Ultimate Tomboy

“You don’t start out writing good stuff. You start out writing crap and thinking it’s good stuff, and then you get better at it. That’s why I say one of the most valuable traits is persistence.”

—Octavia E Butler.

“You can always edit a bad page. You can’t edit a blank page.”

—Jodi Picoult.

“The first draft is just you telling yourself the story.”

—Terry Pratchett.

***

Anna’s POV

8:05 a.m., New York City.

Sunbeam crept into my room bit by bit before gradually illuminating my room as the golden soft diffuse rays settled on my face waking me in the process, disrupting my much more craved slumber.

My room is like a perfect magazine cover only that it gave away my tomboyish attribute with tons and tons of clothes scattered on the floor. A huge basketball lay beside my dressing mirror and the room smelt of lavender and coconut mixed with a pinch of sweat from yesterday’s ball practice without showering. My eyes lazily studied the pathetic state of my room. Big, flamboyant but untidied. The couch is cream but inlaid with fine green silk, leaves embroidered so delicately that they might have landed there in spring and just sunk in.

I stretched my hands and yawned tiredly as my hands fumbled to pick my phone on the nightstand laggardly.

One glance at the screen of my iPhone, sent a panic alert to my brain, as I registered that I was freaking late for school.

I immediately jumped out of bed and decided that any more sleep was not going to happen.

There was certainly no freaking way I could be late to school on a new resumption.

I reluctantly and hurriedly head to my huge bathroom, scrubbed as fast as my lazy body could.

I decided to throw on a grey-beige trench coat worn atop crispy white shirt and tucked into shortened denim blue skinny jeans and I finally completed the look with lace-up loafers.

I hurriedly carried my backpack and filled it up with the necessary books I will be needing, I picked my ear pods, wallet, ID card, cash, and headed out of the huge mahogany room but not before throwing my jet-black hair in a messy bun before finally heading to the huge kitchen to get something to eat.

“Good morning ma’am,” two maids greeted in unison while passing and I nodded to them in acknowledgement.

“Hey darling, how was your night and what wrong with you? you look tired,” mom asked as her black eyes which I inherited from her pierced my soul while she took a long sip from her green tea. Drinking green tea every morning is now a schedule for her as she does it devotedly daily.

“Morning my beautiful momma,” I walked up to her and gave her a peck in her freckles covered cheek.

“Well, let just say someone didn’t get her perfect dosage of sleep plus I still feel very very very sleepy,” I confessed pouting my lips.

I plopped on a high kitchen stool and watched the busy cooks maneuver their way around trying to fix breakfast.

“Isn’t it possible I skip school today?” I questioned pouting and giving her my best cute look in an attempt to bribe her. And trust me, that always work!

“Sorry to burst your bubbles, Annalise Gray Mitchell, you will not sit back and skip school when you have been on a long summer break,” she said in that authoritative Mama bear’s voice, which of course, held no room for argument.

“If I were you, I will simply cheer up and get going to school, besides you get to reconcile with your friends and let not forget it your last senior year in high school. Just scale through the last year without any scandals, pass your exams in flying color and you get to move to the next stage of your life. So, look on the brighter side,” Mom chipped in as she gave me her heartwarming smile.

“UGH!!” I groaned annoyingly and watch her sashay her model-like body out of the kitchen.

Mom is a Fashion designer, a model, a beauty creator and she’s got her face on so many makeup brands and her glowing skin on so many cosmetic and beautician products.

Mom was an independent gorgeous Millionaire spinster before she married the love of her life in grand style.

The handsome CEO of the Gray’s INC, a wealthy multi-billionaire, whose business was passed down from generations to generations, who also happens to be my dad.

Now, a lot of people will call me lucky or spoilt. But, I might just burst your bubbles, I’m a gentle and cool person.

Or, scratch that! I’m not ladylike, nor am I manly. I’m something else altogether. And there are so many ways to be beautiful.

I’m confident, rebellious, and adventurous. I’m bold, brazen, fierce with a whole dosage of sexiness. I’m not known for following rules instead I’m known for doing and wearing whatever I want.

And most importantly, I’m athletic and strong and I’m not one bit interested in boys.

Love. Just four letters words, yet so fickle, mundane, stupid, and poisonous that it makes people do stupid things and lose total control of their freaking minds. Love is nothing but an historical fiction that is dated back to during the early period of Cupid.

I don’t believe in love. All I have ever dreamt of is to graduate from college as a pharmacist and take over the Gray’s empire. My lineage generational business as the sole billionaire heiress, nothing more, nothing less.

Besides, I’m neither stupid nor dumb, so I hate it when people try to ride on me, or act bossy around me because I’m my own boss.

“Looks like I have got no choice then,” I sighed.

A cook placed a tray of my breakfast which consisted of sunny side up eggs matching the scorching sun outside, with avocado slices, tempeh bacon, fresh fruits and Affogato espresso poured on a vanilla ice cream and served in a cappuccino.

I hurriedly drank the coffee and ate my eggs but unfortunately didn’t get to finish the food when a car zoomed into the garage noisily.

A car I suspected to be Jess’ car and I stood up immediately to join her.

My best female friend Jess isn’t one to waste time, she is highly meticulous and time conscious, but she is undoubtedly late today, she hates one keeping her waiting.

“I got to go mom, Jess is here,” I shouted jumping to my feet and heading out of the house.

“Bye Anna, my regards to her and be good at school, no breaking of rules young woman.” Mom reprimanded.

“I don’t know if I can hold up to the deal but I will try.”

I slammed the door shut and ran out to meet my childhood Bestie.

Our friendship started when the Walker’s bought the next mansion close to ours in the estate.

Jess’ Dad wanted to be a shareholder in father’s company and mom wanted Jess’ mother to model for her brand and soon a family friendship kicked up.

We have been friends for as long as I can remember, we are family, friends, Best buddies and everything, we have been attending the same school ever since kindergarten, and we even moved to other schools together as we grew up.

I feel one of the major reason we stuck together is because of the qualities she possesses. I formed a knitted bond with her because of her courage to stand up to bullies and her smartness plus, she is extremely fun to be with. And have I mentioned we share one great quality. That is we both suck at singing. We have bad voices which we use as a weapon and for fun.

“Hey Babes,” I greeted hopping into the passenger seat next to her hugging her tightly before finally strapping my seat belt around me.”

“Hello Anna banana, how have you been dearest tomboy?” She queried wiggling her brows up twice for dramatic effect.

“I have been good, it being ages. Look at you, you have lost quite a weight. You look a lot better and hotter. And much leaner and tanned.” I complimented touching her curls while she kept making facial faces enjoying the compliments.

“Look at yourself babes, I’m sure you must have grown some abs in there. You don’t look too bad yourself.” She complimented with a wink and chuckled loudly.

“By the way, I missed your annoying ass. I hope you enjoyed your holiday in Miami.” I perused hoping for some juicy gist, while I tucked a piece of my front jet black hair that managed to get released from my bun behind my ears.

“Of course Anna, Miami was fun, and I met this really cute guy his name is Gabriel, we went out often and he made my holiday the best I wished the holiday never ended,” she divulged shrugging her shoulders.

“But, what can I do about it, hun! Your girl needs to graduate.” She scoffed and started her car.

“Yeah right, we have being diagnosed with stage four seniority, in other words, we must graduate,” I commented while she chuckled away.

Jess owns a Mercedes Benz, her parents are also within the Billionaire and popular cycle in the community. They attend met gala, do fundraising for poor children and good causes.

But, unlike me, she doesn’t have bodyguards shuffling around her, she is much freer like she has no enemy in the world.

My dad is a powerful tycoon, who has a lot of enemies that want to overtake his business and watch his downfall. And since I’m the only daughter, the heiress to him. I’m very much a target in the business world. So to be safer than sorry, dad has well-trained spies and bodyguards that monitor my every movement without other people knowing. They are always in black suits and black mouthpiece often trailing me around in a black car with tinted glass.

“You needed to see me try to get my lazy ass out of bed this morning. it was such a struggle,” I said shaking my head while Jess laughed as she drove across the busy city of New York.

“Men, I can imagine, you wouldn’t believe I thought today was a Sunday till I saw Mom heading to work and giving me the stink eye, that screamed, Girl if you don’t get the fuck…outta that couch this very minute.” She concluded while we both chuckled.

I opened her pigeon hole and took some Oreo to munch on.

Jess is the type of girl that has every freaking candy, cookie, Chocolates, chewing gum in the damn car, your girl stores her car with all kind of junks, still, there is no single fat in her hot gorgeous body with bronze skin tone.

“School sucks. But either way, we gotta get a degree, so we better suck it up and listen to some good music,” I suggested staring at the beautiful crop top she had on that says “I KNOW I’M GOODLOOKING, STOP STARING.”

Like, y’all see that her confidence level is top-notch.

She paired it with a ripped blue jean, black bracelets and gold wristwatch, and she had her hair half up and half down with some nice curls or do they call it edges, adorning her face, she’s got a nice black paint on her fixed nail.

She also has on a lot of makeup that seems pretty too much for school in my own opinion, but Jess is your regular girl that loves slaying so, we are pretty much different in our ways.

How we managed to remain friends despite how different our personalities are is still a mystery yet to be unraveled, yet we get along so well.

The song “Please me,” by Bruno Mars and Cardi B came up and we sang together, we sang only the chorus properly and the rest were just jargons since we didn’t know the lyrics.

After thirty minutes of singing and driving, we eventually reached school.

Royal academy high school was pretty much one of the most popular schools for wealthy folks in New York, majority of the students are snubs, arrogant, proud, spoilt, egotistical, slutty, cocky with a whole lot of bundled up bad characters.

We still have some average or poor students that got into the school through scholarship, so we have nerds, psycho, and normal people who often get bullied by rich folks.

That has been how the school system works, the policy and hierarchy has the rich students placed high and treated like majorities while the poor are the helpless minorities.

The school authorities know about the maltreatment, bullying and all, but the gifts they inherit from wealthy parents is enough to shut them up for life and buy their integrity.

You know the saying “Rich people own and enjoy life and the poor people are left to suffer,” well that basically what happens in my school.

When the truth is the world slides, the world goes, and death makes equal the rich and the poor.

An arrogant rich and a humble poor both need help! The former needs help to be human and the latter needs help to live humanely.

All the same, The school is popular and well known for great academic records, most celebrities finished from the school, the likes of Selena Gomez and Ariana Grande, Drake etc.

Jess drove in and parked in the school garage where rich folks park all sort of expensive and luxurious cars.

I jumped out of the car with Jess by my side who was very busy with her iPhone at the moment.

As usual, the whole school was filled with students from the drama queen with her three minions, to the nerds, clowns, jocks, bullies, artists, star, clueless, slacker and soon.

Did I mention I have male Besties, they are Ian, Mike and Eric, we have been tight as a knot since we started attending Royal academy in sophomore year.

Eric is tall and dark, he is much more bookworm type. Nerdy Eric.

Ian is around 5ft, he is Asian, he loves singing, he has this high soprano voice, he is lovable and convivial.

Mike is the blunt type, the guy doesn’t know the word sugarcoating exist, so he is white, with brunette hair, he is also kinda reserved, he likes to mind his business a lot.

Ian, Mike and Eric’s Family is around the Millionaires cycle, their dads are Lawyers, Engineers and Doctors, but they are still pretty rich and cool people to hang out with.

They are among the sane people in the school that avoids the ongoing and never-ending drama in Royal Academy.

Here they come, My friends, Eric Mike and Ian came over to greet us after giving them my bone-crushing hug and talking about how the vacation was. which was what every other student at the garage, corridors, class, lunchroom, lockers and every other place in the school seems to be talking about.

“Oh goodness! Ralph is here,” a random girl screamed.

Two brand new shining cars, Chevrolet Impala and Chevrolet Malibu drove into the garage with loud music blasting from the stereo as laughter rang from every corner of the cars as the fantastic-4 stepped out in all their glory.

The once loud noisy garage filled up with chatters became dead silent as a graveyard. The silence was so thick that even a new kitchen knife will instantly get blunt at the attempt of slicing it.

The fantastic-4 are the most popular, hottest, good looking, wealthy guys in the school. They came together as friends and earned the name fantastic-4.

Girls always threw themselves on them while those who weren’t courageous enough often had a crush on them and imagine they are married to them with ten kids in their heads.

Amidst the four hot looking Greek gods, there are jocks, musicians, hard worker, and the flirty one.

Now note, they are all very flirty, and never take girls seriously. This minute you can see them with a blonde and the next minute you see them with a red-haired. You will think will all these characters that the girls will be sensible to stay away from them. Well, too bad common sense isn’t common because they still throw themselves at them.

The cheerleaders and drama queen moved forward in their ridiculously short frilly skirts and walked towards the car, shouting and hailing Raphael and his gang.

One of them groped a cheerleader’s ass and I stared at him in disgust. The real ring leader, mastermind, head, chieftain, and notorious baddest boy. the hottest one, the one whom every girl except me fused about.

Ralph Smith is a tall bad boy with 6’4 height. his skin is a dazzling perfection.

He has long and tousled hair that served as bangs, his bang covered a part of his eyes giving him this entire bad boy look, he had on a black leather jacket, with straight leg trousers and a button-down shirt also paired with black Adidas sneakers and a tartan scarf around his neck with a sunshade glasses.

I admired, and I fell in love immediately. With his Adidas sneakers the moment I sighted them.

It got me looking forward to owning that sort of nice sneaker when next I go for shopping with Jess.

The other guys around him looked pretty hot and cute in their bad-boy ways.

I turned back to face Jess who was still staring at Brady dreamily. The second in command to Ralph.

I looked around and rolled my eyes in annoyance at the usual dazed look the girls portrayed. Some even went as far as licking their lips and throwing winks and kisses towards the boys. And an action that made me query myself all the time, that what makes these guys special or unique? Nothing.

I held Jess’s hand and jerked her back to reality and dragged her to our first class, English.

We sat at the middle of the class because I feel like front rows are for nerds, back rows are for the clueless ones but the middle is just perfect.

“Omg!!” Jess exclaimed fanning her cheeks with her perfectly manicured hands.

“Anna, Ralph and his gang are so freaking hot, I mean look at their dress sense, physique, and those magical eyes of theirs, they are just so perfect like angels on earth. What do you think of them?” she scrutinized widening her brown eyes to match the size of a saucepan while waiting for a response.

I scoffed and searched for my English book I will be using today.

“Like I care, I only admire those Adidas sneakers, they will fit with that my new ripped skinny blue jeans. Aside the blue stripe and the white background of the sneakers just seem so cute. Imagine me wearing my white shirt it will just seem perfect and—”

“This is a joke Anna banana, I’m talking about the fantastic-4, and you seemed to be carried away with the damn sneakers,” she hollered staring at me like I grew an extra pair of head.

“Oh please, stop sounding like a lovesick puppy, didn’t you notice that the sneakers are cute,” I commented shrugging my shoulders.

I knew I was simply frustrating and infuriating her by not giving her the expected response but I hate it when she starts this topic, boys.

“When will you start thinking like a girl, I mean when do you want to start noticing guys, Ralph is just so hot and any girl can confirm that, but you seem less carried away by him.” She asked looking at me unbelievably with a frown marring her face.

“Please, don’t start by bringing this topic Jess, and I might as well just slap you across the face with a freaking saucepan if you say one more word about the fraternity-4 or whatever they are called.” I forewarned and began scanning my notepad with utmost concentration even though I couldn’t comprehend what was written there, all thanks to Jess distracting figure.

“But Anna….” she started again.

The greetings of Mr. Allison brought our argument to a halt and for the first time, I became glad that a teacher entered the class to lecture.

Mr. Allison is a tall slim and white teacher, who only comes to class, teach and leave, he has a degree in minding his business.

While he welcomed us to a new session and started revision on noun phrases, the door swung open and Ralph walked in like a boss with a few of his gang behind him.

They were all laughing and discussing something before entering the class. I bet it just some random girl’s ass they are talking about.

“Mr. Smith, why are you just coming in now, you are ten minutes late,” the teacher asked with a bored tone as he glanced at his wristwatch to emphasize his point.

“Because of a sign down the road,” Ralph stated with a stupid smirk on his face while he tapped my love. Sorry, I mean his beautiful sneakers on the floor.

“What does a sign have to do with you being late?” Mr. Allison questioned totally confused and flabbergasted.

“The sign said, school ahead, go slow!” Ralph finished off smiling as his dimples reflected. The whole class erupted in laughter minus me of course as I rolled my eyes at his dry jokes.

“Fine grab yourself a seat Ralph and make sure to turn a blind eye to any other sign that promotes late coming next time.” Mr. Allison said with a tone of finality.

“Attention class!!!” The teacher bellowed loudly as his cheeks turned red from exhaustion since he was clearly frustrated.

Ralph strode to the back seats majestically like the boss he thinks he is with his crew as they continued their discussion.

“See what I meant, he is gorgeous, the perfect combination for you,” Jess whispered yelled excitedly as she clapped her hands dramatically.

I tuned out whatever she was implying and mentally facepalmed.

“Oh shut up,” I mumbled with my breath.

“I can only see pride and smell big fat ego oozing around him,” I finished off and began jotting notes.

Jess hissed and faced the front of the class, which I very much preferred.

Finally, the bell jiggled time for A.P chemistry while Jess had art so we had to part ways.