Real Life: Alaska Girl Thaws In California

By Katrina Wilterding

If you think high school is bad, wait until real life starts.

Real life? What does that mean?

How is love, death, grief, and joy not real life?

So much can happen in just a short time. Four years, the amount of time in high school on average. Four days, the amount of time before astronauts on the Apollo 11 mission walked on the moon after leaving Earth. Four hours, the time it takes to fly from Anchorage to San Francisco. Four seconds, the time it takes to say “I do” on your wedding day. It does not take much to change a life forever. Real Life tells the story of a little over four months in the lives of two high school students. Four months was all it took to rearrange their lives for forever.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Publication Consultants
• Release date: Jun 1, 2014
• ISBN: 9781594334696

Katrina Wilterding

Katrina Wilterding began writing while she was in high school in California. Reading and writing have been a considerable part of her life since she was young, reading every chance she could and writing short stories. She grew up in the high desert of California and often visited Tehachapi, where her cousins lived. When she went into high school, she felt that it was just another four years of her life meant to prepare her for college and life after. However, as she watched friends, classmates, and events that happened, it felt like so much more. Real Future is the end of a trilogy of books showing the drastic changes occurring during high school. Katrina graduated from San Diego State University with a Bachelors in Liberal Arts and from UAA with an elementary teaching certification. She currently lives in Anchorage, Alaska with her family.

Book preview

Crash

A Fresh Start

Buzz, Buzz , went the alarm clock that was sitting on my dresser.

I groaned but got up anyway and hit the off button of the alarm clock. My body was going to need some time to adjust to getting up early every day again after having slept in all the time over the summer.

I stretched and looked around my cluttered bedroom. There were clothes everywhere (who knew if they were clean or not), papers were strewn about, books were stacked precariously on top of each other and in danger of falling over at any moment, video games could be seen out of their cases all over the place, cords created a hazardous maze to cross as the ones from my game systems and radios all intertwined and blank music sheets covered my guitar which was on my bed, making it kind of cluttered.

Oh well, who cares, I said to myself. I was too lazy to pick any of it up, which I had been told to do numerous times by my mom. Besides, the clutter was conducive to an artistic mind, in my opinion.

I ran my hands through my hair and went to search for some semi-clean clothes for the first day of school. I finally found a pair of jeans that were thrown in a corner and then a black t-shirt and a button-up over shirt that appeared to be relatively clean and put them on quickly.

I then made my way to the bathroom where I brushed my teeth and ran my fingers through my hair several times. I examined my face in the mirror. Over the summer I had changed a lot. My face was now thinner and less round like the child I had been last year when I was a sophomore in high school. This year, I was a junior, an upperclassman, and I was ready to take my place as the most popular boy at Summit High School. I was the captain of the soccer team, the best sport at our school and I was also on the volleyball team. All of these activities gave me a very large dose of popularity, much more than any other boy at school.

I was also ready to join the ranks of those with girlfriends. I am ashamed to admit I have never had a girlfriend before but that was about to change this year, I was sure of it.

David, my mom yelled at me from the bottom of the stairs.

Coming, I called back to her as I left the bathroom and took the stairs two at a time.

Are you ready yet? she asked as she handed me my backpack.

Yep, I said.

Have a good day and try to pay attention in your classes and not focus on the girls. She frowned slightly but her tone suggested she was only joking with me.

I’ll try. I smiled and waved good-bye as I left the house.

We lived in southern California, in Tehachapi. It was a nice enough place but when I went to college I planned to leave and go off somewhere far away. But for now I was content with where I was at. Our house was only about two blocks away from the school, so I usually walked each day.

The walk only took about ten minutes and then I was suddenly surrounded by a very large group of kids as we all entered the school gates and made our way to the posts that had the lists of where everyone went to pick up their schedules for the semester.

The noise was overwhelming in some ways as girls shrieked at each other and hugged one another as if they had not seen each other in years and guys joked and laughed loudly while trying to impress the girls that were in the nearest vicinity. I smiled to myself glad to finally be back where I belonged.

Just then I caught sight of one of my friends from last year.

Hey Mike, I called out and waved to get his attention.

Hey David, he answered back. I gave him my hand and we did our familiar handshake. Pound, slide and slap. When we were done he started the conversation.

So how was your summer? Are you ready to start volleyball? Do you think I will be on the team this year? Have you seen any cute girls yet? the questions just kept coming; he had always been a talker. I sighed and answered his questions.

Summer was fine. I can’t wait till it starts and yes I think you will make the team, I mean you made it last year didn’t you? And no I have not seen any cute girls yet, sheez, I just got here, you really need to take a chill pill.

Yeah but I’m still nervous about making the team. By this time we had reached the posts in the center of the commons and I searched for my last name. I found it. The lists told us which room to go to get our schedules. It wasn’t meant to be a full period, only about five minutes and then we moved on. I had to go to room 125 to get my schedule whereas Mike had to go to 109 to get his.

Just then the bell rang and I said good-bye to Mike and walked to the third quad to get my schedule. I hoped I had good teachers this year and my classes weren’t too hard. As I made my way to the classroom I was jostled around by the crowd and given high-fives by so many people that I lost count. Yes, I thought to myself, this year was definitely going to be better.

~~~

Ring, Ring, Ring.

Just five more minutes, I thought to myself, trying to find the snooze without opening my eyes.

Jessica, you need to get up, my dad urged me, while banging on my door loudly.

I mumbled something incoherently and swung my legs off the bed slowly. I rubbed my face with my hands and tried to flatten my hair, which did not help one bit. My alarm was still going off so I reached out and hit the off button, finally shutting the thing up. I glanced around my now-familiar room. We had moved to California from Alaska over the summer and I worked hard to get everything unpacked. My room was extremely clean because I could not stand clutter; it made me feel like I was slowly going insane. Thus everything in my room had its own place where it belonged and it was always put there.

I yawned and made my way to the bathroom where I grimaced at my reflection. I looked even paler than normal, which is saying a lot, and my hair was sticking up all over the place. I opened the medicine cabinet and brushed my teeth and then made my way back to my room.

I stood gazing at my closet for a very long time trying to pick something out to wear for the first day of school but I could not decide on what I wanted to wear. Finally I picked out a pair of jeans and a black blouse that had a tie around the middle. It was very cute and I liked the way it looked on me so I figured that was all that mattered. I then decided something had to be done about my hair so I got out a brush and worked on dragging the brush through the tangles and tried not to feel the pain too much. Eventually I got all the tangles out and my hair felt smooth to the touch. I glanced in the mirror. My hair was perfectly straight and did not look too bad so I left it down.

Jessica, are you up yet? my mother called.

Yes, I answered.

Are you getting ready to go?

I’m almost done! I yelled back.

I grabbed my backpack, after checking to make sure everything I needed was in there and I looked at myself one more time in the mirror.

I was dreading going to school. It was my first day as a junior in a new school and I was not looking forward to having to go to class everyday again. I sighed. Oh well. Nothing could change the fact that I had to go to school.

I left my room and shut the door behind me.

Bye dear, have a good day at school, my mom said from the kitchen.

I will.

I’ll be there out front after school to take you to your flute lesson.

Alright mom, I said. Make sure you bring my flute with you so I don’t have to carry it around all day.

It is by my purse so I won’t forget it.

Bye, I said and waved as I walked out the door and headed towards school. It only takes about fifteen minutes to walk to the school from my house so I walked to save the gas.

As I got closer to the school, I was immersed in a large group of people my age all making their way to the school gates. I sighed. I didn’t like crowds of people, especially not pushy teenagers.

I made my way to the posts and found the room number I was to go to in order to get my schedule. 113. I waited around for the bell to ring, trying not to attract undue attention by sitting alone in the library, reading a book.

Finally the bell rang and there was mass movement as everybody separated and went to pick up their schedules. Several times I was knocked to the side by others and once my hand got squashed between a wall and my body as someone ran into me. I sighed and flexed my throbbing fingers. This definitely wasn’t going to be a good year.

Foreshadowing Schedules

D avid Spyd.

Finally, I thought as the teacher called my name and I went to get my schedule. I examined it as I got back to my seat. I had first period French, second period Biology, third period English, fourth period History of the Americas, fifth period Calculus and sixth Drama 1. They were all Advanced Placement classes, which I had been enrolled in since freshman year. I did a double take at my schedule. Drama. Since when was I in Drama? There had to some type of mistake, I was a sports player, not an actor; I had to get this fixed. I would go to the counselors during lunch and see to it that I was switched out as soon as possible.

~~~

Jessica Narry.

I got up and approached the teacher’s desk. She handed me my schedule and I went to sit back down at my desk. I looked at the schedule in my hands. I had first period French, second period Biology, third period English, fourth period History of the Americas, fifth period Calculus and sixth Drama 1. All of my classes were AP because my mom wanted me to challenge myself and I was taking drama this year because I still needed a fine art that fit the requirements for AP so I figured why not stick with something I was used to? I had already taken Drama at my old school. Overall, I wasn’t too concerned about my classes; I just needed to make sure I continued to do well in them so I could get scholarships for college. I wasn’t particularly thrilled about any of my classes but I also was not unhappy with them.

One Glimpse Was All It Took

The bell rang and I made my way to French class. Along the way I said hi to a bunch of old friends. They smiled and greeted me enthusiastically. I smiled to myself. This year was definitely going to be a good one.

Mr. Allens was the name of the AP French teacher. He was a middle-aged man with a receding hairline, glasses, small eyes and a ready smile. From my first impression I thought he looked like a nice enough person but also one that did not allow a lot of slacking in his class. Oh well, I knew I had to keep up good grades in order to stay involved in the sports at school and I had always done well anyway, so I wasn’t worried about his class.

I took a seat near the middle of the class and watched as the class filtered in slowly. We still had about five minutes till the bell rang so they still had plenty of time to arrive. Several of my friends were taking French as well so they sat by me in a circle and soon I was surrounded by admirers, guys wanting to be like me and girls wanting my attention. I smiled and laughed and joked with them until the last bell finally rang and Mr. Allens called the class to order.

Bonjour and welcome to AP French, first year. Please forgive me if I mess up your names when I call the role. Don’t make a big deal out of it but just let me know how to pronounce it correctly and I will work on getting it right and learning your names as fast as I can.

As he was calling names I looked around to see if I knew all the kids in the class. I knew all of them except one.

Jessica Narry, the teacher called and a girl near the front raised her hand.

I looked past all of my friends to examine her carefully, so I could commit her name to memory. As soon as I saw her clearly my mouth fell open in shock and I stared at her for much longer than was polite.

She had dark brown hair that fell just past her shoulders. It was board straight but when she moved her hair glistened and glimmered in the light. She had it tucked behind her tiny ears. Her eyes were a vivid blue and were strikingly dark compared to the rest of her skin which was extremely pale. Her lips were pink and perfectly formed beneath a small and cute nose. Everything about her screamed perfection and I was struck dumb.

One of my friends was waving his hand in my face. Earth to David, he said trying to get my attention.

Hey, dude, what’s up? he asked. I’ve been talking to you but you haven’t said anything.

Sorry, I was daydreaming. What were you saying? I snapped back to reality quickly.

He just shook his head without repeating his question and I glanced back over at her, unable to take my eyes away from her for a minute. Finally Mr. Allens was done taking role and he passed out a worksheet we had to fill out in French. We then had to go around introducing ourselves to the class so everyone could get to know each other. It was kind of a pointless exercise because we had all been in pretty much the same classes with each other since freshman year but I was anxious to learn whatever I could about the new girl, Jessica, so I did not complain like my friends. When it was her turn I listened carefully to her answers to the questions and worked to commit her answers to memory to aid me in the future.

Eventually the whole class was done, we were just finishing as the bell rang for break. I hurried to pack up my supplies so I could try to talk to Jessica but she was already gone, so I was unable to find out if she had noticed me. I sighed dejectedly and half-heart-edly walked with my friends to the place in the commons where we had hung out during break and lunch last year, so we went there out of habit.

Break was only ten minutes long so we did not have much time to do anything but stand around and talk. When the bell rang for class, we all dispersed and I made my way to the science classrooms, specifically the Biology lab.

The AP teacher was Mrs. Barnum. She looked very strict and completely like a no nonsense kind of person, one of those people that rarely laugh or smile. I took a seat more towards the back as I did not want her eyes on me the whole class, as I was sure they would be if I sat in the front.

As soon as I