Always Rated R

Chapter 1- New Beginnings

•CHAPTER 1- New Beginnings

Rebecca Johnson. I loved my name. It was just what I needed, nothing more. I loved my talents. I was grateful to God above for blessing me with such singing and acting abilities. I loved my clothing, and I loved my beautiful, flowing, blonde locks. I had decided once that my strands must be supernatural, because they were just too unendingly stunning, and my best feature. What? It's fine for me to admire my own hair. It's not my hair. It was placed on me by an angel at some point in my childhood, I'm sure of it. I loved my beautiful, real friends, and my loving, kind family. My age, on the other hand: 17. Ugh. I was always either too old or too young. And worst of all, every guy that I was attracted to was inevitably three to five years older than me. I hadn't had a boyfriend my age for a while. Not like I minded. I didn't really throw myself around at boys. Only about four had called me theirs. I just wish I was older.

It was the morning of my first day of college. But, that was most assuredly not the biggest change for me recently. I had just moved to an entirely new country on an exchange and drama scholarship. Thank God for those, otherwise I would be stuck back in my home of Atlanta, Georgia. Atlanta was an alright place, but I preferred where I was originally from: Los Angeles, California. I didn't like it for the reason other people might, for the beaches, glamour, and fame. Don't get me wrong, I loved all of that. But there was another reason I had for adoring this "city of angels". Something that it couldn't live without. The spirit. There was just this sense of freedom, like you could just pick any moment in the history of time and be frozen there. It was the same feeling I got when I acted or sang. As I woke up for my first day at Bristol University, which was about a two hour drive from London, I had this sense of intense accomplishment. Maybe it was because I was on foreign soil, but I had some sort of feeling. And it was euphoric. I saw that my roommate, Alice, had already left for her first class. She was honestly an extremely wonderful girl, and I was lucky to be rooming with her. I walked over to my closet and picked out an emerald green oversize jumper, some black footless tights, and some cobalt blue flats with silver circle embellishments on them. I had already taken a shower the night before, and as a said before, my hair is magic, so all I had to do was let it fall down in its beautiful cascading waves, it being a little curly underneath with highlights all throughout. I didn't put much makeup on, because although I loved the stuff, I always thought that I looked better with less on. Plus, I had naturally fuller eyebrows that framed my eyes beautifully. The only feature that I didn't like about myself was my nose. It wasn't a big or small one, although the latter is what I wish it would be. I wished it more when I was younger, until I realized that most models have a nose my size, even though I would still get a little jealous whenever I met someone with a face full of absolute symmetry.

I grabbed my Kate Spade purse and ran out the door to my first class, a class entirely devoted to monologues. Not the best thing to be doing at nine in the morning, but, you know, to hell with it. It's the school's decision. I walked in, and was immediately sized up by every pair of wandering hormonal male and snotty stuck-up female eyes in the room. We all had to do a short monologue in front of the class from "Les Miserables" in order for the professor to be informed of our acting level. It went on this way through "Acting Visualization", "Advanced Vocal", an array of dance and musical classes, and several standard ones. I was so exhausted by the end of the day that I had to force myself up from my desk in "Calculus 101" and drag my feet heading towards my flat building.

It was already quite dark outside, and I decided to put my earbuds in before braving the outside. I put on "Carry On" by Fun. as I started making the trek.

"If you're lost and alone, and you're caught up in the storm, carry o-o-o-o-o-o-ooooon..."

I was quite happy with how my first day went, but I started to wonder how my life could get any more new or stressful. As I rounded the corner right near my building, my obnoxiously tall body hit something hard that was about the same height as me, and my books, my dance bag, and purse went flying everywhere. I slowly looked up, infuriation contributing to my already passionately drained state. The first thing that I noticed were the eyes. Those chocolate and bronze glittering orbs. They were already quite wide to begin with, and with a look of horror spread over them, it was actually sort of amusing how brightly they shone. "Oh my god! I am so sorry! Great. This is just my luck.", a deep, Northern English accent sounded. I still couldn't see the whole of the man's figure, as the only light that was in close proximity was a street lamp high above. I swore immediately, not having the capacity for bullshit like this at the end of a long day. "You most definitely should be! That's my whole first day's work, right there!", I exclaimed, trying to scavenge a few papers that had shaken loose from inside my binder. He was already down on his knees picking up my wallet and phone. Good thing I had decided to put an OtterBox on that earlier. Melted Eyes spoke again. " I really am truly sorry! I was in quite a hurry, and-" "I really don't give a fat shit! You should have been looking where you're going!", I stated. I was letting the crankiness get the best of me. I noticed he was staring at me intently. "I-It really was a mistake, I'm so sorry..." he trailed off. I could see him a bit clearer now. He was most definitely about my height, and he was probably the most beautiful human being I had ever laid eyes on. I immediately realized what I had said. "Oh my god, I didn't mean that- I... you didn't even damage anything." "Oh, it's ok. Here...", he said, handing me my student ID card. "So... I guess it's Rebecca? Unless that's someone else's card.", he joked. "Oh... uhm, yeah." I was starting to get lost in those now starting to feel familiar eyes, although I didn't know why. "I'm Zayn.", the beautifully low voice said. Oh. I now knew why.