Rivals

Chapter One

I refresh the website again for the hundredth time, and still, there is no change.

"Doing that isn't going to make the time move faster, M," Carmen says from the bean bag in the corner of my room.

I narrow my eyes at my best friend as she reapplies a coat of dark red lipstick using her phone as a mirror.

"Easy for you to say, you got your acceptance letter weeks ago," I grumble and frustratingly refresh the page again. "This is so annoying." I groan in exaggerated despair.

Carmen snorts and stands, readjusting her little sundress and fixing her braids in my full-length mirror. Clearly eagerly ready to join the party downstairs. "I wonder if Luk came."

I roll my eyes at her, "he lives here." Her crush on my brother makes her a complete and utter fool.

She sticks her tongue out at me and then plops down beside me, resting her hands under her chin, staring at the stupid screen with me. It made me feel guilty when she sighed as I went for the refresh button again. She came here for the party but instead wanted to make sure her best friend wasn't sacrificing Earl - my fossil of a cat- to the universe to get a response from her dream college.

I rolled my eyes at the idea of sacrificing my grumpy baby. I watch said grumpy baby take a nap on a pile of dirty clothes in the corner of my room.

"You can go downstairs if you want, you know," I tell her, placing my laptop aside for the sake of my sanity.

She opens her mouth to argue, but I beat her to it, "Luke has a new tattoo he's been flaunting about like some chick magnet."

She gasps, "You're shitting me."

I shrug and fight the urge not to crack a mischievous smile, "I shit you not."

She blinks at me like I just told her the most outrageous piece of gossip ever and quickly rushes up and to the door. "You better not be bullshiting me, Willson!" She yells over her shoulder before she practically runs out of the room, leaving my door ajar.

I chuckle and shake my head as I get up from my bed to close the door, but my hand freezes on the door handle as I look over my shoulder at my laptop making my stomach knot anxiously then look back out my bedroom door, where the music vibrated throughout the house.

I've been to quite a few parties, and it was enough for me to conclude that it's just a headache. I bite on my bottom lip as I make my decision.

"Fuck it. I need a drink." I say and grab my discarded hoodie from the floor head downstairs and make a beeline straight towards the kitchen.

I glance around the island and find a bunch of empty beer cans and bottles and then have to practically shove a couple making out against the refrigerator, only to sigh in disappointment when I don't find what I'm looking for.

I decide to venture to the backyard where the actaul party seems to be and make my way through a group of bodies, out onto the patio in the backyard. Cringing at the sight of the mess already made.

Luke is going to be in deep shit if he doesn't die from alcohol poisoning first to clean this mess up before the parentals come home.

I turn left and right and finally spot the keg and my heart does a whole backflip when I see who's standing there talking to a guy in an ugly ass Hawaiian shirt.

"You handling the keg tonight, Brown?" I ask and stand in front of the two, interrupting their conversation.

Dylan Brown's dark brows fly up at the sight of me, in clear surprise and not in the -oh she's so stunning- but smiles nonetheless. "Hey, May." He says slowly then narrows his brown eyes at me. "What are you doing here?" He asks.