The Road Trip

Prologue

"We have a week of finals left and then we're done with school!" I exclaimed to James and Mae.

"This year sucked ass. No one told us it would be this hard," Mae replied.

"What'd you expect? It's high school" James answered. My friends and I had decided to go to In-and-Out for lunch. James, Mae, and I said that we would get a table outside while the rest of my friends got the food. James squinted in annoyance as the sun filtered through his dark hair whereas Mae's brown waves ruffled in the breeze. The boy stretched his tall frame in one of the seats, pushing his glasses up as Mae checked her phone to see what time it was. Her lips were a pastel pink and her light green eyes shone behind her thick lashes as her hair caressed her cheeks.

The first time I met Mae, she immediately pronounced my name incorrectly, causing James to elbow her in the side. I didn't blame her, Meghana was a mouthful to pronounce for their 13-year-old mouths and so I walked them through it.

"Meg...nah," I said slowly, watching as their mouths molded around the word.

"Ohh! That makes more sense" James said, smacking his forehead. That was when I met my first friends and we were joined at the hip ever since. Eventually, Wren joined our group when she and James were assigned to work on a science project in the first week of freshman year. I immediately saw a spark between both of them and since Wren had just moved from a different state, I demanded that she sit with us for lunch every day.

"Oh my God! That would be amazing but..." he had said, tugging on her hair as she bit her lip.

"But...?" Mae had said, raising her eyebrow as she munched on a carrot.

"Is it ok if my brother sits with us?"

"Of course! What's his name?" James asked, eager that another boy would be joining the group.

"Fletcher," she said, furrowing her eyebrows when my mouth fell open in disbelief.

"Fletcher O'Sullivan is your brother?" I laughed, my face splitting into a large grin.

"Yeah, why?"

I had met Fletcher on that same day but I never realized that his sister was someone I knew. So I explained to the trio how there were no empty seats in our science class, meaning Fletcher had to sit next to me. That morning, we were dissecting a frog and I accidentally stabbed the stomach, which made the contents explode all over Fletcher. But instead of getting angry and punching me in the throat (which is what I would've done), he burst out laughing and wiped his face. Afterward, as payback, he chased me around with frog intestine on a scalpel till we both got detention; him for chasing me around with a knife and me for running around in general.

I shook my head to clear my thoughts as I came back to the present, tugging on my ponytail to make sure none of my dark curls had escaped the scrunchie. I was wearing a graphic tee and some leggings, glad that I could dress down for one day. I smiled at my Mae once more as my thoughts drifted elsewhere.

While the rest of my friends were complaining about senior year, I was just glad that everything to do with high school was coming to an end. These four years of school were a pain in my ass but I had managed to get accepted to UCLA.

Surprisingly enough, the sun was out for the first time in months. People were running or biking through the streets while others were going on walks with their dogs or loved ones to soak up as much sun as possible. All in all, it was a beautiful day to have lunch outside.

"Sorry we're late, the line was huge," Fletcher interrupted my thoughts as he plopped down next to James with the tray of food. Fletcher was tall and lanky and his dark hair was pushed up and away from his face, which was covered in the occasional freckle. His hazel eyes glinted brightly as he unwrapped his burger.