Starting New by Kirsty Cassia (paper ebook reader .txt) 📖

Chapter 1

How would I start this story?
Well, there isn’t much of a ‘start’ to this story, its practically your ‘cliché’ American high school story….expect mines slightly different…and I thought I would write it down.
Where should I start? Hmm….
OK, let’s go back 1 or 2 years…when I first moved I guess…
Here’s my story…

Chapter 1
“Have you finished packing everything in your room?” My older sister asked as she came into my room. I looked up from rolling my posters off my wall to her.
“Most of it,” I answered sullenly. I wasn't exactly amazed at the idea of moving, more of hating it and my sister and mum knew that…but they still went with it and didn't listen to my pleads and protests. I was fine where I was, I had good friends, surprisingly alright school and almost perfect grades…I say almost because who has perfect grades? And it was all being thrown away for this new job my mum was getting. Sure we were slightly short on money…and the job offered a home to live in but did we really have to do all that for one job?
“hurry up then, mums getting stressed, don’t annoy her,” my annoyingly older sister, Maggie, replied as she got up and left my room.
Maggie was 19, she had just left school and was taking a gap year while we moved, she had applied for a college close to where our new home was and was still waiting for a reply from them yet. Maggie was pretty and beautiful and gorgeous…just like any big sister should be, except Maggie was bossy…and I hated it, it ruined the perfect big sister act and completely ruined her personality. She was always the one to be a head of a big group of friends at school….childhood memories were the worst….she would repeat everything my mum would tell me to do, or make me play ‘families’ with her, she would always be the mother and I would always be the child. I thought she would grow out of it when she would go into high school but it got worse and instead helped her popularity, she grew prettier, she was a natural artist at makeup and people liked being bossed around by her which completely confused me. People would be shy of me then and think that I acted like her when I was the complete opposite of her. I was shy and timid, I let people push me around in crowds, I was always bullied in middle school until in upper school when they finally left me alone due to the endless bullying assembly’s, they realised what they had been doing to me and instead just left me alone. My sister was too busy and popular to notice surrounded by numbers of boys and girls all wanting to be like her. It annoyed me but I had to live with it.
I did have an advantage though, I was ‘mummy’s favorite’ which meant that when I was younger, Maggie always got told off and I got let off with things easily, when I became older and the bullying started in middle school, my mum was always there to hold me at night while I cried, Maggie never understood and teased me that I was only doing it for attention. Of course, some of it was because of that, I wasn't going to lie, being the younger child did give you advantages but it didn't stop the bullying in school. Luck came by though and high school actually turned out alright, the bully’s in my old school formed their own groups and left me alone, I found friends from other schools and I was happy again…until the move was announced. That’s when its all went pear shaped.

Friday Morning – Moving Day
Moving day. I hated those two words. It meant I was leaving, all my friends, all my hard work at school, all those memories…
My mum woke me up at 6 am exactly and I woke up in a bad mood. It didn't lift either. I grudgingly got up, got washed and dressed, had a cereal bar as I was too tired to eat. I hadn't dressed very well either, in my black leggings and dark baggy grey top I only wore in bed, it looked as if I had just climbed out of bed and found the first things to put on…which it was. I didn't care though, what was the point, it wasn't like I was trying to impress anyone. When I walked downstairs, my eyes almost popped out of their sockets. There was my sister standing by the cabinets using the few cups we had left out to make coffee. Her hair was looking shiny and long, her make up looked perfect and her clothes looked as if they had been planned out a week before – which they probably had. She did look as if she had just got out of bed at 5 am just to look nice and make a nice impression which seemed completely and utterly stupid to me.
As I walked in, she looked up and sighed lightly before turning back to stir her coffee, I didn't have to ask to know what she was thinking. It was pretty obvious by her face expression that she didn't approve of my appearance.
“wheres mum?” I asked looking around at the empty places furniture used to be. It felt so empty and desolate.
“still getting ready, you need to brush your teeth, the toothbrush and that is still all in the bathroom,” Maggie told me taking the spoon out of her coffee and sipping it delicately.
“OK,” I replied and scuttled off upstairs in hope mum wasn't still using the bathroom. The door was open which meant it was empty. You could tell she had had a shower as they was steam all on the mirrors still and it was all hot. The tiled walls were all damp and wet so I opened the windows to get rid of all the steam. I wiped the mirrors down with a towel and then grabbed my toothbrush and started the endlessly boring task of brushing my teeth. When that was done, I went in search for my mum. I ended up in the kitchen and found both of them talking about the move.
“hi mum,” I greeted leaning up to kiss her cheek before grabbing another cereal bar as I searched the cupboards.
“hey sweetie, you all packed fully now for the car trip?” she asked taking a sip out of her coffee.
I nodded, mouth still full of food.
She smiled slightly and looked back down to her cup of coffee, it was quiet for a few minutes. I was thinking through all the happy child memories I would cherish.
“Right,” my mum finally said loudly so much that I jumped. “I think we should start packing the car.”
I blinked suddenly, realizing that this is going to be the last time in this house so instead of helping, I wandered off to say good bye.
By the time we had finished and were in the car hallway to our place, it was around 8 am. Saying good bye to the house was hard and I would be lying if I said I hadn’t shed a few tears.
It was finally time to try and convince myself that this was a fresh start, I could be anyone I wanted at this new school, I could dress different, act different, start a new leaf as they say…but I didn't want to, I liked how I was. Sure I got annoyed how shy I could get in school but it was the way I was, I wasn't going to change that no matter what, I was who I was. Maggie on the other hand was a different story, she said she wanted to be a ‘better person’ at college and try new things, meet new people and get some new hobbies. I knew she was excited for this move and maybe she wasn't as happy as I thought she was at school although she was the role model to everyone but even that would get a bit tiring.
Now she glanced out the window with an excited look on her face as we drove down the motorway, she had a clean, refreshed look that showed her natural face expression.
I was not as pleased as her as I said earlier. But I wouldn't start complaining since I knew it wasn't going to get anywhere.
The car journey would take 4 hours and It was going to be long and tiring but mum was determined to give us positive by making us play the annoying car games during the queues, some of these would include eye spy, the repeating food game – where you say, ‘one day I brought….’ You say what you brought then the next player has to say what you brought and what they brought, i.e I started by saying, ‘one day I brought an apple.’ Maggie said, ‘one day I brought an apple and an banana,’ then mum said, ‘one day I brought a apple, a banana and some cereal,” it’s the most boring game but it takes your mind off from where you are.
We had lots of games that was stupid and pointless but it took our minds of things.
When we eventually arrived at the place, I started to get excited. What was the place going to be like? Was it close to the school? Was I in walking difference to the shops? All was soon to be revealed…

The questions continued to swirl around in my mind and I couldn’t wait to get out. My legs and bum was aching from sitting so long and anticipation wasn’t helping.

When we drove up the street to our house, I wasn’t sure we were in the right place; the houses were all huge and expensive looking and when we found where the removal truck was, I couldn’t hold in my surprise. I gasped loudly along with my mum and sister. The house looked big enough for a family of 5 or 6, not 3. When we got out, my mum went to talk to the delivery men, and I and Maggie stood still staring at the house. Suddenly shouting overtook our awe, to our left, a boy came striding up the drive looking angry and annoyed, he looked my age, maybe older and had dark auburn hair. I couldn’t see his face shape as he was glancing behind himself. Another figure came out and it looked like his mum, she looked young and pretty with tired features and the soft brown coloured hair tied back into a low ponytail.