Playing the Bad Boy's Game

Chapter 2 ↬ Broken Snow Globes

"Elena hurry your ass up already!" My brother yelled from the bottom of the staircase, his bellowing voice traveling all the way to my room. "I don't want to risk giving my parking space away to some bimbo!"

I picked up my already fast pace and stuffed all the textbooks and stationary that I needed today into my floral backpack. I zipped up my laptop in its case and threw it in the backpack as well. I usually wasn't like this, in fact, I'm usually the one sitting by the kitchen table before everyone else was awake. But the sleepless monster decided to attack me last night, the night before the first day of school.

"E-lena!"

"Alright, alright! Sheesh," I snapped back at Alex.

I was halfway out my bedroom door when something black on my dresser caught me on hold. It was Xander's wallet. Without much thought, I grabbed it and shoved it into my backpack, while skipping down the stairs two steps at a time.

I swiftly grabbed an apple from the kitchen counter, threw on a pair of Converse and ran out the door towards Alex's black Chevrolet Corvette. I crawled into the passenger seat next to Alex and slammed the car door, leaning against the seat and panting.

"Hey! Careful with the door, Elvira's fragile!" Alex cried when the car door slammed shut.

Oh right. Elvira. Give me a second while I roll my eyes at the stupid name my brother gave his car. Yes, he's one of those guys who cared about his car so much to give it a name. Oh, and lets not forget, he sometimes also has these conversations with it. Sometimes I really wonder where Mom and Dad went wrong with Alex. It's a shame really.

"Geez, sorry Elvira." I retort, sarcasm dripping on my every word.

Alex went on muttering about how no one appreciates his precious Elvira and I couldn't help but roll my eyes at him. Eighteen years old and still acting like a whiny baby.

I bent down to tie the shoelaces of my shoes that I had so carelessly thrown on due to the rush. As I was sitting back up right after tying both shoes with a double-knot, Xander's wallet dropped out of my still open backpack.

I bent down again to pick it up while Alex watched me by the corner of his eyes. Out of curiosity more than anything, I opened the wallet. To my surprise, the inside of his wallet was clean and tidy. I mean, I had thought I'd see slips of paper stuffed everywhere, coins, cards, receipts, but all Xander's wallet contained was a couple of bills, a few cards and a family photo.

Aw, how cute.

I brought the wallet closer to my face to look at the photo clearly. It was the kind of photo where everyone was not smiling directly at the camera, but instead, looking very natural, doing their own thing. Mr and Mrs Hale were smiling at each other lovingly, while Xander and his sister, Vivian were laughing at each other. A smile unknowingly crept up to my face as I studied the photo longer, and realized how good Xander looked in that photo. How does this boy manage to look like an Abercrombie model all the time?! Seriously, he ought to have a bad hair day; both literally and metaphorically.

When I saw Xander's sister in that photo, a warm feeling gathered in my stomach. I liked Vivian very much, she was always nice to me when Xander picked on me, and acted like the sister I wish I had. Not that I didn't like Alex, he can be heck of a companion when he feels like it too, but sometimes having a sister, like Vivian, to talk to can be a really great thing.

I was pulling out Xander's family photo to look at it more closely when another photo behind it caught my eye. Behind the family photo was a small rectangular photo of Xander with a girl by his side.

I had no idea who this girl was, but just from the photo I could tell she was pretty. The kind of pretty that any guy would fall head over heels for in a second. She had luscious blond hair, and big, baby blue eyes. Her face was petite and she held a natural look of innocence and sweetness. Judging by the way Xander had his arm around her waist, I guessed that they had a type of intimate relationship.