THE FLASHBACK

Pulling into a neighborhood I didn't know, and had never previously seen before was scary. The long winding road only making it that much more intense as the car speeds down it, slowing down to turn suddenly. I could see my breath in the air with every breath I took, my hands clad in pink gloves made of thick cotton, and a white fuzzy scarf draped around my small neck. My tiny legs shaking of fear, my rubber snow boots crossed together in front of me.... The snow falling slowly to coat the ground with more whiteness, as if the snow wasn't high enough on the ground. The road covered in snow salts, keeping ice from collecting. The trees looking quite elegant, coated in the fluffy snow. Every movement of the woman next to me louder in my ears then they should have been.

I had no idea where I was going, and I couldn't tell if this woman wanted to hurt me or not. Tears silently fell from my eyes as the car pulled to a stop in front of a big, two story home made of bricks. The neighborhood was nice, calm even. The houses around looked quiet, and possibly even empty at the time.

All except one, where another little girl sat on her front step, watching curiously as I was doing the same to her. She soon smiled and waved, and I knew it wouldn't be the last time I would see her.

Days later, the little girl knocked on the door, and asked if I was allowed to come play with her, to which Danni, my adoption mother, said yes. The little girls name was Ana, she had become my first and best friend.

****

It was a very lonely night, unable to sleep in the new box I now call my room. With the dark grey walls, my small bedside table lamp dimly lights the corner by my bed. My shadow flitting across the wall, and the sound of water dripping from the leaves outside and the rain began to hit the roof harder. I knew then that I was supposed to be happy, that any other kid would have been more than happy to be adopted. However, the fear of not belonging; or not being wanted; blinded me.

It wasn't too long ago since my parents had died, on a night very much like this. Dark, cloudy, and so foggy you couldn't even see your feet. They were headed to the market for supper, when a drunk semi-truck driver hit them head on as he flew down the wrong side of the road.

Leaving me an orphan...

....

THE BEGINNING

Crashing.

Shattered glass.

Yelling.

It's all I could hear, I was so scared. It hadn't been more than 8 months since I had arrived there, when Danni had adopted me. The first few months were quiet, and nice, when Danni would wake me up to go eat breakfast, and we would start our day. She was nice at first, but suddenly.....she wasn't anymore. I would be told to go to my room or go outside to play, or she would simply yell at me for no apparent reason. I could tell she wasn't well, her eyes were bright, red and swollen from drug use, and she seemed to be losing weight. I was worried about her, but I knew I couldn't do anything to help.

Ana and I had become very close, she was the only one who understood me. I could trust her, and I often spent lonely scared nights at her house, where her mom welcomed me in as if it was my home, too. It almost was, I had a key to their house in case I ever needed to get out of my own, I had clothes in the guest bedroom where I would sleep when I was there, I didn't even have to knock when I went over. They were like my family.

I began to become distant from Danni, too, over the course of the last 8 months. I learned to dread going home, using every excuse to not go home right away.

Learning who I am hasn't been easy, and I'm afraid the feeling of being lost will never go away.

....

THE DISTANCE

It's hard to tell when it all went wrong, how can you ever know when the real problem started? If Danni didn't want to help herself, then I couldn't help her, either. That had been the lesson for the previous eight years.

But at least a year previous, Danni would have protected me from abuse. However, that hadn't been the case when her new boyfriend had left bruises up and down my arm.

"Little brat! I thought we told you to stay upstairs! You never listen, but you will learn one of these days!" He threw me around, like he would throw Danni around when he would get mad. The bruises from that day were so bad that Danni had to hide me for a week and a half so I could heal them all away. She told Ana I had went to her parents for a week, of course that didn't work with Ana because she knew that Danni doesn't have parents to go to. Everyone in the neighborhood knew that Danni was alone in the world, her parents both died in a car crash when she was 21.

Ana didn't know what was happening, but I will never forget the feeling of disappointed that she had let the lie slip so easily.

I had grown away from Danni in the first eight months since we had been together, but it was only that moment that I truly grew away from her. All I could feel was the betrayal, the pain, the resentment, the hurt, and the anger. How could Danni let this happen to me? Of course, why would she have cared? I wasn't her actual daughter, I was just another page in her story. The drugs were her true friend, because she couldn't be a friend to herself.

Even after Danni's boyfriend was gone, and I was safe, Danni and I would never be close again. And just like that, a page from Danni's story was ripped, to reveal the true nature of her novel.