Superstitions

Chapter one

The sun was high and proud in the afternoon sky, beating down on the pedestrians scattered on the beach bellow. Sprawled out on my pink and white stripped beach towel, which I'd had forever, my skin tingled with heat. Living in Santa Barbara the sun never failed to pull through, meaning tanning season was most of the year around; and after vacationing in England where their summer consists of mostly rain and one or two slightly humid days it was more than a relief.
Lifting my aviators from my eyes I propped myself up using my elbows taking a glance at my three friends happily bathing in the rays of heat.
"Hailey, you're not still reading that are you?" I scoffed. She'd been reading over and over the horoscope section of Vogue with intent for the past 20 minutes - really I didn't know how she hadn't memorised it.
"What? It says Neptune is in line with Pluto," she almost squealed with delight, her pearly white perfect teeth dazzling my eyes.
"Hailey, English please," I replied to what may as well have been Zulu.
"It means I'm going to meet a guy," she smirked.
"And so is the rest of the millions of people who share your star sign," I said rolling my eyes.
Hailey was very in to the whole superstition, voodoo magic, karma bull shit that con-artists pump out to get naive people to spend inordinate amounts of money on. I, however, was the exact opposite.
"Oh sorry, I forgot I was talking to miss superstition-my-arse," she mocked.
"Honestly, Hailey do you really think this is true?" I sighed.
"Well, she does have a pretty good change considering the masquerade ball is tonight," Leo chipped in. He sat in his little life guard chair wearing the iconic red shorts looking like he just jumped out of Baywatch. He was right the masquerade ball was tonight and considering that there are five schools going the chance of her meeting someone was high. Cliche I know but it was a 'work' idea to get the 'youngsters' involved. Mine and Hailey's fathers worked for the same company and we're both very high up in their positions meaning we didn't have the option of not going. The evening would be full of dancing, drinking and conversation about the company and what a nice young lady I had turned into.
"Not you too," I shook my head in dispaere.
"Ever since he was nice to the freshman on the football team and then the next day he got to third base with Stacy Johnson," Laila laughed. Even just the sound of it made the rest of us crack up.
"Hey, it was karma alright," Leo said half defensively half chuckling."I had been trying for weeks,"
"He's right it was karma," Hailey said smugly. "Moving on from Graces' most hated subject. You all need to be at the dance by 7," she added joy filling her blue eyes.
"You know there is such thing as fashionable late," Laila chimed in.
"Come on please," Hailey pleaded. Hailey mom was the planner meaning Hailey has practically lived and breathed this dance for the past five months. Resulting in her making us turn up half an hour early just to check if everything was perfect.
"Oh, the things we do for you," I smiled. I was more than eager to put on my dress and mask and get all glammed up ready for the ball. The theme of it was an obvious guess seeing as Hailey was obsessed with all things mysterious and romantic and so was her mother.
Running my hands through the soft warm sand I picture what the ball would be like, Hailey had been more than pedantic about the affaire so we were all expecting big things.