Chapter One

"Oomf," I grumbled. Someone was tugging on my arm while I was sleeping.

"Honey, Jillian is going to be here in half an hour. Get up, for the fifth time this morning." My mom sighed. I looked at the bright green numbers on my alarm clock.

"Mooom! It's eight thirty in the morning! Summer was invented for sleeping late," I whined as she dragged me out of bed. No, literally; I ended up on the floor. I looked up at her with narrowed eyes. "This has to constitute as child abuse," I said, getting up.

"Waking you up five times in one morning has to constitute as parental abuse," my mom chuckled, walking out the door. A second later, she reappeared in my doorway. "Hurry up, though. She's going to be here soon."

Ten minutes later I was showered and contemplating on what to wear. I ended up dressing my slender figure in my favorite skinny jeans and maroon varsity jacket with a white tank top underneath it. I glanced in the mirror while I quickly combed my long, almost black hair.

"Bacon!" my mom yelled from down the hallway. She really knew how to get my attention. I practically ran to the kitchen, smelling the delicious sizzling meat. She put a plate down in front of me with a bacon smiley face.

"You're lame," I snickered while eating my bacon. I love my mom, I really do. But sometimes she is just so…well, lame, for lack of a better word. We were really close, though. My dad skipped out on us when I was seven, and ten years later, I still don't care about him. I used to be pissed at him for doing so, but now the thought of him rarely crosses my mind. "So, why are we going out again?"

"Jillian and I need new bras." My mom shrugged. She and Jillian Michaels have been best friends since they realized they were the only two single mothers in our Californian county who happened to be neighbors. Yet Gavin (Jillian's son) and I weren't close at all, even though we're in the same grade. We used to be when we were younger, but then he grew into an ass. He's full of himself and knew he was attractive, which he was (not that I would ever admit that to anyone). Being confident was one thing, but being vain and conceited was just annoying. We generally just ignore each other due to our mutual hatred with one another.

Before I could moan at the thought of spending time with Ms. Michaels and my mom in some bra shop, the doorbell rang. My mom jumped with excitement and opened the door. At our doorstep stood the Michaels, which consisted of Ms. Michaels (dyed blonde hair, slim body, and girly attire) and…Gavin?

"Hey, Hun," my mom said to Mrs. Michaels as they hugged.

"Hey, Sandra! Charlotte, you've grown since the last time I saw you." I hugged Ms. Michaels as she looked at me up and down. "You are quite the beauty." She hugged me again, while I blushed profusely. Gavin chuckled at me and I shot him an icy glare. I really did hate him.

"Well, why don't we go ahead to the mall, then?" Ms. Michaels said after a few minutes of small talk and more Gavin-glaring. We all followed her out to their car. My mom had passenger, while Gavin and I climbed into the back.

I heard the two of them talk about nothing and everything while Gavin and I stayed quiet. After a few minutes of complete awkward silence between us two, I pulled out my iPod and put my headphones on. I heard Gavin mutter something under his breath.

"What did you say?" I asked, pulling my headphones off.

"I said, 'that's rude'."

"What's rude, exactly?" I crossed my arms.

"You just put your headphones on and ignored me." He looked out the window.

"Oh, I'm sorry. Were you going to say something, Sir King Gavin?" I looked over to him and sighed. "Neanderthal," I muttered to myself, shaking my head in disgust.

"Did you just call me a Neanderthal?" He looked over at me, amusement flashing across his eyes.

"I don't know what you're talking about," I shrugged lying. A few more minutes passed, but I decided against playing my music.

I glanced over to Gavin, who was playing with his iPhone. He had dark chocolate, curly hair that framed his boyish face perfectly. His eyes were an intense blue-green, like the color of the ocean. And his lips were always pink and plump; perfection.

I mentally slapped myself. Do not think of him as good looking, I internally told myself. He's a douche.

"You like what you see?" He smirked at me. I realized I had been staring at him for a little over a minute, so I snapped my head up, making eye contact with him.

"No, ew." I wrinkled my nose in disgust. "Stop being creepy."

"You're the one who was staring at me," he pointed out, a grin taking over his mouth.

"As if, Michaels." I said, shoving my earphones on and blasting the latest Katy Perry song until we got to the mall.

"So we're going bra shopping. Are you coming too, Charlotte? Is your bra still supporting your goods?" Ms. Michaels asked, in total seriousness.

I felt my cheeks burn, and I looked at the bra shop sign with a horrified expression. "I'm, uh, I'm fine." This time, Gavin openly laughed at me, almost doubling over. The two moms swiftly walked inside, chatting away while I stomped over to the food court.

I was in line to get a cinnamon bun when all the sudden I felt a hand on my shoulder. I looked up to find Gavin standing next to me, looking at the menu. "I'll have a cinnamon roll with no butter," he said to me and then walked over to a table and sat down. I rolled my eyes and ordered us both cinnamon rolls with no butter.

"Here," I set his cinnamon roll in front of him and sat at a table across from him.

"Come on, Char. You can at least sit with me." He nodded to the chair next to his.

"Why on Earth would I sit with you?" I asked, ripping a piece of cinnamon roll off and plopping it in my mouth.

"You're impossible." He shook his head and got up. "I'll be right back." He announced as if I cared, walking over to the restroom area.

I figured this was the only way I could escape, so I took my cinnamon roll and ran. Quite literally, I ran. I ended up in Sears, since it was the biggest store in the whole mall and the last place anyone would really find me. I tossed my leftover cinnamon roll out and backed into the juniors section, pretending to look at clothes.

"Charlotte!" I heard a familiar female voice scream. I looked up to see my best friend, Natalie Kendrick, running up to me. She tackled me into a huge hug, bringing us both to the ground.

"Ow, Natalie!" I laughed at the blonde. We got up and hugged again. "When did you get back? I thought you weren't supposed to get back until tomorrow?" She had been in the Caribbean for the month of June, which was obvious because her normally pale skin had a slight tan.

"We got back a few hours ago, actually. Wait…why the hell are you in a Sears's store?" Her eyebrows furrowed in confusion.

"Charlotte, you are a complete asshole!" I looked behind me to find Gavin walking towards me.

"That's why." I said, before grabbing Natalie's arm and darting the other way.

"Why are you running away from Gavin Michaels? Wait, why are you even talking to Gavin Michaels?" Natalie furrowed her eyebrows again. For some reason, a saw a blush creep from her neck onto her cheeks.

"Why are you blushing? And our moms dragged us here."

"I…I'm not blushing." She covered her neck with her hands. I shrugged at her awkwardness as we ran to the escalators, and I finally looked behind us.

Gavin was running after us. I looked next to me, noticing Natalie wasn't there. I heard my cell phone ring, and I answered it while I got off the escalators, running towards the sports section. "Hello?" I answered, out of breath.

"Hey, it's Natalie. My mom said we had to go, so I'll see you tomorrow at like noon, alright? We need a movie day."

"Okay, I'll see you tomorrow, Nat. And I missed you when you were gone."

"I missed you too, hun! I'll see you tomorrow." We hung up, and I made my way to the bike section. I grabbed a Barbie Tricycle and started pedaling as fast as I could. Sears was pretty much dead, and I looked around to see Sears Employees chuckling behind the counters at me and Gavin. He must've stopped somewhere because now nowhere in sight.

I decided to ditch the tricycle and haul ass instead. I wasn't athletic or anything, but I could run at a pretty decent pace if needed. Not that it was typically needed in this situation.

I looked behind me to see that Gavin still wasn't there. I sneered and looked in front of me to find myself running into a display of tennis balls. It was too late to dodge the display, so I ended up covering my face with my hands. Tennis balls rolled all round the sports section.

"Smooth move, darling." I looked up to Gavin crossing his arms above me. He was really tall; around 6'2". I stood up at my short 5'4" self and started picking the yellow balls up. Insert perverted joke here.

"Just forget it!" I heard a Sears's employee snap. She clearly not pleased with the newly created mess. I was about to protest before Gavin pulled me away.

"What is your problem? Why the hell were you running?" He looked pretty pissed, too, but amused at the same time.

All the sudden, in the midst of all this, I got a genius idea. I started to fake cry. "I'm sorry, Gavin." I looked down, still fake crying.

"Oh, uh, it's, um," He was uncomfortable, as any male would be in this type of situation. He backed up a few feet, as if that'd make me stop crying. I looked up at him sadly, and I saw an odd emotion flash through his eyes. That was when I smiled, and ran. I ran as fast as I could. Damn, I need an Oscar Award for that performance.

"Dammit!" Gavin said, mostly to himself, before taking off for me again. I laughed as I ran into an elevator. "Hold that elevator!" I heard him yell to everyone around me, but nobody did. And I got away.

I ran out of the elevator and exited the Sears store, running into a pool store nearby. I quickly ran by the water guns section and grabbed the one on display. I ran to the hot tubs, filled it up, and bought it. The cashier gave me an odd look but let me go anyways. I walked to the entrance of the pool store and got my cell phone out. I scrolled down my contacts list to an old number I had for Gavin, hoping it was his current number.

"Hello?" I heard his voice answer. He obviously had no idea who this was.

"Meet me by the fountain in the middle of the mall," I said in a British accent.

"Who is this? Charlotte, is that you?"

"Just go to the fountain." I hung up, smiling. I made my way to a store that was near the fountain, waiting.

A few minutes later, I saw Gavin. He looked around with a confused expression across his flawless, beautiful face. Shut up, mind. When he was looking on the other side of the fountain and his back was towards me, I shot him with my water gun in the back of his dark brown, curly hair. He instantly looked at me and narrowed his eyes playfully, running towards me. I shot water onto him over and over until he reached me. People were running from us, dodging the water. He picked me up and hauled me over his shoulder. "Gavin! Gavin put me down! Put me down this instant!" He stopped dead in his tracks.

"Well, if you insist." He dropped me into the fountain, splashing water everywhere. He started laughing when he saw how pissed I was. He bent over, clutching his stomach. That's when I pulled him into the fountain by his belt loop.

Again, water splashed everywhere. We both were pissed now, but we couldn't help laughing at ourselves. Here were two seventeen year olds, splashing around in a mall fountain. All of the sudden, a shadow overcame us and we both looked up to find a mall security guard. He took our arms and dragged us down to the security office, where they made us call my mom.

"Mommy," I started.

"What do you want?" She always knew I wanted something when I called her 'mommy'.

"For you to give me mercy." I whispered as Gavin laughed, since the she was on speakerphone. I was still kind of shocked that my phone would work when it had been drenched inside my pocket, but hey, I wasn't complaining.

"What did you do?" She playfully accused. She wasn't going to be playing around in a few seconds, though.

"I need you to come pick Gavin and me up."

"ARE YOU IN JAIL? CHARLOTTE BERNICE LANSON, I SWEAR IF YOU TWO ARE IN JAIL-"

"Mom, we're not in jail. We're just in the security office of the mall." I interrupted, pissed that she used my middle name that I hated. I laughed half-heartedly. Psh, jail.

"What!" I heard my mom and Ms. Michaels yell into the phone at the same time. Then they sighed, as if they were exhausted. "We'll be right there." My mom said quietly.

In a few minutes, with their bra bags in tow, our moms arrived. "What did you two do? Why are you wet?" My mom accused. Gavin and I looked at Ms. Michaels for some support, which she obviously wasn't giving.

"Ma'am," the security guard called them into his office. I heard him tell our mother's what happened. I just sighed.

"Gavin, you're a jackass." I said when he shut the door to his office with our mothers still inside.

"Shut up, Charlotte. You're the one who started this."

"No I didn't. You're just an asshole that nobody really likes." Which is half true; too bad people actually like him.

"Yes you did."

"No I didn't!" I stomped my foot while sitting in the chair.

"Did you just stomp your foot at me?" He said with a shocked expression. "Sixteen year olds." He shook his head.

"Gavin, I'm three days older than you, which makes me seventeen, too."

"How do you know that? What are you, some kind of stalker?" Gavin turned towards me.

"Don't flatter yourself. I used to have to share birthday parties with you." I crossed my arms.

"Oh, yeah." He mumbled quietly. What an idiot.

Finally, the doors of the office swung open and our moms were smiling, along with the security officer. What the hell did they do in there?

Our moms grabbed our arms and dragged us towards the parking lots. "What is wrong with you two?" Ms. Michaels crossed her arms, glaring at us.

"Do you think you could, oh, I don't know, not act five?" My mom grilled.

I saw Gavin wince at the same time I did. I wish I could say we drove home in silence, but we didn't.

"Why do you two hate each other?" Our mothers pressed with sad expressions.

"Charlotte's mean." Gavin whined.

"Gavin's an idiot." I followed suit. We both glared at each other and turned to look out our windows. The car came to a halt in my driveway but before I could climb out, my mom locked our doors.

"Stay here for a second." Ms. Michaels muttered. The two moms stepped out and had a brief discussion, looking at us every once in a while.

They marched back to the car and opened our doors. "So, we decided…" Ms. Michaels started, looking at mom.

"That you two are going to spend more time together." My mom finished.

"What?" Gavin shouted.

"No!" I yelled.

"Yes!" Both the mothers said forcefully in sync. Gavin and I exchanged looks and whined.

"You two will spend time together until you get along." My mom crossed her arms.

"Starting with tomorrow. You will go get ice cream and see a movie." Ms. Michaels crossed her arms as well.

"But I have plans with Natalie!"

"And I have plans with, um…" Gavin tried, but failed.

"Cancel your plans for tomorrow. You can re-schedule them." My mom sighed. Gavin and I exchanged another horrified look and gave in. There was no use; they used their mom powers on us.

This summer was going to be hell.

AUTHOR'S NOTE: Hey, guys! I hope you enjoyed the first chapter : ) I'm going to go work on the second chapter now, but I would love to read if you liked this story or if you thought it was total crap, so please review!

Also, I'm planning on setting up a website so you can see character pictures. I already have them picked out.

Anyways, review please! 3

Oh & big shout out to:

Shelbator

^She's awesome. That's all I have to say about that, haha.