What's Meant To Be

Chapter 1

I never sleep before the first day of school, ever. I always convince myself I’m going to sleep but it never happens. Instead, I toss and turn all night, overthinking every little thing that could possibly happen the next day. When I say every little thing, I do mean every little thing.

Is the outfit I picked out cute enough? Will it send the message that I was trying too hard? What if I don’t know anyone in my lunch well enough to sit when them? Will I have to go to the library and pretend I have work to do? On the other hand, no one ever has work to do on the first day of school, so everyone would totally know I was only in the library because I was a loser and had no one to sit with. What if I don’t have any classes with Alexa, my best friend since freshman year?

The list goes on and on and by the time I have to get up in the morning I’m in worse shape than the night before. This is because now not only am I extremely tired from being up all night but I have a knot in my stomach the size of a large rock from all the worrying I’ve been doing.

The night before the first day of my junior year however is way worse than any year I can remember. Not only do I have the normal things to spend all night worrying about, but somewhere deep down in the bottom part of my soul, in the very very back of my mind, I know I’m sure to be seeing Austin.

Now, as I sit in homeroom the next morning, I can’t help but still worry about it. While a tiny part of me is excited, most of me is just absolutely terrified.

Should I go up to him? Should I text him and ask him to meet me somewhere?

Will he text me?

The sound of someone slamming a notebook down hard on the desk next to me snaps me out of my thoughts and I turn to meet my best friend Alexa’s sharp blue eyes.

“Oh my god!” she gasps as she takes her blonde hair and twirls it up into a loose bun. “It has been the morning from hell!”

“Shhhh!” I whisper as I look around our homeroom at the few people who are now looking at Alexa like she might be a little crazy. “What happened to you this morning? You were supposed to meet me in front of the office, I texted and called you.”

Alexa lets out a little bit of a sigh and flops her body down in the chair next to me. Well, flops as much as she can considering she’s only a hundred pounds. “I know! I’m totally sorry, I could not decide what to wear this morning, then I had to stop for a Starbucks and the line was totally long and then when I got here well… there was a whole Karli situation to deal with.”

It takes me a minute to fully wrap my head around everything Alexa just shot out of her mouth. She’s talked this way ever since I’ve known her. I always tell her to breathe in between sentences but she just laughs like I’m joking.

“A Karli situation?” I fake shock, but I know what’s coming before Alexa even starts to explain. Karli is Alexa’s little sister. She’s a grade younger than us, and is always getting herself in trouble with girls in her grade. This is because Karli is just as little as Alexa with dark blonde hair and the same intense blue eyes.

Anyway, someone’s always thinking Karli is looking at their boyfriend or flirting with their boyfriend or liking one of their boyfriend’s pictures on facebook. This really wouldn’t be a big deal, since girls will be girls, except that Karli cant seem to let anything go. Which means she has no problem going up to whatever girl is upset with her and saying things like, “I don’t like your boyfriend at all, so maybe you should work on your insecurity issues.” Then walking away like nothing is wrong. Which in turn usually means the girl ends up wanting to kick Karli’s ass, and Karli never seems to be scared or worried about this even if the girl is twice her size. This is usually around the time that Alexa steps in.

“Yes!” Alexa screeches. “No way was I letting her get into a fight on the first day of school. I mean really, I tell her to lay low this year so she doesn’t get herself into another situation like last year with that Tina girl and already on the first day...” She must see the look on my face, though, because she trails off.

“Well anyway, you look totally cute today.”

I look down at my Old Navy Jeans and light blue tank top. What looked cute and simple this morning, somehow seems boring and childish next to Alexa.

She’s wearing black leggings, Ugg boots, and an oversized white sweater that’s decorated in some sort of silver and gold tinsil. The best part about her outfit, however, is how effortlessly it seems to be thrown together.

“Me?” I ask her as if she’s blind. “You make me look like Nikki Hilton.

And you’re Paris.”

Alexa looks confused. “Who’s Nikki Hilton?”

I sigh. “Exactly.”

“Haha, totally kidding.” Alexa laughs. “Ashley, relax, you look great. So have you seen Austin yet? I thought I saw him walking in but now that I think about it I’m not sure it was him, I mean if it was he was wearing this awful green shirt that just did not…”

“Alexa!” I gasp. “SHHHHHH!”

“What!?” She looks around quickly. “Its not like he’s in this homeroom, his last name doesn’t even start with an A.”

I grab her tiny arm and practically drag her out into the hallway.

“Owwww,” she wails, faking hurt as she rubs her arm.

Oh, please. I didn’t even have that tight of a grip. Did I? Hmm, it does look a little red now that I think about it. Oops.

“I’m sorry,” I whisper, “but you need to be careful. Like three kids from the basketball team are in our homeroom and could easily tell him some crazy girl was talking about him.”

Alexa laughs and glances around the hallway before speaking. “Ash, you need to stop worrying so much. I mean, you’re gonna see him. He’s in our grade so its kind of unavoidable.”

“I know,” I sigh. “Its just I don’t want to be overbearing. He never answered the few texts I’ve sent him since I got home.”

Alexa smiles. “This could be a movie. One of the most popular boys in school ends up in the same hotel as you over summer vacation, and it turns out h is mom and your mom are in the same book club....and you end up spending almost every day together and become like super close. I mean Ash--you can’t make that shit up, it’s classic.”

I laugh and push her playfully. “Oh, shut up.”

She laughs back and says, “You two are totally gonna end up dating.”

I give her an annoyed look. “Me and Austin Givens are just friends.”

Alexa raises her eyebrows. “Are you honestly telling me you don’t like him even a little?”

“Yes, Lex, that’s what im honestly telling you.”

Alexa puts her hand on her hip. “Best friends do not lie to each other.”

Only I can’t answer her, I can’t
speak
even, because out of the corner of my eye, I see him. Austin. He’s about twenty feet away from us walking down the hall with a couple of senior boys. As he nears I can feel the knot in my stomach growing even bigger, not to mention my heart’s beating a mile a minute.

Austin’s eyes meet mine, and for one quick moment, I feel like this is going to be the best first day of school I’ve ever had. The look on my face doesn’t last, though, and neither does the feeling in my heart.

Because something awful happens.

Without so much as a smile Austin looks away and walks right past me like I don’t exist.

Chapter Two

I’m not sure I know what a panic attack is, but I’m pretty sure I’ve been having one for the past half hour. My heart is beating so fast that I’m afraid it might explode in my chest. I’m sitting in my first period class and I feel as if the walls are slowly closing in around me.

After Austin blatantly ignored me in the hallway I felt like I was going to throw up and ended up spending the rest of homeroom in the bathroom with Alexa. “Maybe he just didn’t see you.” She tried to comfort me, but I wasn’t stupid, I knew he had. After I assured Alexa that I was neither blind nor that naïve, she moved onto the “Austin’s such a jerk, you don’t need a friend like that anyway” tactic.

The thing is though, I
did
need a friend like that. I mean, me and Austin had gotten so close over the summer. Or so I’d thought. It was true that at first I’d figured he was just being nice to me because his mom and my mom were friends, but as the time passed, I started to let myself believe it was more than that.

We would text each other even though we were only a few floors apart at the hotel. Our families would do things together almost every day; sometimes me, Austin, and his sister Miley would even stay up late in one of our rooms watching scary movies and ordering food.

Then, it turned into a lot of just me and Austin. Me and Austin going to get ice cream. Me and Austin sneaking out after our parents went to sleep to sit in the hotel lobby and just talk. Me and Austin going to get lunch together when no one else was around.

I told Austin things I didn’t tell anyone. Things it was hard for me to even talk about with Alexa. Like about my parents divorce or how I like to write short stories. And he told me things too, like how he only played soccer because he knew it made his dad happy, and how he wanted to be a journalist someday.

Things you don’t tell someone just because you’re being nice for your mom’s sake.

So what went wrong? What’s his deal? I’m so busy trying to figure out what Austin could possibly be thinking that it takes me a second to realize that everyone in the classroom is staring at me.

“Young lady, you’re up,” our teacher says, his eyes locked on me. I can’t seem to remember exactly what his name is. Something that starts with the letter P?

Nor do I have any idea what he is talking about. I’m just about to admit that I don’t really know what I’m up for when the door flies open and Karli stumbles into the the classroom, mumbling something under her breath.

Relief washes over me as all eyes in the room turn away from me and onto her. Unlike me, Karli looks anything but upset about being the center of attention.

“Mr. Preston!” Karli declares loudly.

Ha! I knew his name started with a P!

“Mr. Preston,” Karli says, this time a little bit less forcefully. “There was a mix up with my schedule, but not to worry. I went right to guidance and got it straightened out.”

Mr. Preston seems to have a pained expression on his face when he answers. “A mix up. What type of mix up Miss Greenwood?”

“Well, they tried to put me in Miss Gleeson’s class for Spanish II, but no way was I allowing that. I mean, Miss Gleeson? I can’t take her class, I had her for homeroom last year and she used to make me spit my gum out every morning before I was allowed in the room. She’d make me open my mouth even!” Karli delivers this statement as if a teacher asking her to spit out her gum is a violation of her human rights and not just a teacher enforcing school policy.

“Well, technically, gum isn’t supposed to be chewed during school hours…” but Mr. Preston trails off as if he knows anything he could possibly say would go in one ear and out the other with Karli.

“Well anyway,” Karli continues. “Once I explained to my counselor how I failed Spanish I in both 7th and 8th grade and I only passed last year ‘cause of you, well she moved me right into your class for Spanish II. So luckily it all worked out.” She waves her new schedule around as if to show Mr. Preston she isn’t lying.

Mr. Preston gives a little bit of a sigh before he answers “Well .. this is great news. Why don’t you take a seat?”

Karli smiles sweetly and stomps to the back of the room and takes a seat a few rows away from me. I guess Karli’s presence distracts Mr. Preston from whatever he wanted from me because suddenly he’s going over the course outline he passed out at the beginning of class, and I’m in the clear, which is just fine with me.

I lock my eyes on Karli and wait for her to notice me, and when she does, her face lights up. Suddenly she’s taking her pencil and forcefully poking the girl who’s sitting next to me. “Psttt,” she hisses, way too loudly. I sigh and look away quickly because I fear a scene is about to unfold.

“Excuse me...” Karli whispers to the girl, who’s looking at Karli like a deer caught in the headlights. She’s tiny and clearly nervous about Karli poking her with a sharp object. She’s may even be a freshman, but I cant say for sure.

“I need you to switch seats with me,” she says to the girl, more telling her than asking her. Then, before the girl can answer, Karli’s up out of her seat and transferring the girl’s belongings from one desk to the other. The girl (who is clearly too shocked to speak) just sort of nods and then gets up and moves to the seat next to her. Mr. Preston, however, seems to be oblivious to what Karli is doing.

“Thank God we have a class together!” Karli exclaims much too loudly.

She isn’t even pretending to be subtle in talking to me, her whole entire body is turned in her chair as she looks at me. “Lex texted me and told me about what Austin did to you this morning. What a jerk!”

I look around quickly to make sure no one’s looking at her before I answer.