Chapter 1: The Deal

I'm going to start editing the chapters of this book soon, i promise. for now, though, this book is full of a lot of mistakes that i apologize for :)

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I hate school.

I really, really, really hate school.

Don't get me wrong, I love learning, and the power knowledge grants you is great, but I just hate it in a school environment.

Standardized tests do nothing to prove how much a student has learned and the entire construct of school itself is pointless. Don't even get me started on the idiots—I mean, my fellow peers that join me throughout the school day.

Everybody that knows me, which isn't a lot of people, is aware of my extreme hatred. Which is why one of my best friends, Graciella, is bouncing on my bed, attempting to wake me up.

"Gracie," I groan. "Leave me alone."

"Nope," she chirps, popping the 'p'. "Can't. It's the first day of school. I'm so excited. Aren't you excited? First day of our senior year. It's gonna be awesome and–"

"Shut up," I groan, hitting her with one of my pillows. "Go away. I don't wanna go to school."

I can literally feel her pout.

I feel Gracie get off my bed and hear her walk out of the room, and I sigh happily, snuggling my face into my pillow. I'm just starting to drift off to sleep when cold water and pieces of ice hit my face.

The cold water instantly wakes me up, and I jump out of bed, staring at Gracie, who is standing in front of me with an empty cup in her hand.

"Did you just...pour a cup of ice water...on my face?" She poured an entire glass of water on me. Who does that?

She nods, smiling smugly.

I can feel the cold water running down my shirt, and when it hits my stomach, I let out a screech.

A fucking screech.

Gracie giggles. "Oh my God, you should've heard yourself, you sounded like a banshee." She erupts into another round of giggles.

My wet hair is dripping onto my wood floor and I step into my bathroom to grab a towel.

As I'm drying my hair, and doing my best to dry my wet shirt, I glance at my alarm clock and do a double take before screeching again.

"Why the fuck are you in my house at five in the goddamn morning?" I yell loud enough for the neighbors to hear.

"Two dollars," my mother yells from her room, which is across from mine.

My mom has a thing against cursing, so any time my dad or I say one, we have to put a dollar in the 'swear jar'.

It's ridiculous and consumes all my money.

It's been going on ever since I was around fourteen, so you think I would virtually never curse, but you would be surprised. I lose at least twenty bucks a day to that stupid jar.

I shoot a glare at Gracie before moving to my swear stash, which I fill with money and loose change entirely for this purpose, and retrieve two dollars.

"Why are you in my house?" I ask Gracie as I leave my room and walk towards my parents' door with the money in hand.

"Because, silly," she says cheerfully, not affected in the slightest by my words or stare. "It's the first day of school and everyone knows that you have to be up for school super-duper early on the first day, I mean..."

I roll my eyes but smile despite my annoyance. Gracie talks a lot, but that's what makes Gracie unique; she's just a naturally hyper person who acts like they've had five cups of coffee all the time.

I open my parents' door and walk to the swear jar, depositing my two dollars.

The swear jar is a big jug that sits at the foot of my parents' bed, nothing special about it. I don't know what they do with the money; when it gets full it's empty the next day.

I turn to my parents, who are sitting up side by side in their bed. "Good morning," I say, sounding like a disgruntled child.

"Good morning, sweetie." Mom lets out a yawn. "Why so grumpy?"

"Let's see," I say, pretending to think about it. "One, it's five in the morning, two, I have to go to school today"—kill me now—"and three, someone poured a cup of water on me to wake me up at five in the morning." I shoot Gracie a not so subtle pointed look.

Dad smirks. "I wonder who that was."

"It was me," Gracie shouts excitedly, hopping up and down. "I was just so excited for school and Cass wouldn't wake up."

My parents chuckle. "Good morning, Grace."

"Good morning, Mr. and Mrs. Parker. Sorry to disturb you this early in the morning but it's the first day of school today, as you probably already know, and I just couldn't wait so I came here super early so Cass and I could get ready together." Gracie pauses to take a breath before turning to me. "Aren't you excited because I'm really excited and—oh my gosh—we get to catch up with all of our friends, not that we have any, but–"

"Holy shit, Gracie, shut the fuck up already. You're giving me a goddamn headache. How many cups of fucking coffee did you drink?"

I'm not exactly what you would call a morning person.

"Cassandra Grace Parker, four dollars, swear jar, now."

I scowl. "Damn it."

"Five," is my mom's response.

My scowl grows but I mentally hold myself back to keep my 'fuck' from slipping out.

Gracie gasps. "Oh my gosh, that's right, I totally forgot that your middle name is part of my first name. I don't know how I forgot but..."

I groan. I love Gracie, I really do—she's one of my best friends in the whole wide world—but I hate when she comes into my house at five in the morning and dumps a cup of water on me.

Believe it or not, this isn't the first time she's done this.

You have no idea how much I wish it was.

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"Oh my gosh, Cass, tell me you're not gonna wear that to school today," Gracie says, looking horrified.

"What's wrong with it?" I ask, looking down at my outfit. "I look fine."

"Cassandra," she says, her usual bright and happy expression replaced with a serious stare. I flinch at the use of my whole first name. "You can't wear sweatpants and a T-shirt on the first day of school. Other people are gonna think you've been living under a rock and have no care for fashion or trends."

I stare at her, confused. "But I don't care."

She groans. "Yeah, but you're not supposed to let other people know that."

The fuck? "Why not?" I ask, even more confused.

"Because," she stutters. "You're just not. Now go change into these." She throws a pair of high-waisted black ripped jeans and a white crop top with words on it. "Or I'll make sure we're late to school."

"And why would that bother me?" She knows exactly why it would bother me.

She smirks at me. "Because even though you hate school you have this weird obsession with attendance that I never really understood. I mean, if you hate school, why would you want to be on time and never miss a single da–"

"Gracie?"

"Yeah?"

"You do realize this has happened every day for the past three years of high school, right?"

She always tries to make me wear crop tops and jeans, when I would rather wear anything else, by threatening me with tardiness. I always end up going to school in sweatpants and T-shirts because I'm more stubborn than she is and I'm never going to budge.

And it's not even that I'm a tomboy, or I don't like the clothes—don't get me wrong, the clothes are cute, I guess I just never want to wear them.

"Yes, I am aware of that," she says grudgingly. "But this year is different."

"And why is that?" I smirk at her, knowing whatever it is she has planned is never going to work.

She smirks back. "Because this year I got your parents to back me up."

My smirk drops. "Fuck."

"One dollar," Mom says as she enters my room, Dad right behind her.

"How long were you guys standing out there?"

"Doesn't matter," Dad says dismissingly. "What matters is that you are going to wear whatever it is that Grace is trying to get you to wear."

"She wants me to wear these." I hold up the jeans that have rips all the way up the thighs.

Dad's face shows confusion. "And?" He draws the word out, probably thinking I'm too stupid to get the fact that he doesn't care.

I am kind of stupid, but still.

Rude.

"Shouldn't you be refusing to let me wear them because I'm your baby girl and no boy needs to see even a glimpse of my thighs or stomach?"

Excuse me for thinking this, but I thought that was standard dad behavior.

Gracie lets out a giggle, and all eyes turn to her.

"Sorry."

"Listen, sweetie," Dad says in his 'don't take this the wrong way' voice. "It's just... sometimes I have trouble believing you're a girl."

"Well, okay, ouch, Dad."

"Sorry," he winces. "That was a little harsh,"—you bet it was—"but you always wear sweatpants, no matter the weather or occasion, you hate shopping, all you do is play video games when you're not playing outside or eating, and you've never once talked about a boy you've liked, which means that I haven't gotten to be the overprotective father I know I can be–"

"And I haven't gotten to be the embarrassing mother I know I can be."

"–and that sucks." He pauses. "For us, at least."

I swirch my gaze between my parents and Gracie before speaking. "First off, I don't know why the fact that I do all those things makes you doubt my gender, and second off, I'm still not wearing the clothes."

They all groan in unison.

"How about this, sweetie," Mom says. "You let Grace pick out your outfits for school and school events, still wearing whatever you want otherwise, and I'll let you have the entire first month, last month, and the month right before Christmas break with half off the amount you need to put in the swear jar.

"N–" The word is on the tip of my tongue, but then I really think about what my mom just said.

I always lose most of my money to the swear jar during the first month of school, because it takes time for my brain to readjust to all the fucking idiots, the last month or so, because freedom is so close yet so far, not to mention the fucking exams, and the month right before Christmas break because by then I'm fed up with all the dumbasses that are somehow able to pass as mildly intelligent human beings.

But fifty cents every time I curse instead of a dollar?

With all the things that come out of my mouth, I could end up saving a lot of money.

"Fine," I say curtly.

"So," Mom says. "Just to be clear, we have a deal, right?"

I briefly wonder if I should reconsider what I'm doing. Having Graciella, out of all my friends, not that I have any others beside her and Gabs, plan my daily outfit could easily be one of the worst decisions I could ever make.

"We have a deal."

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Thoughts on Cass, or anything else, so far?

Thanks for reading!

-- jae

the cover was done by me, but my previous cover was made by txmbxy-ish ! i love their work and all the graphics i've seen on their profile, so go check them out :3