the outbreak ☣ 1d

Chapter 1: The Warning {FIXED}

~Stephanie’s Point of View~

 “No, Stephanie, for the tenth time, you cannot go to London, even if you are nineteen and with your best friends,” My mom said sternly, picking her mug of coffee up from the table early in the morning.

 “But Mom, you know this is my dream! London is just so magical. I don’t want to go there for any damn celebrities like that... Horrid, horrid One Direction... Or to get wasted. I just want to go there, because the scenery is amazing. That’s it. Even for just a day, please. I’m 18 already, stop treating me like a baby! I bet the girls can go,” I protested, crossing my arms, feeling like pulling my hair off out of frustration. I unwrapped my arms then pushed the unappealing typical fake American copy of Crumpets away from me, pouting.

 I have always wanted to go to London with my 4 best friends, Gina, Julia, Elissa, and Taylor. Actually, let me rephrase –– we all want to go to London together. This has been our dream for years, and I’m responsible enough to take care of myself. I’m 18, for God’s sake, I should be moving out of this house already.

 I want to go to Britain because of the beautiful places, like the Big Ben or the Victoria Tower. I want to hear its musical, melodic chimes. I’m captivated by those things.

 Gina wants to go to London to eat in the restaurants there. We all laughed at her for that. Who goes to Britain just to eat? But now that I think of it, consuming poor copies of a Full English breakfast in America isn’t quite magical. But eating it in the place from where it originated from, now that’ll be great.

 Gina and I are closest among the group. We’ve known each other the longest and we just... Understand each other more than we understand anything else. I know her like the back of my hand, and vice versa. The same with Elissa and Taylor. We really need a sixth person in our group, so that Julia would stop bugging us.

 I would've laughed at my best friend's goofiness, but I was currently upset.

 Julia wants to go to London for the sake of going somewhere, and to be with us. I think she only wants to because her idols, One D’Erection, are there for a tour. Oops, did I call them One D’Erection? My sincerest apologies, madam. I don’t get why she likes them. Even Gina and Elissa like them. Actually, y’know what? I don’t get why people like them in general. Their voices aren’t anything special, and their lyrics are meaningless. Who wants to listen to ‘Rock me, rock me, rock me, rock me, rock me, rock me…’ on repeat for hours? Certainly not me. At least Taylor’s there to side with me, she hates them as well.

 Taylor wants to go there because, there’s some big fashion show going over there that she wants to watch. You know how people will ask you, ‘are you a trend-setter or a fashion follower?’ Well, Taylor’s kind of both. One day she’ll be wearing a neon blue T-Shirt with a unicorn on it, and she’ll amazingly pull it off. The next day, she’ll be yelling at us to wear skinny jeans only with ballet flats because that’s what the magazine says. She also wants to go to London to shop and all. 

 And Elissa wants to go there to––

 “Steph, hun,” Mom interrupted my thoughts, placing her mug down on the table, “are you aware of the fact that you can get killed, robbed, raped, or kidnapped? And you won’t have your parents there to protect you.” She shook her head in disapproval.

 I rolled my eyes. “Thing is, Mom, we’re not kids anymore. We can take care of ourselves. And who said we would be walking around at 3:00 AM, the obvious time for those criminals to come out of their hiding places? We’re not stupid, Mom.”

 Mom was about to protest when my dad walked in on our conversation. “Your mother’s right, Stephanie,” he told me, sipping his own mug of coffee. “The girls won’t be able to protect you; they’ll be too busy trying to protect themselves. I’m sure the parents of the girls also said no. You’re not really 18 yet; you’re still kind of 17... Sort of. You just turned 18 two months ago. Look, darling, you can’t go to London let alone another continent by yourselves, it’s too dangerous, and that is final.” He glanced at the clock, and Mom did too.