International Date Line

Chapter Three: Someone's gonna be grounded.

Chapter Three: Someone's gonna be grounded.

"Your mom can't come because of her pregnancy. But I told her everything you have done, so be prepared later in entertaining her questions. Good luck with that because she seemed very very disappointed in you, Jessamine." She's an old hag who loved playing sarcasms with students; that's why many hated her so much.

In my mind, I kept on saying to myself. "You old bitch." But my mouth worded: "Okay."

"Return to your class now. Don't be late."

I waited for Courtney to go out first then I slammed the door. She was startled at the sound of the door and glared me for it.

“Are you trying to get us into more trouble?” She whispered but in a loud angry manner.

"What? It's not my fault that this fight started." I shrugged.

Marc patted me on the back and smiled at me. Marc's the usual temper breaker. When someone gets angry, he usually tries his best in making someone smile. He tried to lighten the situation by saying some random joke. Courtney on the other hand sighed and pushed me to class. When we returned to our seats everything went normal again… At least nobody in the class mentioned about the fight. I was pretty sure a lot of them knew already because Phoebe was such a tattletale. But never mind those kinds of issues, because I just have to face my mother later on; that was scaring the crap out of me.

When the bell rung, I slowly arranged my things in my bag. Marc and Courtney approached me and waited for me to finish fixing my things.

"Marc's going to a party later on, and we're not invited." Courtney rolled her eyes.

"You don't want to see Phoebe again right?" Marc crossed his arms and gave confused look.

I nodded and placed my last notebook inside my bag. "Whose party is it?"

"Clarence. Chelsea's cousin."

"I don't care about parties." I grabbed my bag and left. "And Marc, chill with your girlfriend. You don't seem to like her that much anymore."

The only reason why I hated parties was because I couldn't go to any at all. If I couldn’t join them, I would just hate them to convince myself that I never needed any entertainment like that in my life. My mom would always forbid me to go one because she thought it would always go wild and unsupervised.

I checked my phone and there were two messages from Finn. I opened it and read it.

Finn: So, anything happened at school today?

Finn: Maybe you'd like to share?

I typed.

Me: Yeah. Got into a fight. Some girl hated me so much that she pushed me down. I pulled her leg so she fell down too. But since it's my unlucky day, the principal, which is her mom, called for me. I will get serious trouble when I go home later.

I placed my phone back to my pocket, thinking Finn might still be sleeping since it's 4 pm right now. It must be 3 am there. But my phone vibrated, so I checked on it. It's him! What? Why wasn’t he asleep?

Finn: Flower girl is dangerous and a freakin’ awesome toughie. Pretty cool.

Me: Why aren't you asleep?

My chauffeur welcomed me outside the gate of the school. I opened the car door and sat down. Afterwards, I returned to chatting with Finn.

Finn: I slept for four hours. I just woke up for a glass of water. Toughie, you should have pulled that girl's hair for being such a b***h to you.

Me: I am not that mean....

Finn: Flower girl, I did not expect this from you. I thought you're someone who's girly and demure.

Me: Girly? Demure? Never in my life. I watch UFC. I have skills. I can be like Frank Mir and beat that girl.

Finn: You never fail to make me laugh

Me: I'm not even being funny.

Finn: Well then I can assure you that I'm laughing my ass off with your UFC thing. I watch UFC too and I like the way you use Frank Mir. Ha.

Me: Thank you but right now I'm so afraid of what will happen to me when I get home. My mom's going to be so angry with me.

Finn: If you did something wrong then be ready to get scold at. Lol.

Me: You're not helping at all. My mom's a different specimen and besides, it's not my fault, it's self-defense.

Finn: Sure. Better text me details about your mom's scolding.

Me: Yeah yeah, talk to you later. Maybe. If my phone isn't confiscated.

Finn: Someone's gonna be grounded.

Me: Whatever. Thanks for this conversation for nothing. Ugh.

I deleted the Twitter app and all my messages in case my mother really confiscated my phone. It was indeed scary. I was sure she would also check my phone if she really did confiscate it. Slowly closing the car door, I wandered around the gate of my house and purposely patted the neighbor’s dog, having fun with it. Even though Spike was the neighbor’s dog, she

"Spike, mom's going to kill me." I sighed and opened the door. My maid who was sweeping the floor immediately helped me grab my bag. "Where's mom?"

My maid pointed at the couch where mom's reading the newspaper. I gulped and nodded. Scratching my elbow, I walked towards my mom and greeted her. “Hi… Mom…”

"Oh, Jessamine, you're home." She flipped the newspaper back and forth. "So what happened at school today?" She then placed the newspaper beside her and looked at me dead in the eyes.

"Uhm mom, I..." No matter what words I've thought of saying, no words came from my mouth.

"Who's Phoebe?" Her face still remained blank.

"Phoebe is my classmate. She...slapped me first. I didn't do anything! I was hurt that's why I pulled her leg! I didn't start a fight, she did! The only reason why the principal called you and told you it's my fault is because she's Phoebe's mother!" I literally knelt in front of my mom. Tears started to crawl on my eyes to my cheeks because of how afraid I was. My whole body was shaking and my step-mother did not have any idea how affected I was because of her.

"Oh, is that it? You expect me to believe you? Don't play pity games on me Jessamine. You just want attention." She managed to stand with her big tummy.

"But mom-"

She pointed at me and yelled. "Jessamine! Stop talking back! I'm your mother!"

You're my mother? Mothers never do that. "I'm sorry..."

"Next time the school calls again I will transfer you to some boarding school. Understand?" She was literally shouting. She was pregnant and I couldn’t make her angry, but I did not care. She chose to be angry at me by not listening to my explanation and believing in Mrs. See no matter how ridiculous.

"Yes, mom." I slowly walked away when she returned reading her newspaper.

It was surprising that she did not confiscate my phone. I was in heaven probably. It was really a miracle! I locked myself inside the room and downloaded the Twitter app again. I just laid on the bed and waited for the Twitter app to finish loading.

I opened my message inbox, there are 2 new messages.

Finn: Aw, I pissed Flower Girl off...

Finn: I'm sorry

I actually laughed a bit. I was not pissed off. I find myself smiling at his messages, maybe because my mom wasn't that much angry a while ago, a lot better than I expected it to be.

Me: I was not angry. And good thing my mom didn't scold me that much. I'm feeling really happy now.

Finn: Really? So she didn't confiscate your phone I bet...

Me: Well duh. I'm using it right now. So you think my mom's talking to you right now?

Finn: Haha good one. How would I know though?

Me: Whatever, do you have school?

Finn: Of course I have school. I'm in college.

Me: What do you study?

He did not reply anymore afterwards.

I turned my phone facing upside down and placed it under the pillow. Grabbing my textbooks and calculator, I started solving the Physics problems given to us as an assignment. Everything reminded me that college would soon to be my year level and that I needed to focus and get high grades.

I would not want to consider myself a huge nerd I suppose, but my grades were terribly high. It's not because I was smart, but because I badly wanted to prove to my parents that I was a daughter worthy of attention. I also hoped that I could win a scholarship to a prestigious university to prove I could do it. Sounded stupid because I knew my dad could afford my college tuition anyway.

The moment I was solving the last number of problem, Ate Mina knocked on my door and told me to eat dinner. Hurrying towards the stairs, I noticed that my house was awfully quiet. I dashed to the dining table in order to prepare the plates, but Ate Mina was just sitting there and handed me a plateful of food: rice, curry beef, mixed vegetables, and shrimp salad.

"Where are the others?" I scratched my head in confusion. I mean, my dad would be home by now, and my mom was supposed to be here too, since she was just there when I got home. Where was she now?

"Your mom left a while ago, with your dad." She answered me nonchalantly while watching Korean drama in her phone.

They didn't even bother telling me or informing me? Especially dad, did he forget me? His only daughter? Well they were going to have a new baby soon, but why would they treat me like this? As if I was invisible? I stabbed the piece of beef and slowly chewed it. The night's starting to get cold as I finished my dinner. They could have at least texted me or left a message. Whatever.

While Ate Mina was washing the plates, I hurriedly return to my room to finish the remaining problems of my assignment. I was feeling exhausted and wished to get an early sleep, so I decided to do my last task which was just a reading on my bed. Upon sitting on my bed, I could feel that the pillow was constantly vibrating. I creased my forehead and remembered that I had hidden my phone there. I grabbed it and realized it was Marc calling, so I immediately answered it.

"Hell...o?"

"Jessamine...Jessamine..." I could clearly hear Marc's voice, upset and drunk. It concerned me so much because I was afraid he might do something stupid.

"Marc? What...What are you doing?"

"Jess, Chelsea... dumped me. I...I...hate this. I hate this!" He roared and I almost got deaf, good thing my instincts were fast in allowing me to pull the phone farther away from my ear.

"Are you drunk?"

When he did not answer back, I repeated loudly, "Are you drunk?"

I then heard people yelling from the background instead of Marc’s voice, "Drink! Drink! Drink!"

Shit. This is not good. Marc was still a minor to drink! I hung up my phone and realized Finn had messaged me, but I got no time for this because Marc’s in trouble. Since step-mom was not around anyway, I discreetly sneaked out of the house and told my driver to bring me to Clarence's house. After all, being Marc's best friend, I had to be there for him. If he needed someone to save him...why not me? I just hoped I would not have any repercussions afterwards.

My phone rang again so I answered immediately. "Marc?"

"Jessamine...ugghh..."

"Marc!" I yelled.

Suddenly, I heard him puking, which totally grossed me out.

"Marc!" I yelled again. "I'm coming!"

I hung up the phone, hoping step-mom would not return home before I do. It was already a miracle that she did not confiscate my phone a while ago. I was sure she would now if she would come home earlier and found out that I was missing. Because of that, I promised myself that I would move as quickly as I could. Marc needed my help! What could he do? For all I know he may be doing God knows what and embarrass himself. After embarrassing himself he would transfer schools and I would lose a best friend. Being a loner in this school, it was rare for me to have friends already, and I did not want to lose another.

I thought of all possibilities that would happen. Some jerks might let him do silly things, take videos to blackmail or bully him. It was painful to even try to imagine every possible thing that could happen. I needed to be there as fast I could in order to save him. Poor Marc.

Kids, use this as a lesson to be careful during parties, especially parties hosted by the privileged popular people of your school. At first I wanted to message Courtney about Marc, but decided not to anymore. It would be best to know first the situation and ask Marc to clarify about what happened.