Summer Hatred Chapter 1

I was so fucking afraid once I got back home after my three weeks in hell over in Iowa.

Yeah, I was back in my hometown, my happy place, where my dad and stepmom, my best friend, Zack, and everybody else (Not a whole lot.) I loved, lived. But, there was somebody I loved that I probably shouldn't. He was graduating next year, like almost all my other friends and I was going to be a sophomore.

Why was I afraid? I was afraid of bumping into him.

This is sad, but there are at least a hundred other little white Fords manufactured between 2000 and 2004 in town and I get a heart attack every time I walk around town because I think I see Lloyd but then it isn't him, thank God. But if I see a disco ball hanging on the rearview mirror and his license plates are blue and you can faintly hear pop through the windows, then I have a perfectly good reason to go to the hospital and not because I had a heat stroke.

As much as I care about Lloyd, I fucking HATE seeing him.

It breaks my heart that he's almost, ALMOST 100% gay and is ridiculously talented and is super nice and shit; while I don't have a dick and I'm one of the most heartless people in the Northwest and the only talent I have is cursing like a sailor.
I remind myself of his best friend, actually.

I get that this kid is going to some dance camp this July and whatever but he said it wasn't until like the middle of the month, and so I'm more on edge than usual. To calm myself down, I call Zack and say I want to come over. Of course, Zack is obliged because, like me, he's not always running around with everybody he knows.

His house is this crappy, run down house by a gas station and is usually smells like cigarettes and cat piss because his family, consisting of two vicious felines and a really depressed mom and a Zack Crawford, inhabits it. He usually prefers coming over to my house because my dad makes bank compared to his mom and my life is way cleaner and not as loud and obnoxious as his.

Zack is also graduating, like Lloyd, next year and he's an emo kid who's five foot nine, scrawny, and obsessed with chess and Percy Jackson. His dark blonde hair is usually over his eyes and he wears this black and red checkered tie almost everyday, sometimes with a black blazer he inherited from his grandpa. He Sharpies his nails black and eyeliners his eyes and owns a guitar his brother gave him.

We sit on his ratty corduroy couch, watching Judge Judy when he turns towards me during the commercial break.

"So, what's going on?" He asks, picking at a hangnail on his thumb. "Are you okay?"

"If you consider my first eighteen hours basically consisting of over thinking about the fact that my mom just put me on a Greyhound back to Couer D'Alene" (Which is in Idaho.) "without my parents even knowing that so she basically abandons me and also freaked out that I could see Lloyd before he goes to dance camp okay."

Zack just looks at me as if I've swallowed a dolphin whole. "Your mom did that?"

"Why do you think I call her the Venus Flytrap? Women are fucking CRAZY."

Zack laughs and leans back. "I can relate to that."

I smile and grab a handful of Hot Cheetos from the bag between us. "I'm glad to be back, really. But I feel like Lloyd is always right THERE. You know how I told you I can feel his approach?"

Zack smirks and cups his hand around his jaw. "I think the quote was, 'I can feel him coming to me.'"

I blush like crazy and looks away as he laughs again. "I was a FRESHMAN when I said that." I grumbled.

"It doesn't matter. It stills sounds so wrong."

"No shit Sherlock," I sneer at him as Rufus, one of Zack's cats, walks behind me on the top of the couch. His amber eyes stare into my soul and then he continues balancing on the couch towards Zack.

"Your cat is way better than mine are." Zack said.

"Apparently, my EVERYTHING is way better than yours, according to you."

"Including your chest." He says, howling in laughter.

"I can leave," I threatened. He grins and stands up.

"Can I come, too?"

I look around. I never liked coming over to Zack's house-I usually did it when a family crisis that I didn't like being involved in occurred, which was seldom. His house was honestly really disgusting, and even though I met Zack at the beginning of the year and I'm used to everything about him and his weird life, I preferred hanging out anywhere, ANYWHERE but here.

"Sure, but cut the sass."

"Can't promise that, Eureka." He grins.

Okay, so my mom is from Eureka, in Montana, a little town nobody knows about like most places in Montana, and she is so low-budge that she named me after it. Well, at least I wasn't named after a street. I usually prefer being addressed by my middle name, Samantha, or Sam, even better. It's just that Zack calls me Eureka just to be pissing me off-he LOVES doing that more than anything else in this world, even masturbating.

We go out into the sun-it is scorching out-and walk to my house. It's about two miles away, and I feel like we're a pair of nomads from like Arabia or something. I'm in a pair of jeans, rolled up, my Converse, a white T-shirt and a camouflage bandana is wrapped around my neck. Bad day to wear that outfit.

Zack is probably way stupider than I am-he's wearing his tie, or course, for starters, black skinny jeans, a dark grey t-shirt, and combat boots. He's panting like fuck when we walk up the slight hill to my house. I get us in with my house key and the AC embraces us, my cat, Nemo, walking up to greet us. He meows, the sound bouncing off the walls and echoing into the high ceilings. Okay, I guess Zack knows what he's talking about when my everything is better than his...except my love life is about as good as his.

Zack usually dates kids in my class, now going to be Sophomores, that are WAY more awkward than me, dorky, not his type, despite the Percy Jackson obsession, and so when I see them hug first thing in the morning (We take the bus together.) I wanna hurl, and I wish I could find somebody better than them for him...not me, of course.

Dude, that's fucking awkward. What's wrong with you?

I make sandwiches with leftover Rotisserie Chicken and mayo and pour some lemonade and we have our lunch in the kitchen. I give Nemo some chicken and the orange dude-cat gobbles it up, flinging the scraps around.

"So, what's your deal with Lloyd? Why are you being a pussy talking to him?"

"Zack," I say softly, steepling my hands. "Think about it. He's almost completely gay, like probably 75% gay if you think about it, he's graduating next year, he's always with his chick-friends and Josh says he hates me and he's a hipster," I rose my voice, shaking my fist. "Do I look like a hipster to you?"

Zack smirks as he eats his sandwich. "Josh says he hates you?"

I nod pathetically.

"Well, for one, Josh is a huge dick...I think his mom was almost considering naming him Dick when he was born but decided to bail on that and name him after her dead brother."

I snort in laughter.

"And also, was there ever a time when Lloyd hated anyone?"

I widened my eyes and looked into space. "I'm the Chosen One."

Zack furrowed his brow and sneered. "Bullshit. Josh is just trying to get a rise out of you."

I stare at him. "You're so full of shit, your eyes are brown. Lloyd hates me, man. I'm so fucking weird and he's like a goddamn angel. THOSE WINGS ARE INVISIBLE, I'M TELLING YOU."

Zack takes another enormous bite of sandwich. "Ha, then if he's an angel, why would he hate you?"

"Why do you think he's on Earth and not in Heaven?"

Zack thought for a moment. "That's true..."

"Okay, so there. Lloyd hates my guts. And he's gay. Almost."

Zack rolled his eyes. "You're such a smart ass."

"Hypocrite." I say, hitting him with my sandwich, a chunk of chicken and mayo dropping on the floor. Nemo immediately rescues it as Zack and I stare at one another.

"Who was right?" I thought to myself. I couldn't believe it, but I didn't want too avoid the Ford anymore.