Trust me, if you read the whole book, you won't regret it.

Love ya peeps

Chapter 1: Why me?

C-r-o-w-e-l-l

Those letters were arched over the tall, black gate. From where I stood, I could see the front view of the Crowell mansion. It was built with stone and the designed the way ancient castles were. There was even a cone shaped room on the third floor. A huge water fountain stood in between the gate and the mansion. A dolphin sat in the middle of the water fountain; it was supposed to be sprouting water out of its mouth, but it didn't because of the cold weather.

As I stood there, I muttered some curses at those people. Crowells were rival industrialists. Their business was slightly larger than ours, and they had been trying to expand more.

They tried to put my parents out of business fifteen times, but failed miserably. My family was still the second richest in town right after the Crowells.

I wished these people would simply disappear.

Something skittered across the sidewalk in front of me and I jumped back in surprise. The small black devil meowed at me before shimmying it's way to another black cat. Should I worry about bad luck? Wait, it also crossed the path of the Crowell mansion. Maybe it gave them the ugly luck . . . I shouldn't hope too high.

But such a tiny creature almost stopped my heartbeat.

"Good morning."

The whisper next to my ear nearly made me jump out of my skin. I turned around way too fast for my sake and the person's. Not even within five seconds, I was covered with cold liquid on my torso.

"What the hell?!" I cried disgusted as I stopped and tried to get the drink off me. "Wasn't the cat enough?!" I muttered under my breath.

"Oh, I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to startle you."

I looked up to find a tall stranger with a foreign--maybe British--accent. He didn't look familiar. In our small town where everybody knew everybody, it wasn't hard to distinguish a newbie. The stranger had messy black hair, and a sparkle in the sky blue eyes of his.

The idiot had spilled his iced tea all over me. I was beginning to feel sticky and really grossed out. Iced tea and sweat from the jogging didn't make a good combination.

"Disgusting!" I groaned. As I shook my arms to get some of the spilled drink off, I heard the stranger laugh. I snapped my light brown eyes to his light blue. "What? Why are you finding this amusing?" I asked with a frown as I surveyed my stained tank top. One huge discolored patch had formed on the front. It was my favorite one!

"Oh no. You have it wrong. Normally, the other person would apologize as well," he explained as he picked up his large--once full--cup from the ground.

"Well, do I look normal to you?" I retorted in annoyance.

He smiled, staring at me like he had never seen a person before. "I suppose not," he admitted.

Huffing, I started walking away. It was wrong not admitting your mistakes, but I was too pissed off to care. Under normal circumstances, I might have apologized, but hey, it wasn't normal to chit-chat with a stranger who had spilled his drink on you.

Wait, when was the last time I apologized to anybody?

Grandma? Last Christmas? Because I called her sugar cookies worse than horse crap. It wasn't on purpose, I swear. My older brother, Jimmy, decided to play a prank on me by switching the sugar cookies with raisin cookies. Trust me, everyone was pissed off at my comment and I had to spend twenty minutes snitching on my brother and then apologizing.

Saying sorry doesn't always solve problems, but it satisfies most people.

"Hey, wait up. Let me help you clean up. I live right here," the guy said, breaking me out of my thoughts. My eyes followed the direction of gesture and widened upon seeing the Crowell mansion.

Oh, he was a Crowell, then.

I couldn't honestly trust him. Stranger danger rang in my mind. Quickly, I shook my head at his offer and turned to leave. Before I could have taken another step, I came in contact with the ground. I hadn't noticed that my shoelaces had come undone.

Cursing, I glanced up from the ground and roared at the sky above me, "Why me? What the hell did I do wrong?" Seriously, I needed to know the answer!

As I started to get up, I found a hand stuck out in front of me to take. I found the British guy grinning at me, two dimples showing. I swear it was too early in the morning to be happy and smiling. There was nothing to be freaking happy about. I stood up by myself and walked away.

"I'm sorry again!"

I ran off without looking back even once.

***

I sighed in relief once I arrived home. I took a nice, long shower. Some of the spilled drink had splashed into my hair, apparently. It was bloody disgusting.

Once I finished, I put on my faded blue jeans with a black shirt that consisted of the writing, Gryffindor. The white text lied in the center of the long sleeved shirt. A sword was placed right after the r in Gryffindor. I had been quite obsessed with the Harry Potter series for a long while. My older brother, Jimmy, had specially gotten this shirt made for me on my fifteenth birthday. Trust me, this gift was one of the best gifts I had received in my life. It was better than my brother just handing me twenty bucks for living another year.

I went downstairs to eat some breakfast. I saw Petrina, our caretaker, in the kitchen making pancakes. My parents didn't trust Cate and I to survive alone after my brother left for college, four years ago. Jimmy was twenty one, now. He came to check on us on the weekends since our parents only came around Christmas Holidays. They had so many business trips and all that jazz that they were unable to settle in one place for long.

"Cassandra, here are your pancakes. Now, don't add too much syrup. It isn't healthy," Petrina warned.

I rolled my eyes at her as she handed me a plate of freshly made goodness. I quickly reached for the maple syrup and poured it over my pancakes. One bite and my morning felt better.

"Oh em gee! Do you have to eat that every morning, Sandy? It looks so disgusting!" My younger sister, Cate, said as she entered the dining room and saw my breakfast. I would have felt offended if I had cared enough.

"Your face is disgusting," I retorted after I swallowed a bite. She rolled her eyes and plopped down in the chair across me. We were used to insulting each other.

Cate was a total pain. Yes, she was my sister, and I was allowed to feel this way. But I really disliked her presence. Cate and I were nothing alike. I had long dark brown hair while she had shoulder length, blonde hair. Her eyes were bright green, whereas mine was light brown. I had gotten all my traits from my father while she took completely after Mom. Luckily, I was still an inch taller than her at the height 5' 4".

Cate was two years younger than me being a sophomore in high school, but she was way more popular than I was. I didn't care much about popularity. It didn't matter at all because I was never going to see those people again.

"Here is your breakfast, Cate, dear," Petrina said kindly as she handed Cate her fruit salad. I gagged. Who ate fruit salad for breakfast? I followed the one rule about breakfast: Eat like a King...or a Queen, in my case.

"Cassandra! Don't make those idiotic faces. Eat your breakfast. It's seven! School starts in thirty-five minutes," Petrina said and went back into the kitchen.

I hated the old caretaker. She seriously needed to chill. Not even once had she taken my side. Petrina was a sixty-year old woman with graying hair and dull gray eyes. She disliked me, conspicuously, just as she noticeably adored Cate. She simply favored Cate because Cate always sucked up to her.

"Oh Petrina, thank you so much! This is so delicious. I can never get used to your cooking. It gets better every day!" Cate said as she happily ate her fruit salad.

I narrowed my eyes at her. Mimicking her tone, I said, "Oh Cate, who the hell cooks fruit salad?"

"Was I talking to you?" she asked.

"Kiss up," I muttered.

"Ungrateful brat," Cate retorted. Why should I be grateful when my parents paid Petrina a decent sum of money for putting up with me? This was her job!

"Go to hell, Cat," I said as I finished my first pancake. Cat was my nickname for her since I despised those vicious creatures sent by the devil himself. Trust me, I got attacked by one when I was six. I was legitimately scarred for life. Not to mention, one crossed my path this morning.

"Cats have nine lives. I'll come back. What about you?"

"I'll stay in hell if you intend on coming back to this world," I said sweetly.

I didn't have anything against our world. Okay, maybe I did. But it was just the people. I could live with Mother Nature, but the people on the planet were just ridiculous. They cared about nothing but themselves. And I happened to be one of them. I didn't give damn about anything that didn't involve me. Quite contradicting?

Who cares?

"Great. That would be a huge favor . . . to this world." She finished her fruit salad fairly quickly.

I ate my pancake slowly and ignored her. I was Cate's ride to school. She had to wait for me.

¤》¤《¤

"I can't believe the fact that we're late to school," I said annoyed, as I ditched my coat in my car, and we headed towards the school building.

My slow pancake eating plan had led to my own downfall. Because of my slow eating, Cate went to do her make-up again. Apparently, she wasn't content with her lipstick color. She took forever to find the perfect color, which happened to be the original one she had.

That's why I went natural.

My face combined with my personality was a deadly people repellent.

"Actually, we still have a minute," Cate said and rushed in front of me. She entered the school building not bothering to hold the door for me.

How polite of her.

She better find herself another ride.

Just as I was about to open the door, a hand reached from behind me, and held the door. I was really pleased by the gesture. I looked behind to meet a familiar sky blue eyes. It was the British boy from before. He seemed just as surprised as I was.

Before I could have said anything, the final bell rang marking the start of the day. Cursing, I went inside after saying a quick "thanks." Cate was nowhere to be seen. She probably went and sneaked in her classroom like the last time we were late.

My first period class was Literature means that I had to get a pass. The teacher this year wasn't lenient on the seniors like the other teachers were. I headed for the main office to grab a late pass.

"Excuse me?"

I turned to find the same guy who had spilled ice tea on me this morning and held the door open for me. The guy who had claimed to live with the Crowells.

Oh god, wasn't this morning enough?

I knew that black cat would bring me bad luck.

A/N

Sooooo whatya think?

Good? Bad?

You like Cassie or Sandy?

Okay, I tried to write half of the thing after I watched the movie Titanic. Yeah, that didn't work. No, I did not cry even though I was tempted to. All in favor of Rose dying and Jack surviving, say 'aye.' Everyone else can say 'nay.'

I swear, in books and movies, once you start caring about someone, you die!!!!!

So just remember:

CoMMENT

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