Guess What? Life Happened.

By Hermione Daguin

Nicole was one of those perfect students, with impeccable record and the highest GPA in her senior class. She had the perfect plan for her life until her world came crumbling down. She discovered that her father had Leukemia and barely had a few years left. She relied on her best friend to help her through this as she did when her mother died. Her fear became greater when she find out she was being stalk. At the same time, she ended up dating the schools bad boy, Ken. Her life was coming out of the shadows until she find out the truth behind her fathers terminal disease.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Dec 17, 2014
• ISBN: 9781503522534

Hermione Daguin

Hermione Daguin is an 18-year-old who has recently graduated from high school and is now attending college to pursue a degree in biology. Her primary goal is to become an obstetrician-gynecologist but she also has in her plan to obtain a minor in creative writing. She is originally from the small Caribbean island, Haiti, and moved to Florida in 2010.

Book preview

Chapter 1

Sometimes I wished that I was Peter Pan running, flying, and having fun in Neverland. I’ve always thought that it would be fun to waste fairy dust with Tinker bell, roll in the mud with the lost boys, and create trouble with Captain Hook. Ahh, Neverland, my childhood’s fantasy that became my teenage years’ best escape plan.

However, like every wish I ever made, it never came true. I was not Peter Pan and I was not in Neverland. Instead, I was just a stupid seventeen years old girl trying to survive her last year in high school.

Yes, high school… the land of the drama queens and egocentric football players. Speaking of egocentrics, as I turned my eyes towards the vending machine that boy appeared out of nowhere and just winked at me. Seriously dude, you’re not even that good looking. Yes, you have almost every girl in the school drooling over you. Yes, you banged most of them and disregarded them like trash but they seem to not be able to get enough of you. But, I still stay firmly behind my observation; you are not that good looking.

His blond hair was in desperate need of a haircut; his green eyes that shimmered with a mischievous glint in them no matter the circumstance resembled the ones of a vicious cat. His jaw was too sharp for my taste but according to some of the girls, models would kill for it. His overly white teeth that he enjoyed showing constantly were slightly crooked. His skin was tanned but not from the natural sunlight. Long blonde hair concealed his athletically muscular feet and abs. I knew this because he had a fetish to jog around town every day in his shorts only. I tried to get the image out of mind but it’s futile when he does it even on school ground. I could come up with an entire list of everything that is wrong with his body but it wouldn’t change a thing about his womanizing ways.

It’s not like anyone cares about my opinions anyway. Apparently, I was not smart enough for my opinions to be put into considerations. I was just the kid with the highest GPA in the school. Yep, I was the dumbest of them all.

He’s so hot. If God makes him fall for me, even for one night, I will never miss church ever again for the rest of my life, sighed the redhead next to me.

I rolled my eyes at her. Roxie has been my best friends since forever. I thought we shared everything but apparently not our taste in guys. How could anyone fall for this jerk? He was clearly the devil in disguise. The boy changed girls faster than he changed his cars. For a normal person that would be a pretty long time but not for Ken McCall. The boy had a different car for everyday of the week. Rich, lazy bastard.

Seriously, Nicole I’m starting to worry about you. Roxie tore me out of my thoughts.

Why? I replied confused.

You’ve never find any guy attractive. At first, I thought you were simply gay but then, you don’t find any girls attractive either.

Okayyyy. How is that a bad thing? Every single guy I’ve seen walking these halls is either a disgusting pig or taken.

Have you tried outside of school? She continued. I needed to come up with an excuse because she was not going to stop anytime soon. That girl was always trying to set me up with any guy her eyes fell on.

Pedophiles, I stated simply.

Or you’re simply asexual which I think… She got to be kidding me. I swear that girl was getting crazier by the second.

Hold it, hold it. We are not having this conversation inside the school’s cafeteria. I interrupted her when my eyes fell on this guy sitting on the table next to us. He was trying to act like he couldn’t hear us but I could see the amuse smile on his lips. Ughh, eavesdropping on girls. That’s just creepy even for hormonal high school boys.

Thankfully the bell rang before Roxie could say anything else. We headed to our next class, pre-calculus. Before you can start with your insults, I would like to remind you that everything about life is math. So get over it and embrace your love for math just like I did.

Roxie and I settled in our seats and started with our work. I finished mine before the teacher was even done teaching. Math class was a breeze to me. No kidding, I don’t see why everyone hates it so much. It’s just like solving puzzles, who doesn’t like doing that? Wait… Now that I’m thinking about it maybe I’m the only one who feels that way. I don’t care anyway because math rocks.

Do you want to go to a party tonight? Roxie asked dragging me out of my thoughts.

Yes, of course. I whispered.

Seriously? She exclaimed.

Yeah, we will take my dad’s car, drive to a dark alley to buy some drug, twerk all night, and wake up in the arms of Hugh Jackman in his mansion on Jupiter. I rumbled on carelessly.

Sarcasm doesn’t suit you, Craig. She retorted then turned away from me.

Oh, crap. Roxie only used my last name when she meant business.

Come on, you know I don’t do the all high school party scene. I poked her, hoping to lighten the mood but she stayed stiff as a pole. Roxie, please. You knew I was going to say no. I don’t see why you’re even mad at me.

Because I thought you would want to do something fun for our last year in high school. She finally answered. Come on, I’m tired of being left alone.

But you’re not alone. I’ve always been there for you. Thanks for forgetting that.

Nicole, you know that’s not what I meant. I love your company but a little mingling won’t hurt us.

It would hurt me. I hate being around all those fake girls and sex-addict boys.

They are not all like that but you’ll never find out who’s different if you don’t mingle.

Ms. Craig, it seems like Ms. Angus and you are already experts on logarithms since you won’t stop talking. Why don’t you come to the board and solve this for us? Roxie and I jumped at the sound of Mr. David’s booming voice. Every pair of eyes in the classroom was focus on us. Mr. David was standing in front of the classroom with his hands white with chalk dust. He was raising an eyebrow in our direction with his right arm extended as a sign to invite us to join him on the board.

I rose out of my chair slowly with cheeks red and burning as lava. I had no idea what the teacher was talking about but thankfully I had went ahead and read the entire chapter the previous night. As soon as I reached the board, I remembered what to do. I hastily solve the equation not wanting to be watched by everyone in the classroom any longer. It was a basic one so I barely spent a couple of seconds on it. As soon as I was done, I quickly moved back to my seat. Mr. David went back to his teaching and totally forgot about Roxie and me. We were his favorite students thus, most of the time he just ignored our babblings.

For some unknown reason it seemed like everybody was taking a special attention to me on this very ordinary day. Before I had even start to relax in my chair, a voice came out of the class’s speaker.

Hi, Mr. David. Do you have a Nicole Craig in your class right now?

Yes, she’s here, replied Mr. David without stopping his scribbling on the board.

Can you send her in the office? Ms. Miles would like to have a talk with her.

Of course.

As I rose once again in my seat, I heard some snickers behind me.

ohhhh, the good girl finally did something bad. Somebody at the back of the class chanted.

What happened? Did you accidently break one of the principal’s pencil? Ken shouted as I open the door to get out. As I walked towards the office, I could hear the annoying laughter of the students echo in the empty hall.

Seriously? That wasn’t funny in the slightest. A freaking monkey can do better than that. Kids these days never know what is good. What did I expect? Most of them think rap music is God’s given gift to humanity. I wonder if the ones who think that have ever listened to Bon Jovi or Queen. Probably not, because once you go Queen you can’t ever go back… certainly not to Rap. I realized that my taste in music may be a bit antic but my mom’s radio destroyed me for other genre of music. Well, what do I know anyway? Roxie thinks I went from childhood straight into adulthood. Apparently, my weird taste in music and my insanely mature behavior is proof that I skipped the most fun part of life… being a careless teenager.

If you ask me, I think being a teenager sucks. It’s the most confusing stage of life. You are expected to act like a young adult but still considered a child. You have a bunch of energy and time but have no money so you spend most of your time bored out of your mind. You are so focus on fitting in that any little things that others do not approve of is a blow to your extremely fragile self-esteem. All of them think they are original when all they do is copy celebrities or each other. Pardon me if my brain wanted to skip all that drama.

Ouch! I was so lost into my own thoughts that I did not see the wall that was right in front of me. I just walked into it and that shit hurt.

Seriously, dude you could have warned me? I rebuked the wall while rubbing my sore forehead. I stood there having a staring contest with it until my respectful manners started to kick in. My conscious started to run on the different punishments reserved in hell for people that make others wait forever for them to show up. I turned around and knocked on the door with the framed words:

Sierra Miles

School Counselor

Come in! responded an overly excited voice. I haven’t even stepped inside and I can already tell that she’s faking her concern for the students. I quickly scanned the hall before going in. Don’t ask me what I was looking for because I don’t know. I simply watched way too many Arnold Schwarzenegger movies so I always feel like I’m being followed by a predator.

As I started to go in, I saw a shadow moved behind the wall across from me. I took a step back while squinting my eyes trying to get a better look.

Hey, Jake get moving. We’re going to be late. A voice shouted at the end of the hallway. The shadow figure turned quickly towards the chubby boy with pants way too small for him but not before I catched the amused smile on his lips. It was the creepy guy from the cafeteria. That’s the second time I caught him eavesdropping on me in one day.

Danm! He saw me talking to the wall. Can this day get any more embarrassing?

Are you going to get in or would you like us to have this little chat outside so you can keep gawking at the boy? I practically jumped out of my skin. I totally forgot that I was standing in the doorway of someone’s office. My cheeks were fuming for the second time in less than one hour. I awkwardly took the seat that the blonde lady sitting across from me was pointing at with a clearly annoyed look plastered on her face.

If she didn’t want to talk to me then why did she requested me to come to her office? I was perfectly happy listening to Mr. David teaching about the wonders of math for ninety minutes. Oh, yeah, she needed to show that she was actually helping the students in order to keep her pay checks coming.

Hello, Nicole. How are you doing this morning? She asked emotionlessly while jotting something on a paper as if following a low-budget movie script.

I’m fine. I yawned showing her that I didn’t want to be here as much as she didn’t want me here.

You’re enjoying your senior year so far? She prolonged the attempt at small talk.

Yep. This woman seriously needs to cut to the chase.

Have you finished your college and financial aid applications yet? She finally

Reviews for Guess What? Life Happened.

[pbreaux-1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I really enjoyed this young adult novel. It showed love lost love found, lies and deceit, family drama all rolled into one. It was sad at times and others funny. Great book

[catherinehsu · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

Yikes, didn't like this one very much.The writing style was a little juvenile (there was a lot of tell, not show), and there were TONS of grammatical errors - a few on each page, and they ranged from issues of capitalization, tense, punctuation, idioms, run-on sentences, and fragments.The plot was original but a little all over the place; it kind of felt like the author was trying to incorporate a variety of different subplots and conflicts, but looking back on it, it seemed a little disconnected and jumbled.The characters were alright - tolerable, but I didn't actively like any. The main character was depicted as the stereotypical "nerdy girl", and yet things she said or did didn't really add up.What I usually like in a story is a mixture of good and bad in every character - because that's what it's like in real life - but in this story, it felt like the main character was written to become the victim of everything, while almost everyone else was written as wrong and antagonistic, even the people who were meant to stand by her. These type of character changes made the narrator's story seem extremely tragic - which was understandable - but everything that happened just seemed a little flat and cliche.I guess a simple way to reiterate that would be that the characters were two dimensional - they were either good or bad, no in between.The epilogue was a bit too much in my opinion. I understand that it was an attempt to show a happily-ever-after despite all the tragedy that happened, but like I said previously, it painted the other characters as COMPLETELY evil, which was why they ended up the ways they did.All in all, this story read more like a a story that would be put online by a young writer and even though I didn't hate the story, I definitely wouldn't give it higher than a two-star rating.

[mypennameonly · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I’ve received a mobi.file download [KINDLE copy] of this book through her recent giveaway on LibraryThing and the following is my honest opinion.To start with, the story here has been written in the first person through the guise of its main female protagonist, a seventeen year old teenager, Nicole; who happens to be slightly younger than the book’s author, Hermione Daguin, when she wrote this book. While I did find, as expected before I began reading this book, that it would require some editing. However, I feel given the age of these two individuals, the errors add some authenticity to Nicole’s character.Nicole is essentially your stereotypical high school senior girl with the highest GPA [Grade Point Average] in her class, including a losing place in the dating game. And like many other girls like her she has a flawless record at school, so why does she wind up dating Ken, the baddest boy there. I have to wonder much of this has to do with her having no mother and her now finding out her father is now dying with Leukemia, throwing a curve in Nicole’s young life. The book’s description helps to set the stage for the natural storyline which is happening as you turn the book’s pages. With all things considered, I’ve decided to give Ms Daguin 4 STARS for her endeavor here.