Role Reversal

7. The List Of Things That Will Never Happen

I heard the sound of plastic scraping against metal, shortly followed by the unpleasant sensation of evasive sunlight boring like a laser onto my weary eyelids. I screwed my eyes tighter shut and pulled my soft, warm and comfy blanket higher over my head. Even though my sleep had been disturbed and I was fully awake now, I continued to pretend to sleep in the hopes that whoever had just burned out my idyllic dreams by opening the curtains, would disappear and let me get up in my own time.

Yeah. Like that's ever gonna happen.

Quicker than I thought was possible, my mother mercilessly yanked my blanket from my sleepy grasp as my little sister proceeded to clumsily run into my room and jump on my face. "Adrian! Get up, get up! Get uuuuuuuup!" screamed Leah, gleefully.

I reluctantly opened my eyes and wiped the sleep from them, before squinting at my bedside table and the small, blue alarm clock that sat on it. The tiny black hands told me it was 10:00am, which meant that it was Saturday, which meant the start of summer vacation, which meant spending time with the most hated person in my life.

Fun.

I sighed and gently shoved Leah away from my head, who just scrambled down from my bed and jumped on it again, as my mom began talking to me- the worst thing to do when a teenager has just woken up. "Good morning, Adrian," she cooed, bending down to pick up Leah from my now cold and unwelcoming bed. "Hurry and get ready! I've already packed your bags for you, so check if there's anything that I've missed. Then eat your breakfast and I'll drop you off at...Where did you agree to meet again?" she asked, slightly distracted by my mischievous sister grappling at her leg and trying to take whatever was in her pocket. She glanced at me as I attempted to clear the dream-mist from my brain and recall the details Megan had texted me.

How did I get her number? Well, I didn't. She'd managed to squeeze it out of Mark, that traitor.

Getting annoyed all over again at Mark, I finally remembered and enlightened my mom, "Outside the library. Someone's gonna pick us both up from there."

Megan hadn't told me who exactly was going to drive me to my doom, as when I'd texted back querying the identity of this stranger, she had just straight-out ignored me. Obviously she deemed me unworthy of a reply, and left me hanging, wondering whether she was just pranking me and I was going to get kidnapped.

Oh, man. What if I get to the rendezvous place and there's some creepy, muscly man in a black suit with black sunglasses, and he has this weird earpiece in, which is connected to his gangster boss. Then he shoves me into the car and leaves my bags on the ground outside, and Megan gets in the front and she starts laughing evilly and tells me that I'm such a fool for believing her. 'Why would I want to spend my summer with you?' she would say. Then the car would start moving, and scary buff guy would drive really, really fast and then-

"Hurry up, Adrian! You only have an hour to do all that. I'll be waiting for you downstairs!" And with that final warning thrown over her shoulder, my mom strode out of the room, Leah trotting behind her, unaware of the fact that she had just broken the crazy imagined story my sound mind had conjured up.

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Yawning, I checked my watch before continuing to stare out the window, leaning my chin on the palm of my hand and resting it on the edge of the door. The scenery beyond the car was rushing past in a disorganised mess of various colours, my eyes looking but not seeing it. My mind felt like the blurry silent movie playing outside the double-paned glass of my mom's shiny new Honda. I couldn't seem to focus on one thought at a time; my brain refused to stand still, and I felt a headache coming on.