1Chapter One
Three hours in and already this car ride has been a disaster. Somehow, in the few hours since we left town, us two in back have thrown up, and one of the two in front has managed to fucking set herself on fire. Nevermind the fact that she knows she shouldn't have lit fucking candles in here. I'm actually surprised we haven't gotten lost yet.
Just twenty-two more hours to go.
"Elle, are you going to come back up here anytime soon? The smell of burnt hair left ages ago." Phoebe calls back.
I sit up and glare over the back of the middle seats to glare at my best friend of nine years-aka the pyromaniac who lit herself aflame-up front in the passanger seat. With long crazy curly black hair and deeply tanned skin, Phoebe Kruger is the exact opposite of me with my short straight as a board strawberry-blonde hair and white as a ghost complexion. Our looks seem to be the only thing that are polar opposites though, as we've been pratctically joined at the hip since we were placed next to each other in the forth grade.
"I'm not risking getting caught in the second fire,"
Phoebe rolls her eyes, before holding up the now unlit candle in some odd form of surrendor. "I put it out, see? No more fires until we reach the hotel, I promise."
"Not taking the chance," I wave my hand dismissevely before flopping back down. "Besides, I like it back here."
To be honest, that's not the only reason I retreated to the way back of the van, although it certainly was one of them. I mainly came back here to get away from my cousin.
At sixteen years old, Henley Hatford, my mother's older sister's daughter, has officially nestled herself into the side that Phoebe and Sophia (my other best friend, who is currently sitting in the driver's chair) haven't already claimed. As a pain. I know I'm supposed to love my family, and I do, but there's only so much poking and prodding and being made fun of that one can take before they explode. And considering she's the reason why we're all getting this technically free vacation on the beach, I decided that escaping to the back before any erruptions happened was probably the best idea.
Explaining why could take a while, so I'll just shorten it up so that we can move forward as quickly as possible.
Henley's rich-as-fuck best friend's older sister is getting married on the east coast. Henley was invited. Her parents found they had no time to drive their only daughter down so instead enlisted me to do so, claiming they'd pay for gas and room and board. I, who hate driving and being forced into situations where I don't know anyone (as I'm sure would happen at the wedding), proceeded to refuse until everyone agreed that my two best friends could accompany me. Free vacation on the east coast? Needless to say, it didn't take much convincing to get them to come along.
"How far are you?!" Sophia calls back as I open my book.
"I'm just finishing the fourth volume of Joker!" I smack my lips together and allow a slightly creepy smile to cross my face at a man with wavy light hair that reaches his shoulders and bunny ears on the page. "Oh, Elliot Hare, you can sign my documents all you want."
Almost immediately, I hear some shuffling from up front and lower the book right as Henley peeks her head over, her brown hair falling on either side of her face. Her gaze flickers down to the cover and her lips move slightly as if sounding out the name. "Alice in the Country of Joker."
"You do realize he's a fictional character and you're nineteen years old, right?" she asks, her eyes flickering back up to mine. Her voice drips with disdain as if she were embarrassed to have to admit she's related to me even in front of my own friends.
Join the club, cousin.
I want to send a retort back to her so badly, but bite my tongue before any spiteful words can come out. One phonecall could land all three of us into a world of trouble when we get home and that is the last thing I need. I can play friendly for a week if it means a free vacation.
"Don't knock it 'til you try it," I say instead, digging through a dark blue bag until I find the first volume of the original series; Alice in the Country of Hearts. "Here," I hold it out to her, "It's based off of Alice in Wonderland."
Henley rolls her eyes, before grabbing the book from me and proceeding to chuck it at the back of the car so it lands on the other side of the seats with our luggage. "I got that much, you idiot."
I clench my teeth on another retort and allow my gaze to settle on the rearview mirror where I can just barely catch Sophia's brown eyes staring worridly out onto the road. It's hard for all three of us to play nice with "The Evil Cousin" as we've all started referring to her as, but it's especially difficult for me. They at least have the excuse of "she's not our problem" that they can tell themselves. I'm supposed to be in charge of her, although it somehow feels like the other way around.
"You're such a loser," Henley continues, turning around and plopping back down so that she's facing the front of the car again. Although the phrase is usually used as a term of endearment, it's clear she does not mean it that way. "You're almost twenty and still have yet to have a boyfriend. I'm not surprised. No boy would look twice at a girl who reads that shit all the time."
It takes a lot of effort, but I manage not to dignify that with a response.
Just twenty-two hours and forty-two minutes left to go.
ATJRAWTG
I'm woken up early the next morning by the sound of Sophia's alarm going off somewhere behind me. I let out a soft groan and awkwardly flip over so that I'm facing the middle of the room where her large gray android lays, buzzing and going off obnoxiously in order to make sure we're all awake. It's only six-thirty in the morning but we have to get an early start if we want to make it all the way to the beach today. We still have almost twelve hours of driving left.
The brunette groans as well, before slaming her hand over it to muffle the sound and pushing herself into a sitting position. I follow suit, rubbing sleep out of my eyes as we both stumble towards the bathroom. In order to get an extra few minutes of sleep, the two of us have sacrficed showering alone in the morning, not that I believe either one of us really care. It wouldn't be the first time we've shared a shower, after all.
It's still a rather awkward experience though, as we limp around each other, both trying to get as much time under the warm water as possible. On the bright side though, the cold air does manage to wake the both of us up a bit more.
Phoebe is just beginning to sit up by the time we finally exit the bathroom, large towels wrapped around us. Henley opted to take a shower last night right after we checked in shortly before one in the morning and rather than follow up the Evil Cousin, my black haired friend decided to make the sacrifice of waiting it out until we'd reached our destination before bathing.
We don't talk as we move around to get ready, all of us too grumpy and groggy to really be able to hold up any real sort of conversation. The only words passed are the cuss words Henley throws at me when I wake her up five minutes past seven. It's really getting difficult to not flip out and hit the girl.
Shortly after we're all dressed, while Sophia is doing her makeup, Henley is using the bathroom and the rest of us are making sure that the small over night bags we've brought in are packed up again, a knock on the door echoes throughout the room.
Phoebe-who had already been moving in that direction so she could check us out-turns around to raise a dark eyebrow at me. I shrug wordlessly, to busy emptying out the mini fridge of the snacks we'd had to store in there to wonder who would be knocking on our hotel door, hundreds of miles away from home. I do, however, push myself into a standing position just in case anything goes down right as Sophia appears from around the corner.
The door opens to reveal two boys about our age. One has flowing golden hair and mauve colored eyes, the other a bespeckled boy with neat black hair and grey eyes. Despite my confusion at them being here, I can't help but notice that the black haired boy reminds me of a certain anime character.
"Um, how may I help you?" Phoebe asks, a slight edge to her otherwise, fairly nice voice to show that she isn't playing around. It's difficult to be too afraid with her between me and them. The girl sleeps with a fucking meat cleaver and a knife in her headboard for fuck's sake. She doesn't play around.
"My name is Fred Wolfe," the blonde says, shooting us a heart wrenching smile. "And this is Landon Moreland. We're friends with Liana."
He says the name as if we're supposed to just know who this Liana is. I desperately wrack my brain, absentmindedly hoping that the name will mean something to me so that I can put a good reason behind this visit. But for the life of me, I can't remember.
"Uh, I'm sorry," Phoebe offers them a friendly smile as Sophia and I gather up behind her. "But I'm afraid you must have the wrong room."
Glasses boy-Landon-glances into the room behind us. "Then you aren't travelling with Henley Hatford?" he states it as a question, but it's clear he already knows the answer.
"How do you know my cousin?" I hiss, suddenly feeling overprotective anger flowing through my veins.
"Calm the fuck down, Angelica," Henley's horrified voice suddenly appears from behind me. "Liana is Wendy's older sister." I absentmindedly recognize the name of her best friend. "She's the one getting married."
Oh. My shoulders sag in relief. These two know the bride.
"What are you doing here, though? And how did you know where we were?" Phoebe hisses, still clearly on edge. And for good reason, it seems.
"We were sent by Liana." Landon answers. "She wants us to escort you down to North Carolina so you don't get lost."
"Is she doing that with all the guests?" Sophia asks. My eyes flicker over to her out of habit, before catching something odd. Fred seems to be looking at her quite a bit, which is rather strange. I mean, yes my friend is pretty, but the way he continues to glance her way doesn't sit well with me. But that could be because this whole situation is just uncomfortable.
"No, but I guess Wendy and Richelle are worried about Henley getting here on time so Liana wanted someone to come down and make sure nothing happens." Landon's the one to answer once again.
"Well, thanks but no thanks. Tell her we'll do just fine on our own." Phoebe steps back and slams the door shut.
Henley glowers in the corner, not saying anything, but clearly pissed at how we treated the boys. But I can't help but feel creeped out by the fact that two boys-two strangers-apparently drove all this way just to escort four girls back to where they had just been. It's just too weird.
"Well, that was creepy," Sophia sighs once we catch the figures of the two boys leaving through the curtains.
"Tell me about it," Phoebe nods, "But they're gone now. And hopefully we won't have to deal with them again."