Kasie West - The Fill-In Boyfriend

  How did I cross paths with this story?

  All I'm saying is that good stories easily find me. Thanks, universe!

  My book love?

  Explicitly.

Picture Perfect

We get immediately in the middle of the story without having to read unnecessary bullshit, which already gains me over. I'd like to thank you my dearest book love.

Gia's just been dumped by her ex-boyfriend before her very first senior prom night in the parking lot. Then he drives away letting her alone decked out in all her finery in the dark parking lot. The perfect venue where you'd like to be dumped. Girls, you'd just got a glimpse of a life-size douchebag. Seriously, sometimes guys are in need of a thorough whack in the face or a huge kick in their butts.

But how could she possibly, the most popular girl of high school, the president of the school council plus the future Homecoming-queen enter the most important place of her social life all by herself? The answer is c'mon! a princess would never commit such an outrageous crime. Ever. It'd deprive her of the crown.

Never a misstep - is that so?

Hard times call for tough measures, that's why Gia picks up the first guy sitting in a truck and asks him to play her fill-in boyfriend. As incredible as it may sound, the fill-in Bradley has no objection whatsoever so he agrees to the set-up. Although he doesn't save the world, he gallantly comes to the aid of the Empress of Social Media. Presumably, she'd tweet, facebook even tumbler the horrid news of her break-up right away (I’m single. Let's party, bitches! #LOL) so that everyone can Like it if it wasn't for the Quarter Evil, Jules who's the appropriate personification of Cruella De Vil. She does her best to discredit Gia in any way she can. Her brand-new martial move is to convince all of Gia's friends that she's a pretty-little-liar about Bradley due to the fact that they have never met him before. (As if we were in the Mean Girls.) In order to prove her wrong, Gia's breezing in at the side of this anonymous boy. In your face, Jules!

If I were in Gia's shoes:

The mischievous plan works out well, which means they don't get exposed after their fake-break up and both of them go back to their dull reality. Then why does Gia feel a twinge of conscience mixed with the unsettling urge to see Fill-In Bradley again? Why did he help a complete stranger in the first place? What were his motives? Despite the fact that he's not exactly her type, she can't get him out of her head. There's a mystery to be sold. Sherlock is on duty.

It couldn't get more awkward when you can't even follow a guy's baby sister's car home to find out his address and say hello seemingly undercover and you get busted. Watson isn't happy, as far as I can tell. Poor guy should be glad Gia doesn't spill her perfume on his pillow or smell his clothes. Just normal things common folks do. No, not in a creepy stalker way at all.

Time to pay up - even the $bill$

Sister of Nameless Boy, Becky arranges a fake-date for her brother to the birthday party of his ex-girlfriend. (For the record: either this ex-girlfriend tries to seduce him or wants to show him how happy she is after she cheated on him with his best friend. Nicely done. She couldn't have been crueler.) The perfect candidate for the mighty task to discourage fill-in boyfriend from getting back together with his ex, the Maleficent is Gia again who already owes him. A lot. She can't back out of it now. And maybe she doesn't want to...

Twenty questions

"Hayden?"
"Yes, Gia?"
"Nothing. I just wanted to say your name."

Hayden (yep! it's his name. I know, I know. Cute.) admits he deliberately stayed in the parking lot back then watching whether she needed a ride home because she seemed pretty lost after Bradley tactfully broke up with her. Guess it's another definition of heroism. Captain America should hide somewhere...wait it's not happening. He's too big.

Much to Gia's disappointment, Eve seems to be odd and funny, no wonder Hayden wants her back even after her vicious betrayal. Seriously, people are not in their right minds when it comes to love. Cheating? She can't expect good grace. Out of the Eden Garden. How ironic.
Anyway, it's still fun to make Eve jealous and act for the audience. It's a pity though because Gia wishes their relationship was real.

Perfect Family Billboard - No. 1

"Chin up. There are other fish in the sea. It’s a big ocean. Sometimes we need to catch and release a few before we find the keeper. Just keep swimming."

Her family must take part in the series of What to Say to Your Kids 101? reality show. They'd earn the award for the title of the most meticulous family of all time.

Step one: Have breakfast together every morning with your precious daughter is compulsory. It's a family occasion. Step two: Do not express emotions in case it means confrontation. Peace is safe. Step three: Take no notice if one of your children was a complete jerk to his little sister. Keep being cool about it and ground the victim.

The truth is Drew and Gia have never been close since he is always managing to stir up trouble. What she expects from him is that he'd be willing to protect his little sister from jackass ex-boyfriends by beating them up for good which is just not bound to happen. What happens instead is when his big brother lurks behind Gia's back and shoots a humiliating-all-revealing video for a school project targeting her as a subject for mocking. What's more, the film is available on social websites, it is replayed before a whole bunch of people, plus Drew has won a prize for his explicit spit-the-truth criticism of society. I dunno nowadays who others you can trust if it is not your own flesh and blood. He might as well throw her in front of a group of predators like a piece of greasy meat. There's certainly something wrong with this world.

Reprogramming a Generation

"How is selfworth measured today? By the amount of likes a post gets, by how many friends we collect, by how many retweets we accumulate? Do we even know what we really think until we post our thoughts online and let others tell us if they are worthy?"

To put it bluntly, Gia's social media addiction reflects the problem of present generation globally. Need for validation, collecting as many likes as possible defines us generally hoping 'friends are tweeting our post, otherwise it didn’t really happen, right?' I can tell, I'd definitely watch this video and post it everywhere unless I am the protagonist. Stressing the importance of having virtual 'friends' over existing relationships only to justify your coolness sounds ludicrous. I'd most likely get hundreds of dislikes on this post by now....

It must be tough for her to realise she's a shallow snob measuring her worth in those terms. And she is. Or she used to be when her most serious problem of all was to unfollow her ex-boyfriend first. Since then, she's trying to be a better person. Not a coward who only cares about what others think about her. She focuses on not becoming her parents who don't express bad feelings because that would imply her family is less than perfect. Keeping everything inside. Well, it was high time to follow Hayden and Becca's lead who are anything but perfect, luckily.

Don't do repeats

"Tomorrow we are all going to be better people."

Gia & Hayden go off the beaten track when Hayden doesn't consider Gia trustworthy with a long history of lying. On top of that, Jules' secret agenda just came to light. All of her friends got to know who the real Bradley was. Drama, drama, drama. Consequently, Gia's lost his best friend so we can admit Jules just nailed it. She literally got away with her stealthiness.
She must have venom running in her blood really. Clearly Gia didn't manage to pull off her better-person dreams. On the grounds that she was lying to her friends took all the credits from her trustworthiness. And why would she anyway be given another chance by Hayden while she's the one without doing repeats? The typical case of someone falling into her own trap. It must hurt badly.

Second chances - end of the buildup

Likewise, every true love throughout history was assisted by a chaperon or an unintentional but not quite accidental spin of fate. How on earth would Elizabeth have fallen for Darcy if it wasn't for the Gardners? What would have happened if the crazy friends in Failure to Launch didn't do their best to shepherd together Trip and Paula? It's a superior force I tell you.

The best part of these stories when the guy owns up to his idiocy and begging for the girl's forgiveness. Best chapter. I couldn't express enough my gratitude to Becca the goth self-searching sister who brought them together. I appreciate her mastermind. We are needed to be guarded in the right way sometimes, TBH.

How I feel now
Rather giddy.

Next step
I'm goingt to dig up the other books of Kasie West for sure! Keep an eye out 👀

Starring

Hanna Marin the gorgeous, blond, Ms. President in charge. I've grown into the habit to listen to Shawn Mendes so he's big hair and skinny enough for Hayden.💘

Song

Imagine Dragons - Second Chances

Rating

5 out of 5