The Unraveling of Melody

The Unraveling

Of Melody

A Caplin Brothers
prequel

By Erika Van Eck

The Unraveling of Melody

Copyright ©2015 Erika Van Eck

1st Edition

Cover Design by Erika Van Eck

Cover photographs purchased through
Dollarphotoclub.com

All rights reserved. No part of this book may
be reproduced or transmitted in any form without written permission
from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote brief
passages for review purposes.

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.

Editing by Editing4Indies

www.editing4indies.com

ISBN-13: 978-1507640593

ISBN-10: 1507640595

Dedication

To my family, friends, and readers-

Thank you for the unwavering support. I
wouldn’t have gotten to this point without you.

Playlist:

(Sorry, this one’s short)

Gardiner Sisters- “Home/Dirty Paws”

Nashville Cast- “Ho Hey”

A Fine Frenzy- “Hope For The Hopeless”

Broods- “Never Gonna Change”

*For this playlist and more, follow me on
Spotify.

If you haven’t read Ace’s Wild, this story
contains major spoilers.

Beginning of Senior
Year

“I
can’t
believe we’re seniors, Mel!” Emma says excitedly. I put my newly
acquired books into my locker while Emma talks animatedly about our
first day of school. “Seriously, this is totally our year. Maybe
Scott will finally get the balls to ask you out.”

“
Shh! Don’t be so loud, Emma. Jeez,
someone will hear you.” I feel my cheeks heat from embarrassment. I
quickly shut my locker and begin walking toward the exit, not
looking back to see if Emma has followed me. As I approach the
double doors, I hear quick footsteps approaching.

“
Come on, Mel, you know I was kidding.”
She pauses for a moment. “Well, kind of. I meant what I said, but I
shouldn’t have said it so loud.”

I keep walking as she remains quietly on my
right. I’m not really angry with her, but I like to make her squirm
a little. It’s actually pretty entertaining at times.

I bite my lip to keep myself from smiling at
my evilness. I stop in front of Emma’s car because she’s my ride
home today. She unlocks the doors, and we both quietly climb
inside.

She puts her keys in the ignition but
stops and turns to me before starting her car. “Mel, I am really
sorry. I
swear
I
didn’t mean to piss you off.”

At that moment, I can’t take it anymore and
laughter bursts from my mouth. At first, Emma looks annoyed, but as
soon as a snort escapes my nose, we both completely lose it and
giggle until tears are falling down our cheeks.

As soon as Emma catches her breath, she
smiles over at me. “You’re such a bitch.”

“
But you love me,” I joke as I lay my
head on her shoulder.

“
Unfortunately,” she shoots back. She
glances over at me one last time before sticking out her
tongue.

***

As soon as I complete my homework and chores,
I call Sara to see if she’s okay. Her family doesn’t support what
she wants to do after high school, and on top of that, she and
Dustin, her boyfriend for the last two years, went through a rocky
break-up.

When I say rocky, I mean more like explosive.
There wasn’t one person in our high school not talking about it.
According to most, Dustin dumped Sara for a college girl. But a few
of us know the actual truth.

That Dustin is a psychotic,
cheating douchebag
.

I plop down
on
my bed while looking through my
contacts list on my phone. I quickly find Sara’s name and press
“call.” It rings twice and then the line goes silent. I take the
phone away from my ear to see if the call connected, and it says
that it has, but the line is still utter silence.

“
Hello? Sara?”

The only response is sniffling. It’s so quiet
that I’m not sure that I really heard it.

“
Sara, what’s wrong? Did you talk to
Dustin again? I swear I’m going to shove my—”

“
Mel, it’s not him,” she interrupts my
ranting. “I’m just having a bit of a fallout with my parents
today.
They're
total
assholes.”

“
Aww, Sar, do you want to come over?
Mom’s making her famous pesto pasta casserole,” I offer. I strongly
dislike her parents. I’ve tried to get along with them for the sake
of Sara, but they demean her every chance they get, and I
absolutely hate it. I’ve never understood why parents push their
dreams on their children rather than encouraging their own damn
dreams. I don’t think I will ever understand that, even as I grow
older.

“
That sounds perfect. I’ll be there in
ten and then we can talk about all of the drama that’s happening in
my household.”

With that, we hang up and I do the
little homework I have. Which isn’t much, just covering a few
textbooks in paper
bags.

By the time I exit my room, only about
fifteen minutes have passed since I talked to Sara. As I walk out
into the living room, the incessant giggles of my little brother,
Lucas, floods my ears. Even
though
he’s six, he still has the belly laugh of a
toddler, and I can’t help but smile when I hear it. You’d think, as
brother and sister, we would have sibling rivalry, but there really
isn’t. I think the age gap helps.

As I round the corner, I see my dad in his
work attire standing over Lucas, tickling him until he surrenders.
Luke is a very stubborn kid, so I don’t see that happening anytime
soon.

“
Dad, you know he’ll pee his pants
before he gives up. I don’t know why you still try to get him to
submit.” I laugh.

My
dad
looks over at me with a grin on his face. “I
just like to hear his belly laugh; I have no intention of
winning.”

“
Good because otherwise I might have to
help him out.” I wink at Luke as he’s nodding in agreement through
his giggles.

My dad takes a break from tickling Luke and
plops down onto the couch. “How was school, Melody?”

I sit down on the loveseat across from where
my dad and Luke sit. Luke has recovered from his laughing and is
now engrossed in his DS.

“
School was the same as always. Other
than my college prep classes, I don’t feel like much of a senior,”
I say as I pick at my nails. “Oh, before I forget, Sara is coming
over for dinner.” Right on cue, the front door swings open and Sara
comes strutting in. She’s gone through a bit of a rebellious stage
recently, and her hair has a few pink streaks mixed in with her
dark blond hair.

“
Hey,
Mr. H, how’s it goin’?” she says as she plops down onto my
lap.

“
Holy shi-” I mutter but catch myself
before I let the profanity fall from my lips. “I m-mean, crap,” I
stutter. I
poke
Sara
in the ribs as a small payback for catching me off
guard.

My dad rolls his eyes and then looks at Sara.
“Hey, Sar. All is well in the Hershel household.” He nods with a
fatherly smile.

We chat a little longer with my dad
then make our way back to my room. Sara’s façade for everyone but
Emma and me drops, and she practically crumbles in front of me. She
vents about her
ex,
but that’s only a blip on her radar right now. Her parents
have decided that if she doesn’t straighten up and choose one of
the colleges that they have
approved
then they won’t support her anymore,
financially or otherwise. As far as I’m concerned, that would be
their loss, not Sara’s.

She’s devastated with some anger mixed in,
too. I quickly begin telling her about my hopes to go north to UC
Davis and suggest that she apply and we can be roomies. That lifts
her spirits and we begin planning our adventures.

Halloween Party

S
enior year,
so far, has been a semi-success. Sara finally got out of her funk
from the beginning of the year, and she has been sassier than ever.
She’s set on UC Davis, as
am
I. We just finished our applications, but we
won’t know if we got in until the end of March. It feels like it’s
so far away, but I have confidence that we’ll be admitted. Even
Emma got on the UC Davis bandwagon and submitted an
application.

Scott finally asked me out. We’ve gone on a
few dates, and I guess you can say things are going well. He’s
extremely attractive, but I’m starting to think something is wrong
with me when I’m near him. I get nervous, but I don’t have that
feeling in the pit of my stomach that’s so often described when
others talk about their significant others. I guess I just have to
give it time and maybe it will transform into something. It’s still
new so maybe I’m worrying about nothing at all.

Emma’s birthday is coming up, and she
decided to have a Halloween party, which is surprising. Her
birthday falls on the day after Halloween, but she’s always refused
a Halloween themed party. I’m not sure what got into her
this
year,
but she’s
over-the-moon excited to plan it. Who am I to burst her
bubble?

She’s been talking nonstop about her
new love interest, Nick. I have a feeling this party has something
to do with
him
but
decide against asking her about it.

According to Emma, Nick is a college
sophomore at UCLA. They met while she toured the campus at the
beginning of the school year, and they have been inseparable ever
since. Sara and I haven’t had the chance to meet him yet.

Emma, Sara, and I agree to go costume
shopping together. However, we end up in a lingerie store.

I let out a frustrated huff. “Aren’t we
supposed to be costume shopping? There’s no way I would be caught
dead in this,” I say while holding a thin piece of fabric between
my fingers. By the looks of it, it’s supposed to be a firefighter
costume.

“
Oh, come on, Mel. You know you want to
dress sexy for Scott. I’ve seen the way you act around each other,”
Sara says as she winks at me suggestively.

“
You can look sexy and be fully
covered. This,” I shake the lace costume in front of her face, “is
not sexy. It’s slutty.”

I hear Emma’s laugh from behind me. “Same
thing, Melody.”

Sara nods her head in agreement. I guess I
won’t win this battle. I suck back my stubbornness and quickly
change the subject. “So, Emma, how are things with you and
Nick?”

Emma lets out a sigh and looks dreamily up at
the ceiling. “Amazing. He is such a sweet guy, and he’s a complete
gentleman. Things have gotten hot and steamy between us, but I’m
just not ready to go all the way.” She looks down as if she’s
ashamed then quickly replaces the slight grimace with a soft smile.
“Nick is okay with it, though. He said he respects me.”

Sara and I both look at Emma with smiles on
our faces. It’s nice to finally see Emma so happy.

After bribing them both with pumpkin spice
lattes, they finally agree to go to the actual Halloween store. The
variety isn’t much better, but at least there’s a little more
material on the costumes. We make our selections and then spend the
rest of the evening talk excitedly about the Halloween party. Emma
is having it at her house since her parents are hardly ever home.
And even if they were, they’d still be okay with the party. They
like Emma to embrace all aspects of her life and that includes her
“growing into womanhood,” as they put it.

***

The party starts in an hour, and I’m
nervous about my costume. It’s just a Little Red Riding Hood
costume, but I keep pulling at the bottom hoping it will cover
more. Unfortunately, I can’t make material suddenly appear. I throw
on a pair of black booty shorts underneath and pray that I don’t
accidentally flash anyone, even with the shorts on. Luckily, my
parents don’t see me in this. Sara and I have been here at Emma’s
all day to help set up. We’ve been playing an upbeat playlist,
singing and dancing
along
while being productive.