The Edensville High Series: Adam Book #1

By J&M Irwin

The first book in the Edensville High Series introduces you to Adam Grace. He's your average looking, typical 16 year old male student, but with extremely good grades. His only downfall and achilles heel, if you were to ask his best friend and fellow scooter ride David King, is that Adam has to live in the shadow of his perfect older brother Joshua and the fact that he's had a crush on the head cheerleader, Eve St. Clair, since they were in Kindergarten. The only thing is, Eve only remembers Adam as being the kid who sniffed crayons and ate glue back then. Her sights are set on more dangerous and exciting adventures and they've all got to do with the bad boy, Lucian Black, who transferred in sophmore year.
Join Adam as he is catapulted into complete chaos when his home is turned into the house party of the year after cunningly being deceived into giving Lucian Black his dad's house keys. Ride the tumultous wave of Adam's struggle as he wakes the morning after with a very naked Eve and unable to remember what happened. Experience the uncertainty as he tries to makes sense of it all while trying to capture the heart and attention of Eve St. Clair, hold onto his faith in God and survive social death once his dad finds out about the party and the fact that his precious, candy apple red F450 is missing.

• Language: English
• Publisher: J&M Irwin
• Release date: Feb 28, 2015
• ISBN: 9781310645204

J&M Irwin

The Edensville High Series is the brainchild of husband and wife writing team, Jackie and Mike Irwin. This couple may come from separate parts of the United States, but they are united in tandem storytelling. The first book of the Edensville High Series has been on Jackie's heart to write for many years, but it took the encouragement of her best friend, Mike, to write it down and write it down she did! When working with your best friend its not like work at all!Jackie is also a published author of a self help book under the pseudonym Jackie Tramel called Shelved: Waiting on God, Waiting on You. Through the EHS work, the couple hope to reach the young people (and adults) that think they must first be clean before they come to Jesus.The two reside in their beloved south just outside of Nashville, Tn where they enjoy the love and encouragement of not only each other, but their family, friends and granddaughter whom they call LoVeY.

Book preview

THE EDENSVILLE HIGH SERIES

by J&M Irwin

Adam

High School doesn’t last forever, but the choices that we make can.

Custom Cover Design by Jackie Irwin

Cover Photography by Irwin Hills Photography

Editing by Brendan Martel

[e-mail]

http://edensvillehighseries.wix.com/edensvillehighseries

Copyright February 2015

Published by Irwin Hills Publishing

This eBook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This eBook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to your favorite eBook retailer and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, place and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons living or dead, is entirely coincidental. All rights reserved. No part of this publication can be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, without permission in writing from the author or publisher.

COMING SOON TO

The Edensville High Series

by J&M Irwin

Eve

Miriam

David/Goliath & Samson/Delilah

Joseph

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Chapter One- Adam’s Freedom

Chapter Two- The Kings of Edensville

Chapter Three- A Day of Regret

Chapter Four- House Party of the Year

Chapter Five- Truth of the Consequences

Chapter Six- Adam & Eve

Chapter Seven- To Forgive Thine Own Self is True

Epilogue

From Us to You

About the Authors

Acknowledgements

Chapter One

Adam’s Freedom

EDENSVILLE HIGH SCHOOL

The chanting came from the carload of football players in Joseph Coatsman’s new car as they pulled out of the school's parking lot hailing the end of the week mantra.

Eagles! Eagles! Eagles!

They usually did it at pep rallies to psych themselves up for the weekly Friday night football game, but this week Adam wasn’t sure if they were more excited about the game or getting to ride in the quarterback’s new Mustang with the custom designed paint job that changed colors with heat. Seems all of them were taking advantage of the heat signature and covering it with their handprints, footprints or whatever else they could find that had heat.

Adam shrugged off the athletes and made his way to his vehicle, his red Honda scooter with custom made saddlebags that hung over each side. He was still grateful to his older brother Joshua for making his dad buy the saddlebags instead of the dorky wire basket that hung off the front, but his father had made it perfectly clear on more than one occasion that the only reason he had even gotten him the scooter was so that he could run quick errands for the hardware store after school. Adam had had the scooter since freshman year so he had built up quite a thick skin to all the teasing, taunts and jokes of his peers. Taking it all in stride, he guessed that he should at least be thankful that his dad had gotten him the scooter in the first place. However, it wasn’t his dad driving around on a little red Honda scooter, nor his older brother Joshua, Adam’s mind tossed in. Who, by the way, was given their dad’s old F250 when he went off to college after their dad bought himself a new one, a brand new F450 to be exact. Adam had taken a little comfort in knowing that the old truck his brother got had already broken down several times and was in the shop in need of constant repair. Yeah, he knew it was petty to think that way, but his brother wasn’t the one getting laughed at either, he was.

Adam pulled his helmet out and fidgeted with straightening the straps for a moment before putting it on. The thought of his parents leaving for the airport this afternoon to fly up to West Point crossed his mind again, and he rolled his eyes. It was always about Joshua and his needs. The couple had decided to go so far as to rent a car and follow his brother home from school just to make sure that he didn’t get stuck on the side of the road broke down somewhere. Their dad and Joshua had agreed to just bring it home so that the two could spend time together and work on it during his brother’s fall break.

Whatever, Adam didn’t mind. In fact, he was actually looking forward to it. Maybe with Joshua home his dad would stay off of him a little. The silver lining in Adam’s book was the fact that his parents had finally consented in letting him stay home alone over the weekend for the very first time. When they had gone away over night for something before Joshua, the older more responsible child had been there to act in the place of dad. So needless to say Adam was pretty stoked in being home alone this weekend, even with all of the restrictions that his parents had placed on him.

Hey B.R.! Adam hadn’t heard David walk up. He glanced over at his best friend who was making his way toward his own Honda scooter, the very one that his dad had gotten the idea from when it came time to buy Adam a vehicle.

You coming to the game tonight? David asked as he threw his leg over his own light blue scooter as if he were straddling a Softail Heritage Classic Harley.

Freshman year the pair had started calling themselves The Highwaymen. Their very own biker club moniker detailed with jackets and biker names to fit. Adam was Big Red. B.R. for short because he was tall and….well, rode a red scooter. David was Drumstix due to the fact that he carried drumsticks around with him wherever he went because he had started taking drum lessons. Later he shortened it down to just Stix. Yeah, it was corny looking back at it now, but back then when they had gotten their scooters they were so excited to have their new found freedom that the names sounded cool, hip and fantastic. Now? Ummm, not so much. Adam cringed every time David used the names and silently prayed that no one at school ever heard him. He no longer used the terms himself, but that didn’t stop David from it. Adam, in himself, felt like he had grown a lot since then, two years in fact and now the whole biker club thing sounded a little more like a couple of sad, lonely and pathetic wannabes trying to be cool.

I’m not sure just yet. My parents are leaving around five, and I'm sure dad will lay down the law again one more time for good measure like he has every night this week. So I guess it depends on what kind of mood they’re in.

David nodded. Bummer. Well okay, text me when you know something.

The pair had started meeting up at games in ninth grade at the same spot every week. It was kind of their thing like an unwritten rule somewhere. Their parents would dropped them off. They would make their way to the front gate to pay to get in, and then they'd wander for a little bit before making their way to the top of the bleachers to people watch. Well, David people watched. Adam watched the cheerleaders, more specifically Eve St. Clair on the cheerleading squad. Whatever the reason, having someone to hang out with at these school events helped to get them through freshman year until now since both were a little on the socially awkward side of things.

With a toot of his horn, David took off out of the parking lot leaving Adam to cinch up his helmet and head toward home to face his parents and their lectures once again. He hoped they had moved on with the guilt of what a privilege it was to get to stay home alone over the weekend and just gave him the 411 on the rules and regulations once more.

Adam reached the JROTC crossing guard just as the queen bee of the Populars at Edensville High, Eve St. Clair came out of the front doors and headed across the parking lot. The Populars crowd consisted of the typical upper crust as with any high school, clichéd jocks, cheerleaders and rich kids. If you weren't a Popular then you were nothing more than what they walked on, to them at least. Therefore that put you in the crowd known as the Walk-Ons. Adam hated the clique system, and he certainly didn't care for the fact that, according to the Populars, he was a Walk-On and considered not popular enough to be in Eve’s social network. So what, he was a Walk-On? He liked Eve St. Clair. Simple as that. When he got the chance to tell her she would acknowledge him as more than the kid who sniffed crayons in kindergarten, and then he’d have a shot. Besides sniffing the crayons wasn’t anything weird. They were meant to be sniffed. They were the ones that had the special scents like licorice, banana, lime, cotton candy and Granny Smith Apple. I mean come on everyone was sniffing them! Tamar Davidson had brought them in and was passing them around for everyone to smell. Just so happens the teacher caught Adam and called him out in front of the class. So he’d been labeled as the kid who sniffs crayons ever since. Kids were cruel and just didn’t let some things go.

Adam probably knew more about Eve than anyone else at the school did, like her favorite scented crayon in kindergarten was the cotton candy one. He had had a crush on her ever since she leaned over holding it and whispered to him this one’s my favorite. That’s when he got caught smelling the cotton candy. Yum! But from that day forward he noticed that when he got around her she even smelled like cotton candy, like she had bathed in it. Sweet, heavenly, deliciously scented cotton candy. Her mom must have went to the Scent Shack and gone crazy buying her the whole works of perfume, body spray and shampoo. It turned into her signature scent and whenever she walked past him in the halls he could smell it. Now even a trip to the mall, or when the carnival came to town made him think of her as he walked by the cotton candy maker.

So armed with all the guts and knowledge that he had of her, Adam was determined that this was going to be the year that he finally made it out of Walk-On status and asked her out. His crush had been a secret for a long time, well David knew of course. David knew everything about him, but so would the rest of the school when she finally acknowledged him and walked down the halls of Edensville High on his arm. They’d know then that he was Popular material. He wouldn’t forget David either, after all he was his best friend. There would definitely be a place for him in the Popular crowd next to him and Eve. He'd make sure of that.

******************************

Leaving the shadows of the halls in Edensville High behind, Eve stepped out into the sunlight. Her long, blonde hair glistened as it hung down her back and caught the rays. Her fair skin showed signs of looking like she spent a lot of time in the sun, but her tan was spray on. Adam knew that because he had seen her go into one of the Sun Shop’s spray on tanning rooms. No, he wasn’t stalking her. His dad’s hardware store was across the street. It’s a small town. You practically know everyone’s business if you just sit for one afternoon outside on a park bench. So Grace Hardware being in the center of town gave Adam a front row seat of every action happening on Main Street through the front windows or bench outside.

Eve’s eyes were a light cobalt blue and caught any light’s refraction and sparkled brilliantly almost like a prism, but it was her smile that moved him. Oh, did he even have to mention her smile? The sun completely paled in comparison. Adam sighed as he watched her move across the parking lot. Yeah, it was her smile that got him the most. It was like a brilliant ten thousand watt light directed straight at anyone that had the privilege to just be near her. Of course, he’d give anything at this moment to be the one she was directing it at, but her best friend Miriam Marah was the lucky recipient right now. Some day it’d be him he thought. He was gonna make sure of it. He heard her laugh out loud. That sound was infectious like the tinkling of tiny little bells moving gently on a summer’s breeze. He knew it sounded clichéd and poetic, but that's what he heard when he heard her laugh.

Lost in his own world with Eve St. Clair, Adam didn't see the crossing guard's big red sign that clearly stated STOP on it. He ran straight through the crossing guard’s directions and lost control of his scooter nearly wiping her and her big red sign out. The JROTC girl dressed in all green yelled, Hey, just as a horn blew and a four door car swerved around him. It was a close call, but thankfully he was okay. After he had regained control over his scooter and come to a complete stop he turned to evaluate the situation. Everyone in the parking lot had turned to stare in his direction and his face was nearly as red as his Honda. Adam glanced over his shoulder in Eve's direction. He was so embarrassed, and she was bound to have witnessed it too.

However, in the usual Popular style of doing things, if it didn’t involve them or someone in their social web then they paid little, if any, attention to it, unless they found it hilarious. Then they just posted it on YouTube, Instagram, Vine or Tweeted about it. Obviously Adam’s little glitch barely read on her matter meter. She had paused only briefly then kept right on across the parking lot with Miriam. Adam sighed in relief. Thank you, Lord!

Mortified at the spectacle he had made, Adam turned back to the crossing guard and mouthed, Sorry, but the girl didn’t seem to care.

"Whatever, could you just get out of the way?" She used the big red STOP sign to emphasis her directive. Still on shaky legs, Adam pushed the scooter back up on the pavement. He took one final glance back at Eve as he pulled onto the main road in front of the school. She had already made her way over to Lucian Black and his supped up jet black Chevy Camaro.

Lucian Black was the guy that every male in school wanted to be and every female wanted to date. He was the typical bad boy with a dark mysterious past. Which seemed to make him even more intriguing to the females at Edensville High since he had transferred in last spring from Palestine High, where rumor had it he had been expelled from. The truth of the matter was that he wasn’t even supposed to be on school property right now because he had been suspended for smoking and misconduct with a minor. A minor? Yeah right! That statement gives the illusion of someone that’s an innocent, but Jezebel Baal was anything but an innocent. So much for the administration doing their part to keep him off the property because there he was! No doubt he had witnessed the whole embarrassing incident of Adam and his scooter too. However, none of that bothered him as much as seeing the look in Eve’s eyes as she made her way to Lucian. She ran her hand across the hood of the car. It seemed not only did she still have a thing for Lucian’s black Camaro, but for Lucian Black himself! Adam wasn't stupid. He may not have had a girl give him that look before, but he recognized it when he saw it. Eve walked the length of the car tracing