Holly Hearts Headlines (Holly Hearts Hollywood Book 2) (12 page)

Oh, Cora just texted me! I haven’t really heard from her since the night of the auction and I’ve been meaning to text her and see if she wants to hang out, but I don’t even know her well enough to know what she likes to do. What if I ask her to coffee and she hates coffee and is offended that I even asked? Anyway, here’s what Cora said:

CORA: Serena just told me about the accident! Are you okay?

ME: Hey, I’m fine. I just have a concussion and eleven stitches. No worries.

CORA: Do you want any company? I could bring over my season DVDs of
Buffy the Vampire Slayer
. Have you ever watched it?

ME: No, I’ve always wanted too!

CORA: What time can I come over?

And so I asked my mom and after pleading and profusely promising her that watching TV with Cora wouldn’t cause my delicate brain any kind of injury she agreed to let Cora come over!

Later, 8:00pm—Home

So,
Buffy the Vampire Slayer
is totally awesome and I don’t know how I’ve lived my life without it. In the show, Buffy, played by Sarah Michelle Gellar, is destined to fight vampires and other supernatural creatures of the night. She has to struggle with the fact that she just wants to be a normal teenage girl and go to the mall with her friends and go on normal dates, but her fate to hunt vampires won’t let her. She also meets a very hot vampire boy and falls in love with him, which makes her job pretty difficult if she’s in love with the enemy.

And I realized that I like, could totally sympathize with Buffy and that we’re pretty similar. And yeah, I don’t fight vampires with my kung-fu skills in platform boots like Buffy does, but I am living a double life like her. I would like nothing more than to just be myself completely, but instead I have to keep secrets. I even have a boyfriend that I’m not supposed to have! Cora bringing this show over for me to watch was obviously fate.

Or, as Serena put it when I mentioned it to her, it is more likely symptoms of my brain injury since one of the side effects of concussions is the inability to think straight.

Later, 9:00pm—Home

Mom just came in and made Cora go home claiming that since I’ve had such a day today that I need to go to sleep early. Little does she know that I have a flashlight in my nightstand and that I’m currently using my comforter as a tent so I can write in my journal.

I really like Cora. She’s very different than I expected which should teach me a lesson about assuming things about people. She’s actually kind of nerdy, which I totally dig. She loves science fiction and her favorite shows are
Buffy
(obviously),
Firefly,
and
Doctor Who
. She wants to go to MIT and study biochemical engineering so she can invent a way to instantly make all water on earth drinkable and save thousands in third world countries. Talk about goals, right? My only goals in recent memory involve Grayson and a dark row in the back of a movie theater where no one can see us go to second base.

I need to get my priorities in order.

April 16
^th
, 9:00am—Home

The best thing about having a concussion so far is that I have absolutely no responsibilities. Is it my turn to do the dishes? Too bad, I have a concussion. Homework due tomorrow? Get an extension because after all, I have a concussion and cannot possibly do math problems. So today, I get to stay home in bed and do whatever I want.

I should get in car accidents more often.

Later, 11:00am—Home

Grayson just sent me a text curtly inquiring why he was not informed that I nearly met my death yesterday on the freeway. To be honest, I had completely and totally forgotten about him. Of course, I didn’t tell him that. I just blamed the concussion for affecting my memory. He forgave me immediately, and the best part is that he is on his way over!

I’m home alone and my boyfriend is coming to see me. This might turn out to be the best day ever.

Later, 1:00pm—Home

When will I learn? The opposite of what I wish to happen always happens to me. If I wish for bright and sunny weather, I instead get a hurricane. If I wished for the world to continue spinning as normal, I swear the earth would fall off its axis and plummet into deep space instead. I wished for the best day ever and instead I’m getting the worst day ever.

And that might be a dramatic statement, I suppose. I mean, nothing outwardly
bad
is happening between Grayson and me. I made him watch the pilot episode of
Buffy the Vampire Slayer
with me but he didn’t really like it. He thought it was corny. I like corny shows that don’t take themselves seriously. We watched a movie, we ordered a pizza, and everything was great. But he was just so distant. He held my hand, but he didn’t attempt to passionately kiss me or anything. For a while, I was wondering if my stitches were repulsing him, but he said that wasn’t it at all.

Apparently, and this is just perfect, he was afraid he would
hurt me
if we started making out too much. Like really, dude, your tongue isn’t going to put me back in the hospital. This concussion is literally getting in the way of making out with my boyfriend and maybe getting some under-the-bra action. I mean my brain isn’t in my
boobs
. He won’t give me a super-concussion from fondling me.

Why me?

Later, 7:00pm—Home

Serena says that maybe Grayson doesn’t want to be that physical yet and that maybe he enjoys bonding with me through other ways. Serena and I were in the kitchen making hot fudge sundaes, which is exactly what the body needs when it has been through an ordeal like mine.

“Aren’t guys supposed to be controlled by their sex drives though?” I asked as I doused my ice cream in hot fudge.

“That’s a horrible generalization and you know it,” Serena replied. “The stereotype that guys can’t control their sex drives and that girls don’t have sexual impulses at all are so misleading. Maybe Grayson just isn’t ready for that kind of action yet. Don’t rush him; let it happen when he’s ready.”

“Humph,” I grumbled.

Ivy walked in just as we were digging into our sundaes and said, “I knew a guy back in Iowa who wouldn’t touch my breasts because he was afraid I’d get breast milk all over him.”

Serena started laughing so hard that hot fudge came out of her nose. “That’s ridiculous,” she gasped as she wiped the fudge off of her face.

“Who was that?” I asked Ivy.

“Evan McCain,” she said.

“Well that explains it. Not only is Evan McCain not very bright, but he works on his parents’ dairy farm. He’s probably forgotten how that actually works after all those years exposed to cow milking.”

We spent a little time making fun of all of the boys we’ve known. Serena, of course, has known the weirdest boys. She’s known boys who insisted that she couldn’t wear high heels around them because they didn’t want to look smaller than her. One boy took her out on a date and then told her if she wanted a second date, she’d have to start going to the gym to lose weight. She left
immediately
.

We were cackling over these stories when my grandpa walked in and asked what we were laughing about. Serena, who was gasping for air, finally found the strength and said, “The patriarchy!” and then we all died laughing again. My grandpa just left the room, shaking his head.

The power of girlfriends is incredible. I feel as if I am concussion free.

April 17
^th
, 8:00am—Home

Ugh, I take it back. I’m definitely feeling my concussion this morning. And my mom is insisting that I have to go to class today. What fresh hell is this?

Later, 10:00am—Home

I’ve been nagging her all over, and my mom won’t budge. She says that it won’t hurt me at all to sit in a classroom and learn something. I tried to tell her that due to the attitude of all of my classmates it actually takes a lot of emotional effort to deal with all of them, but my pleas fell on deaf ears.

My mom has obviously forgotten what it is like to be in high school.

Later, 1:50pm—Beverly Hills High School

I hate my life right now so much. I know that this class is only once a week, but I always wish a banshee would burst into the room and suck my soul out instead. It isn’t that I don’t appreciate the knowledge that Miss Ansell is providing me with, for example last week Miss Ansell stuck her entire arm into a condom to prove to us how durable they are so that when a boy claims they’re “too small” for him we can prove him wrong. That was highly educational and very entertaining, mainly because all of the boys in my class looked very embarrassed by such a display.

But everyone here will not stop starring at my stitches. Like I get it, I look like Frankenstein’s Monster, but geez doesn’t anyone here know that it isn’t polite to stare? Shouldn’t good manners automatically come included when you are born into a good family with money, or have the Kardashians (the world’s best family) taught us nothing?

Eve, the girl with the short black hair who happens to be the only real human being in this class, just leaned over and asked if I was okay. I told her about the accident and everything and she immediately went, “Oh my God, I didn’t even notice the stitches. I was asking because your face was turning red, and you were writing in there like you were really, really angry.”

I was mildly mortified. “Oh, I didn’t realize my emotions show so much.”

She laughed. “No, it is okay. Are you a writer?” She gestured toward the journal.

“Sort of,” I said.

Eve was just about to say something else when Miss Ansell walked in. At the start of every class, Miss Ansell requires that she gets to inspect our eggs to make sure they are in good condition still, and right now one of the girls is quietly crying over her cracked egg which she has attempted to duct tape. I don’t know how you could let the eggs crack. It is like, really easy. You just
don’t drop it.
Problem solved.

Later, 6:00pm—Home

Grayson hasn’t called me all day. My life is probably over.

April 18
^th
, 9:00am—Home

Still nothing from Grayson.

Later, 10:00am—Home

Nil. Nada.

Later, 11:00am—Home

He’s probably preparing a break up text to send me as I write this. This is what I get for trying to get to second base.

Later, 2:00pm—Home

I was in the middle of a video chat session with Jennifer, my tutor, and she was desperately trying to get me to show some kind of interest in my calculus homework (like, ew) when Grayson finally texted me. The best thing about video classes is that she can’t see my cell phone if I keep it out of the webcam’s sight.

GRAYSON: Sorry I haven’t texted you recently. Lacey and I got attacked by some fans at a sushi place in Beverly Hills and I dropped my phone in the gutter.

I was just about to text him back an accusing message claiming that his story was much too convenient when he beat me to the punch:

GRAYSON: I promise this is a true story and not at all made up. You can look it up online. There are pictures all over the internet with my arm shoved down a gutter trying to get my phone.

And he was right. All of the paparazzi got really good photos of his butt which I saved into a discreet photo album I have on my laptop of my favorite photos of Grayson. We texted one another for a little while as Jennifer waxed eloquently about how calculus would apparently be useful to me in my future adult life.

Somehow I doubt that.

TO DO LIST:

1.      Make list of reasons why calculus is useless to convince Jennifer to let me drop the class.

2.      Hide secret photo album of Grayson better.

Later, 8:00pm—Home

Have you ever found out that a friend is mad at you and thought to yourself, “What did I do?” Because that just happened to me. I’ve been texting Serena, and she hasn’t really been acting like herself toward me. She hasn’t been replying, and if she does, she just sends me short, one-word responses, which she knows is my pet peeve.

So I finally called her after an hour and was like, “Hey, what gives?”

And do you know what she said? She said that her feelings were hurt because I hung out with Cora the other night and didn’t invite her. I was baffled. I didn’t even know what to say to her because I didn’t realize that I wasn’t allowed to hang out with another girl. I really had no idea that Serena had such a jealous side.

“You are like, my only friend, Holly,” she was saying. “I don’t trust anyone else like I trust you. Everyone else just wants something from me or eventually steals my jewelry or sells secrets about me to TMZ, and I know that you would never do something like that.”