Summer Love [Harry Styles Fanfiction]

Prologue

Cassie's POV

"Alright, and your total will be twelve dollars exactly!" I smile at the old man in front of me. He doesn't smile back, however, and I roll my eyes. How hard is it to smile at someone?

"Here you go," the man replies, handing over his money. I get the correct amount of change needed from the cash register and hand it to him. He grabs his cart and quickly walks out the door without saying another word.

"Have a great day," I whisper to myself, rolling my eyes.

Finally, I get to go home. I've been working at this small grocery store, Marks', for the past 2 years. Lately, my parents haven't been able to pay the bills as easily, so I have been working at the store from the moment I get out of school until closing time- which is 10 o'clock. I don't make a ton of money, but it's enough to buy food for the family and buy important necessities for around the house.

"Bye, Carol!" I yell to my boss and begin to put on my black rain jacket. It's been raining a lot around here lately. I currently live in Brooklyn, but I'm originally from Ohio. My parents and I moved here about 11 years ago, when I was 7. I'm about to graduate from high school this year and I couldn't be more excited. I plan on going to a small college and then I'll transfer to something bigger.

"Oh wait, Cassie! I need to talk to you about something," Carol yells from her office. I turn my head to face the noise and I see her standing there, motioning for me to go into her office. The office is a quaint little space. Its rustic appearance gives off a country vibe, which is weird considering we live in Brooklyn.

"Yes?" I ask, curiously, hoping I didn't do anything wrong.

"Cassie," she pauses and walks over to her desk. She sits on the desk and turns to face me. "You know how much I love your help," Carol pauses yet again, but this time she smiles at me sympathetically. "But you know you can't keep working this late."

Great. I somehow knew that this is exactly where she was heading with this conversation.

"It's really no big deal!" I reply, trying to sound confident. It's really hard to seem confident, though, when you're crying on the inside.

"Sweetie, you have school. If you keep working this late, you won't be able to keep up with homework. Besides, you need to finish out the year strong seeing as you're going to be graduating," Carol gives me another smile.

"Someone applied for your job today, and I'm going to give it to them. You now only work on weekends," Carol places her hand on my back gently. I begin to say something, but no words come out. She puts on her jacket, grabs her purse, and starts to walk out the door, but turns back around to face me.

"Brett is going to close up tonight, so don't worry about it," Carol spoke nonchalantly. "Have a good night," she gives me a small wave and then exits out the door.

I roll my eyes. She's always had a strange attitude about me working in the position I did, well, the position I used to. I don't think she realizes that I don't care that I have to work late- it's my choice to work as late as I do. This job has helped my family out greatly, and I don't know what I'm going to do now that I no longer work enough hours. I mean- I'd totally find another job that suited my needs, but it's not exactly easy to find a job in this area when you come from a poor family. I exit the office and head back to my station to grab my purse. Once I've turned off the light to my checkout lane, I leave the building and begin to walk home.

As I'm walking down the sidewalk back to my house, I can't help but notice how strangely quiet it is. It's raining out, but not too hard. For the past week or so it's been storming like crazy, it's kind of nice to be able to walk home without getting soaking wet. I have an umbrella, but that's not much use when the wind blows the rain right at me.

Sadly, I didn't get to enjoy the nice silence for long when my phone starts to blare out my ringtone, "Afraid" by The Neighbourhood. When I look at the caller ID on my phone I realize that I don't recognize the number, but I answer anyway.

"Hello?" I answer.

"Cassandra Parker? Is this you?" A woman's voice on the other end asks, I can't recognize it.

"This is her. Who is this?" I ask, nervously, and I begin to dig my nails into my free hand, a habit that I've had since I was a little girl.

"Cassandra, this is Sheriff Landers," the voice pauses. "Sweetie, your parents were just in a terrible accident-"

"What? An accident?" I cut off the lady speaking to me on the other line, my voice is shaky.

"They were speeding on a very slippery road which caused them to swerve off into the grass and hit a tree head on,"

"Are they okay?" I cut her off frantically, but my voice comes out more as a whisper. This can't be real. Please, God, please tell me this is not happening right now.

"I'm sorry," the sheriff pauses. "Your father wasn't buckled so he went straight through the windshield and got stuck between the front of the car and the tree. It's assumed that he died immediately on the scene. As for your mother, she suffered from major blood loss and head trauma. By the time we got here, it was too late to save her," she finishes.

Suddenly, everything is blurry. I slide down the wall of the brick building next to me and stare out at the road. I feel tears begin to trickle down my cheeks, but I don't wipe them away.

"Hello? Are you still there?" the sheriff asks.

"Barely," I reply.

[A/N]: heeelllllooooo!!! if you're reading this, it's probably because you just read the prologue of Summer Love, and you're wondering why I didn't go so in depth with Cassie's back story... no? well, I'm going to tell you anyways. yes, Cassie's parents did die in a car accident (I know it's not original now, but when I came up with this story back in 2012 it was), but I decided not to elaborate on it too much because I wanted to jump right into the main idea of the story. throughout this book, though, there will be moments where Cassie talks about her parents accident/ has flashbacks.. WHICH IS WHY I DECIDED TO WRITE THIS PROLOGUE, SO YOU WOULD UNDERSTAND!! thank you. love you all :) xx