Her name was Rose

Chapter 1....

Jocelyn started as she felt her hand slide on the desk slipping away from her lolling head. Sitting up right she blinked rapidly glancing around the room to see if anyone had noticed. Apparently they had because some guy was snickering at her from across the room. Falling asleep hadn’t been her fault though. She’d been up all last night dreaming about Adam.

“Miss Kage do you have something you would like to share?” She inwardly groaned as she stared back at my teacher with blank eyes.

“Um excuse me?”
“I said do you have-”

“No, no,” She said quickly as she felt the rest of the students eyes boring in all around her. “It was my mistake sir.” As he let out long sigh Jocelyn watched him pull up his belted slacks and push his glasses farther up his large nose.

“You only have one week left, I suggest you don’t slack off now. I can still fail you if need be.” With that he went back to explaining the uses of knowing the mathematical equation pie. Where as Jocelyn went back to staring at the clock. Five more minutes till the end of class. It wouldn’t have been so bad even if she had Liana here with her, however her best friend was off skipping with some unknown guy. Liana always seemed to have a way with guys. How her hips automatically swung with a confidence and ease that Jocelyn clearly lacked.

She’d been told though that she hadn’t always. Lacked the skills to being a successful girl that is. Back when she was sixteen, before the accident, her mom would tell her, she had every guy wrapped tightly around her finger. And when Jocelyn worked her way through the old photographs she found herself staring at the girl. Her hair long and blonde past her shoulders, with big gray eyes and a wide smile that stretched from ear to ear. The girl was almost never alone, always with some friend, and in more often then not you could see she was laughing. Head tilted back, her eyes crinkling as her smile burst. Yet she held the same elated presence when she was alone, posing with hands on her hips, goofy sunglasses shielding her face. How long Jocelyn had tried to bring her back, tried to smile as big, laugh as loud. No matter what she did though she just couldn’t. It was like part of her was gone, missing, just out of camera view in the pictures, something she couldn’t place.

The accident, Jocelyn found herself drifting away to the only memory she could recall before her mind was fogged by hospital beds and beeping equipment. It was late; it was always late in the memory. I guess that’s how it should be, she thought, after all memories don’t change. She knew that she was driving; maybe on a motorcycle cause her hair was whipping back. And someone was sitting in front of her, because she was gripping his or her waist tightly. And the person was laughing, at something she had said she was sure of. It was a familiar sound, she had been with someone she knew. Until a moment later the laughter had died as quickly as it came. Bright lights, a yell, squealing tires, and blackness all around. That was the only thing she had ever been able to recall since she was sixteen.

Doctors and her family members had told her that it was an accident, the driver she was with had been drunk. All her life after that had been filled with regret. Of being a stupid girl and driving with someone who’s breath was oozing with the smell of bittersweet rum. Due to that one night she couldn’t remember anything about her past. From that moment on being re-taught her life by old videos and photos. Of her own stories being poured out of her friends mouths, all the heartbreaks, laughs, as they looked on at her with sympathetic eyes. The girl who didn’t know who she was.

Wrenching her self-free of her depressing thoughts she tried to focus for the umpteenth time on her professor. He stood at the front explaining loudly as he watched his sun soaked students stare back at him eyes glazed with far off thoughts that roamed quite clearly outside the walls of the school. Really you couldn’t expect anything better; it was a miracle to expect anything at all actually. When you lived on a golden California cost most teens minds where off on the beach where they tanned and surfed the waves.

Jocelyn needed to pass this course though. She had done everything she could to pass the exam. Staying up practically all night before going over everything, again, and again. Hoping that she would just pass, that if she were lucky her teacher would just give her an extra few marks and be done with it. She could not go to summer school, it was living hell, or so Liana had said. Having to spend the summer before retaking science, she swore over her dead grandmother’s grade that she would pass all her courses. And then she spat on it. That was Liana for you. Completely rebellious, or what she tended to say a “revolutionary chica.” Plus she had never liked her grandmother. Liana’ Spanish heritage gave her the sass every male longed for and her curvy figure was enough to drive even the gay ones straight. This year summer school would just have to wait, Jocelyn thought as the bell sent a shrill shriek through the air. Everyone jumped up closing the books shut and rushed for the door in a mob. She and Adam were supposed to work things out anyway. They just had too.