Title: Jared and the Sociopath He Imprinted On
Published: 03-15-09, Last Updated: 07-10-09

Chapters: 35, Words: 112,072

Prologue: Kim- Nothing like a Cold Shower

Book One

Beep-beep! Beep-beep! Beep-beep! Beep-beep!

I could feel my blood pressure rise with each beep. That stupid fucking alarm clock would kill me! It was just past 7am and I was forced to weigh my options; on one hand I wanted nothing more than to lie in my bed all day and pretend to be dead, and on the other hand there was the burning need to stop that goddamn beeping noise… and pee!

The beeping (and my full bladder) won. I turned over, crossed my tiny room and slammed down the alarm button with extra malice.

With a sense of dread I dragged myself out the door. Yawning loudly, with my eyes tightly scrunched, I trudged directly into a cold pile of puke, tripping over my mother's limp body in the process.

Great! Just fucking great! Sticky fucking pink puke, all over my mother-lovin' foot! This was the fifth time this month I was blessed with the pleasure of waking up to a passed out mother. On the bright side, if there could be a bright side to living with an insufferable drunk, this was only the second time this month that vomit was involved.

I flipped her on her back, my foot still covered in sick, and smacked her face a few times, a bit more forcefully than I needed to. The bitch wouldn't even notice; she was so doped out on boxed wine and god knows what else that she probably didn't even know her own name.

She didn't stir.

Shit! Was this it? Dead mommy on a Thursday morning? How morbid!

I put my ear to her mouth and listened for her breathing, while I felt her underarm for a pulse. It was a trick I learned from watching reruns of ER. My heart started beating again when I heard her wheezing breath and I re-adjusted myself, grabbing her hands and dragging her towards the bathroom before my younger brother Matthew could come out and see her.

Living with a raging alcoholic didn't go unnoticed by him, even a nine year old was insightful enough to realize mommy drank more booze than anyone should, but he didn't need to see the lows—which were getting increasingly more frequent and subterranean.

With a 'hmph' I dropped her carefully next to the shower stall, she was heavy enough to make my lower back sore from strain. I tweaked the nozzle, making it warm so she didn't get sick.

My arms burned with the struggle to get her in the shower stall and though I tried not to get myself wet my top half was soaked by the time she was settled into the tiny stool I'd placed there for just this situation. When I realized it was a lost cause I gave up and hopped in, still fully pajamaed.

Now I was both rousing my drunken mother and getting ready for school, truly a multi-tasker.

"Mom, is the water okay?"

"Fuck water," she muttered, weakly trying to push against me. I stripped off her sopping house dress keeping her underwear intact and after a few minutes she regained herself enough to turn to me.

This was the hard part: there were only two reactions to this kind of wake-up service. I backed away readying myself for the violent response, but when she collapsed to her knees, sobbing and apologizing I wished she had hit me. Anger was easier to deal with than remorse.

"It's okay, mom. Let's get you out of here," I said patting her back. I was still soaking wet when I turned off the water and carefully guided her out.

My dark blue pajama pants looked black with the water and were so heavy they sagged off my hips. I dropped them, slipping on my bathrobe then hers. She held onto me for support and I wrapped her hair in a towel, shushing her wails before I led her to her room.

I was still pissed, I was fuming internally but when someone broke down in drunken sobs on a bi-weekly basis, calm comforting was an automatic reaction.

When I set her on her bed she hiccough, swore and passed out again. I rushed back into the hall.

I was going to be late and I needed to get Matthew ready for the 4th grade since my mother was still too drunk to handle him.

"Matty, wake up!" I screamed pounding on his door. I burst inside his tiny room like a tornado, rummaged through his drawer and threw him a clean shirt and jeans.

"I'm sleepy!" Matty cried.

"Dress yourself," I ordered him still trailing water as I headed back to the bathroom and hopped in the shower again.

It was freezing, I had wasted all of the morning's hot water on my useless mother and I was forced to hop around trying to wash my nitty gritties without standing directly under the deluge of frosty water.

I was shivering when I emerged after less than five minutes later, half clean and angry, but I had learned a vital lesson. I would never to waste warm water on my mother again.

I didn't bother to put on makeup as I raced to get dressed. It didn't matter if I wore make-up, Jared hadn't been to school in days, and even if he had, he wasn't going to look up from his history book or notes (more often doodles) long enough to notice me.

With eight minutes left until my ride to school arrived and I ran downstairs dragging Matty with me. We searched together through the bare cupboards for something breakfast worthy, finding a good amount for expired things and three new bottles of raspberry flavored malt liquor. I settled on crackers with jelly and a bag of gummy bears which I had to share with a grumpy nine year old.

As we argued about the last green gummy I heard the honking and I dropped it in his hand, grabbing the bottles of liquor as I went.

I hid them from Matty while Crystal buckled him in the back seat. I buried the bottles in her trunk. I planned to take them back to the only store in La Push for a trade in. Maybe I could get some bread and peanut butter.

My mother lived on the cheapest alcohol she could find so unfortunately, food is not always an even trade and I couldn't get much for the three bottles of Boone's Farm.

"Wow Kim, looking a bit Courtney Love today," Crystal said as I buckled my seatbelt. It was her one requirement for our daily pick-ups. I don't have a car, a problem in our tiny reservation of La Push where public transportation in non-existent.

"And what the hell does that mean?"

"Not exactly zest-fully clean," she said in a sing-song voice.

"Just shut the fuck up and drive, okay?" I screamed smacking Crystal's headrest angrily. She laughed wickedly.

"Nine whole school days without lover boy Jared has really made you cranky!" Crystal squealed.

"Yeah, it's Jared's absence and not the violent alcoholic I live with," I whispered sarcastically.

I didn't want to admit it, but most of what she said was right, because in the nine day that Jared had been missing, school had lost most of its charm.

My delusional and borderline obsessive crush on Jared Cameron had spanned six years, during which time quiet Jared (who I knew nothing about), was sensationalized in my mind. He turned into a white knight, my perfect man and the answer to all of my prayers. He was warm, kind, considerate, trustworthy, loving, caring… the best boyfriend and protector in the world. I never really realized how much I needed that fantasy knight-in-shining armor to get through the days until he was gone.

After stopping at Matty's elementary school we parked in front of the Quileute Tribal School. We walked through the chipped red doors and made our way to the school's famous combination cafeteria/auditorium/gymnasium… or Cafétoriasium to those in the know.

The room was packed, each table stuffed with friend laughing and students rushing to half-ass finish homework assignments they'd forgotten. Crystal and I took the first seats available because we couldn't find the rest of our crew and I tried very inconspicuously to see if my underarms were fresh or not. Crystal's Courtney Love comment was getting to me. I remembered all too well the years of being called 'Dirty Kim' because my drunken mom didn't have time in her schedule to wash my clothes or me.

The only table available was filled with sophomores and I tried to ignore them as they gossiped about nothing. QTS was a school of gossip— gossip was dull, yes, but every little bit of it was dragged out, examined, discussed, debated and blogged about before the issue was finally laid to rest. I didn't get involved with it because I was afraid to hear what they said about me, especially since I knew most of it would be true.

I'm not a mean girl or a wild girl really, I'd just say I'm misunderstood. Growing up without a father and a drunk for a mother I had to be tough to survive, and I just don't take shit from people, especially fake or dramatic people. I don't like girls who surround themselves with drama to get attention and I don't like girls who change their opinions to fit a group of people. That happened to be just about every girl in our school, sans Crystal. My biggest problem though was that I just didn't know how to keep my mouth shut.

All that being said I don't participate in gossip, normally but my ears perked up however when I heard his name.

"I know, but seriously Jared-"

"What?" The word was out of my mouth before I could stop myself. The girls, whom I knew by reputation but had never spoken to, looked up at me with evil eyes.

"What, what?" said one of the four girls. Her hair was dyed fire engine red and it was not at all flattering.

"Jared, what?" I asked a little impatiently.

"Oh yeah, he's back, and massive… he had a crazy growth spurt. He looks like the Hulk or something."

"And he's gorgeous," another girl responded. This frumpy girl had orange blond hair with black roots, again not a good look.

"Yeah, he's hot now!"

Gorgeous? Now? He has always been gorgeous. I had the animalistic need to bare my teeth and growl at the competition. They were all dyed, primped and pressed, but Jared didn't like that kind of thing right? No, Jared would want a girl who was all natural.

Well, the Jared in my mind at least, and then I started to panic. What if every girl started to see how amazing he was…

"You know he was out of school because he had a wicked mutated case of Chlamydia, right?" I word vomited.

I don't know why I said it, but once the words were out there I couldn't take them back. I rushed away before they could ask anything else.

I was going to pay for that, in a school this size the source of rumors didn't stay hidden for long.