The strangest thing I noticed when I left the shower was the cold. It was freezing.

And yes, that was odd. It was Summer. The temperature should've been way over 55 F, yet even with the AC off, the room was chilled to its remotest corner. I felt my skin stiffen and turn soft as I stepped out, wrapping my arms and torso in the towel as fast as I could and grabbing away the nearest source of warm air I could think of: the drier.

I turned it to it's highest setting and blew some warm air around meself before drying my hair, feeling the heat return to my skin and letting an extra dye away my freezing cheeks to a rosy color before turning the contraption off and pulling a shirt over my head.

This morning had been really strange.

For the ill informed, this had been a strange morning, but to be honest, so had most mornings since the start of my new school year, —which I had taken to affectionately call, The Year— as I had referred to the rest of the school year that started after I was transferred over to my new school. The reason had been that, despite being only sixteen at the time, I had been asked to skip straight to Senior Year.

Now, normally this would result in... issues, to say the least. However, the fact that it was a performing and normal arts school and that I had a monumental growth spurt in the weeks leading up to the transfer, compounded by my ability to deal with most stuff the public school system had deigned to toss my way meant not only did I fit in. I thrived. Yes, that's right, I was surrounded by older, wiser students, and I was faring better.

Seriously, at this point it's going to be even harder to sound modest. Said growth spurt had replaced my lanky body with something you'd see in an Olympic gymnast or figure skater. Not the 'best' type of body a guy could get, but really good looking for a barely 16 years old teen boy. Add to that the wealth from my family, the humongous sixteenth birthday festa I threw before entering school (and which the whole city would talk about throughout last year, what with the party going from a Hotel ballroom into the streets below) and the fact that the best students of said arts academy had seen me perform live and been impressed with my acting in ye olde school's first production of Don Quijote and you get instant popularity despite everything else having conspired to murder your social pedigree.

Alright, arrogant mode off. There, it's much better... and now you know how lucky I was. I wasn't your sob story hero-slash-heroine. But I certainly wouldn't be a jock in any sense of the word.

Also, this luck wouldn't last for long. When the Seniors had called a meeting to decide where we would be going for our last field trip, everyone had been flinging ideas around. Naturally, they noticed my conspicuous silence and that of my sister (whom I had threatened to keep her mouth shut lest she earn my scorn, and my scorn could give the worst women's a run for their money, as Rachel knew all too well) and that was when my plan to go unperceived backfired spectacularly. Everyone immediately realized that one of their 'Idols' (oh gosh... yes, they had nicknames, and I was a recipient!) so to speak, had the perfect solution in his mother's origin, since everyone knew everyone in this school.

'Hey everyone, how about Spain! Amaranth-boy here could be our guide and all! He's Spanish after all!' they had all clamored loudly.

There were only a few problems with that: one, I wasn't Spanish. I was half-Spaniard. My mother was the Burgalese girl... and two, I had never visited Spain beyond looking at pictures from my mother's youth albums and looking up the places she had visited back then on Yandex (Google had gone belly-up in 2008 bankrupt and the Runet then essentially cannibalized the internet). In other words, I knew jack-squat about Spain. Both me and my sister were able to speak Spanish down to the accent so I did say I could feign being their interpreter. Thankfully, the teachers on the field trip were all fluent Spanish speakers, so I wouldn't have to do anything.

But one thing still remained. I didn't want to go.

Since now I was stuck in a hole, I had no choice but to go. After all, someone needed to look over my sister and make sure she didn't break anything.

After finishing dressing up in a sheer black 'I'd Rather be at Deer Camp' shirt (which summed my mindset up right now), the green baggy cargo pants —they were soft and if I was going to be sitting for 10 hours straight, I wanted to feel as comfy as I could— and the black Demonia platform boots I could only use when I wasn't going to be walking an awful lot, I ran downstairs with my travel bag slung over my shoulders.

I certainly did not expect everyone to already be in the car. Apparently, mom had decided to wait me next to the driver's door. Given Rachel had probably already hugged her and wished her good luck on her own journey, I guess this was to be expected. Sighing, I wrapped my arms around my mother, realizing how warm she was and how frozen and crisp the morning air was. There was definitely something weird about the weather given most mornings had been rather warm up until now and we were in the initial weeks of Summer and not the first few weeks of Winter. After breaking up the hug, I almost thought about asking mom if it was just me or the weather was really having bipolarity issues. This was that weird. Well, at least it was nice.

Even if my arms froze, it was still better than unbearable heat.

"Goodbye mom..." I settled for. It wasn't like we weren't seeing each other again, right?

"Farewell Amaranth" she said, pressing a kiss into my forehead tenderly, which made me wince slightly, but I didn't complain about the somewhat childish gesture "Take care of yourself... and your sister. God knows she can't stay out of trouble for more than eight minutes..."

Love what you're reading? Discover and support the author on the platform they originally published on.

I smiled and gave her an smaller, shorter hug.

"I will, love you Mama!" I finally said as I opened the door to the driver's side of my CX-9, closing it and watching as Gracie returned towards the house, waving one last time before closing the door. I waved back at her, as did sis from the shotgun seat. She then closed the door and vanished into the house.

I had a lingering feeling that I wouldn't be returning here for a while, if ever.

But since that idea was silly and unfounded, I just sighed slightly and revved the car to life, sliding the seatbelt on right away before my eyes darted right. Bingo.

I turned to address my sister.

"Seatbelt?" I asked, though it was clear it wasn't a question.

"Can't you just focus on driv-"

"Seatbelt?" I pressed on, noting how my sister seemed to shun fastening herself. Given her 'comfortable position' right now —sprawled with the recline as back as she could and with her feet on the dash— I suspected using the seatbelt was not a high priority for her.

"Bro..." she pleaded with me, trying to make her visage look pitiful. I only glared at her, making it clear I wasn't driving without her using the bloody seatbelt. Finally, she gave up, righted up her seat, freeing space for one of the other two passengers on the back seat and ended up fuming over the dash as she pulled the seatbelt and fastened it around her waist. "There!" she exclaimed, clearly disgruntled "Better?"

"Passable..." I mocked, smiling smugly as I pulled out of the driveway and into the traffic.

"I still don't get why you hate seatbelts so much..." the blonde boy sitting behind my sister asked with a playful smile.

"Oh just stop it!" Rachel objected, digging through her Twitter feed to distract herself. "I just don't like having to sit upstraight in a friggin car!"

"Good thing we aren't flying tourist then!" the blonde added too happily. Sis just kind of shut up, grumbling unintelligibly.

That's why Aston —the blonde boy sitting behind her in question— was my best friend. We thought along similar lines.

The guy was kind of like me in a different way as well. Despite being 16, he was a Senior as well. Now, something I should have mentioned was that his mother owned the Academy where we studied. I know, I am making it sound as if he used his mom's influence to skip a grade... except the guy was on AP everything, and he still was the star of the Academy's Figure Skating team. He wanted to be either a figure skater or a Ballerina. Now, despite those two futures sounding feminine, my best friend wasn't a weakling or 'manlet' as some would say. He was as tall as I was now, and his figure seemed willowy and flexible, but it was clear from his posture he packed the same amount of muscle as any teen dude, albeit more discreetly. The only feminine things were his hands, face and hair, which I also shared with him in this regard. He was also more of a fashionista than I was, dressing in the best brands all the time... in fact, right now he was decked in so many Gucci and D&G stuff his suitcase was probably the most expensive thing in the car, including the car itself! Even his hair, —perfectly straight, with long bangs and bronze highlights— screamed 'I'm so stinkin' rich I could buy Bel-Air if I wanted to'...

It truly was a wonder he didn't use makeup, —which would have essentially made the worth of his whole person soar past the clouds— and still managed to look like a freaking model (which I was surprised to learn he did not want to be) even when we were going to do something completely dirty and dusty and essentially sleep badly for the next 10 hours.

There was also another passenger. After all, I did mention I was taking three people to the airport. Riding on the back seat alongside my best friend was the best friend of my crush. As you'd expect from the kind of friends I had been making since I changed schools (being the new guy is supposed to be ruinous, not glamorous!), the girl was very popular, almost as much as her best friend herself. With long, midnight black hair and a body built like that of a glamour model, Felicia Cuda was pretty much one of the two sweethearts of the entirety of Hesperia Academy. Her voice, which was her most prominent trait, was the smoothest and nicest sounding in the city, sounding so velvety it was almost fragrant, her dulcet, soft words being so enthralling you could almost taste the sweetness. Thus her dream of being an Opera singer was a foregone conclusion, one that I didn't question as much as Aston's refusal to be a model. All the students loved her. Well, they said they did.

Often, I'd find girls commenting on her and 'her bestie, 'Ms Perfect', hogging attention all for themselves... and guys themselves would spread rumors about one, the other, or even both, being more than just good looking. Indeed, her bestie Selene was often said to be a bit on the slutty side. Naturally, I often ignored this. Well, mostly...

I say mostly because the way they spoke of those two didn't bode well with me. However, I did know that at least one of them was at least a bit too bold... and she was sitting right behind me.

As for Selene? I couldn't think of her that way. Not because I would mind... but because it was a good way for me to fantasize while I spent time 'on my own'. Also, her personality never struck me that way.

Oh, and she was also the crush I was talking about, if it wasn't clear enough.

There was also the fact that between Felicia and Selene, I always thought of Selene as more popular. People spoke about her more often. She had a higher social status. She spoke plenty of languages and she was also incredibly good looking even when compared to 'Lucky Felicia'. However, almost everyone seemed to be pinning for the cool and flirty, midnight haired Slovak over the blonde, high fashion socialite ragazza from Turin. What this meant was that Felicity was also more approachable, so anyone could talk to her. This was, sadly, not the exception with me, as it seemed to be for Selene...

...Because ever since I met Selene, she would ignore me. The girl acted as if I didn't exist. Even when others were being addressed, she'd always leave me hanging around, even when I asked her something, even the time. I genuinely wondered what I must've done to deserve her scorn.

But the worst thing was that from what I recollected, her bestie had a crush on me. Yes, you're reading right. A popular girl crushed on me and I was not particularly happy about it. The only thing that made this worse was the fact that I was a girl crazy idiot that couldn't stop inwardly fretting over her feeling something for me whilst I still felt something for her best friend.

If you're confused now, I have terrible news for you my friend. It only gets worse from here. Fetch yourself some aspirin.

Right now, I was thinking of a way to avoid going on a group outing, mostly in an effort to avoid my crush. Avoiding Selene was, so far, my number one priority. I needed to come up with something, —whatever it was— to spend most of the day away from the rest of the class. Away from her.

Even now, the idea of crossing paths with her scared me, among other things. There was no way I could even look at her.

I could only hope things turned out alright.