Mixxed Nuts

Chapter One - [Mixxed Nuts]

Today is arguably the crappiest day of Junior year. At least I am finally walking home from that nasty prison. Elyehn is in the most horrible mood; she looks like she could kill a puppy. Her face is all scrunched up and her gray eyes stare coldly at nothing. I am not saying my mood at the moment is much different. Being stuck with my unbearable twin twenty-four/seven kind of causes our emotions to run together.

It also did not help matters that Lucy Pfeffer was being ridiculously annoying today. Gosh, that kid does not know when to stop! Seriously world, your ‘let’s go screw with Alyenne’ day is really pissing me off.

“I’m going to go to Luke’s house, got it?” Ely tells me plainly. She does not even look at me in the eye.

I purse my lips. “Ely, you seem to go there an awful lot…”

“Aly! It’s none of your freakin’ business!”

Aha! She got too protective too quickly. “So whatcha going to do there?” I ask in a sing-song voice.

She growls at me and glares at the ground.

“I didn’t know you two were so close,” I admit, finally settling on a normal tone. Ely does not comply and continues to look like an angry bear.

“We aren’t.”

“Do you talk a lot?”

“Not much,” she replies and then winces. I have caught her.

“That’s low.”

“Shut up!” She looks straight at me and stops walking. “One word to Mom and Dad,” she adds, “and you’re dead.”

I shrug as she walks the opposite way to Luke’s house. Honestly, I was glad that she was gone, even if she was going to be a low-life and go make out with some boy and lead him on. I sigh. Well, at least my mood got considerably better after she was away from me.

Now what would make me feel better, I think, suddenly remembering a certain street vendor. Yeah, vendors are pretty common here, but most of them are actually quite safe. Anyways, yesterday, I saw some guy with huge packs of mixed nuts - really cheap – and I am kind of majorly obsessed with nuts. Peanut butter and nuts are practically my main diet, even more so after I became a vegetarian. I was planning to stop by today and buy a pack. I smile for the first time today. Elyehn and her crappy mood was out of my life for a few hours and I was going to get a yummy snack.

The street vendor seller was younger than most vendors – fresh out of college by the looks of it, and he wore a too-big white button down shirt and torn gray jeans. He had dark brown curly hair, brown eyes, and he needed a shave.

“Oh, hey! I’m Steve.” He says with a smile. “What do you want?”

“Mixed.” I tell him.

Steve points to a portable rack full of packages. “Take your pick.”

I pick up a bag different than the others. It is white with ‘RoseWood Lab – Mixxed Nuts’ printed in heavy navy blue letters. I’m not one for misspelling things (come on people, it’s ‘cool’, not ‘kool’!) but I thought the two x’s looked pretty cool. The pack sure did stand out from the rest of red packaged bags. Strange.

 “Why’s this one different?” I ask.

“Mm, I’m not sure.” He inspects it curiously. “Sorry, I sell these for somebody else, and he supplies the inventory. But anyway, it’s just a different brand. Probably left over from a shipment before I started working here. That’ll be three dollars.”

I open my bag and quickly hand him the money.

“Thanks,” he says, with a lopsided grin. I smile back and head the opposite direction.