. U 2 are
perfect 4 each other!!! Katelynn Julian. With kids Mark Julian and Alexia Julian. HAHAHAHA!! Dare u 2 tell him u have feelings of LUVVV 4 him”
I could imagine Katelynn’s reply. She would use a ton of cuss words, and she would use many mad emoticon faces. I snorted. I pictured her face. When Katelynn got mad, her freckles became more pronounced, and looked like connect the dots on her unusually red face. At my birthday party, when it was just Zoe, Katelyn, and I, Zoe and I did draw a connect the dots star on her face.
Zoe and I (or mostly I) had teased Katelynn about how her usually pale skin became red. Her nickname at school was Tomato Kate. She had embraced the name in third grade, and thrown tomatoes and William Turner. The principal at that school had quite a day, as did the janitor.
Katelynn was not a teacher’s pet. She did daredevil stunts that got her in trouble, caused fights on the playground, once had been the instigator of a food fight. She was truly a rebel.
Then in fifth grade, Zoe arrived from Miami, because she was living with her grandparents because her mom and dad got divorced, so her Mom kicked her Dad out. Zoe said it was the hardest decision choosing who to live with. And so her Dad and her went to live with her grandparents.
That was when Zoe, Katelynn, and I became three peas in a pod. Katelynn never listened to me, but she did listen to Zoe. It was like working with algebra. Katelynn was the negative number 1, while Zoe was the positive number 1, and added together there became nothing. That was the end of Katelynn the Great. Almost.
We moved to middle school after that, which must have been Principal Keith’s greatest day ever. Like Christmas for a little five year old. At the graduation ceremony when I received my diploma from elementary, along with my participation and academic awards, Katelynn received her crumpled diploma (Principal Keith was clenching his fists) and a glare from the secretary, nurse, Principal Keith, Vice Principal Smith, janitors, and all the teachers,
when she shook their hands. I remember laughing about Katelynn’s expression. Her white blonde was loose and wavy as always, looking ironically angelic because it mixed with her exotic blueish/greenish eyes. She was wearing converse high tops with her black skirt, and her white shirt. Her outfit was very casual compared to the rest of us. We were wearing dresses featuring sparkles and lace. Our faces were masks of paint and feigned confidence after a boring year with no triumph, but Katelynn’s face was one of absolute victory. I still am dumbfounded, to this day, over why she would be victorious.