East Wood High

Chapter 1: Unpacking

In the southern states of America was a moderately sized city called Titusville. The population barely exceeded 120,000, so anyone from a large city would consider it small. And that’s exactly how Julia Garcia felt when her parents drove to their new home.

            Julia was a seventeen-year-old Hispanic girl. She has long curly black hair and matching eyes. Her hometown was Los Angeles and she missed it a lot. Two days ago she was forced to move during the middle of her junior year in high school. Her father was promoted and transferred to East Wood, Titusville. That didn’t sit too well with his children, especially Julia.

            Los Angeles was all she knew. Her family, friends, everything she held dear to her remained there. She didn’t want to leave, but what choice did she have? Now, here in this strange, taboo, small town, she would be forced to make new friends, and start a new life.

            “Julia, get up and help me!” Mrs. Garcia ordered. She looked at her daughter who sat on the couch trying to watch TV.

            “Mom, … can I get five minutes, please?” Julia begged. “My show’s almost over.” Mrs. Garcia folded

her arms; she didn’t seem to be impressed.

            “Fine. FIVE minutes, and not a second longer,” she replied. Julia smiled and returned her attention to the TV. In truth, she didn’t want to help her mom unpack at all. They were the ones who wanted to move here, so the least they could do was unpack their own stuff, right? That’s what Julia thought, but she’d never voice it, not if she wanted a place to live.

            It wasn’t long before Julia’s television show ended and Mrs. Garcia appeared out of nowhere. She leaned on the side of the wall with a smirk on her face. Julia could feel her presence and knew what time it was. She pulled herself off the couch and onto her feet.

            “Okay… I’m ready,” Julia sighed. Her mother smiled and motioned for her to follow.

            “I need some help setting up the family room. Your sisters are already working on the dining room,” She said. She led her daughter to an empty room loaded with boxes everywhere. The only furniture in the room was a couch, a table, and a lamp.

            “Aww man…” Julia complained. Her mom went over to one of the boxes and cut it open; she tossed her daughter a folded window curtain. Julia unfolded the curtain and frowned.

            “I want you to hang the curtains. And do it right, I don’t want them looking tacky,” Mrs. Garcia ordered. Without hesitation Julia did as told. While she was working her mom glanced at her. “So, you ready for school tomorrow?”

            “No…” Julia mumbled.

            “Why not?”

            “ ’Cause, I’m just not,” Julia stated.

            “That’s because you have the wrong attitude about it,” her mother replied. “If I were you, I’d be excited. It’s like you get to start anew!” Julia rolled her eyes; she saw no reason to be excited.

            “Yea, and that’d be cool if I wanted to. But I don’t,” Julia said. Mrs. Garcia stopped unpacking and turned to her daughter.

            “Julia, I know this move was hard for you and your sisters, but it’s for the best,” Mrs. Garcia said. “Now your father’s making almost double what he was in L.A.”

            “I know Mom, I know,” Julia sighed. “It’s just everything was going so good, then we had to move out of nowhere. And here of all places.”

            “What? Would New York have been better?”

            Julia nodded. “Yea, it would have. New York, Atlanta, DC: anywhere would have been better than the country.”

            “Girl, this is not the country,” Mrs. Garcia laughed. “Trust me, I know what the country is. I grew up there.”

            “Well, it’s close enough. There are COWS five miles from our house. That’s country to me!”

            “I think a little bit of country will do you good. You’ve been in the city too long. Need to open up to something else,” Mrs. Garcia replied. Julia stepped down and got another curtain from the box. Her mother pitied her; she wanted her daughter to cheer up. “Julia, I’m sorry we had to move, but we really needed the money. How else would we be able to send you all to college?” Julia stopped her decorating and listened to her mother talk. “I just want you to give Titusville a chance. I’m sure there’s going to be plenty of interesting people and things to do here. All you have to do is give it a chance… do you think you can do that?”

            Julia picked up another curtain. As much as she didn’t want to admit it, her mother had a point. Maybe if she stopped looking down on Titusville and gave it a shot, it wouldn’t be as bad as she thought.

            “Fine…” Julia painfully agreed. “I’ll give it a chance.”

            “Good.” Mrs. Garcia smiled. “I’m sure you’ll make plenty of friends.”

            “Yea… right,” Julia said with doubt in her voice.