You're What I Want (Y.A Series Book 4) Read online

  You’re What I Want

  (Y.A Series Book 4)

  By

  Sarah Tork

  Copyright ©2015 Sarah Tork

  Smashwords edition

  This eBook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This book 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 it and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author. This book is a work of fiction and any resemblance to any person, living or dead, any place, events or occurrences, is purely coincidental. The characters and story lines are created from the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

  Photo from Dreamstime.com

  Table of Contents

  Title page

  Copyright page

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  About the Author

  PROLOGUE

  *JENNA*

  Sunday August 1, 1999

  Sporting a red-and-white candy-cane-striped bathing suit, with my favorite mermaid towel wrapped around my neck as my cape, I ran into the living room of our two-bedroom apartment in Kissimmee, Florida.

  “Super Jenna!” My mom, dad, and older brother Robby, who was seven, cheered in front of our new thirty-two-inch cube television. I stopped in front of them, cried out one last victorious roar and planted my hands to my waist, posing like a superhero would have.

  “You did it again, princess!” Dad picked me up in one quick swoop, swinging me in his arms. “The big winner in the Little Mini Relay. Bringing home the gold as the fasted freestyler in the entire race. Jenna ‘The Wave Crasher Rocket Swimmer’ Sabini!”

  “I did it again, Daddy!” I squealed and turned in his arms, facing Mom, who had picked up Robby. “I did it, Mommy. I did it, Robby!”

  Later that night, after I was put to bed, I heard my parents talking in the living room.

  “We got the house, Tony?” Mom gasped, all of a sudden.

  “Yeah,” Dad answered excitedly. “Greg just called me, the other relator just called him about the homeowners accepting our offer.”

  I squealed in my pillow. We were going to move to a big place, with a backyard where I could play with Robby all day long. Today was the best day of my life.

  One month later, a day after moving into our new house….

  “Jenna, baby?” Mom turned from the front seat of our red minivan. “You excited for your first day of school?”

  I nodded, staring at my pink and white polka dot dress, wishing I could have worn my candy-cane-striped swimsuit to my first day of preschool instead. “I’m going to a big girls’ school today, right?”

  “That’s right.” Dad chuckled, maneuvering the car into a parking spot. I stepped out of the car with my mermaid backpack on. Robby had on his robot backpack.

  I looked at Dad, grinning at how tall he was. My dad was practically a giant and I bet if he wanted to, he could touch the sky. “I’m a princess, Daddy?”

  He grinned down at me. “Princess, Champion Swimmer.”

  My jaw dropped for a second before it slowly snapped into a bewildered smile. “I’m a Princess, Champion Swimmer?”

  “Faster than a rocket.” Dad added.

  “Faster than a rocket!” I squealed, looking at Robby.

  Robby scowled, squeezing his bag straps. “Yeah, well I’m stronger.”

  He could have that; faster was better than stronger, any day.

  Any.

  Day.

  We climbed up the stairs towards the Royal Heights Elementary School sign.

  “Wow,” I whispered as we crossed the terrace to the entrance. “A big girls’ school.”

  Mom had mascara dripping down her face from crying as we dropped off Robby at his grade one classroom. Dad asked me to help drag her away from Robby’s classroom. But she wouldn’t leave, and kept saying she was scared. I told her not to worry.

  “I’ll protect him, Mommy.” I assured her, giving her a curt nod while pointing my thumb at myself. “I got the Sabini blood in me.”

  “That’s right,” Dad rejoiced.

  Mom kissed me on the cheek. “You got that right, sweetheart.”

  Smiling and not crying anymore, Mom let Dad and me push her down the hallway. It was my turn next, and we entered the preschool hallway. There were paintings and drawings, and craft cutouts everywhere. It was beautiful, like… straight out of a dream beautiful.

  “What do we have here?” a loud voice asked.

  With a racing heartbeat, I glanced up at a giant woman. She was almost as tall as Dad, but I bet she couldn’t touch the sky like he could. She had long black hair, just like me. And her eyes were brown, also like me. She was scary looking.

  “This is Jenna,” Mom answered as I hid behind Dad’s tree long legs. I was safe there.

  The scary woman grinned down at me. “Hello, Jenna.”

  “Don’t be scared.” Dad crouched down beside me. “Remember who you are.”

  I took a breath before answering. “I’m a Princess, Champion Swimmer,” I said in a small voice.

  “Wow, you’re a princess and a champion swimmer; that’s amazing,” the not-so-scary lady said. Her smile was like a rainbow now. She held out her hand to me. “Come inside, we’re coloring now. Do you like to color?”

  I nodded and turned to my parents to bid them good-bye now that I knew I was going to be coloring. Mom cried, hugging me tightly. After I pulled away, Dad hugged me quickly.

  I took my new teacher’s hand, whose name was Miss Jane. She led me inside a colorful room to a table where there were two boys and two girls sitting. “You can sit at this table with Annabelle, Matthew, Dana, and Roy.”

  I sat down next to Annabelle, who gave me a smile, which I returned right back to her.

  “Everyone, say hello to Jenna. She’s new,” Miss Jane told them.

  They all said hello and then Miss Jane left. I grabbed a blue crayon and began drawing a swimming pool on white paper. Halfway done, Annabelle began to cry.

  “Stop, I grabbed the green crayon first,” she cried, trying to wrestle the green crayon away from Matthew.

  Matthew scowled, holding the green crayon away from Annabelle’s flailing arms. “I need it. I’m coloring a tree. A tree is green and brown.”

  Annabelle wiped the tears from her face. “But I’m coloring a green dress.”

  Matthew stuck his tongue out. “That’s stupid. Girls don’t wear green dresses. They only wear red, pink, and white. That’s what my older brother says.”

  I’d had enough of this. I got up and went to the empty table behind me. There was a package of crayons there and I took the green crayon, then I sat back in my seat.

  “Here.” I held the green crayon to Annabelle as she wiped her nose. She slowly took the crayon out of my hand and stared at it.

  “Thank you.” She sniffed, smiling.

  I glanced at Matthew and stuck my tongue out to him. “I think green dresses are pretty.”

  Before he could say anything back, Miss Jane spoke. “Everybody, come to the magic circle please.”

  Dana, Roy and Matthew dropped their crayons and ran to
the circular carpet across the room with the rest of the kids. I got up from my seat at the same time as Annabelle. She was wearing a purple dress with pretty black sparkly shoes. My shoes were pink.

  She looked at me and her cheeks were pink. “You want to be my best friend?”

  I thought about it for a second and then nodded.

  “Okay. I’m a Princess, Champion Swimmer, and I’m faster than a rocket,” I told her as we crossed the room in unison.

  “I’m… a… banana,” she whispered secretly.

  My jaw dropped. “Really?”

  She nodded. “Yep! I’m not lying, honest.”

  My new best friend was a banana… wow!

  *~*~*

  *JENNA*

  Thirteen years later…

  Jenna: Earth to Annabelle! Answer me biotch before I come to your house blazing with fire.

  I stared at the screen of my cellphone for five minutes with no response. My stomach felt queasy from disappointment. Being ignored by Annabelle had become a recurring theme this past year, and it sucked beyond annoyance and anger, leaving me in a constant state of sadness.

  “What’s got you angry, champ?”

  I looked up from my cellphone and smiled at my grandpa taking a seat beside me. He had a plate of salad and three cheesy garlic sausages I knew he wasn’t allowed to eat.

  I eyed the fatty sausages. “Grandma won’t like that.”

  Grandpa put a finger to his mouth and shushed me playfully. “She doesn’t need to know.”

  I grinned. “Oh, you want me to lie now, do you?”

  He gasped mockingly with a hand to his wounded self. “I would never want such a thing.” He winked and forked a sausage to his mouth for a bite. The patio doors slid open behind him and out came Grandma, looking angry.

  “What do you think you’re doing?” Grandma screeched. “Don’t you dare eat that, Michael!”

  “Let me live, Lily!” Grandpa dropped his fork and glanced over his shoulder as Grandma dived around him. She grabbed a paper plate off the table and began taking the sausages off his plate.

  Bringing in a platter of burgers and chicken and sausages from the grill, my dad and Uncle Frank laughed out loud.

  “Let poor old Dad live a little, Ma.” Uncle Frank grinned at his scowling mother.

  Dad placed the platter onto the table. “Barbeque Wednesday’s in the house! Dig in!”

  Grandma twitched, hesitating with the hijacked sausages. “You know he has to watch his cholesterol, Frankie.”

  “It’s one day, Lily. One day!” Grandpa cried playfully, reaching for the plate of sausages. Grandma relented and handed over the plate.

  “All right, but if you get gas, don’t come crying to me later.” She stormed back inside the house.

  Grandpa took yummy bites of his sausage and eyed his sons lovingly. “My boys, always there for their old man. Sabini men stay together through thick and thin. Three cheers for conquering sausage-gate, here, here!”

  “Here, here!” Dad and Uncle Frank cheered along with him.

  Mom, Grandma, and Uncle Frank’s second ex-wife, Winnie, who he was trying to work things out with again, came barging out of the house with a bowl of salad, a pitcher of iced tea with lemons, and a plastic bag full of hamburger buns.

  Mom placed the bowl of salad in the middle of the table, took a seat next to Dad, and eyed his plate of grilled chicken, sausage, and a cheeseburger. “Really, Tony?”

  “Barbeque Wednesday, woman,” Dad stated slowly in a playful way. Everyone laughed.

  Mom rolled her eyes and poured salad onto her plate. “Don’t come crying to me later then, ’cause you know you have the same gas problems as your daddy.”

  Dad’s jaw dropped, looking ridiculous as he exaggerated the dramatics, thus making everyone laugh harder. Especially moi. No, seriously…. my stomach squirmed in that laughing-too-much pain kind of way.

  “Oh, my stomach… the pain… but… too funny… can’t stop.” Rubbing my belly, I exhaled a rough breath, trying to stop the intensity of the laugh.

  “Treason at its finest. Tsk, tsk, tsk. From my own daughter… and especially from my own wife. This means war,” Dad muttered, and brought the cheeseburger to his mouth. As he growled in the midst of chewing like a savage, Mom scoffed and munched on her salad, careless.

  Just another day with the Sabini clan.

  Hours later, our family get-together took the party inside to Uncle Frank’s rec room to watch some sports game that had nothing to do with swimming. So naturally, I had no desire to stay and watch.

  After deciding what to do with the rest of my evening, I entered the kitchen, which was in the process of being cleaned. “Hey, Winnie?”

  Winnie stopped washing a plate and smiled at me. “Yeah, Jenna?”

  I cleared my throat. “I know Uncle Frank wants to eat the last cheeseburger later, but… can I have it?” I eyed the last cheeseburger on a paper plate on the counter next to the stove.

  “Sure, it’s no problem.” Winnie winked and dried her hands with the dishtowel hanging off the side of her jeans. “No problem at all. He ate too much earlier anyways.”

  “Yeah, he did.” I smirked.

  Winnie placed the cheeseburger into a plastic bag and handed it to me. I grabbed my mini tote and stuffed it carefully inside.

  “You gonna eat it at home? You want a ketchup packet?” Winnie asked, bending down to the last drawer and pulling it open. Inside was a bowl of ketchup packets from Brucey’s.

  Hilarious… yet heartwarming.

  “Okay, I’ll take one. Thanks.” I shook my head and smirked at the bowl. “That’s a lot of ketchup.”

  “Yeah.” Winnie sighed and grabbed one. “That’s your Uncle Frank for you.”

  Mom entered the kitchen with an empty chip bowl as I took the ketchup packet from Winnie.

  “What’s going on? You’re leaving?” Mom smiled at me and placed the chip bowl on the counter.

  “Yeah, gonna head off. Maybe go to a friend’s house for a bit.” I unzipped my tote and dropped the packet inside. Mom noticed the burger.

  “Still hungry?” she asked, looking surprised because I had made my fullness known to everyone after I scarfed down the last bite of my cheeseburger earlier.

  “I’m going to Annabelle’s house right now.” I mentioned with a timid smile.

  “Oh,” Mom mouthed with a look in her eyes telling me she understood. “All right, well don’t be out too late and call me if you need anything. Anything, you understand?”

  Mom knew the Annabelle situation. Going on strong for the last eight months, every time Annabelle would come over and cry, Mom noticed. She never intervened though, letting me handle it.

  It was my job.

  I nodded. “Got it. See you later.”

  After saying good-bye to the rest of my family, who were busy watching a boxing match on HBO, I headed to Annabelle’s. Uncle Frank lived two blocks away from her house, so it took no time to get there.

  In front of her door, I hesitated to ring the doorbell. The cheeseburger in my bag felt like a drug, and Annabelle’s house like the airport, with her mom as the TSA. My nerves were going crazy anticipating being caught.

  Just do it, scaredy cat! There’s a best friend in crisis in there!

  Despite the high probability of getting banned from Annabelle’s house for life, I pressed the doorbell anyway.

  Here goes nothing.

  After a few seconds of waiting, Mr. Simms answered the door. “Hey Jenna. What brings you by?”

  “Here to see my old buddy, you know, take advantage of the last days of summer before our lives are over forever.” I smiled in ‘my good old innocent, not here to cause any trouble or break any rules’ kind of way.

  Worked like a charm.

  “She’s upstairs; come on in.” Mr. Simms stepped out of the way and I entered the house. He closed the front door and I glanced into their family room where Charles, Annabelle’s younger brother, was playing video games.
/>   “Hey Jenna, what a surprise.” I glanced away from the family room as Mrs. Simms came walking out of the kitchen.

  “Hey, Mrs. Simms. Just came by to surprise Annabelle with a little pre-high school, pre-senior year girl session.”

  “That’s wonderful.” She smiled, but there was something off about her expression. Like she was forcing herself to smile. “Well, go on up. If you need anything… actually, wait a second.”

  Mrs. Simms rushed back into the kitchen and opened the refrigerator door. She came back with two small bottles of green juice.

  “I just bought this juice from a farmer’s market downtown. Sworn testimony from over fifty nutritionists that it’ll change your life. I couldn’t believe it until I’d tried it for myself. Couldn’t say wow enough times. It has wheatgrass, kiwi, Swiss chard, kale, and a tiny bit of honey. Sounds yummy, right!”

  And now it’s my turn to fake it. “Yeah… yummy.”

  She handed me both bottles with the biggest smile on her face. “Don’t drink it all too quickly.”

  “I won’t.” I grinned, then double-stepped my way up the stairs.

  Lately Annabelle’s mom was a sandwich short of a lunchbox. Totally off her rocker, and this green juice just tipped the insanity scale. Who would ever drink this stuff? It looked rank, like toxic slime. If Annabelle and I drank this we’d turn mutant. An extra arm, another leg, maybe another ear too. What a great way to look for the first day of senior year.