Chapter one

I eyed Veronica from behind the magazine I was reading. She was sitting on my bed sucking a loly pop and listen to music on my beats. I had the TV on so that’s probably why she put them on. I was starting to wonder why she was so quite.
“Veronica!” I yell. She keeps on moving her head around like a psycho. The beats really work. I set down the magazine on the floor and slowly stand up from my bean bag.
She still doesn’t seem to notice me at all. I tip toe to my desk and grab my Gatorade bottle. I laugh; she’s so going to hate me for this better get a head start.
I open the door so when I make a run for it I won’t have to open the door and loose precious time. I position myself to her side and throw the Gatorade bottle at her.
BAM! Right in the head! She looks up at me confused. Quickly her confusion turns to anger as she notices what I did to her. She rips the beats off her head and growls at me, “CRYSTAL!”
You know when ever your bored and want to do something the best thing to do is upset Veronica. She gets really mad and chases you around like a maniac. It’s pretty funny if you think about it.
She jumps off the bed to chase me but I’m already out the door. I run down the hallway downstairs to the kitchen. I can hear Veronica cursing me out. I shouldn’t be in the kitchen were sharp things such as knives are.
I see Veronica at the bottom of the stairs looking around for me. Then she spots me, her expression murderous. Oh-oh. She runs towards me and I back up towards the kitchen door. I open it and step into the wet spring grass.
I run faster barefooted. I make a bee-line for the fence and begin to climb. I hear the back door open; standing in the doorway is Veronica holding. What is she holding? Oh s***, she has the paint gun.
She would go for the paint gun. I jump off the fence on the other side just in time. I could hear four shots. Ha.
I look around at my neighbor’s backyard. I know the lady that lives here thank god she’s not home she’s really strict. If she caught me in her backyard she will literally kill me.
I hear Veronica climbing the fence behind me. S***. I sprint across her backyard and make it to the other fence. I climb and hear her shot another paintball. It missed my face by an inch.
I landed with a soft thud in the other house. This one actually had people in the backyard. The little kids screamed when they saw me. I know their parents will be outside any moment.
“Be quiet,” I whisper and run to the side of the house. The side gate was opened. Thank the lord I wouldn’t have to climb it. I make my way to the street. I glance back to see if Veronica has caught up.
Nope, no sign of her but I don’t take this as relief. Veronica is like a ninja. I make my way through the neighborhood and arrive at a house.
Its peach and two story with a beautiful garden in the front. I make my way to the door. Judging by how many cars are in the drive I assume one person is home.
I knock on the door urgently. After like what seemed like an eternity the door opened. Standing in the doorway with nothing but his boxers on and eating a sandwich is Adrian. His black hair messy as always and he’s blue eyes looked at me amused.
“What brings you to my house?” he asks. I pushed passed him inside and make my way to his garage. “What are you doing?”
“I need to get armed. Veronica is pissed at me for throwing a Gatorade bottle at her head. She has a paint gun. Come on your on my team. She probably made her way to Steven’s already,” I say as I rummage through his paintball supply.
“Sweet, I’m in. but we need to get Jake before they do,” he says. Then he checks me out. “You need more clothes then that,” he points at what I’m wearing. I look down noticing for the first time what I’m wearing.
Ugh. I was wearing a tank top with no bra and my short shorts. “Your right, I didn’t have time to change when she attacked me. Do you have anything that I could wear?” I ask.
“Yeah, load up the guns. I’ll be back with your clothes,” he leaves to go upstairs. I grab to guns and load them up with paint balls. The rule is when we fight in the woods.
I remember the first time, the neighborhood called the police on us because of the mess of paint we left. They made us clean every once of it. Veronica only shot one put of the house; I wonder where that one landed.
Two minutes later Adrian’s downstairs handing me a huge shirt that reached my knees. I looked at him with a sour expression, “Really you don’t have anything that fits me? My legs will be exposed.”
“Sorry, babe I don’t own anything else,” he says and takes the gun from me. He always calls me babe so I’m used to it by now.
I go to the bathroom to go change. I look I like a kid playing dress up with this shirt. I strap the gun on and head out. “Do you have a marker?” I ask.
He leaves and comes back with a black marker. He hands it to me, “Thanks,” I say and head back to the bathroom. I look at myself in the mirror and draw one straight line on each cheek. When I walk out of the bathroom I draw the same thing on Adrian’s cheeks.
I finish his face and we head out.



Outside the air feels chilly. We cautiously make our way to the forest, back to back. People don’t give us a second glance cause they know we’re headed to the woods.
This sort of thing happens every month; our neighbors are used to it. I know it’s pretty childish for seniors to be playing this sort of game and acting like ninjas. What can I say, old habits die slow. We’ve been doing this since middle school; it was me and Steven who invented the game.
If one of us upsets the other physically, like how I throw the bottle at Veronica, then that person can declare war. He/her could start fighting right away like Veronica did or run and get back up. We make teams and fight till we get tired.
Last time it was Adrian and Jake. Jake punched Adrian for killing his player in call of duty. Adrian declared war and I was on his team. I’m always on his team and he’s always on mine.
We reach the woods and stop at the edge to listen. They’re not here yet. “We should hide in one of the trees,” I whisper.
“Yeah we’ll get better range,” he whispers back.
We nod in agreement and climb the highest tree. Climbing tress is second nature to me so it’s easy. Once we’re high up and hidden. We get ready.
I aim my gun at the ground. Then I hear footsteps, they’re being careless. A figure gets in my field of vision and I shot. “No,” whispers Adrian but it was too late the paintball was already on its way. It was headed Lauren Gilmore’s way.
“Eh,” she screams as the paintball hits her right on the side, making her purple sun dress turn blue. She looks up at us to see who shot the paintball. But she couldn’t see us because we were well hidden.
“S***, I thought she was Veronica. What is she doing here?” I whisper. I look at the girl as she starts crying because her beautiful dress is ruined. What a drama queen.
“I have no idea,” says Adrian gazing at her. “This is just about to get interesting.”
He was right. Chad came from nowhere and stopped in front of Lauren. She looked at him, “Look. Someone shot me with a paint gun and ruined my dress.”
He holds a serious face then starts laughing, hysterically. I giggle at the expression Lauren wears. She can’t believe her boyfriend is laughing at her. “Ugh, you’re unbelievable,” she yells and marches the way we had come.
Chad suddenly turns serious and follows Lauren, apologizing. What a stupid thing to do. Apologize to a girl like that. Chad shouldn’t be with those types of girls, I honestly don’t know why he dates them.
We jump off the tree and decide to go home because it was growing late and still no sign of the other.
That was the biggest mistake I ever took. Once our feet hit the ground the guns went off from behind us. “Take cover!” yells Adrian. I drop to the ground and roll behind a bush.
They caught me. I examine my body, three shots. My shirt is colorful now. Adrian makes his way to my side and grunts, he has also been shot. I scan the bushes for our threat and find them behind the tree we were hidden in.
Veronica smiles at me an evil smile making her grey eyes turn dark. Steven and Jake are at her flanks smiling. “Fire!” I yell. Adrian and I shot about all our paint balls. We managed to get Veronica and Steven, but Jake ducked.
And so on we fought. We fought till night fall when the guys started complaining that they were hungry. We headed off to my place me and Veronica laughing in the front while the guys walked in the back. We were pretty loud on the way back to my place and we probably looked hilarious.
We were covered head to toe with paint. I stop on my heels an idea forming in my head. Veronica and the guys look at me warily knowing something is forming in my head.
“Let’s do karaoke at my place, come on we haven’t done that in a long time! Come on please!” I beg them.
“We should do that, remember last time?” says Adrian. We laugh at the memory.
“Okay we should definitely do that,” beams Veronica. Of course she would want to do it since she’s the best singer.
We arrive at my house; my mom doesn’t get home till midnight. We don’t bother changing at all and go straight outside to the back deck. Steven’s goes to the garage to grab my electric guitar.
The only instrument I know how to play is the electric guitar, my dad taught me when I was young and I’m pretty good. I’m not a permanent member in the Veronica’s band. I sometimes play with them at some gigs but not all the time because I’m more devoted to sports and hardly have time.
Me and Veronica go inside and make hotdogs for the guys. We come back outside with a tray filled with at least twenty hotdogs and coke cans. We sat down and ate quietly for once. The night was beautiful outside the stars were out in the sky and happy.
Once we finish I grab my electric guitar and plug it in to the amp. I put the strap around me for safety. “So who’s first?” I ask.
Steven jumps up, “Me of course.”
“What song Stevo?” I ask as he makes his way to me. I hand him a microphone.
He accepts it and says, “You know ‘freak the freak out’, right?”
I nod and start tapping my foot at a steady beat. I start playing the guitar and Stevo sings happily. He doesn’t have a bad voice but it’s not as good as Veronica’s.
So we spend the rest of the night singing and playing guitar. My mom got home at midnight and told everyone to go home because we have school tomorrow.
After everyone left I took a shower and tried to rub off all the paint but I had bruises all over the place. I finished taking a shower and looked at myself in the mirror. I have bruises all over my body and the tips of my hair were painted green and pink. Then I went to bed and instantly fell asleep.
That night I dreamed of Chad.