Jaded Ways

Chapter 1

In a place called Hollywood, a certain group of seemingly normal teenagers go to a performing arts high school known as Hollywood Arts. These teens go through your typical teen drama, such as dating troubles and adolescent woes. But they are by no means ordinary teenagers. While they are all extraordinarily gifted students, their talents are not what I'm referring to. These young students have a very dark secret shadowing them.

A beautiful Monday afternoon, the sun is shining, the birds are chirping, and a rather annoyed young woman with a scowl set across her face is walking by. As she walks through the outdoor eating area the weather seems to drop ten to fifteen degrees wherever she goes. No one makes eye contact with her, and everyone avoids her as if she were the plague itself. Her name is Jadelyn West, and everyone at Hollywood Arts knows not to get on her bad side. So for their own safety they try to stay out of her way, and pretend she isn't there.

As she approaches a round blue table with a group of young teens sitting while eating and conversing she can't help but get irritated by a certain girl sitting at her table. As she gets closer, she squeezes on her plastic container containing her lunch and struggles not to crush the poor plastic. You could easily see the irritation on her face and even see her hands straining not to crush her food container as she gets closer. Once she arrives to her table she drops her food and bag on the table and sits down on the bench with a loud thump.

"Yeah so like I was saying, they got all sorts of cool stuff at that store. You guys should really check it out." One of the cheery teens says. "Yeah, totally. We should all go there after school. Oh, hey Jade." The tall dark haired boy with a killer smile said to the annoyed girl as she sat down next to him, to his left. "What?" Is all she says as she glares daggers at them. Sensing her foul mood the others quickly change from being cheery to uncomfortable instantly. They all shift quietly and uncomfortably in their seats as the boy who greeted her continues. "Andre was telling us about this new music store he found, and we were all planning on going there and checking it out after school. You in?" The boy, Beck asks calmly, but with a bit of unease in his voice. "Why would I waste my precious free time going to some stupid store with you morons?" Jade practically growled at them, with obvious irritation on her face and in her voice. "Whoa, Jade. You alright? What's got you so upset all of a sudden?" Beck asks Jade with concern and a bit of fear in his voice. "Maybe it's just that time of month again. Oh wait then that would mean she would have that every day." An annoying brunette says with a mocking tone. "Watch it Vega!" Jade shouts at the brunette sitting across from her. "Whoa cool it guys. Let's not fight here. What's the matter Jade?" A shorter broader, darker toned, guy with dread locks and a kind expression on his face says. "Stay out of this Andre! You got something to say Vega?" Jade yells to the boy sitting next to beck on his right and then to the brunette across from her. "I think you get what I'm trying to say her Jade." The foolish brunette sitting across from jade says, while staring her down. If looks could kill, Jades would murder this poor idiotic girl in front of her. Not that she'd need looks, since in a second she'd be across the table ripping this girls head off. That is if a certain red head didn't appear behind Jade just in time to calm her down.

"Hey guys!" The oblivious redhead cheerfully states to her friends as she sits down to the left of jade, placing her food tray and bag on the table. Jades expression suddenly softened a bit, but you could still see that she was outraged with this Vega chick. If it weren't for her hearing that sweet innocent voice that could only come from a redheaded angel, Jade would have killed that girl right then and there, for she was not in the mood to deal with stupid people like her today. Jades hands begin to loosen a bit as you could see she had them clenched around the edge of the table causing it to bend under her enormous strength. All the while she didn't stop glaring directly to the girl causing her so much anger at this moment. "Uh, hey Cat. What you got there?" Andre asked the small petite redhead who just sat down, in an attempt to change the subject and avoid the tension. "Just a salad and some fruit. Oh, and a flyer for this new play HA is going to be having auditions for soon!" She cheerily explains to him completely unaware of what was going on just mere moments ago. However it didn't take long for Cat to notice that Jade was in an extra bad mood today. "Jade…What's the matter?" Cat asks in such a cute innocent voice clearly displaying her pure concern for her friend sitting beside her, with sad eyes and a frown sketched on her face. Jade was brought out of whatever rage induced trance she had been in as she heard her friends voice and looked over to her side to look at her. What she saw felt like a dagger being jabbed in her side and then suddenly being twisted, as she saw those sad eyes that made her feel like she had just kicked a kitten.

"Cat, it's nothing. Don't worry about it." Jade tells the sad girl beside her in a calm yet sincere voice. All her anger suddenly vanished as she looked into those beautiful milk chocolate brown eyes of pure innocence. She suddenly forgot the reason she had been upset in the first place and was only concerned with calming her friend down, as she hated to see her worried or upset. "Okay." Cat said in a small non-convincing voice. She still had this confused, yet concerned and sad look on her face. "Hey Cat, you wanna go with us to a new music store Andre found after school?" A hopeful request from another boy at the table. This boy was scrawny and weird with an afro and holding a puppet. He was sitting on the Vega girl's right. Suddenly Cat's expression changed as this seemed to remind her of one of her many odd tales. "One time my brother and I were at a music store and my brother had to pee, but he couldn't find the bathroom. So he found a drum set and turned a drum over and peed into the drum. Later he 'accidently' set a guitar on fire." She used air quotes when saying accidently as she cheerfully told her story. Everyone just stared at her with dumbfounded expressions on their faces. "We aren't allowed to go back there anymore." She simply states while nodding her head. Everyone just sits there and stares at her, not quite sure what to think about that odd comment. "Man! You are one crazed up fruit loop!" Robbie's puppet Rex suddenly shouts. "Huh!" Cat gasps loudly as she places her hands to her mouth in shock with an expression of hurt on her face. With that Jade throws a knife into Rex's forehead. "Oh man!" Rex shouts in his odd voice. Jade was back to being angry again. "Don't you ever dare talk to or about her that way ever again!" Jade glares at Rex with pure anger on her face. "Next time you won't get off so lucky." She angrily says to the puppet. "Now apologize to Cat this instant." Jades eyes are so dark and so scary that everyone's afraid she may actually kill someone this time. "Alright! I'm Sorry! Okay? Just get this damn knife out of my head already!" Rex yells out in general. Jade turns her gaze to Cat and places a reassuring hand gently on her shoulder while changing her face to a kind and gentle expression. "Don't listen to it Cat. That THING doesn't know what it's talking about. You're NOT crazy." Jade says to Cat in the most genuine sweet and sincere way she can manage. Something she can only ever do for Cat. "Thanks Jade." Cat says quietly as her face softens and is replaced with a small smile.

After school. In parking lot as students are leaving. Cat is happily talking to Jade as Beck, Andre, Tori, and Robbie are talking together a few feet behind them as they all head to their respective vehicles. After lunch the group all decided to go to this new music store Andre had mentioned as a way to cool things off a bit.

At the music store. After taking all necessary vehicles they all proceeded to head to the music store and are now getting out of their cars and heading inside. "Nice place." Beck calmly states. "Yeah, they got all sorts of cool stuff here. They have an entire area dedicated to older music with hundreds of records near the back. They've also got the largest selection of instruments I've ever seen in a store before." Andre explains as they enter the store. "Cool." Beck says as one of the employees greets the group. "Hey guys. Welcome to our music store. Feel free to ask me or any of the other employees throughout the shop if you need anything." He kindly greets.

The group splits up and goes their separate ways to check out the store. Robbie takes Rex to get some replacement guitar strings cause his 'snapped' the other day. In reality Jade cut them with her scissors for pissing her off with some stupid comment Rex had made about her the other day. Tori went to check out the mikes and stereo systems. Andre went to check out the key boards. Jade, Cat, and Beck all went to check out the old records in the back.

Jade found a record of a heavy metal band she liked and hooked it up with some headphones and put them on to listen to some songs. Jade was listening to her record while rifling through the other records when Cat gently tugged on her jacket sleeve. Jade stopped what she was doing and turned her head towards cat while still listening to her music. "What are you listening to?" Cat sweetly asked her as she was genuinely curious to what Jade had found. "Here." Jade took off the headphones and placed them on Cats head. Cat cringed at the blazing sound bursting her ear drums, but pretended to enjoy it for Jades sake, and even gave her a fake smile. "Heh. You don't have to pretend to like something just to make me happy Cat." Jade laughingly told her in a sweet tone. "I'm not pretending. I really do…like it." Cat gave another fake smile. "Oh please Cat. I always know when you're lying. You really think I believe that you like this? Just be honest with me. I know you hate it." Jade mockingly tells her. "Okay. I hate it." Cat plainly states with a serious expression on her face. Jade can't help but smirk at Cats face. Even when cat is completely serious she has a way of making it seem adorable. Jade laughs at Cat and wraps an arm around her waist, causing Cat to blush and shift her eyes away from Jade. "What? Now you're embarrassed to hug me Cat?" Jade mocks Cat with a big smirk on her face. "What? No! Of course not." Cat says in a defensive tone as her cheeks get redder and she continues to look away from Jade. At this point Jade decides to completely envelop Cat in her arms, into a full on bear hug causing Cat's entire face to redden and freeze at the sudden display of affection towards her, from Jade, of all people. Beck can't help but notice this as he holds a record in each hand. Jade releases Cat, laughing with a big smile on her face. "Lighten up Cat. It's just a hug. It's not as if I kissed you or anything." At that, Cat's entire body stiffened in shock of the thought of jade kissing her as Jade presses her lips to cat's ear and whispers quietly, in an innocent tone "Unless you want me to?" At this Cat's eyes get so wide you'd think they were going to explode or something. Jade just loves teasing Cat like this. But you'll never find her acting this way towards anyone else. After all Cat is special.

"I'm gonna go check out the guitars." Beck nonchalantly tells them before walking away. "Yeah, I think I'll join you." Jade states, back to her usual scowl faced self. As the two walk away, Cat simply stands there, frozen.

A/N: This is my first Fanfic i've done. I'd really appreciate any feedback anyone can give, such as constructive criticism. I hope you enjoy it.