My Modern Day Romeo – Chapter One

‘Is love a tender thing? It is too rough, too rude, too boist’rous, and it pricks like a thorn’

Romeo Act One, Scene four, Lines 25-26 – Romeo & Juliet

8th March

I looked down at my reheated plain spaghetti that was all clumped together in an old Chinese take-away plastic container without the least bit of interest. But when my mother had amazingly remembered me and decided to call and see if I was still breathing she told me to eat the pasta from the fridge so she wouldn’t have to when she returned home.

In my more-than-slightly hung over state I honestly couldn’t be bothered to try and find something more appealing to add to the half cold noodles. I grudgingly took a fork from the draw and trudged upstairs to my room. I flopped down upon my large king size bed and unenthusiastically stabbed my food with the fork – occasionally lifting some to my mouth and swallowing.

The party at George Benson’s house last night had been great. It was his and his twin sister’s Sweet Sixteenth party and they had gone all out. By now I was used to these all out, extremely expensive birthday parties so no longer did I generally gasp or even bother commenting on the décor anymore. But this sixteenth had managed to create a slight gasp from me.

Being born in the month of March the twins were Pisces and so they themed their sixteenth aquatic. In the back yard they had – somehow – erected an enormous fish tank full of amazing tropical fish. The fate of these colourful little fellas for the after-party didn’t look too promising but it was a spectacular sight. All the lighting was blue and purple and next to their pool there was a light up dance floor.

The party lasted well into the early hours of the morning causing me to sleep well into the afternoon. I caught sight of myself in my wall sized mirror and shuddered. I hadn’t managed to remove all of my make-up from last night causing me to have streaks of blue and black smeared and smudged all down my cheeks. My hair was going out in all directions and – even without the make up accentuating them – the huge bags under my eyes weren’t going away any time soon.

I finished what I planned to eat of the pasta and went to shower in my adjacent bathroom. After a steaming hot shower I reapplied some basic make-up: foundation, mascara, eyeliner and lip gloss – I headed to my built in wardrobe. I pulled on some simple grey sweat pants and a white tank top with some black flip-flops. I drew my blonde hair into a messy bun then shook out my bangs and some other stray hair. I made sure none of my blonde hair covered my green eyes and deemed myself worthy to leave the house.

I checked in my wall mirror and decided that I looked perfect. I had perfected the now popular look of looking like I just rolled out of bed and managed to look this hot. You know the one I mean – the ‘I tried too hard to look like I didn’t try too hard with my appearance’

I headed back into the kitchen and made a coffee. I had it black to A) wake me up and B) I was watching my weight.

When I heard Max, my little adorable chiwawa, start to madly bark I knew our mail had arrived. I stepped out onto our large porch and squinted in the early afternoon sun. I started to walk down our long drive way as Max trotted happily along beside me, the jewels on his collar chiming merrily.

Once I had collected the mail I began to flip through it as I slowly turned and began to head back into the house.

“Juliette!”

I spun around and saw my friendly neighbour, Mr. Grensworth, standing at our massive wrought iron gates – the latter of the two managing to dwarf him quite spectacularly.

“Hi Mr. Grensworth, how are you?” I answered as cheery as I could with my mild hangover – the sun was not helping.

“I was just wondering if you and your parent wanted to come for dinner at my place tonight.”

Ahh, He was so naïve, so innocent.

“Sorry but I am going to have to decline. James and Anita are in Miami at the moment due to business commitments and I have plans with friends. Thank you for the offer.”

With that I turned and headed back to the house. Bill, bill, postcard, thank-you letter, party invite, party invite, party invite…

I sighed and headed upstairs into my fathers office. I didn’t call him dad or daddy – nor did I call mum or mummy – because they simply weren’t around enough to earn that title. Sure, they loved me and I loved them but in order to be a mother or father – they had to have to have been there for all my low times as well as my happy times. They thought that giving me endless amount of money was good enough – not that I’m complaining.

I logged onto my father’s home laptop and automatically paid all the utility bills over the internet and sent him an email to his on the move laptop telling him that I had done so. I got out all the bill notices I had just paid and, with a grin, stamped on them with the huge red stamp: PAID.

I then heaved myself out of my father’s huge leather office chair and dragged my feet on the expensive plush Persian hall runner down to my room. I scanned it and decided that soon I need a room make over – complete with a celebratory slumber party of course.

I wandered over to my computer and pressed the on switch. While I waited for it to start up I checked myself in the mirror and lazily fluffed my hair a bit more and wiped off some smudged eye liner. When I looked back at my pink dell laptop, I frowned as the screen was still black. I progressively hit the power button faster and faster until I gave up in a huff.

I whipped out my pink mobile and pushed all the excessively fuzzy, shiny or pink charms dangling from it out of the way. I called the one person I hardly ever talked to unless necessary: my sister.

“Hey Joyce” I sugar coated my voice to the max.

“What do you want Juliette” came the grumbling reply.

Joyce and I don’t exactly see eye to eye on the world. I’m more of a ‘the glass if half full’ kind of girl, Joyce is more ‘the glass is half empty’ type of outlook. I loved to go to house parties, make out with boys, have people follow me and do my every whim for me, go to prep rallies and cheerleading camps. Joyce on the other hand loves to hang out in people’s basement, listen to ‘hate me. Kill me’ music and spend her holidays in deserted sheds and rock concerts. To speak in stereotypical terms: I was a prep and Joyce is a Goth/Emo/Loser… Take your pick.

“Can I use your computer? I need to do an assignment”

I heard raucous laughter from the other end of the phone.

“You must be joking right? As if I would let you on my computer that contains all of my private stuff!”

I narrowed my eyes in annoyance and let out an annoyed, strangled cat kind of noise

“Joyce. You know I am going to use your laptop whether you like it or not. I was just trying to do the nice, polite, sisterly thing but if that’s how it’s going to be fine.”

I snapped my phone shut and let out a small growl. At once I remembered how unattractive frown lines are and smoothed out my forehead with a sigh. I stalked down to Joyce’s room and booted up her black laptop. I shudders as I looked around at all the band posters littering her wall – those people are creepy, I don’t understand how she can stand them looking at her all the time.

Finally the login page came up on screen and I dialled our families IT people.

“Hello this is Rent-A-Nerd Joseph speaking. How may I assist you in your technological endeavour?”

I rolled my eyes

“Hi Joseph, this is Juliette Cooper – of the Cooper family. I just needed the password to Joyce’s computer, she needs me to print out a document for her and I need to access her laptop”

I crossed my fingers and bit the left side of my lip-glossed lips.

“Sure. One moment please”

Any other time and I would have been worried at how easily I was able to receive our passwords – who knows who could pretend to be us and get our passwords?

“Her password is ‘FreakShow’ all one word plus the capitals! Is there anything else I can do?”

I said no and thanked him and then proceeded to hang up on him. I typed into the computer the password and grinned happily as her desktop began to load. After a few moments I opened a blank document and typed the heading of my assessment. Usually I got someone in the class to do it for me for the small price of a party invitation – or for me to let them escort me at a party. But today I was so bored I decided I would actually do the work: shocker, I know.

After a few hours of research, a bit of web surfing and email checking I was getting bored and about to log off when an IM window popped up. I didn’t remember logging in and so I just assumed I automatically had when I booted up.

PrinceOfCats: hey. Sup?

I looked at the screen name in confusion as I didn’t recognise it. I scanned my mental list of who it could be but I didn’t find anyone. So I just left the message window minimized as I did some last minute research.

PrinceOfCats: are you there? I had a great time with you yesterday

Oh no. Don’t tell me he is some admirer from the party last night. Oh god. How to let him down lightly…

FreakShow: I’m sorry but I don’t know you. If we hooked up last night, I’m sorry, but it didn’t mean anything

I read over it and then hit enter. I thought I was nice but firm and let him down easily. As soon as I saw what I typed pop up under what he wrote I had to do a double take. My screen name wasn’t FreakShow. What on earth??

I opened up the main messenger window and looked at the contact list:

RedDevil

DemonChild

I didn’t know any of these people. It slowly dawned on me that Joyce’s computer must have automatically signed her online. Oh gosh, I may be a bitch, but ruining one of my sister’s friendships wasn’t something I aim to do. Just as I was about to open the window, apologise and bail out of there, the window began to flash again.

PrinceOfCats: Haha. You’re so funny. Is your sister home?

Curiosity killed the cat.

FreakShow: She might be, why’d you want to know?

PrinceOfCats: I was thinking we could hang out at your house – I’ll bring the movie!

FreakShow: Well, my sister is home – I’m sure she won’t mind if you come over

PrinceOfCats: Oh you are just rolling out the jokes today. Have you had a brain lapse or did you just forget that your sister is JULIETTE COOPER?

I lent back in shock. I don’t even know the guy and he is pinning away for me. He probably is just too nervous to come over and face me.

FreakShow: Oh don’t be nervous, I’m sure she will be just super nice to you!

PrinceOfCats: Juliette. Nice? Have you fallen and hit your head? Juliette is the A-Class Bitch remember?

OUCH! Ok, maybe I misjudged his view of me…

FreakShow: She isn’t that bad…

PrinceOfCats: I think you must be sick

PrinceOfCats: …hey… why are you phoning me?

Uh oh. I quickly thought of a way to escape

FreakShow: I… I miss your voice? Um but look… I’ll just talk to you on the phone…Got to dash. Xx

FreakShow is now offline

With those parting words I ran out of the room so fast that I forgot to even save all my work onto my memory stick.

9th March

The next day at school was very uninteresting. There was the usual hum in the corridors of people gushing over the sixteenth that happened on Saturday night. As I made my way down the hall to my locker as usual the conversations would stop until I was at a safe distance so they could continue.

I was standing at my locker when I felt a tapping on my left shoulder and immediately I put on a huge fake smile before turning around. As soon as I saw my sister standing there I dropped my smile and turned back around.

“Juliette… I just wanted to give you this. I know it’s none of my business but…”

I cut her off by turning to face her.

“Whatever it is it can wait til after school, Joyce, you know I can’t be seen with you!” I reprimanded her in hushed tones while glancing around the hall counting the stares.

“Oh my gosh! You are such a selfish bitch! Argh!” Joyce’s eyes burned with fire as she spat these words

“And don’t you forget it now!” I replied cheerily and tapped her on the nose.

I turned around to my locker once again smiling. I heard and immensely irritated growl come from behind me followed by her scary, clunky boots stomping off. I merrily began to hum a tune that was on the top twenty radio show that wakes me up every morning. I let out a huff of annoyance as I was once again I was tapped on my shoulder – this time, however, quite a bit harder.

“Who do you think you are?” was the angry gruff voice I was met with before I had even turned around

As soon as I did turn, though, I was met with a rather broad chest. I took a small step back in shock and look up at the owner of the angry voice.

“All she wanted was to give you this memory card with your assignment on it so you wouldn’t fail. It’s not like she wanted to talk to you!” the guy in black said again and jabbed me with a familiar pink memory stick.

"Hey! Why were you in my room creep!!" I retorted horrified at the thought of him dirtying my room.

He just threw my pink memory stick at me where I watched it hit me and then fall to the floor, and then moved to walk back to his group. I felt an arm slither over my shoulders and I looked up to see Leon, my boyfriend, as well as all his football friends glaring at Joyce’s tag along who was walking away.

“Is this guy bothering you?” Leon asked me.

“No… its ok, he was just leaving” I whisper staring at one of the most beautiful faces I had ever seen.

After a few awkward moments I shook my head and bent down to grab my USB memory stick off the hallway floor before someone stood on it. As I was bending over, Leon unexpectedly smacked me on the butt causing me to fall forwards, flat on my face.

I looked up to see Joyce’s entire group laughing at me. I sprang to my feet and hit Leon in the chest. I quickly slammed my locker closed and headed to my homeroom to start off what was sure to be a pretty crappy day.

A/N:

Hello everyone!

Yes I have a new story! Yay! I plan to probably wait to write Marriage Bites after I finished re-writing Love Bites so it is on temporary hiatus.

I hope you all like this series, it should be more fun that the other stories so I hope you like it. Its my favourite concept so far.

And just so you all know, I am against labels and labelling and all of the cliche highschool groups but I just used them for the purpose of this story. I apologise if I have offended anyone as these comments are for pure entertainment value only.

Thanks for reading!

Mel .xx