Starla (The Ladies of Karnage Novella Series)
Jennifer Culbreth
Dedication
For all of my Ladies of Karnage.
Never stop fighting.
Preface
There are two types of people in this world; the kind that run and the kind that stay and fight. When the shit gets deep, you find out just who people really are. I don’t have anything against people who run, their minds are set on self-preservation. But since the day I was born, I’ve always been a fighter.
I was born three months too early and severely underweight. My lungs hadn’t completely formed and I had to stay on a ventilator to keep breathing. The doctor told my parents that I wouldn’t make it longer than a few days, looked my mother right in the eye and told her to start making arrangements for my passing. But he was wrong. I wasn’t giving up that easily.
There’s a long enough moment of calm when shit hits the fan, for you to make the decision of what kind of person you’re gonna be, and in the world I live in. Only the fighters survive.
Chapter One
“I can’t fucking believe we’re going to Ireland. How did you talk your parents into letting you go?” my best friend Joni asked as I finished shoving the last of my clothes into my already tightly packed suitcase.
“I begged, pleaded, washed the dog for the past year, and I paid for half of my ticket,” I laughed as Joni hopped on the top of my suitcase, closing it enough for me to get the zipper closed the rest of the way.
Senior year was over and we were heading off to backpack through Ireland. It had taken some convincing on my part, I even went so far as researching the tiny trace of our family’s Irish heritage to get my parents to agree. But after months of tough negotiations, they had finally said yes.
I’m sure you are wondering why Ireland, right? Of all the places you could go in the world, why would I want to go to the country of sheep and potatoes. The idea had bloomed from a project in my world histories class my junior year of high school. Our teacher had split us up into groups of three and assigned each group a continent. We ended up with Europe and I had been stuck with researching the outlying islands. After a month of research I fell in love with the culture, plus the accents were fucking sexy. And after months of waiting, the time had finally come to leave. We would be flying out of Nashville International in about ten hours and I couldn’t wait to get my ass out of Tennessee.
The night before the flight Joni and I had spent hours researching where we would go once we got to Dublin, which beers we would drink, which parties we would go to. I wanted to have as much fun as was humanly possible before I left for college in the fall. It was sometime around three in the morning when we finally dozed off, the screen of my ancient computer still illuminating the room with pictures of the Irish countryside. Then sometime around six my mom came in and woke us up. I felt sluggish as I made it through breakfast, but as we approached the airport my blood was once again pumping wildly through my veins.
We checked our bags at the counter, I hugged my mom and dad goodbye, and we took our tickets, heading for the line of people going through security. Security was a breeze, but then again this was years before they began cracking down on what you could and couldn’t take on an airplane. Joni and I made our way through the line of people, dragging our carry-on bags behind us as my mom yelled out,“You girls have fun! I’ll see you in a few weeks! Love you!” She waved, trying to hide her tears and blew me a kiss goodbye.
“Love you too, mama! You too, dad! I’ll see you in a few weeks,” I yelled back toward where they stood. I didn’t know it then, but that was the first of many lies I’d end up telling my parents over the next few years.
We boarded our plane, bouncing off our seats as the flight attendant pointed out the direction of barf bags and air masks. Twenty minutes later we were bolting off into the air and heading toward our exciting destination. Once we got in the air and the exhaustion from the previous night’s lack of sleep set in, I quickly dozed off to the quiet hum of the plane engine. A few hours later I woke to the news that we’d be landing in Dublin in less than an hour. Joni was snoring loudly beside me as I shook her gently in an effort to wake her up.
“Hey, pssst. Wake up.” I giggled as she closed her mouth and attempted to roll over onto the man next to her. “Joni,” I said a little louder, trying not to disturb anyone around us. Her head bolted straight up from the man’s shoulder and she looked over at me confused. “We’re still on the plane. And you were sleeping on your neighbor,” I explained. She eyed the man in embarrassment and whispered an apology.