It all started when I was 15. When my brother was 18, he brought this girl home one night. His girlfriend.
I was sitting upstairs memorising the first 50 elements of the periodic table when I heard my brother slam the front door shut and scream, "Kate! Come downstairs, fast!"
Mumbling about how he always disturbs me and never lets me study, I slammed my book shut and ran down the stairs.
"What do you want, Jose? Let me study."
"Oh, come on, you got 96% in your last Chemistry test. Give yourself a break."
I rolled my eyes.
"Jose, I need to go." I said, heading back towards the stairs.
"Hey Kate, I wanted you to meet someone," He said, taking a deep breath in and sighing, he continued."She's really special to me, and if you don't like her, then I want you two to at least be on good terms.
A girl emerged from behind him, her big grey eyes locked on me. As soon as she saw me, a smile tugged on her lips.
"Hi. I'm Ashley. Nice to meet you."
I scanned her up and down before responding. She had a raspy tinge to her voice. She seemed like a fun person, and she was behaving like that, but her outfit was completely different. I could almost hear her tight dress and killer heels scream 'whore'. Her cleavage was on display, she had fake nails, fake lashes, fake extensions, and she could probably barely even wink from that face lift she got last week.
I pushed my glasses back up and tucked my hair behind my ear, extending a hand. "Katherine."
She gave me a wide grin, showing her perfectly straight pearly white teeth, her Crimson lipstick outlining her mouth, the corners of her big eyes crinkling. "Loosen up a bit, sweetums, I'm not going to eat you. Hug?" She opened her arms wide. I accepted, embracing her. Maybe she isn't bad after all.
Time lapse mode
My brother let the two of us spend some time together and we got along really well. She's a really fun and witty person. We spent a lot of time together, and we were soon BFFs. She was really popular at school and when people saw her with a nerd like me we did get a lot of strange looks, but we didn't care. I met her friends, and all of them were the same. Friendly, funny and goofy people. I even began to notice that their fashion was good. I asked them where they bought their clothes from, and went and shopped from their stores. I was having a lot of fun with them. Constant get togethers, hanging out at Starbucks, window shopping, pranking each other.
I sure was living THE life, wasn't I?
How very wrong I was.
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About four months later, I was one of her group. We were planning to go to the local Tim Hortons but the group insisted they had planned a surprise for me and they can't wait any longer to show me.
"If you keep doing this to me, I might burst with excitement; stop." I said, giggling.
Charlotte, or Char, laughed as she tied a blindfold around my head.
They led me to an abandoned place. When we reached, the smell was of paint and smoke, and I could hear small branches crunch underneath my feet. The place didn't have a pleasant feeling.
I felt two hands take off my blindfold. I slowly opened my eyes, and saw a building that looked ancient, with ivy growing over it, and the wind was adding an extra creepy effect to this place. Why would they bring me here? And for a surprise?
I sure was disappointed.
They all were looking at me with anticipation, expecting me to give them some reaction.
"So?" I shrugged.
"You're not happy? You aren't thinking what we were thinking?" Grace asked.
"I'm sorry, I don't think we have the same minds." I replied, laughing.
I hadn't even reached the end of my sentence when Ashley began speaking. "We always come here, but it's our secret place and we thought by introducing you to here, you would truly become" --she took a step toward me, with dramatic eyes-- "one of us."
"So what do you guys usually use this place for?"
"This is our perfect place for one of our most favourite things: smoking and drinking." Char said.
"What?!"
While we were talking, Bruce told us he's going to 'get some' from the car and headed off.
"Did that come off as a surprise to you?" Grace asked.
I blinked my eyes and acted stupid, "What?"
"You know, that we drink and smoke."
I looked down."Yeah. It's just that you guys are so outgoing and nice, no one would imagine you to be the type to this."
But inside I was screaming, "What? You drink?! How can you? You're barely 17 what are you thinking?" My faith in humanity was just.... Lost. They were so nice, and they were... alcoholic smokers?
That night was the night the last piece of my innocence had left me.
They forced me to smoke.
"Come on just once, try it."
"Fast, it's burning off."
It's okay, Kate, just do it once for their satisfaction and then leave it.
I just grabbed the cigarette and stuck it between my teeth and inhaled. It went into my lungs and felt unhealthy, yet thrilling. I couldn't tell myself to put it back down because I wanted to taste, to feel it again. So I did. One more. And another. More.
I finished a whole packet like that.
A while later, they dared me to drink vodka.
"One sip, that's all."
"It's not that bad, really."
"Quick, Bruce is going to gulp it down!"
I took one sip. One. Bitter but unlike medicine. It made me feel dizzy, unstable. So I took another sip to stable my self. I became addicted to it and soon I was drinking like a sailor. And by addicted, I mean addicted.
They watched me go bad. Rotten. Like a fruit, I was turning bad.
Slowly but surely.
