The Bet

Chapter 1-The Beginning of It All

Procrastinating, once again.

You guys know the drill.

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"I bet you she could be really attractive if she put some effort into it."

"She probably could, but only if she lost the whole 'I don't care what people think of me' look."

"Well, I bet you $100 bucks that I can get Cameron to notice Bree."

The sound of my name made me jump a little, and both America and Vanessa laughed at my sudden movement.

"Okay Mar, if you can get him to like her, then the money is yours. And if not, shopping spree for me." Vanessa said with a high pitched laugh as she flipped her golden hair over her shoulder.

"Well, I think even if I loose I will just eat my way through pizzas at your house."

I couldn't be the only one who loved when their friends talked about you as if you weren't even there.

"Um guys, I never agreed to anything." I said quietly as I shifted my messenger bag higher up on my shoulder, the thick leather strap digging slightly into my neck.

"Bree just hush, you will love it don't worry." America said with a wink as she tied her honey blonde hair up in a top knot, her maroon nails skidding smoothly through her soft waves.

Of course I wasn't going to 'love it,' or whatever they thought. I had spent years trying to hide away from all of that and I was not just going to throw away all of my hard work to help America win a simple bet. It wasn't about changing into contacts, or even changing into tight fitting clothes, actually it wasn't even about changing my image itself at all.

Back when I lived in California I had been what most people would call "the perfect image" or whatever. Of course, I didn't love being watched all the time, I mean people would follow me to my house and do all things extreme, but I did kinda love the attention at school. Being rich also helped with a lot of it, I mean money helped you fit in with any and all of the upper class folks. If you have a big house and I have a big house, why not become friends? I lived like that all throughout grammar school up until sophomore year, but it all stopped when my family had to move to Florida. And of course, since my father worked with the Hlavin family, Cameron just had to move as well.

Much to my enjoyment.

The Hlavin's and my family had always been close, so it was odd that Cameron had to move a year before my family arrived, due to the fact that his father was one of the main people in the buisness, so he had to be there early for whatever reason. And, since my family was quite attached to the buisness, we got stuck trailing along behind them, having longer to lounge about on our Californian beaches.

When I finally had arrived in Orlando I thought maybe Cameron would recognize me, maybe even remember our friendship that we had had back in Cali, but before I could even go to see him my little brother had gotten sick.

Chris had only been thirteen. He was more like me than my parents, so stubborness was in his blood and not even by his own choice. Being the self-sufficient child he was, he didn't tell us about his symptoms, or the pain staking headaches that happened almost every other night. If he was more like my other family members maybe he would still be alive, but nope. He was too much like his damned older sister.

After Chris's death, my family hit a major speed bump. It had hit everyone hard, but for me, his only older sister, it stopped my entire existence. I stopped eating, stopped sleeping, and only drank a sip of water whenever my vision would blur. I knew Chris wouldn't want me to do that, he would tell me to keep going on with my life, but I just couldn't help myself. The pain of loosing him was too much and I wasn't strong enough to endure it, and my God how that angered me. Since I didn't want a lot of attention while I was mourning and going through that terrible stage, I constructed myself to be quite unappealing to the eyes at the new school that I would be attending.