Chapter One
Idiom
The grass is always greener
on the other side of the fence.
Truth
The grass is greener
where there is rain and sun.
From where I sit now, there is nothing but sand, and sand sucks when it’s too cold to wash it off your body in the ocean. It’s March on the Jersey Shore, so that’s not gonna happen, unless I were to get drunk, something I’ve yet to do in all my seventeen years, like the rest of these fools.
Sure, I’ve drank, but never to the point that I would take a near polar bear plunge like they’re doing. And, okay, not all of them are fools, just the ones stripping down to their skivvies and jumping in the Atlantic in the dark … in March.
I’m surrounded by my fellow ensemble members of Seashore Academy’s spring musical, Newsies. Yep, us lowly members of the ensemble were not invited, via the school’s unofficial app, The Seashore Sound, to attend the also nonofficial cast party, so we created our own.
Right before my family, and my extended family, moved to Mantoloking and we all started school here at Seashore, I discovered the app.
The face of the app had major appeal. It showcased the student government. All four of the officers could also have been on covers of magazines.
Harrison Reeves, vice president of the student body, junior, and captain of the crew team, is absolutely delicious. His bio includes information, such as his SAT scores being 1550. Tall, dark-ish, and extremely handsome. One click on his picture brought me to his IG page, where I saw picture after picture that could land him on the cover of GQ. And if that didn’t solidify him as my future crush, the fact that his family owns the largest collection of Broadway houses certainly did.
Once upon a time, my dream was the ballet, but after last year, I realized I would never fit into the mold of a ballerina, so I turned my passion and focused on the possibility of Broadway.
Why did I change focus? Because my body changed, and I had no choice.
Unlike my twin brother’s, Justice, six-inch vertical spurt that had doctors concerned about his accelerated growth, my shit went horizontal. A year ago, my ass was on a road trip heading to Kardashian-ville. No ass injections here. Just a lovely growth spurt that started at my once B cups—now a large C—and moved to my ass.
My cousins, Brisa and Tris, are practically holding their breath, hoping they’ll be as “blessed” as I am in those two departments. Because their mom, my aunt Bekah, is “thick” in all the right places. But that wasn’t the case for me. So now, knowing I didn’t trait after my mom, except in height, they’re worried.
It wouldn’t be so bad if it wasn’t for the fact that I’m a dancer, and not to toot my own horn, but I’m really good. Until my growth spurt, I was always a featured dancer or soloist, and I never had to wear a bra under my dance leotard.
Dad was livid after my end of the year recital that I didn’t tell them that things had drastically changed for me. He was even more angry at the fact that the girls who seemingly took my place were truthfully less talented, less trained, and less disciplined as I always had been than me failing to tell him about the changes.
Cursed by the name I was given, I always spoke my truth. And the truth was that my body didn’t fit the mold anymore. I held back the fact that I would have been blind to it, if not for the snickers and overheard corner conversations of those I thought were my friends at the studio. Even the most honest, loyal, and truthful people want to bury their insecurities.
When—unbeknownst to me—Dad called out Madame Gloria on it, she denied it had anything to do with my body’s changes. She told him that I wasn’t training as hard as I had been, that because of it, I’d lost the confidence it took to fill the roles that she needed me for in the past.
When I began eating less and less, in hopes that my body would change, my parents, who had already nearly begged me to quit the dance school, decided to end my enrollment without my knowledge. I was pissed at first. But then, in staying truthful with myself, I had to eventually admit that it was causing me mental harm, and if it continued, it could cause physical harm, as well.
I was still training, just not at a school. I had a private instructor, Julie, who I met with three days a week for three hours before the move.
Justice was the only person, other than our parents, who knew my ugly truth.
But that’s all in the past, until moments like this when insecurity rears its ugly head again.
Back to The Seashore Sound …
The president of the student body, Tobias Easton, also HAF, but his scowl, even on a screen, was anything but inviting. He’s a senior, plays no sports, and when you click on the picture to get to his IG, you’ll see that it’s private. His profile picture was of him and a girl. I would have assumed it was his girlfriend, if they didn’t look similar.
Treasurer, Miles Jameson, good-looking. Dark brown hair and eyes, perfectly proportioned facial features—almost too perfect—and extremely preppy. He’s the debate and STEM team captain. His pictures were of family, travel, and food.
The last picture was the student government secretary, Kai Hatt. Tall, dark, handsome and, just like the others, hot. His IG pictures were all with the other boys that make up the student body government.
After getting past the face of the app, and having done enough swiping, I quickly realized that The Seashore Sound … was basically the equivalent of a gossip magazine or column. Nearly all the junior and seniors had a profile that, after reading, could not possibly have been of their own creation. Some were rude, so fucking rude it hurt my heart for the victims of the hate without even knowing them. It was a high-tech news rag. I’m assuming it’s mostly fake news used as the biggest bullying tool at Seashore.
The Sound also came equipped with a school and social event calendar, and if you’re one of “the chosen” to receive a special invitation code, via the app, which I have not been given, you get to unlock the members-only portion of The Sound, where you can give and receive all the info on last-minute parties, provided by the upper echelon, those who hold the power of the app and the highly coveted code.
My family is wealthy, just as wealthy as everyone else in that … school, but none of us carry a chip on our shoulders, drive Maseratis, or other vehicles with six-figure price tags, sport overpriced designer clothes just because we can, or look down our noses at anyone … undeserving. We don’t act like we are above everyone else. None of my crew were raised to act entitled and would quickly get our asses jacked by our parents, or any other member of the crew, if we started acting in such a way.
As miserable as I have been riding bitch for the past several months to a conniving snatch like Gabrielle Morales-Ortez, the “it” girl whose secret I am still keeping in my pocket in case I ever need to utilize it. Even after all the shit she’s pulled, I’m not capable of stooping so low as to expose her secret just to make myself feel better.
I’ve also since learned that Harrison Reeves is a self-absorbed ass who dates, or just sleeps with, Gabrielle Morales-Ortez yet ogles my ass every time we’re in the same vicinity, even in front of the girl he’s said to be banging.
The dirt I have on Gabrielle Morales-Ortez?