by D. K Lake
Finding Paige
(The Paige Diaries)
Book 1
Copyright © 2020 by D.K. Lake
Cover image by © creativecommonsstockphotos
https://www.dreamstime.com
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This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
Intro
Dear Diary,
How did this happen?
I'm officially screwed.
He knows I'm back in Radley Springs.
He saw me at that stupid party. It's not like I planned for this to happen. And it's not like I could hide in a closet because he saw me first, and that would have been all kinds of childish.
Why did he have to be at the same party? Of all the parties, he happened to show up at the one I'm at, the one Em dragged me to, the one I didn't even want to go to. The one I wish I could erase from my memory. But it won't stop playing over and over like a broken record.
And it was by far the most embarrassing moment of my life.
THE. MOST. EMBARRASSING. MOMENT. EVER!!!
I literally wanted to die.
For reals.
But he looked...good.
No! I don't care!
Gawwwd.
He saw my period blood.
Ugh.
Ugh.
UGH.
I want to disappear down a black hole.
The plan was to go to college, study hard, have a little fun, and not get sidetracked.
That plan failed...and it's only been two days.
I've been here for two days and I've already seen him twice.
Twice!
The funny thing is, he doesn't even go here. He's not in college, he's not a janitor or anything, so he shouldn't even be here! But he was here, like last night, and this morning. Strolling around as if he owned the place.
But now he knows I'm back.
Any plan I had to blend in and avoid him for the next few years just got shot to hell. Tomorrow is my first day at college and I refuse to let this little run-in with him ruin my plans. I came back here to go to college and to be with my best friend, not because of him. He has nothing to do with my decision in coming back.
Really.
Nothing!
He's in the past, buried along with everything else shit-tastic that went down last year.
This is a fresh start.
He means nothing to me.
I don't even like him anymore.
He's just somebody that I used to know.
Dammit.
Now that song is going to be stuck in my head all day.
But whatever.
I don't need Dario Boston in my life.
LIAR!!!!!!!!!!
Chapter 1
September
I stand in front of the building that is to be my home for the next few years. It's dull and uninviting. But what else did I expect of a college dorm? I wanted to stay with my dad, but he'd told me (several times) that there isn't room. He lives in a ridiculously large house in a town called Radley Springs that is about a ten-minute drive from here. It would have been easy to commute to college every day and cheaper than paying for me to live in the dorms, but apparently, there's no room in his massive house.
But what he really means is Aubrey, his soon-to-be-trophy wife, doesn't want me there. She's as nice as pie to my face but I know she's the reason why my dad refuses to let me stay with them. They recently had another baby and my dad is using it as an excuse not to let me move in, saying there isn't enough room and a baby will be distracting while I'm trying to study. I say it's all bull. My sister used to tell me that Aubrey isn't as nice as she makes out to be and I'm only now starting to think my sister might have been right all along. My sister had been right about a lot of things, but I’ve been too stupid to see it. I thought my dad could do no wrong, even after he had an affair and left my mom, but now, I'm finally starting to realize people are selfish and maybe some time away from my family might be good for me.
It's weird being back here. I grew up in Radley Springs, Colorado, and about halfway through my junior year, my mom decided to suddenly up and move us to Nebraska. I know, right? Crazy. It was all to do with my older sister, Kelsey. She had gotten herself into trouble with some boy...but that's a whole other story. Mom had wanted me to go to college closer to her but I had pushed to come back here so I could be near my best friend, Emily. I missed her like mad when I had to leave, but now I'm back and we're starting college together, and we've been lucky enough to get a dorm room together.
"Are you sure it's a girls-only dorm?" Dad asks skeptically, watching a group of boys coming out of the front doors.
It isn't technically a girls-only dorm, but he doesn't need to know the ins and outs. From what Em had told me, the girls are on the first floor and the boys are on the ground level. It makes no difference to me. I've had enough of being treated like a child. I'm eighteen and should be able to make my own decisions. I've had enough of both my parents checking up on me and making sure I don't slip up again.
I made one mistake last year.
One.
But because of it, my mom sent me to an all-girls school for my senior year and it sucked monkey balls. The girls were all stuck-up bitches, it was horrible, and I had no one.
Maybe not staying at Dad's house is for the best, I might get a little freedom for once. I'm sure my mom will be hounding him from day-to-day to check up on me, but I'm so done with that woman. She's so controlling it's unhealthy. My sister is the lucky one, she managed to get away from her.
"It sure is." My best friend, Emily, pops up behind me, smiling sweetly at my dad like butter wouldn't melt. "Hey babes," Emily pulls me into her arms to greet me.
She'd arrived early and had already unpacked and was waiting on me.
Aubrey, my dad's soon-to-be-wife, rolls back over to us with the pram, cooing over my new little sister, while her other child, Archie, who is sixteen-months, picks up something from the ground and puts it in his mouth.
"Archibold, no!" Dad says, chasing after him.
Dad quickly catches up to him and sticks his fingers into Archie's mouth to get whatever it is back out again.
They'd named him Archibold. Archie for short, keeping the A letter tradition in Aubrey's family. He's just like Aubrey with his striking orange hair and pale skin and looks nothing like my dad who has dark brown hair which is now peppered gray with age.
Aubrey had popped out another baby straight after the last one and they had called this one Anna-Marigold. I know...weird name. Aubrey thought it sounded nice alongside Archie's name. You know, Archibold and Marigold. I think she's been sipping too many fruit smoothies.
Anna-Marigold is still a baby and not doing anything interesting, and she's the spitting image of Archie at that age.
The baby lets out another cry and Aubrey tries to pop the pacifier back in her mouth but she's not having any of it.
"She needs her feed." Aubrey says, glancing around. "But I'm not breastfeeding her here. Not with all these teenagers running around."
"All right, all right," Dad sighs, walking over with Archie in his arms. The poor man looks as though he's ready for his afternoon nap. I don't know what possessed him to star
t a second family so late in life. "Do you need help with the boxes?" Dad asks, setting Archie back on his feet.
"Nope. We're all good, Mr. Moon." Emily says, shaking her messy bleached hair out of her face as she stacks two of my boxes and picks them up.
Whaaa, whaaa, whaaa.
Anna-Marigold starts crying and Aubrey groans.
"Yes, I know you're hungry." she snaps, pushing the pram back to the car.
It's obvious to everyone she isn't enjoying motherhood, and as my sister always said, Aubrey only took a shine to our dad because he had money and he was a meal ticket to never having to work again, so she got herself knocked up to make sure Dad couldn't back out. Only now she's stuck with two kids and it's like she doesn't know what to do with them.
"Are you sure you're going to be okay?" Dad asks, scooping Archie up into his arms before he can escape again.
"Yes, Dad. I'll be fine." I insist.
"You will call your mother later on?"
"Yes," I sigh, already thinking up an excuse not to.
"You know she worries about you."
What he means is she worries about me meeting boys. Boys are the devil's spawn in my mom's eyes. Unless your name is Colt (my sister's current boyfriend) who my mom is mom-obsessed with, then she doesn't want to know. I'm not allowed to date.
But that was then, and this is now.
The rules don't apply to me anymore because Mom's not here to say anything.
"I know, but really, I'll be fine. Right, Em?" I nudge her.
"I'm going to take good care of her." Emily says, jiggling the boxes around in her arms.
"All right, well I better-" A car horn cuts Dad off and we both turn to see Aubrey leaning over the console smacking the horn. "Go." Dad finishes and pulls me in for a quick hug before saying goodbye to the both of us and hurrying back to the car with Archie, about to have his ear bitten off by Aubrey.
"Gawwd. She is such an uptight bitch. You'd think after having a baby it would have loosened her up." Em says with a smile and I give her a pointed look. "What? I'm just saying. After you've had a baby everything gets a little-"
"Stop!" I laugh, grabbing the last of my bags off the sidewalk.
"Come on, you're gonna love what I've done to the room."
"Please tell me you haven't brought your wall of Channing Tatum with you?"
She pinches her lips together, a tell-tale sign that she is hiding something.
"Em. Noooo. You didn't?"
Em has a major celebrity crush on Channing Tatum. Her bedroom wall is full of posters of him...which are apparently now pinned all over our dorm room.
"Well...yeah, but that's not the surprise."
Em giggles and I follow her inside the dorm block and up the stairs to the girls’ floor. I try not to be nosy as we make our way down the hallway but it's hard not to look when people leave their doors wide open for everyone to see inside. Girls-only floor, ha!
Did they really think a flight of stairs would be enough to separate us all? I see boys and girls that have already settled in, mingling around in their bedrooms, some laughing, some listening to music, some making out, and there is even a couple walking down the hallway damp from the showers with only towels to cover themselves.
"Are the showers co-ed?" I ask, stepping over a pair of long legs that are stretched along the hallway floor while trying to catch up with Em.
"Yup." She flashes me a wicked grin. "You should have been here yesterday when the boys got back from football practice. I was in heaven."
"Em!" I can't help but laugh.
"Hey. If they're gonna walk around half-naked then who am I to tell them to cover up? I think I brushed my teeth for twenty minutes straight while they were in there. My teeth have never been cleaner."
"You're terrible." I tease.
I kind of feel like I'm the last one to join the party. Everyone has already settled in ready for college and I'm the last to get here. I was late because my mom and stepdad decided to take off to Switzerland on holiday and I had no one to drive me down here. I had to wait until a ride came up and, in the end, my stepdad phoned and asked one of the Spanish-speaking gardeners to drive me down here to my dad's. Most awkward car journey ever. I do speak Spanish, but I had no idea what to say to the man, and I had to listen to Spanish music the whole way here. He dropped me off at my dad's house because I insisted, and because I didn't want him coming to college and insisting on carrying my boxes for me. I was afraid he would break his back or pop out a hip or something, and I'm not sure how I would explain why there was an elderly old man that doesn't speak a word of English following me around.
Emily slows down and stops by a door.
Room no. 32 B
She wedges the boxes against the door as she unlocks it.
"You could have just asked me to help." I say with a laugh.
"I got it. See," She pushes the door open with her foot and lugs my boxes inside and I shuffle inside behind her, dragging my bags.
"Ohmigawd!" I laugh as I step inside, looking at her side of the room.
There are two beds, one on either side, each has a nightstand, there's a desk near the wall on Em's side, and at the end of the room near the door, there is a long closet. And Em has taken it upon herself to put up some kind of makeshift voile curtain down the center of the room to divide the beds, but that's not what has caught my attention.
Channing Tatum is plastered all over the wall on her side, and there isn't even a blank space of the wall left.
"What did you do?" I drop my bags and kick the door shut before anyone can see this.
"I wanted to feel at home. And Mom said I needed to bring everything with me that makes me feel at home."
"And Channing Tatum makes you feel at home?"
"He sure does. Anyway, I don't know what you're complaining about, you get a clear view of him from your side if you push the curtains aside."
"I do like the voile curtains."
"I knew you would. Surprise! It was my idea and Mom got them at a discount price. I figured if we have company...you know?" she says with a dirty smirk.
"Are you being serious?"
"Well, yeah. We're in college. Time to experiment and have the time of our lives and all that. I know I’ve already experimented enough for the both of us, but I think it’s time you started."
"You're planning to bring guys back here and…you know?"
"Yes. So are you."
"No, I'm not!" I scoff. "Not after last year. I have sworn off boys for good."
Em gives me this sympathetic look. She knows what happened last year but sometimes I wish I hadn't told her. But she's my best friend and it's not like I can keep a secret from her for very long.
"Paige-"
"Don't." I stop her. "You know I don't want to talk about it."
"I know," she sighs. "I just think maybe if you talked about it, you'd feel better."
"Feel better? What's done is done, Em. There's no point bringing it up again. It's in the past, leave it alone."
"Okay, fine. But this year is a fresh start for both of us, maybe you'll meet someone new."
"I don't want to meet anyone new." I lug my bags onto the bed and drop down onto the bed to test the mattress.
"Why? Because you don't like boys or because you're still hung up on Dar-"
"Don't say his name. Em! You promised you wouldn't say his name."
"I'm sorry...but you know he's like, ten-minutes down the road and we're bound to go into town at some point. What if you run into him?" she says, lifting the curtains aside to look at me.
"I won't."
"What if my car breaks down and I need to get it repaired?"
"It won't."
"You know, you're going to run into him eventually. If you really wanted to never see him again then you wouldn't have come back."
I roll my head to the side and pin her with a stare.
"What? I'm just saying."
"I came back so we could be together in college, l
ike what we always said we would do."
"Uh-huh. You know I was totally up for moving to Nebraska, I wouldn't have minded the change of scenery."
"The dorms are too expensive there." I remind.
"Right, because your stepdad isn't loaded or anything, and I have more than enough money in my college fund."
"Can we please stop talking about this? I'm here because I get to see my little brother and baby sister, and I wanted to come back. It has nothing to do with..."
"With?" Em smirks.
"Shut up." I say and she rolls her eyes. "Leave me alone to wallow in self-pity."
She claps her hands together and I frown at her.
"No time. You need to get up." She grabs my hands and hauls me into a sitting position.
"Why?"
"Why? Because we're going out tonight. Surprise!"
"Out where?" I ask skeptically.
"Party."
"No." I deadpan.
"Paige, it's your first night at college, we're going out to party. I waited for like, ever for you to arrive so we could go out and have some fun. It's no fun on my own."
"What party?"
"Frat house party.
"Gawwwd. No. I've been stuck in a car all day with an elderly Spanish man listening to the same songs over and over. I just want to relax and unwind."
"Fine. We can stay in...but I'm going to bug you no end about a certain person that you pretend to hate but are secretly in love with."
"No."
"His name begins with D."
"Stop it."
"Dar-"
"Em!"
"Then come out with me and have some fun. I am not leaving you here to scribble in your diary all night. If you really are over him like you say you are-"
"I was never into him." I talk over her but it's a downright lie and she knows it.
"No, he was totally into you." she teases, and I glare at her. "Well, if you are over him, prove it. Come out and flirt with a few guys, have a few drinks, have some damn fun. Forget about Dar-"
"If I come out with you, will you stop saying his name?" I talk over her again.
"Sure."
"Em."
"Yes, okay? Now, get over here and let me make you pretty."