Salstune Town by Cat Lewis (elon musk reading list TXT) 📕

The car journey had been a long one, 5 hours! My legs had got cramp at least twice and my sister Kody attacked my face with a yawning hand on multiple occasions. I looked around me. This was to be my new home. All of a sudden as I was staring out the window day dreaming, Mum, with her fabulous driving, jolted the car to a stop and one of the boxes from the boot flew through the cap and hit me on the head.
"Ow!" I yelled and Mum replied with,
" Guess that's the box your taking in first, come on!"
It was then I realised we weren't still driving through surrounding towns like we had been for the last half an hour even if under Mum's insistence, we weren't lost, we were taking a tour of the same 3 mile radius over and over again.
My house, my brand new house!
This was the first time I had moved since I was around 7 after Kody was born and we needed more space, but we didn't move far. This time, we'd moved to another country! Ireland. And it was beautiful and it made me all the more happy that Dad had left. I noticed my 10 year old, little sister, scared, confused. A twang of brothers instinct hit so I wandered over,
"It's gonna be great here Kod's, promise!" She glared at me with unsure eyes but shock her shoulders and ran over to Mum, she may not have been happier, but I still felt I'd done my job.
"Hurry up Parker! I'm struggling here!"
"Coming Mum."
I couldn't wait to get inside of the house, it looked gorgeous from the outside, a large modern house.

I stood in shock as Mum stepped out of the way letting me through the front door. I looked around, amazed. It was great! I almost dropped the box as mu sister sped past my legs through into the open living room, fully furnished. Everywhere looked beautiful and all it needed was our little ornaments to top it all off. I rushed up the stairs and then the next flight until I tumbled into my room. Mum told me that my room was on the top floor, but I didn't think she meant literally all of it1 It was massive and I had my own bathroom and everything! My bed was on a platform off the floor which looked amazing and a wardrobe took one wall and the wall opposite my bed was all windows. It all looked awesome. A fresh start, a good start. And a new school tomorrow! I guess I was really looking forward to it.
I used to get picked on at my old school, too shy I guess but this time I was ready. I wanted to find friends and was positive I would.

A sudden scream came from downstairs but not a scared scream, a happy one. Kody's one. I ran downstairs, she was looking at her room, beautifully pink. Made for a princess. It suited her perfectly. A round, pink curtain draped round her round double bed, on a platform like mine. Her dressers were white and one wall was made of mirrors with a ballet dance support through it. She loved her dance.
I guess you're wondering where we got the money from to afford this house. Well Mum sold her business after Dad left and we got A LOT for it. Mum spent most on this house, some on a car and the rest in savings getting a decent amount of interest from the bank. Lucky, huh?

I woke up that morning, early. So early it was still dark out. I rolled over and looked at the clock. 5:10am. That was the point that I realised that that was the day I was starting high school.. I couldn't wait, Mum had said that I could have gone to a private school with the money we had received from her business but I'd decided to go to the local public school instead. I didn't want to seem to be some posh, rich person which I certainly am not!
I walked up to the small, fragile looking face in the same uniform as me at my bus stop. She looked about the same age as me, maybe a year younger.
"Hi, I'm Rosie!" She was so bubbly and happy and confident. And pretty. Her crimson hair brushing her collar bone and her blue-greeney eyes covered by her glasses which suited her perfectly. She was beautiful. I noticed she was still smiling at me so I decided to put my shyness aside.
"Hey, I'm Parker, I'm new here!"
"I thought I hadn't seen you around before, hey, there's the bus, come on!" She took her glasses off at this point. I wondered why. She looked so different but still pretty.
The bus turned the corner. Bright yellow, clean, like everyone should be happy, but as I climbed the steps, the hit of Monday morning tiredness threw me. Rosie had got on the bus before me and sat down, now patting the seat next to her,
"Hey, sit here Parker!"
In front of her I noticed a girl about her age and a boy my age. The girl seemed to completely blank the boy next to her where as the boy was staring at her with doting eyes. The girl glanced at me then hit me with a solid and obvious wink.
"Parker, this is Joe and Sammie."
"Hey guys, I'm Parker!"
"Hi, names Joe!"
"Hiya Joe, like the jacket!"
"Thanks mate"
Great, I'd already made more friends than I had at my old school in minutes.
The blonde girl introduced to me a Sammie came and sat on my knee. She weighed about what felt like a feather. You could tell she definitely watched her weight or exercised a lot!
"Come on Sammie, he may be quite hot, I mean, well, you know... but give him a break, k?"
"Oh, looks like someone has a little crush their, Rosie!"
"Says the girl sprawling all over him!"
I just sat their quietly, I mean what was I meant to say, er, yeah, actually I find Rosie prettier and really want to talk to her so get off my knee please Sammie? Bit of an odd start to a first day.

The bus arrived at the school.. It looked quite newly built and modern. We all got off and Sammie tried to grab hold of my hand. I sped up my walking to catch up to Rosie.
"Hey" she mumbled.
"What's up?"
"Just Sammie annoyed me, she knew I'd react like that."
"Oh don't worry about her! No need for jealousy, there's enough of me to go around!" I grinned smugly until she looked at me and I pulled a funny face. I wanted to cheer her up.
"So why did you take your glasses off earlier?"
"Shh!"
"What?"
"Well no one knows I wear them apart from you and Sammie..."
"Oh, I see. Why? You look so pretty in them, I mean you look really pretty now too, I mean, oh, now I know how you felt earlier!"
"Well yeah, but thanks, let's go get your schedule and diary, don't worry, I'll look after you!"
She was back to her bubbly self which I overly admit I was happy about. Her smile was perfect.

We walked into our first class, turned out we were in the same class. I was chuffed. So were Joe and Sammie. Through out the day you could notice how much Joe liked Sammie but she was just not interested. I had no idea why, he wasn't ugly and that's coming from a guy! I ate lunch with just Rosie and Joe as Sammie had Drama club. We'd been giving a project for Science on the investigation on yeast and I'd paired with Rosie.
"Hey, Rosie. D'ya wanna come over after school to start the project?"
"Yeah, sure, sounds great! I'll just text my Mum and let her know. Will I be home for dinner?"
"Er, dunno you can eat with us if you want?"
"Sounds like a plan! Sure your Mum wont mind?"
"No course not! You like dogs right?"
"Yeah they're awesome!"
"Okay, we'll need to quickly walk Oreo when we get back but apart from that, I'm all yours, I mean, Oh Jeez! I just need to shut up!"
Rosie laughed, "Awesome name! What breed is he?"
"He's a husky, only 2! Bit of an idiot really, walks into walls and stuff! Ya' know!"
It was at that moment that Joe had come over after queuing forever in the dinner hall,
"I swear those ques get longer and longer whilst your in them!"
"Trust you to be complaining about food again

Joe!"
"Shut up, Rosie!" He said sarcastically!
"You know we love you really!"
"Yeah sure, I thought you were both slobbering over him

" He grumbled, pointing at me.
Then Sammie walked over and he was all cheery again. Seems someone has a little crush!

As we wondered back to my house from the bus stop Rosie stopped and put her glasses on. I'd been at Salstune High for five weeks now and things had been going great. The first day she'd come back to work on the project, it was awesome. Mum loved her and so did Kody. She had stayed late, braiding Kody's hair as we watched movies and Mum took her home at 10. She'd kept coming over in the next few days, we were like a family. A family where the boy definitely

liked the girl. So I guess we weren't a family at all.. Five days later, on Saturday morning, she'd come over, asking me if she could talk to me and my Mum. The next day, she'd moved in. She said she'd never trusted anyone like me and Mum before. She'd been living with her Uncle Harry since her Mum had died when she was 3. Now her Uncle had no job, no money and was moving away to find work. She had no where to