Page 1 of Never Forget You

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GEORGIA

“This place is ridiculous!” I scream, not caring how much my father hates when I raise my voice. If he doesn’t want me to shout because it isn’t a way that he, in his old-fashioned way, believes a lady should behave, then he shouldn’t infuriate me all the time. “I hate it here. I’m seventeen years old now. I should be allowed to go skiing with my friends. I find it utterly ridiculous that everyone else should be able to go except me.”

“Georgia Fredericks, I know you might think of yourself as an adult, but you aren’t. You will come on vacation with your family until I see fit to allow you to go alone. I don’t want to hear any more arguing about it, do you understand me?” God, it’s like he doesn’t even care how controlling he is. “You can find a way to enjoy yourself here. Your mother and I are going to enjoy the amenities that this wonderful hotel has to offer.”

“I’m not sitting by the pool all day long with a bunch of old fogies. That isn’t how I want to spend my time.”

Dad rolls his eyes at me with obvious frustration. “Well, find a way to amuse yourself, then. Just because you want to bemiserable because I haven’t let you go underage drinking with a bunch of idiotic teenagers doesn’t mean you need to ruin it for the rest of us. Come and spend some time with your family when you’re in a better mood.”

“Not likely,” I mutter under my breath as I fling my arms across myself in an attempt to show just how enraged I am, not that my parents care. They’ve already gone off to bore themselves to death in this shitty seaside town. I mean, who comes to a place like this? It isn’t like we don’t have the money to go other places. It’s utterly ridiculous. I swear, half of what my father does is just to wind me up. I can’t stand it.

“What an asshole.”

I couldn’t argue with his comments about my friends and their party lifestyle, which is why I said nothing, but I don’t see why he thinks that it’s protecting me to force me to be left out. I’ll be out of the gossip for half a semester. I won’t know who kissed whom, which parties everyone went to, what the skiing was like…

Honestly, what my father is doing to me is way worse. This could probably classify as child abuse.

But we’re here now, and I don’t want to sit in this crappy hotel all day either, so I might as well at least go for a walk, see what this boring place has to offer. Who knows? Maybe I can even make up some adventures of my own in a pathetic attempt to make my friends jealous, even if it definitely, one hundred percent, won’t work.

I mean, who the hell will be jealous of a place like this? Nothing happens, I can already tell. It’s one of those small places where everyone is about a hundred years old and they’ve never been anywhere else in the world. I bet they all know one another too,all know each other’s business as well as their own, all nosy bastards with nothing better to do.

I hate them and I hate this place. I can’t wait until I’m back at school, which I never usually say.

I suppose high school is good for me, though, in the way that I do ‘show promise’. Some of my teachers are obsessed with me because I’m intelligent, especially my science teachers. They all think that I will go far. I don’t want to worry about where I’m going, though, not at the moment. I just want to focus on the moment and make the here and now better because right now, it couldn’t be worse. Ineverget my own way, no one ever listens to me, and now, my family have basically made me a social pariah just because theyneedto control me. It’s pathetic.

I hate them, I hate them, I hate them. I mean, why can’t I just live a normal life like a normal person? Callie never has her parents on her back. They travel for most of the year, leaving her alone, which means she gets to throw wicked parties. Of course, there was that incident last year when they were robbed at a party, but that’s forgotten about now.

All of this has made her so cool that she even has a college boyfriend. God, that just makes her so cool, and he’s pretty good-looking as well. You know, for an older guy. But I’m not allowed to date, no surprise there, until I’ve finished college myself. I mean, isn’t that the most ridiculous thing ever? I hate the power that my dad has…

But then, as a super wealthy CEO of like, a billion companies, he’s used to power, and he commands it wherever he goes. I just wish it didn’t always have to extend to me as well. Isn’t it enough that he has the whole goddamned world at his feet? Does he have to butt his fucking nose into my life as well? It isn’t like he enjoysanything I do or it’s of any interest to him whatsoever, so why can’t he just leave me alone? Everyone else in the country knows him and seems to want to have a piece of him, so it would be much better for everyone if he focused on them instead.

I would love nothing more than to find a clifftop to stand on and scream. People do that in movies all the time, don’t they? They let all of their emotions out in a yell and then feel better. They sometimes even find a solution to their crappy ass lives. But of course, I can find a beach but no clifftop. Not one with easy access, anyway, and there are far too many people on the beach for me to do any over the top, dramatic screaming. More bottling it up, I guess.

I can walk, though, so that’s something. Walk along the soft, warm sand with no shoes on. Since we live in the city, this is a little bit of a plus to this place, not that I would ever admit it aloud, especially since if I were going to be on a beach, then one in Indonesia or Spain would appeal to me so much more. But this is what I got, so this is what I will deal with. It’s better than bothering myself with my anger, and since there isn’t anyone else to listen…

Oh, God,as soon as I find a quiet patch of sand and I take a little seat by myself in the sunshine, a wave of sadness hits me hard. The sweet sound of children playing and families enjoying themselves melt into the background as the anger is transformed by the reality of my father’s control over my life. I mean, he really does control too much of my existence, and I can’t imagine a time when that won’t happen. Perhaps if my mom stood up to him once in a while, something would change, but she doesn’t, either. Everything that I say is just taken as teenage whining.

Will he control what I do at college? Will he wantthatmuch power over me? Will he kick up a stink at the college and determine what room I’m in? Who I room with? What social functions I go to? Oh, God, I start to feel sick as I imagine him guiding me toward the career that he wants for me… and the man as well. Taking over everything.

For most people, that might seem over the top and crazy, but with my family, everything is possible.

I punch the sand hard by my sides, just trying not to let the tears fall down my cheeks. I don’t want to be that much of a tragic heroine that I’m crying in the sunshine at the beach, by the ocean. For some people, this really might be the best vacation that they could afford, and I don’t want to be the asshole who cries in their face.

I already would never fit in around here. Everything about me stands out, and not in a good way. I normally go out of my way not to look wealthy, because it isn’t the cool thing to do, but here, I can’t help it. Even in my scruffiest clothing, I can’t help but look like some rich out-of-town bitch who shouldn’t be here.

Okay, admittedly, I can’t really feel people looking at me. It’s more of an issue inside my head, but still… I don’t want to be here, and so I’m sure that no one else wants me here. It’s just crap. Everything is crap.

A tingle on the back of my neck, which I’m pretty sure isn’t just paranoia, causes me to spin around quickly. There are eyes on me, I just don’t quite know where they’re coming from. I need to find them in case it’s my father come to yell at me in a public place to embarrass the living hell out of me. It won’t be the first time, and I’m sure it won’t be the last either. But it isn’t. I can’t seem to find my father anywhere. No one I know is around me…

Oh!My heart leaps up into my mouth.Oh, my!The person I really find looking at me, and smiling as well, isn’t who I thought I would find staring at me. He’s a young guy, probably the same age as me, and he’s hot. Not just good-looking, like Callie’s college boyfriend, but like a stone-cold fox. A real hottie. He’s tall, dark, and very handsome. Muscular, rugged, he has a look of someone who hasn’t come from old money, like most of the people I know, or new money, which are the people that we’re supposed to look down on, but no money. Like he would know how to work for everything that he has in life, which is surprisingly sexy. A shiver runs down my spine, and I find myself smiling back at him, my shitty day turning around in an instant. He looks nice. I want to talk to him…

If this is what the boys around here look like, then I am more excited to be here than I thought.

Admittedly, I never thought that this is the sort of guy I thought I would be attracted to, but it turns out that I am. Ireallyam. There is something about him which has me all tied up in knots inside. There may well even be a blush forming on my cheeks. I can’t date, I’m not even supposed to like a guy, and there is no way in hell that Dad would approve of a guy like this, but I can’t help the way he’s making me feel. I can’t stop the way my heart skips about ten beats just by looking at him. I can’t stop myself from aching for him in so many ways.

I’m bad.Smiling at the guy might as well be asking for trouble.Really bad.