turn the radio loud

Introduction & Moving

Hey, I'm Carter Adrienne Jones. I know - my parents wanted a boy. Please just call me Addie. I'm 16 and my life fucking sucks. (I know, I cuss a lot. Get used to it, bitches.) Before you jump to any conclusions, I mean it seriously sucks. Well, up until today it didn't. But now it does. Ugh, just keep reading and you'll understand why.

Yesterday, I was the happiest teenager on the entire planet. I had an awesome boyfriend, Brent, who loved me and was attractive and funny and just one of those people, yanno? The kind that everyone just instinctively gravitates towards, because you know how one of a kind and special they are. 

God, I must have been some kind of lovesick fool. But I guess I was. Because last night, when I told him I was moving, you know what he said?

"Yeah, we're probably better off not together anyways. I was kind of screwing Jennifer from the cheerleading team. We'll miss hanging out with you, though!"

Asshole. But back to what I said before - you know, the thing about moving? Well, it's not just to a different school district or state. No, my stupid mom has to move our entire family to fucking AUSTRALIA. Where the fuck even is Australia? I don't know - geography isn't exactly my strongest subject. All that matters is it isn't LA.

So what are your strong subjects, Addie? And why do you care about LA so much? Well, I'll tell you. Music is my passion. In fact, it even runs in my blood. My dad was in a band when he met my mom on tour - they fell in love and got married and eventually out popped me and my twerpy younger brother, Dylan.

My dad used to take out his guitar and sing to us all the time - that is, until about two years ago, when they found malignant melanoma hiding underneath his skin. Now it's just Dylan, me, and our mom, who got a job with some environmental thing or another and thought it'd be a good idea to relocate our entire lives.

None of this would be such a big problem if it weren't for my band. See, we might not have been a big deal yet, but we were really going somewhere. We were even about to sign a record deal, for god's sake! All that has changed now that I'm switching continents and everything, of course.

So what does that tally up to? I'm losing my home and all my friends, I've already lost my dad, my boyfriend - well, ex - is a jerk, and as I'm sitting in LAX waiting to board our flight to Sydney, I'm about to leave behind what could be my only shot at achieving my dreams.

I said it before and I'll say it again: my life fucking sucks.

Wow. I just realized that with all my complaining about my shitty life, I totally forgot to finish introducing myself. Where was I? Oh, right.

Carter Adrienne blah blah blah call me Addie blah 16 blah blah...there we go. I should be going into my junior year of high school in LA, but I don't know if that's the same over in the great land down under or whatever.

I'm 5'6" , with green eyes and long straight hair dyed black. (Not in an emo way or anything, though). My skin is pretty tan, I guess, but only because I spent the whole summer surfing at the beach with Brent. I'm 1/16th cherokee though, so that probably factors in somehow.

Personality-wise, I would probably describe myself as...soft-grunge. I listen to real bands, you know? Like, blink-152, Green Day, My Chemical Romance, Nirvana, Fall Out Boy, the Ramones, Paramore, All Time Low, Pierce The Veil...none of that top 40 crap. I think I'm pretty nice most of the time, but if you cross me, you'll be sorry, and that's not a threat; it's a promise.

Ultimately, I'd say my music is the most important thing about me. I sing (sometimes I play acoustic guitar for accompaniment, but usually I like to leave the instruments to someone else) and, well, I don't really tell just anyone this, but I also write my own lyrics.

Songwriting is my escape. It lets me forget about all the shit happening in my life and just channel all my energy into something communicable and great. I also feel like it helps me connect with my dad.

Kind of feels like I just bared my soul to you. How's that for an introduction?

~~~~~~~

When we finally arrived in our new home after exhausting hours of travelling, I got the worst news of the day. Apparently, my mom read the information wrong - I had to be at my new school THE NEXT DAY. Talk about unfair. Luckily, it was only 4 in the afternoon in Australia, so we had time to go shopping for some emergency school supplies.

The second we arrived back home, I called dibs on room choice. Dylan, of course, refused to respect the dibs and ran into the first room without looking at anything. I grabbed my suitcase and went to see what he had basically chosen for me.

As it turned out, my mom had called moving guys or something to put in brand new furniture, and as luck would have it, I'd ended up in the one decorated for me. The walls were white, excluding the accent wall that was black with white tree branch silhouettes and some black and white photographs.

All of my favourite books were already on the shelves, and there was some modern art for added pizzazz. However, my favourite thing about the room was the Audrey Hepburn quote above the bed - she's just such an inspiration to me. It was cool to see that my mom had picked up on that.

"ADDIE!" I heard yelled from downstairs.

"WHAT, MOM???" I yelled back, kind of annoyed that we had just gotten here and she was already yelling at me.

"It's 9 o' clock! You might want to get some sleep. You don't want jetlag making your first day of Australian school miserable!"

Ugh. So now on top of everything else, I was going to develop the sleep schedule of a toddler.

(a/n) Hope you like it. Tell me what you think about Addie! Is there anything confusing? This is pretty much just introduction, but don't worry! Things start happening pretty much immediately in the next chapter. Let me know if there's anything you'd like to see happen, 'cause I'm always open to that. :)

xoxo

-Gigi