Ain't Shady Baby, I'm Hot

7

"Hey! You made it." Kiara said excited once she saw me getting off my bike. I smiled at the girl as she made her way over to me.

"I sure did. Ride wasn't so bad. Did you get dropped off?" I asked as I looked around briefly.

"Yeah, not yet 16 so still working with my permit." I nodded along, slightly disappointing.

"Alright, we'll that leads me to another question. Does that make you a sophomore for this upcoming school year?"

"Yup. Thankfully I'm not in the awful Kook Academy anymore, this year should be more fun." I froze, my eyes turning to Kiara as she stood waiting for me to wrap up.

"What do you mean, Kook Academy?" Kiara's face fell into a look of recognition as she remembered I was new to town.

"Oh, there is so much I have to catch you up to speed with. Where did you say your house was again?" I frowned, locking my bike up the rest of the way before I rose to look at her.

"Off of 12th street, why?" She seemed to sigh in relief.

"Perfectly in between. Thank goodness. Come on. Let's talk over smoothies."

I simply followed her and made a mental checklist of all my questions. And there were a lot.

"Okay, now that we've got our smoothies, let me give you a run down of Kildare." Kiara started, pausing to take a sip of her smoothie.

"I'll hold all my questions tell the end." I spoke as I too sipped from my mango-orange smoothie.

"Okay, so the only way to give you a full run down of Outer Banks is to talk about the tribal factions within Kildare." And with that, Kiara was off.

"You have the Kooks. Rich kids who mostly live in Figure Eight. Super nice houses, nice boats, good land, classic rich behavior. And all of them, I mean all of them go to the Kook Academy. Or formally known as Kildare Prep." I gagged at the name. Of course the rich kid academy would be called 'prep'.

"Then you have the Pogues. The poor kids, you'll find them living on The Cut. Lower class families who have to do hard work just to get food on the table. You'll find them at Kildare High School, a public school with a decent education considering most of the graduates don't go to college. You may have 10% who end up going to vocational school, but other than that, straight to work. Or jail." Damn.

"To save you from asking, I fall under the Kook category by default. However, I've had a recent falling out with someone who I thought was my best friend. And well, when she's the princess of the Kooks, it's easier to just become a voluntary Pogue. Which is what I did." A Kook Princess. What in the Westside story.

"There's one family of Kooks that are considered Royalty. Live on Tannyhill and are the monetary stable of the community. The Cameron's. Ward Cameron, the king of kooks. Then you have Rose Cameron, the new wife. Then come the kids. Wheezie is the youngest then Sarah, the Kook Princess and my ex-best friend. And her devilborn brother Rafe, he's either playing football or drinking at some party." Rafe. The guy I ran into is the Kook Prince. I suppressed the urge to laugh at my luck.

"Well shit." I whispered. Kiara moving past to continue with her tale of Kildare Lore which slowly became Kiara Lore.

"And then I met Pope, JJ, and John B during sophomore orientation week about a month ago and they've taken me in like we've been buds since forever."

"That's wholesome. I'll be interested to get into their back stories at some point too." I was sincere as I smiled at Kiara.

"So, let me ask a few questions, then I'll give you a brief summary of my Lore." Kiara nodded enthusiastically. Guess I do have decent personal skills.

"Other than where you live, what else determines that status? Like I'm smack dab in the middle, physically and economically, my mom and I both will be working soon. She's got a job at the Prep school and I'm looking for one. We live on 12th street which is neither on Figure Eight or The Cut. We have a nice house but can't afford a trip to Universal Studios." Kiara smiled even though I was confused.

"Well, Xena, I'd say you could be either or both. But because you weren't raised as one or the other, you'll get to make that decision for yourself." That was both relieving and hella nerve wracking.

"Okay. Well. I guess I'll get to my lore as I wait for more questions to come to me."

"Born and raised in Texas. My father is a stuck up white rich man who divorced my mother 12 years too late. My mother is Marie Bayford a hard working and loving person. She really likes you by the way. She took on her maiden name, lucky her, I still have to have Tallen as that's what my maiden name is. Yeah, Xena Tallen is a freaking unit of a name I'll tell you. And if the last name wasn't connected to my dad, I would say I love it." I took a sip of smoothie to calm me down.

"I'll be a Junior this upcoming school year, and I'm pretty sure my mom has me at the Kook Academy where she is working." Kiara grimaced in pity. "Yeah. Well, she promised the sports programs and education were top notch, if they aren't well, I'll be quickly finding a way to transfer out."

"That's pretty much a summary of my life." I voiced as I clasped my hands. "Oh. I do have a quick question. If one were to say become a topic of dislike by one of the Cameron siblings, say, Rafe, for example, how bad can that get?"

Kiara looked at me with wide eyes her mouth agape as she blinked.

"You've been here a full day, and you've already run into Rafe?" She whisper-screamed.

"Yeah, like twice. Once was his fault, the second time he provoked it so I ran into him... literally."

"You're screwed. That man is literally a psycho. You're going to want to transfer as soon as possible."

"Why? What do you mean?"

"Rafe is still in school. He's a senior at the Kook Academy. And that motherfucker runs that school because of his daddy's money." I sighed, rubbing my forehead.

Of course I pick a fight with the biggest dog out here.

"Well. I guess that hypothetical is out the window." I found myself glaring at the wooden table between Kiara and I. If this Rafe character was the big dog on the island, it only made it right I should humble him a bit. After all, I may have already made myself enemy number one.

"Why are you smirking?" I looked up to Kiara with an innocent smile.

"Just planning my island takeover. Sometimes destiny works out in ridiculous ways." The girl smirked as she leaned closer. "You in?

"Hell yeah. I've got three more goons who'd like a taste of that too."

"The more the merrier."