The beauty of simplicity

Junior year

I lay down on my bed with my phone in my hand. Just another day of endless scrolling on Instagram, a never-ending cycle of switching between Snapchat, TikTok, and Instagram. Sophomore year was just about done and frankly, I was ready to start my Junior year. I don't know, but there's just something about being an upperclassman that just makes me feel good.

A sigh escaped my lips. School was about to start in two weeks, I was back in town and had absolutely nothing to do. I decided to call my best friend Maddie. I let my phone ring after finding her caller ID in my contacts.

"Wassup bitch" was the first thing that came from her mouth as she answered my facetime call. "What are you doing today?" I asked. "What am I doing? Girl, it's 6:45 PM, I don't know about you but my day is over and I'm actually getting ready to head home"

"Lol, I'm bored School opens in like two weeks. What am I going to do during these two weeks?" I say annoyed. "Then why'd you come back from Cali so early? You could've stayed there to save yourself the boredom".

I put my phone on the bed next to me staring at the ceiling. "What are you doing for the last two weeks?" I asked ignoring her comment. "You know my ass finna be at all the parties. There are going to be a lot of them this week since school is about to open." There's a sudden silence. "Damn Bitch! Live a little, you're so damn antisocial don't you want to have fun. Matter of fact there's a party tomorrow night and you are coming with me." I chuckle at what she said. "I'm not antisocial lol. I just prefer to smoke weed and get high in the comfort of my home because you know I don't know how to act."

I get up from my bed with my phone in my hand. "I know but, you're gonna be a junior. You need to start acting out a little." I walk down the stairs into the kitchen where mom is seated at the dining table eating. "Give me a minute" I say as I put her on mute.

"Are you going to work tonight?" She puts the newspaper that she was holding down on the table. "What you say sweetheart?" I take a breath and repeat my question "will you be at work tonight?" she gets up from her seat and grabs her purse "I'm leaving right now, I'm doing an overnight as you know I won't be back till 10:00 AM tomorrow. Please don't dirty the kitchen, your brother is bringing some friends over. They're actually on their way back here" she says looking at the clock next to the front door. I say nothing and let her rush out the door. "Bye sweetheart, I love you."

"I love you two" I whisper in the empty room as the door closes behind her. I take Maddie off mute.

"You still there?" I hear Shuffling "Yeah, um...I'm kinda busy right now because I'm driving but I'll call you later when I'm in bed. Bye, love you"

"Bye, love you two" and the call ended. I go back up to my room to find out that it is only 7:23PM. I decided to text Gio to see if I could go over his house.

Gio is a high school dropout. He's a drug dealer, he's my drug dealer and also my friend. He used to like me, I don't know if he still does but he does give me 3 gs for $20. He constantly offers to smoke me out but I'm always down if it's free weed. Aside from him being a drug dealer, he's actually a nice guy. Many times after he smokes me out we engage in some pretty weird convos and I do feel like I can trust him with my business.

*Ding*. I get a notification saying "yah, you can slide through. LMK when you outside." I reply back with "Ight, OMW". I go straight to my closet and pull out a pair of light washed jeans and I throw on a black hoodie and my checkered vans. I grab my nude purse from the top shelf in my closet. This is my go-to bag. I take my wallet and keys and threw them all in the purse, grabbed my phone and was out the door and in my car.

Once I got out of the house I started walking. I didn't bother putting on his address in the GPS, I knew this route like the back of my hands. I've been there way too many times than I needed too. He doesn't live far so walking shouldn't take more than 10 minutes.

I text him to let him know that I'm outside. I then wait a little bit in the car then grab my keys and phone to wait on the front porch. As soon as I'm in front of the door, it opens. I smile.

He moves to the side to let me in the house. "What you been up to?" He asks as I walk past him down to the basement. "Nothing much, you?" I hear him behind me as we reach the room in the basement. "You know," he shrugs "the usual". I breathe in "business as usual".

We fell in a relaxing silence as we wait for the blunt to be rolled. After a couple of minutes, he lights up the blunt and passes it to me. I take a couple hits and pass it back to him. we go in that rotation until the blunt was done.

He then proceeds to roll up another, and light it up then passes it to me. "Lol, I'm all set. I'm already high, I can't". He chuckles "damn, already? You lightweight".

I feel my toes tangle and my eyes feel droopy. I suddenly burst out laughing. My stomach starts to ache and my eyes water as I can't find an end to my laughter. Gio simply chuckles and says "you good?"

My laughter dies down a couple seconds later and I find myself extremely thirsty. I stare blankly at the wall facing the couch. I feel dizzy and I lay back on the couch. "Fuck," I say under my breath my gaze now directed towards the ceiling. I need to go home. I wanted to get there before my brother and his friends so I didn't get any interactions with them. My heart was racing. I wanted to ask what time it was but just the thought of moving my lips had me out of breath.

I stood up abruptly and I had to put both of my hands up at my sides to make sure I didn't fall. Gio stood next to me and held my forearm to help me stay steady. "Thanks," I said softly feeling out of breath. "Are you ok?" He asked sounding concerned.

"I'm just going to call my brother to come get me, because I can not drive home," I said disregarding his question. I took a seat and grabbed my phone with shaky hands, I dialed my brothers' phone number and told him to pick me up. I don't know if he knows I smoke. I mean I've never told him but I think there are some remarkable signs like the smell and how I act weird every now and then. But I guess I'm going to find out tonight.

*********

Hello guys!! Thank you for reading this book. I hope you enjoyed the first chapter. It was a little boring but it was mainly easing into the life of the main character (Jessica Holland) and getting to know who she is, so obviously nothing major happened. But there will be a little something in the next chapter when she encounters her brothers best friend.

Stay tuned, see you all very soon.

XOXOXO Annie