The Lock In

Chapter 1

Author's Note: Finally something new! I'm gonna have fun with this story, but there are gonna be some pretty serious elemets in it. But without further ado, I give you The Lock In! :) Let me know what you think :)

xo Kelly

"Lex? Hello, have you even been listening to me?" 

I snapped my eyes away from the window to look at my friend's now annoyed face. "Sorry, what?" 

"I was telling you about Jackson."

I blinked. "I'm sorry, who?" I was confused. I hadn't been paying any attention to anything she had said.

Ashley narrowed her eyes at me. "Where did you just go these past few minutes?" 

"I'm sorry, I was just," I sighed, knowing it was no use lying to Ashley. She had this way of knowing when I was lying, no matter what. Being friends since kindergarten will do that. It's not like I was bad at hiding the truth, because I was usually pretty good at it. But the way Ashley knew things was actually kind of freaky. I sighed in resignation. "Who's that over there?" I asked, nodding my head toward the plane glass windows at the front of the coffee shop.

Ashley's eyes followed the direction my head had indicated, her face lighting up before her expression fell. "You mean those three incredibly sexy men?" She said, shrugging her shoulders. "Bad news."

I laughed at her nonchalant attitude. "What are you talking about?"

Ashley rolled her eyes. "As if you don't know." And all of a sudden, she was off in her own little world, talking more to herself than to me. "Well, then again your radar has been off for the last year or so, so I guess you wouldn't know. Although I'm not sure how you could keep those three off your radar. But then again, you were pretty whipped not too long ago and–"

It was now my turn to roll my eyes. If this girl had one gift that was greater than her ability to pick out lies, it was the ability to ramble. "Ash," I said, putting my head in my hand. "Can we not?"

"Sorry," she said, smiling sheepishly. "I was just thinking out loud."

I shook my head slightly. "And when did it start being called 'whipped', I air quoted, "when a girl is in love with a guy?"

"Since I became cynical and and contemptuous about love and relationships.” She said, matter-of-factly.

"Oh?" I said trying to hide a smile. "When did this happen to my seventeen year old best friend?" 

"Well if you had been listening to what I was saying a few minutes ago, you'd know. But anyway, this brings us back to the godly men outside."

I laughed, not sure how what she had said brought us back to the boys outside. I have to give it to them, they were attractive. I wasn't denying that. But godly might have been an exaggeration.

"They're from The Academy.”

You would think that with all the prestigious teachers and faculty at the preparatory school on the other side of town that they would have come up with a better name for a private school than The Academy. It actually used to be The Academy at Wilford, but for some reason they dropped our town name a few years back. I secretly think it was because the families that send their precious genius children to that private school want to distinguish themselves and remain as little a part of our quaint and cozy small town as possible. Why those people don’t up and move to another part of California beats me. They could have all the glam and prestige they want just an hour north of this town.