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Blanca. 

I was in no mood for the stupid barbecue but it's not like I had much of a choice, mostly because it was at our house in our back yard. The only good thing about it was that  Tilly would be there too, Nika couldn't make it because she was still away. Every single time a new family moved into neighbour hood my parents insisted on inviting everyone around so they could get to know us, this time it was the Smalls, Mary, Bill and their son Scotty. It was nice of my parents, but when I was exausthed it was a bit much. But we had a big enough house to fit everyone and my parents were big on community so 

My parents had forced me to get a job, it wasn't like I needed it they were more than capable of supporting me and my three siblings, but I had to learn the value of the dollar or something. Eitherway it was a lot more tiring than I thought it would be, stupidly I'd decided to be a waitress in a little cafe not realising how difficult it would be. But I couldn't quit because I changed my mind because it would show my parents that I couldn't do hard work. 

This whole thing had started when my father had decided all four of us were spoilt and that we needed to start working. It had not gone down well with us which probably just proved his point. My older brothers, Alfonso (Alfie -20) and Emanuel (E - 18) had gotten jobs at the club as caddies or whatever paid well enough, my older sister Ellasandra (Ella -18 turning 19)  was working as a candy striper which had left me. I should have probably gotten a job at a fashion boutique, I can tell you with full confidence that I would have preffered it there but then my Dad would have thought I was just doing the bare minimum so I'd gone and chosen something less glamorous. 

My parents were insistant on this, my Dad had grown up with nothing and worked his ass off to get us everything we had, he was a lawyer a really, really good one. My Mom, like me and my siblings, had grown up with everything, but she had never been like us who apparently took things for granted. She worked as a doctor in the hospital in LA. 

Tilly was the first to arrive, she had been my best friend since before I could walk, our mothers were best friends and we'd been born on exactly the same day, the eighteenth of May, so it was a perfect fit really. But for people who were born on the same day we couldn't have looked more different, Tilly, well she was like a live action Charlotte La Bouf from the princess and the frog. Although she was a little more down to earth. Her parents had grown up in Texas before the moved here, insanely rich because of the oil farm they had and the fashion brand her mother owned, so she had a strong southern accent. 

I on the other hand had dark brown hair, dark brown eyes and dark skin, my father had grown up in Mexico and then moved here when he got accepted to U-chicago for his post grad. My mother's family was Argentinian but they'd lived in LA for generations before she'd been born. But the thing we did have in common is we had impeccable taste in clothes. 

"Blanca!" Tilly called catching my attention over the crowd of people flooding into the back yard, "oh my gosh I have so much to tell you!" 

I grinned pulling her into a hug, "Tilly, I missed you." 

We hadn't seen each other almost all summer because she had been gone in Texas, her cousins wedding or something. Nika and I had gone out to visit her for two weeks but after that I'd gone to Mexico and then come here to start my new job and Nika had gone to Vietnam and Paris to see her respective families. 

"I missed you too!" Tilly repliedhugging me back, "but we can talk about that later because I have bigger news!" 

"Okay, spill then." I prompted as we went to sit down on the swings near the far end of the garden. 

"I have a boyfriend!" She told me exitedly, "oh my god you will never believe it, so I wasn't allowed to tell anyone and I kind of wanted it to be a surprise but the other reason I was in Texas all summer was because I was shooting a film." 

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