♥ Ambitious Twilight ♥ {~{Smutt}~} {~{Jarley Minn}~}

Chapter 1

June

I walk to the bus stop by myself.

There is always a fuss about my appearance when I leave for school.

All summer long my mum has been stroking down my hair and straightening my glasses as though it will get me the degree I want in archaeology. I'm not even allowed to walk to the grocery store without having a lecture about my hair discolouring from not using enough product.

"You should use heat protection serum before blow drying your hair,"my sister explains to my mother as I leave. They're standing at either side of the kitchen counter, irritated expressions being thrown between themselves and me. I roll my eyes and begin to unlock the door.

"she doesn't even use a hair dryer," my mum answers back sliding her acrylic fingers through my damp hair. My sister doesn't even look up.

It's like this every week of my life ever since I started secondary school even though I make it blatantly obvious that the gesture will result in me looking even worse than before.

Dad saved me from the clutches of their silicon world the first time I receive the oh-so-important lecture; I was 11. Since then, he told me could fight my own battles. "You've sent a kid to hospital,June. Surely you can manage to win an argument with your old mum;she's as daft as a brush."

I hadn't meant to send that kid to hospital. He wouldn't have hurt me,I don't think. (I still dream about it sometimes. The way the poison berries consumed him from the inside out, like a cigarette burn eating a piece of paper.)

I get to the bus station. Then I take down my slick ponytail while I'm waiting and replace it with a messy bun.

Once I get settled on the bus, I try to revise for my science assessment with my bag on my lap and my feet propped up on a seat across from me but a girl a few rows back won't stop watching me. I feel her eyes crawl up my neck.

Could just be a pervert I thought to myself, rubbing the back of my neck with my knuckles.

She has long blonde hair, fair unlike mine and her facial features are indefinable. She wore a tasteless, flowy shirt and heavy tartan jeans that enhanced her flawless figure. She reminded me of my sister; a tall, athletic girl with a movie-star-grin but unlike my sister she wears thick-rimmed glasses that hid her sapphire eyes.

When I get to school, nobody is waiting for me. There's no one outside the school; I must be one of the first students here. I start to run,just because I can, upsetting a huddle of swallows hidden in the grass. They blow up around me, twittering, and I keep running.

I don't stop running until I reach the library, falling against the nearest chair. I pull out my English booklet and recite the third poem, Sonnet 18,to myself, trying not to look down at the page.There's a technique I'd usually use for reintroducing myself to poetic language but that morning I felt there'd be no point. I watch the dust motes swirl in the breeze and sunlight, then fall back on the chair. I can't remember the last time I just sat and looked out of a window with the intention of spotting someone.

I feel a gentle hand on my soldier but ignore it expecting a preppy student with a handbag bigger than her head to have strolled past.Instead my shoulder is touch a second time with a slight shake which took to my attention. I swivelled around to see a radiant smile-- the girl from the bus. I thought she seemed unfamiliar I think to myself gently placing the open English literature book on the coffee table.

"I think this is yours," a chirpy voice escapes from her red lips like music from a clarinet. She's holding my science book, of which,thinking of other things, must have been left on my seat rather than safely placed into my bag. I take the book and smirk nodding my head as a 'thank you' gesture, in case she's unable to see my gentle nod or mistook for a twitch.

"Sorry,I must have been thinking too hard," I reply before regretting the dork-like remark. A small giggle escapes.

"Harleen Quinzel," she exclaims holding out her hand with the intentions of a greeting, "Or my friends call me, well... let me rephrase,"an almost shocked look plasters her face, "Call me Harley."She bites her lip; a nervous tick?

"June,"I say taking her hand and shaking it through politeness. My mouth melts into a smile as I try not to make her feel too awkward. The bell clatters through the halls; she half-turns towards the hallway door like a puppy waiting for their owner to return, a certain resilience twinkling in her eyes.