Love Bug Bites: Love Bug Bites, #0

By Jerilee Wei

Tired of teen fiction that's all sunshine and rainbows? "Love Bug Bites" serves up a coming-of-age story with a healthy dose of real life (think mean girls, confusing crushes, and unanswered questions about life, the universe, and everything). In this first of a series, join the girl, the sassy Old Woman, and her fierce Mama as they navigate the messy rollercoaster of tween and teen years in a quirky Gulf Coast town. This page-turner tackles everything from anti-bullying battles to the challenges of caring for a loved one with Alzheimer's, all while packing in enough humor and heart to make you laugh, cry, and maybe even dissect a poem or two (because let's be honest, dissecting metaphors is cooler than dissecting frogs, right?). 

 

Bonus: Each chapter comes with discussion prompts, perfect for bonding with family and friends (because sometimes, the best adventures are shared). So ditch the textbooks, grab your beach towel, and dive into Love Bugs Bite – the year round escape that bites back in the best way possible!

 

• Language: English
• Publisher: Jerilee Wei
• Release date: Feb 23, 2024
• ISBN: 9798224401512

Book preview

Love Bug Bites

By Jerilee Wei

Dear Silent Listener, I'm Not Just A Fibber

I'm Learning To See

Children begin by believing everything they are told; they end up by questioning  everything. - Jean Piaget

Chapter 1 - September 4, 2011

Dear Silent Listener –

Yesterday was one of those days you seldom get here in Caledonia, Florida. Those early September days where it’s still hot enough to swim and tan, but also cool and breezy enough to not be dripping in sweat.  It’s Labor Day weekend. We are under a Tropical Storm watch that already has a name – Tropical Storm Lee. The winds in our somewhat protected beach cove were heavenly at first, then not so much.

I watched the Old Woman peering at the sun shiny  white beach sand, gleaming like a crystal vase caught in a sunbeam. Not that long ago our beach was splashed in a short-lived but heavy rainfall. Of course, in the background as usual the Old Man had the local weather volume up so loud even the rain couldn’t drown the din of his TV out.

She proceeded to snap those Cherokee Wax green beans she grew that were spread out on the table into a bowl.  It was like she was thinking something important.  She picked up a remarkably long green bean and pointed at me like it was a laser light beam of scold.

Here it comes I thought as she spit out, I don’t care much for your conduct lately.  You’re just too wild.

What did I do now?  Of course, I was feigning shock.  She tells me the same thing just about every day.

Nothing,   the Old Woman countered.   "You’re just getting too big for your Levi 501 made to last jeans, and sooner or later you’ll mess up.  But that’s got nothing to do with the reason I’m not so lovin ’ of your behavior today."

The Old Woman helped rear me to be respectful, so I was courteous.  Had to be, or she’d tell Mama.  Then I’d be grounded or at the very least off Snapchat for a while. "Why? " I probed.

Because you’re a girl, the Old Woman said. And I am an old woman.  There are days when an old woman looks at a beautiful sexy young girl and recalls what it was like to be a girl. That makes me barmy, because I can’t ever be a girl again.  When you look back on it, being a girl lasts about as long as that rain storm today. Can’t help but leave its mark on you. Don’t believe me? Tell me later about how this Tropical Storm isn’t gonna leave its own special mark on Florida long after it’s gone.

Secretly, as the Old Woman dropped it on me,  I imagined that this conversation was as worthless as any hunk of gabbing gets.  I didn’t say anything back at all.  Mama’s a powerful force to be reckoned with if she ever hears that I talked back to my Grama.  Besides, the Old Woman would tattle on me in a heartbeat.

I’m jealous of course, the Old Woman said.  Just pure ate up with green-eyed envy.  With a touch of osteoarthritis, my bad back, and my know-it-all-brain that keeps saying ‘all train tracks sooner or later end up in the graveyard,’ I ask for your forgiveness about bringing up dying.  I know how you hate it.  But I’d like to entrust you with a notion.  Don’t look so forward to when school’s out next holiday break. That’s all you talk about these days.

You can’t get back those days you wasted looking forward to instead of being in the moment.  Try to prepare yourself to make the most of any event, whether it’s being suspended from school or your boyfriend of the week breaking up with you.  Don’t you think for a minute that I didn’t hear about you getting suspended for having your precious iPhone out during class, probably texting that Ben again.  Next week he’ll be history and you’ll be boo-hooing.  Don’t blame the teacher one bit for being mad.

Most of the things you do, you’ll only do once the same way, even if it seems like the same things keep happening, including getting your heart broken a bunch of times.  Cus’ each drama will be unique.  I can see you’re getting antsy and gonna accuse me of TMI, so I’ll see you later.  No sense in asking you to help me, when you’ve been moping around all morning one of your moods. Probably aching over some dumb boy who doesn’t mean anything but trouble.  Get out of here and don’t be late for supper.

I watched the Old Woman gather up her snap beans and trudge off to the kitchen.  She was hardly ever, if never, so grumpy.  But today, she obviously was what she calls, peeved.  She hadn’t been well for a long time, not since the Old Man got sick.  I guess being sick and being his caregiver was lonesome.  Mama said I had to cut her some slack.  After all, without her, we’d really be hurting on mom’s salary since they cut back on her hours.

All of a sudden I felt powerfully depressed.  You know how it is, when you get used to a person you love and being with them everyday.  You don’t notice how much they are changing or how quickly they are getting old.  I can’t remember a time when we weren’t living with her. But now as I spied on her tottering across the kitchen I noticed she moved laboriously, feet shuffling, shoulders bent more, and it suddenly hit me, "OMG! She’s getting old and so am I!

She’s even shakier and maybe a bit ornery than she was last year.  This had never crossed my mind before.  Right now’s a time when I can’t wait for freshman year to be over, or worrying about having a date for homecoming, or getting my learner’s permit and driving a car.  Maybe I’m purely marking time between one wish or another. Until today her growing old not once suggested itself to me, that as the Old Woman ages, so do I.  

All of a sudden the sun on the beach across the Gulf Highway wasn’t quite so optimistic.  The sky was not so adoringly coated with velvety buttermilk clouds of my golden rosy future. She was right, storms were headed right for us. Nor was everything always only about me. It’s also about her feelings too.

I grabbed my beach bag and towel and headed to our private beach where a girl can have some space to think without some old woman yakking at her nonstop.  You’d be amazed at all the things I see here on the beach or in the water when I’m just there thinking.

The Old Woman is fond of saying that most people look at everything, but never really see anything.  She’s always harping about somethin’ about how people are blind even with their eyes wide open.  Well, I’m thinking maybe she’s right but I’ll never admit it.

Now, she has some kind of old-timey saying about that . . . I can’t quite ever remember, probably just because I’ve heard it a million times too many .  Adages are what my English teacher calls the Old Woman’s goofy sayings, like the one about ‘not counting your chickens before they hatch.’  Still, when I"m alone here on the beach I sometimes begin to understand what she means.

I slather her homemade hush-hush cocoa butter potion on in an effort to have the best tan at Drum Island High.  That’s another thing about the Old Woman.  She’s always making things, even makes her own herbal and natural cosmetics.  I won’t be telling her that I think that’s so cool either.  Some things she just doesn’t need to know though.

Instead, I tell her to stick to making cookies.  I would tell her about Ben, the boy I like, but it’s too soon.  That’ll set her off asking all kinds of embarrassing questions.  Then, she’ll figure out for sure that I lied to her about the hickey on my neck.  I don’t think she bought the story that it was a bruise from PE. Otherwise, I wouldn’t be hearing her not-so-funny jokes about being bit by the love bugs all the time.

Her latest? Looks like you got caught in a vampire love bug bite triangle, and Edward wasn't the only one with sharp teeth! Or my personal favorite one, I think I might need a hazmat suit for this love bug bite infestation . . . or maybe just buy you some  turtlenecks.

While soaking up the sun, I nearly fell asleep daydreaming about Ben asking me to homecoming.  So far he hasn’t.  My BFF Ashley swore she saw him sweet talking to another girl and thinks he’s asking her. I’ve already turned down two other boys waiting on him to make up his mind.

Then while thinking about this, I suddenly again realized that life on the beach is amazing.  I love to hear the waves, the birds, the salty perfume of the water on the Gulf of Mexico.  That’s when I saw it  . . . a little Sanderlings Shore Bird being taught to hunt for its food by the mother bird.  It’s sort of like me and the Old Woman.  She’s always teaching me things I need to know to survive or at least forcing me to think about them.

For the rest of the afternoon I spent a lot of time adding up all the things I know just because of her.  I almost forgot all about Ben not yet asking me to the dance yet or about the other girl.  I even stopped wondering who she might be. I bet Ashley knows her name but doesn’t want to upset me.

I was late getting back to the house when it became obvious we were in for a lot more rain. The Old Woman was sitting on her porch glider writing a poem in her journal.  She’s always writing stuff, especially poems.  Someday I’ll get around to reading one of her books. She did look like she felt better.  She even looked younger.

What have you been seeing on the beach today?  She was testing me already.  You’re going to be as wrinkled as me if you keep baking yourself in the sun."

"Nothing,’ I replied.  It was just the same ol’ beach just with  a lot more wind."

I hope you know I’m not being rude when I call you a pint-sized fibber, the Old Woman stated with a wink.  I guess you know a fibber is someone who tells silly pointless lies.  You being a fibber is a compliment, for trying to hide what I really know you think about and see on the beach.  I ask your forgiveness about this morning all over again. I’m no longer jealous of you because of your youth and great beauty.  It’s just because I’m not a girl anymore on the outside, but forgot I’m still one on the inside.  

Go take a shower and come to supper.  Your Mama got called into a work meeting because of the weather again. No doubt insurance claims for storm and flood damages are going to have her working non-stop in a few days."

She was smirking as I slipped by her into the house.  That’s when I heard her say out loud,I really wouldn’t want to be a girl all over again, she giggled.  Grownups were aggravating enough the first time!

Dear Silent Listener–  That's my Grama for you.  One daffy old woman – I love her so much!  She’ll never know I saw and heard what she said, still being just as much a girl as I am.  I’ll never tell anyone except you.

Our English teacher wants us to write a poem a day. Since I secretly dream of being a poet too, here’s my poem of the day, written especially for you!

Sun-kissed Words And Sands Of Time

Salty breeze and sunlit stormy Gulf shore,

Just a girl’s thoughts on life still to explore,

The Old Woman grumbles, her wisdom stings,

Beach breezes whisper scary secrets that make the heart sing.

Cherokee green beans snapped, a scolding’s chime,

Don’t waste your precious days lost in the future’s climb,

Jealousy whispers The Old Woman’s hidden pain,

A wrinkled woman on the outside, who yearns to be young again.

School work’s a bore, cute boys a fleeting dream,

But beneath the surface, love longing currents gleam.

Aging’s tide ebbs and flows,