3.

"Did you get the food?" Sebastian called out from the dining room.

"Uhm yeah." I was still shocked. I stood staring at the closed door for five minutes. There were no words to explain how I felt, it was confusion at its finest. I couldn't make sense of the thoughts running through my own head.

I walked back to the table and helped Sebastian take the food out of the bag. Excruciating silence fell upon us. I could hear the inhaling, and exhaling, of the both of us. I couldn't take it anymore.

"Can I go eat in my room?" I asked.

"Yeah," He sighed. "Go ahead."

Waking up the next morning wasn't any easier than the dinner. The white digital mirror alarm clock screamed at me from the side of my bed. I looked over to see the time. Upon seeing it, I let out a loud groan, turned over, and covered my head with the pillow. I haven't woken up at six thirty since… well I can't even remember.

I heard a hasty knock at my door.

"Arya?" Sebastian spoke from behind the door.

I groaned in response.

"Arya, I'm coming in." When he opened the door, I heard him roll his eyes. "You need to get up." He turned off the alarm.

"Nooo," I said, rolling around in my bed, keeping hold of the pillow.

He laughed at me. "You need to get out of bed, to get ready for school." Before I knew what was happening he was pulling the covers off of me. I turned over to face him, fury in my eyes. Angrily, I swung my legs over the bed and stomped into the bathroom, slamming the door behind me.

"Thank you!" He shouted, entertainment laced in his voice.

I finished washing myself within 10 minutes, but something kept me in the shower for an extra 15. The warmth of the water seduced me. While it fell on my shoulders, I noticed how calm it made me feel. The water droplets hitting my face helped me think. The solidarity helped me breathe. I put my hands against the wall of the shower head, and dropped my head, letting the water run down my back, untying the knots that Stress created.

I sighed as I turned the water off. Stepping out onto the cold tile floor, I wrapped a towel around my body, and stared at myself in the mirror. My eyes were sunken, and my face was pale. I was bored just looking at myself. After a few endless seconds, I dropped my towel to look at the scars that spread across the surface of my golden skin. I winced, running my hand over them. They didn't hurt. From the time I started doing that till now, compared to the days when they would remain red and sore, they've stopped hurting after only a few hours.

"We're leaving in ten minutes!" Sebastian yelled from downstairs.

I quickly picked my up towel, and looked at myself in the mirror one last time. I looked myself, and gave up. I hated looking pitiful. I looked sad, and depressed. It was like my appearance, itself, was begging for people to be sorry for me.

"Enough of this," I told myself with determination.

"You need to move on… Leave it all in the past." I looked from one weary, elven eye to the other, searching for the right answer in my reflection. It was almost too obvious.

"Like it never happened," I whispered. It was a spark that ignited realization, and a new found inspiration for living life.

I marched into my room determined, and stared at the countless dark garments in my closet. I was down to six minutes. I was growing restless. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a black mini skater skirt. I shimmied the skirt up my legs, then rummaged through my drawers to find a suitable shirt. With two minutes left, I settled for a black turtleneck cowl top with thumb hole sleeves. My hair remained untouched, sitting sloppily on the top of my head, in a catastrophe of curls. Stray coils of my hair brushed against my shoulders. Throwing my backpack over my shoulder, I picked up my phone, and pulled on a pair of black high top converse while hopping down the stairs. I rushed through the front door, to the car Sebastian was honking.

"Here you go," Sebastian said, handing me a bagel with cream cheese spread on it, along with a coffee, as I entered the car.

"Thanks," I said, hoping he didn't notice my change in appearance.

"You look nice."

"Thank you." I was surprised when I found myself genuinely appreciating the compliment. I was worried about my outfit seeming too much for my first day.

"Why the sudden change?"

"Not sure." I shrugged.

"Does this have anything to do with your pa…"

"No." What happened in the past few months were completely irrelevant. I was fixated on leaving the past where it stood.

The rest of the car ride was silent. There was only the sound of me biting into the toasted bagel, bouncing off of the walls in the car.

"We're here." He pointed toward my window, at the school's entrance doors. "Have a good first day."

"Yeah, thanks. You too." Stepping out of the car, and closing the door behind me, mentally scolding myself. Whatever he was doing, was obviously not going to be his first day, I don't know why i said that.

I found myself sighing before walking towards the building. As the distance closed, nerves started to set in. My pace slowed. My feet stopped in front of the entrance .

There were huge stone brick pillars with the words Danvers High School. The rest of the building consisted of glass windows, reaching from top to bottom. Two pairs of white glass double doors were staring back at me. I didn't notice the swarms of horny teenagers around me until the bell rang, knocking me out of a trance, and signaling the start of the school day. I slowly walked toward the door, pushing it open, taking one last deep breath.

I guess other students heard the bell too, because they bombarded the door. Not caring about anyone but themselves. People were ruthlessly pushing past me. I was being trampled. Everyone says how when they get nervous that they want the floor to swallow them whole, but they don't know how that feels. I was being swallowed, and it did not feel good. All I could do was watch as one dirt footprint covered another. My hands flew to my ears, and my eyes squeezed shut, when the sound of sneakers scraping against the hardwood floors became deafening. I was confused when the floor inched its way up to me.

A pain suddenly shot through my head. When I looked up, I saw my father. Everything looked the same as before. Exactly the same. His head was stuck between the roof and the steering wheel. His blood ran up and sat on the roof of the car. His face was caved in. And somehow, the joystick was lodged in between his ribs. Exactly the same. I looked down and saw the glass stuck inside of me once again.

"This can't be happening to me!" I screamed, holding my side and using my free arm to push myself up against the back windshield of the car. I couldn't get far enough. The more I moved, the worse the pain became. I was crying. My lungs were burning, and my breaths were short and sporadic. Looking around for help was useless, there was no one around and I couldn't see through the overwhelming tears in my eyes.

I stared at the glass sprawled around me crying, and screamed from frustration and anguish.

"Hey!" I heard. "Hey, hey, hey."

When I looked up I saw my father turning his head slowly, his eyes on me the entire time. The squishing sound of his blood and brains made my ears cringe.

"Calm down!" He yelled at me.

I could not believe my eyes. I hurriedly pushed myself further against the window, trying to create more space between us. My throat closed up. The more I gasped for air, the more knives carved at my throat. I closed my eyes scratching at my neck, desperate for a few drops of oxygen.

Unexpectedly, two foreign arms dragged me into a hard surface. Warmth radiated off of them. My airway opened up. I found myself calming down, accepting the warmth around me.

When my breathing evened out, I slowly opened my eyes. The footprints were dried out, and the hallways were empty, but a haunting laughter echoed around me.

"Hey," He said softly, cupping my tear stained face, lifting it up to look at him. He ran his thumb over my cheek, wiping away the flowing tales of my memory. "Don't cry, you're okay."

It was the guy from last night, the guy from my nightmare. I questioned his eyes while confusion and fear riddled in mine.

I moved back, away from him, but it caused him to lose his balance. With an expected expression he fell on his butt, stifling a grimace and batting his eyelashes in pain. I noticed that my pain went away. Surveying the halls, I realized that I was also not in the car anymore. I was able to take a few deep breaths.

"It wasn't real, Arya. It wasn't real." Closing my eyes, I forced the feelings it brought on, back down.

"Are you okay?" He asked me.

"Yeah I'm good," I said, reopening my eyes.

"What was all of that? You were screaming, and backing into the lockers over and over again. You were shaking your head so violently, we all thought you were trying to snap your own neck, or trying to give yourself whiplash."

"Uh, no… it was nothing. I think I just hit my head or something."

"Are you sure, 'cause that…"

"Yeah I'm sure."

"Okay."

He jumped up and dusted himself off. I watched him. Shocked when he offered me a hand, to help me up.

I blinked at it for a few seconds before deciding to stand up on my own, wiping the back of my skirt.

"Well okay." He said retreating his arm.

I took a few steps back, playing with a curly brown strand of hair with my fingers. "Right so um… I'll just get going." I turned on my heels to walk away, but he grabbed my hand.

"Hey, I didn't catch your name…"

"I didn't throw it." I muttered, awkwardly slipping my hand from his, continuing in the other direction.

The rest of the day wasn't any better. Everywhere I went people were either staring, pointing, or giggling at me. I tried my best to ignore them, but it's not like they were trying to hide their amusement. Each corner I turned, was as if someone was anticipating my arrival. There was not a step I took that at least one person wasn't watching, waiting for me to freak out again, at what they thought was nothing.

Instead of holding my head down, I walked around practically bouncing. All of the students I was assigned to sit next to were greeted with a chipper version of myself. Not once was I met with the same energy, they all looked at me as if I were deranged. It wasn't until the period right before lunch, that someone engaged positively.

I walked into my fourth period history class, and the teacher gave a short introduction of who I was. My name, basically. Thankfully, he didn't force me to say a little something about myself. None of the teachers had. He instructed me to sit in the last row, a two person shared desk. My desk mate was… bold. She had bright blue, wavy hair that swam down to the middle of her back. Black jeans with zippers covered her legs, which rested on the desk. Thick black four inch heeled boots wrapped around her ankles perfectly, one resting upon the other. Her arms were crossed, while she bobbed her head to the music blasting from her headphones. Her hair started to move down toward her face, covering the sides of her small up eyes. As I got closer to her I recognized the song. It was Redemption by Zacari.

"Oh god that song is so good," I thought to myself. I made the tiniest of movement, trying to dance along. I was basically dancing in my head.

"Hi! I'm Arya. Like you just heard, I'm new." I quietly stated, offering my hand for her to shake.

She looked up at me, holding back a laugh. "Girl, sit down." She pulled my hand, and I fell into the chair. I fixed myself and looked at her, shocked.

"What?" She said bringing her legs down and letting the front two legs of the chair fall the floor.

"Well nothing really, you just happen to be the first person to respond to me… with words. I've just been getting ignored all day, not that it really bothered me, I'm just saying like, huh, what a cool feeling." I rambled.

She huffed in amusement before turning serious. "Yeah," She started, "don't beat yourself up about it. The people at this school chronically suck."

"I think I'm starting to catch wind of that. Some guy in my last period told me 'not to look in his fucking direction' when I went to sit next to him," I made air quotes with my finger.

She threw her head back and laughed. I looked at her and a sense of accomplishment washed over me. "Maybe life won't be total hell here." I thought.

"My name's Bex."

"Hey," I giggled.

"Is there something you wanna share with the whole class, Arya?" The teacher yelled. I jumped in my seat from the sudden eruption. And right when I was starting to like the teacher too.

"Not really we were just…" I tried to explain but Bex interrupted me.

"We were talking about the present day economical, geographical, and philosophical improprieties of this nation you seem to idealize so much."

The teacher scoffed and rolled her eyes as if expecting her witty response, but I wasn't. I was shocked, and I made no attempt to hide the expression on my face.

"Wow," I whispered in amazement.

"I may look emo, but I do happen to fall into the category of genius." I shook my head, a smile on my face.

"If you don't mind my asking, what's your ethnicity?" I don't know why I asked, I just had the habit of saying or asking things that popped into my head without thinking first.

"No, it's okay, I'm used to it. I'm Japanese. My family name is Suzuki."

"I like it."

"Hm, that's cool."

"What do you mean."

"Around this place, when people ask about my background, and they hear my last name, they always look at me funny. Still, after years of living in this town, the people give me sideways looks. By this time, I could read them all. 'She should go back to her country,' or, 'She's so lucky that she's Asain, school must be so easy for her,' or, 'Why does she talk like that, she's in America, she should speak English,' or, 'Her accent is too thick, what is she even saying.'" Bex looked out into the distance, clearly in thought.

"Do people really say things like that? That's terrible, I am sorry." I put my hand on her shoulder looking deep into her hooded light brown eyes. Her eyes portrayed hurt and anger. And her accent isn't even that thick, I thought.

"Not anymore. Every now and then someone makes some kind of remark, but it's mostly looks."

"People suck."

"Tell me about it." We were silent for the rest of the class. There was a sort of resting intensity swimming in the air. The more I thought about it the more I could honestly relate. As a black female I am constantly underestimated and disregarded. Everyone's automatic mind set is that I'm going to walk into a place and start talking extremely loud, clapping my hands, and pointing my fingers in someone's face. And I may not be the darkest skinned female, but the looks, comments, and stereotypes are still thrown in my face.

"I know how you feel." I told her.

"How could you know how I feel?" Bex looked at me, anger rising. She must have been victim of false sympathy, like me.

"Uh…" I pointed to my skin and waited for her to catch on. It took a few seconds. "Gee, she must be a genius."

"Oooh, yeah I get it." She nodded, "That makes sense, yup."

I shook my head at her, a smile plastered on my face.

When the bell rang, I took a deep breath to prepare myself for the loneliness that was coming to saddle my shoulders through the rest of the day, but someone grabbed him by the throat and slammed him into a nearby table. Loneliness was unable to over take my being. It was because of Bex.

She threw her left arm around my shoulder, then continued to walk out of the classroom to the cafeteria with me.

"What are you doing?" I asked, looking at her arm.

"What do you mean, 'what am I doing,' we just had a deep conversation and instantly connected. That automatically makes us best friends. It's like love at first sight, but in a platonic way.., Makes sense right?"

"Yeah, totally." I didn't want to miss my one chance to make a friend at this school. Everyone else seemed to look down on me, as if I wasn't anything more than a waste of space. Being around Bex, even for that short amount of time, made it less difficult to pretend to be happy.

"So here's what we're gonna do, bestie, grab our food and eat outside. Sound good?"

"Huh? Why can't we eat inside?" I whined quietly.

"It's not that we can't eat inside, it's just that the cafeteria is infested with a lethal species. When they first get a hold of you they strip you of your skin leaving your muscles bare. Then, they work their way into your brain and eat at it until you're begging for your own death. Some even influence you to do things you wouldn't usually do."

"How is the school not closed down and torched, with a thing like that?" I was beyond confused, a little irritated too. What kind of irresponsible school board, no, what kind of irresponsible city would allow students to attend a school where hundreds of lives are at risk. That fact alone distracted me from the camp-fire like the way Bex told the story.

"If you want to burn down the school to get rid of the 'thing,' then you would need to set the whole world on fire."

"What are you talking about?"

"The 'thing', as you call it… is the human race…"

"Oh..." I playfully pushed her shoulder. "I thought you were serious."

"I am serious. Humans suck, and there are none outside during lunch."

"Okay, fine. No argument here," I chuckled.

Walking down the stairs to the first floor where the cafeteria and the exit was, I felt like I was alive again. Every step we took, she would say, "Ah, there's another one," and hiss at some poor soul. She kept going and kept going, but the joke only got funnier, by the time we actually entered the lunchroom I couldn't breathe, and my cheeks stung from being lifted into a laughing smile for an unfamiliar amount of time. My chest was warm, there was a faint feeling that mimicked the happiness I knew I used to feel.

My laughter, and sense of light, started to fade when I realized what I was doing. My parents just died and I was over here having a grand old time with my new bestie, at a new school, on my first day. Talk about a fresh start.

"You don't deserve to be happy," I thought, "you have nothing to live for anymore." I felt a pang in my heart, a physical pain pushing my heart and my eyes past their limits, but I kept a hold of myself. Kept the mask on. There was no way I was having a second break down. I closed my eyes, and visualized a waterfall. The water falling violently over a cliff. The boulders towards the bottom being struck by piercing liquid. Everytime I felt upset, I would think about throwing my emotions over the waterfall as if they were inanimate objects. No matter how weird it may seem, it helped. It allowed me to get rid of certain thoughts, and feelings, for a short amount of time.

"Let's escape the clutches of this hell together," Bex said, taking hold of my left hand. I subconsciously might have not let myself be happy for a long time, but at least I wasn't sad when I was with her.